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Rh good. There were six of them all told. Thomas Ruddle had his wife with him, for he could not exist without her; and she, for her part, thought him a marvellous man and a darling. He had a beautiful smile, and a big black beard, and a voice like the bellow of an amiable bull. But Mrs. Ruddle was blue-eyed, with the complexion of a Californian peach and a voice like a flute. She would have followed him to Davy Jones' locker itself if he had asked her, and though he did not think of doing anything so unorthodox, they were not far from having to go there without the consent of anyone. For when the Nantucket was within two hundred miles of Capetown it came on to blow from the south-east as if the very devil was at the bellows, and after the old packet had proved that she hadn't sufficient power to make headway against the gale, she promptly cracked her shaft, and went drifting away to loo'ard like a Dutch schuyt on a lee tide.

"It is a very sad misfortune, and I do not know now when we shall be in Africa," said Tom Ruddle. "I regret to say, my dear, that the captain is on the main-deck using very bad language to the chief engineer, who is replying