Page:The Delectable Duchy.djvu/296

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make a signal. I found a handy chink i' the rock to plant it in, an' a rovin' pain I had in my stomach while I was fixin' it. That was the egg, I dessay. An' my head in a maze, too: but I'd sense enough to think now what a fool I was not to have took Jeff's shirt off'n, to serve me for a flag. Hows'ever, my own bein' wringin' wet, an' the sun pretty strong just then, I slipped it off an' hitched it atop o' the oar to dry an' be a flag at the same time, till I could rig up some kind o' streamer, out o' the seaweed. An' then I was forced to vomit. And that's about the last thing, Mister Geake, I can mind doin'. 'Tis all foolishness after that. They tell me that a 'Merican schooner, the _Shawanee_, sighted my shirt flappin', an' sent a boat an' took me off an' landed me at New Orleens. My head was bad--oh, very bad--an' they put me in a 'sylum an' cured me. But they took eight year' over it, an' I doubt if 'tis much of a job after all. I wasn' bad all the time, I must tell you, sir; but 'tis only lately my mem'ry would work any further back 'n the wreck o' the barque. Everything seemed to begin an' end wi' that. 'Tis about a year back that some visitors came to the 'sylum. There was a lady