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Sabatini, Rafael, 1875-1950

"Captain Blood"


So leisurely an advance argued a master indifferently acquainted
with these waters, who preferred to creep forward cautiously,
sounding his way. At her present rate of progress it would be an
hour, perhaps, before she came to anchorage within the harbour. And
whilst the Colonel viewed her, admiring, perhaps, the gracious beauty
of her, Pitt was hurried forward into the stockade, and clapped into
the stocks that stood there ready for slaves who required correction.
Colonel Bishop followed him presently, with leisurely, rolling gait.
"A mutinous cur that shows his fangs to his master must learn good
manners at the cost of a striped hide," was all he said before
setting about his executioner's job.
That with his own hands he should do that which most men of his
station would, out of self-respect, have relegated to one of the
negroes, gives you the measure of the man's beastliness. It was
almost as if with relish, as if gratifying some feral instinct of
cruelty, that he now lashed his victim about head and shoulders.


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