"I say, old chap," he remarked, "you look awfully cool and comfy.  Been under the head pump, as usual, I suppose.  Upon my word, if it were not for the possibility--not to say the extreme probability--of being snapped up by a shark, I should like to go overboard in a bowline and be towed for half an hour.  And--talking of sharks--have you noticed how often we have seen the beggars following us since we have been in this ship?  I suppose her timbers have become saturated, as it were, with the odour of the slaves she has carried, and so--but, hillo! what has happened to the barometer?"