there and every where, then return home, and have nothing to tell, but that he has been here and there and every where? 'Sdeath, sir, would you have me travel like a lord?

Med. No, the Lord forbid!

Inkle. Travelling, uncle, was always intended for improvement; and improvement is an advantage; and advantage is profit, and profit is gain. Which in the travelling translation of a trader, means, that you should gain every advantage of improving your profit. I have been comparing the land, here, with that of our own country.

Med. And you find it like a good deal of the land of our own country——cursedly encumbered with black legs, I take it.

Inkle. And calculating how much it might be made to produce by the acre.

Med. You were?

Inkle. Yes; I was proceeding algebraically upon the subject.

Med. Indeed!

Inkle. And just about extracting the square root.

Med. Hum!

Inkle. I was thinking too, if so many natives could be caught, how much they might fetch at the West Indian markets.

Med. Now let me ask you a question, or two, young cannibal catcher, if you please.

Inkle. Well.

Med. Ar'n't we bound for Barbadoes; partly to trade, but chiefly to carry home the daughter of the governor, Sir Christopher Curry, who has till now been under your father's care, in Threadneedle-street, for polite English education?

Inkle. Granted.

Med. And isn't it determined, between the old folks, that you are to marry Narcissa, as soon as we get there?

Inkle. A fixed thing.

Med. Then what the devil do you do here, hunting old hairy negroes, when you ought to be obliging a fine girl in the ship? Algebra, too! You'll have other things to think of when you are married, I promise you. A plodding fellow's head, in the hands of a young wife, like a boy's slate, after school, soon gets all its arithmetic wiped off: and then it appears in its true simple state: dark, empty, and bound in wood, Master Inkle.

Inkle. Not in a match of this kind. Why, it's a table of interest from beginning to end, old Medium.

Med. Well, well, this is no time to talk. Who knows but, instead of sailing to a wedding, we may get cut up, here, for a wedding dinner: tossed up for a dingy duke, perhaps, or stewed down for a black baronet, or eat raw by an inky commoner?

Inkle. Why sure you ar'n't afraid?

Med. Who, I afraid? Ha! ha! ha! No, not I! What the deuce should I be afraid of? Thank Heaven I have a clear conscience, and need not be afraid of any thing. A scoundrel might not be quite so easy on such an occasion; but it's the part of an honest man not to behave like a scoundrel: I never behaved like a scoundrel—for which reason I am an honest man, you know. But come—I hate to boast of my good qualities.

Inkle. Slow and sure, my good, virtuous Mr. Medium! Our companions can be but half a mile before us: and, if we do but double their steps, we shall overtake 'em at one mile's end, by all the powers of arithmetic.

Med. Oh curse your arithmetic!

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Another part of the Forest.—A ship at anchor in the bay at a small distance.—Mouth of a cave.

Enter Sailors and Mate, as returning from foraging.

Mate. Come, come, bear a hand, my lads. Tho'f the bay is just under our bowsprits, it will take a damned deal of tripping to come at it—there's hardly any steering clear of the rocks here. But do we muster all hands? All right, think ye?

1st. Sail. All to a man——besides yourself, and a monkey——the three land lubbers, that edged away in the