Jim Parrish, and a few other friends interviewed the crew when the 'Industry' was getting ready for sea. Black Ned was a half-breed native of Kangaroo Island, and was looked upon as the best whaler in the colonies, and the smartest man ever seen in a boat. He was the principal speaker. He put the case to the crew in a friendly way, and asked them if they did not feel themselves to be a set of fools, to think of going to sea with a murdering villain like Blogg?

Dick Secker replied mildly but firmly. He reckoned the crew were, in a general way, able to take care of themselves. They could do their duty, whatever it was; and they were not afraid of sailing with any man that ever trod a deck.

After a few days at sea they were able to form a correct estimate of their master mariner. He never came on deck absolutely drunk, but he was saturated with rum to the very marrow of his bones. A devil of cruelty, hate, and murder glared from his eyes, and his blasphemies could come from no other place but the lowest depths of the bottomless pit. The mate was comparatively a gentle and inoffensive lamb. He did not curse and swear more than was considered decent and proper on board ship, did his duty, and avoided quarrels.

One day Blogg was rating the cook in his usual style when the latter made some reply, and the captain knocked him down. He then called the mate, and with his help stripped the cook to the waist and triced him up to the mast on the weather side. This gave the captain the advantage of a position in which he could deliver his blows downward with full effect. Then he selected a rope's end and began to flog the cook. At every blow he made a spring on his feet, swung the rope over his head, and brought it down on the bare back with the utmost force. It was evident that he was no 'prentice hand at the business, but a good master flogger. The cook writhed and screamed, as every stroke raised bloody ridges on his back; but Blogg enjoyed it. He was in no hurry. He was like a boy who had found a sweet morsel, and was turning it over in his mouth to enjoy it the longer. After each blow he looked at the three seamen standing near, and at the man at the helm, and made little speeches at them. "I'll show you who is master aboard this ship." Whack! "That's what every man Jack of you will get if you give me any of your jaw." Whack! "Maybe you'd like to mutiny, wouldn't you?" Whack! The blows came down with deliberate regularity; the cook's back was blue, black, and bleeding, but the captain showed no sign of any intention to stay his hand. The suffering victim's cries seemed to inflame his cruelty. He was a wild beast in the semblance of a man. At last, in his extreme agony, the cook made a piteous appeal to the seamen:

"Mates, are you men? Are you going to stand there all day, and watch me being flogged to death for nothing?"

Before the next stroke fell the three men had seized the captain; but he fought with so much strength and fury that they found it difficult to hold him. The helmsman steadied the tiller with two turns of the rope and ran forward to assist them. They laid Blogg flat on the deck, but he kept struggling, cursing, threatening, and calling on the mate to help him; but that officer took fright, ran to his cabin in the deckhouse, and began to barricade the door.

Then a difficulty arose. What was to be done with the prisoner? He was like a raving maniac. If they allowed him his liberty, he was sure to kill one or more of them. If they bound him he would get loose in some way--probably through the mate--and after what had occurred, it would be safer to turn loose a Bengal tiger on deck then the infuriated captain. There was but one way out of the trouble, and they all knew it. They looked at one another; nothing was wanting but the word, and it soon came. Secker had sailed from the Cove of Cork, and being an Irishman, he was by nature eloquent, first in speech, and first in action. He reflected afterwards, when he had leisure to do so.

"Short work is the best," he said, "over he goes; lift the devil." Each man seized an arm or leg, and Blogg was carried round the mast to the lee side. The men worked together from training and habit. They swung the body athwart the deck like a pendulum, and with a "one! two! three!" it cleared the bulwark, and the devil went head foremost into the deep sea. The cook, looking on from behind the mast, gave a deep sigh of relief.

Thus it was that a great breach of the peace was committed on the Pacific Ocean; and it was done, too, on a beautiful summer's evening, when the sun was low, a gentle breeze barely filled the sails, and everybody should have been happy and comfortable.

Captain Blogg rose to the surface directly and swam after his schooner. The fury of his soul did not abate all at once. He roared to the mate to bring the schooner to, but there was no responsive "Aye, aye, sir." He was now outside of his jurisdiction, and his power was gone. He swam with all his strength, and his bloated face still looked red as the foam passed by it. The helmsman had resumed his place, and steadied the tiller, keeping her full, while the other men looked over the stern. Secker said: "The old man will have a long swim."

But the "old man" swam a losing race. His vessel was gliding away from him: his face grew pale, and in an agony of fear and despair, he called to the men for God's sake to take him on board and he would forgive everything.

But his call came too late; he could find no sureties for his good behaviour in the future; he had never in his life shown any love for God or pity for man, and he found in his utmost need neither mercy nor pity now. He strained his eyes in vain over the crests of the restless billows, calling for the help that did not come. The receding sails never shivered; no land was near, no vessel in sight. The sun went down, and the hopeless sinner was left struggling alone on the black waste of waters.

The men released the cook and held a consultation about a troublesome point of law. Had they committed mutiny and murder, or only justifiable homicide? They felt that the point was a very important one to them--a matter of life and death--and they stood in a group near the tiller to discuss the difficulty, speaking low, while the cook was shivering in the forecastle, trying to ease the pain.

The conclusion of the seamen was, that they had done what was right, both in law and conscience. They had thrown Blogg overboard to prevent him from murdering the cook, and also for their own safety. After they had done their duty by seizing him, he would have killed them if he could. He was a drunken sweep. He was an outlaw, and the law would not protect him. Anybody could kill an outlaw without fear of consequences, so they had heard. But still there was some doubt about it, and there was nobody there to put the case for the captain. The law was, at that time, a terrible thing, especially in Van Diemen's Land, under Colonel Arthur. He governed by the gallows, to make everything orderly and peaceable, and men were peaceable enough after they were hanged.

So Secker and his mates decided that, although they had done nothing but what was right in throwing Blogg over the side, it would be extremely imprudent to trust their innocence to the uncertainty of the law and to the impartiality of Colonel Arthur.

Their first idea was to take the vessel to South America, but after some further discussion, they decided to continue the voyage to Hokianga, and to settle among the Maoris. Nobody had actually seen them throw Blogg overboard except the cook, and him they looked upon as a friend, because they had saved him from being flogged to death. They had some doubts about the best course to take with the mate, but as he was the only man on board who was able to take the