KNOT IV.
THE DEAD RECKONING.
"I did dream of money-bags to-night."
Noonday on the open sea within a few degrees of the Equator is apt to be oppressively warm; and our two travellers were now airily clad in suits of dazzling white linen, having laid aside the chain-armour which they had found not only endurable in the cold mountain air they had lately been breathing, but a necessary precaution against the daggers of the banditti who infested the heights. Their holiday-trip was over, and they were now on their way home, in the monthly packet which plied between the two great ports of the island they had been exploring.
Along with their armour, the tourists had laid aside the antiquated speech it had pleased them to affect while in knightly disguise, and had
