“I say pourquoi n’arrêtez vous pas?” roared the lieutenant fiercely.
“I ar’nt a Dutchman. I don’t understand. Nichts verstand,” shouted the man through his hollow hands, as if he were hailing some one a mile away.
“You scoundrel, why didn’t you say you could speak English?”
“You never arkst me,” growled the man.
“Silence, sir. How dare you address an officer of a king’s ship like that!”
“Then what do you go shooting at me for? King George don’t tell you to go firin’ guns at peaceable fisher folk, as me.”
“Silence, sir, or I’ll put you in irons, and take you on board the cutter. Why didn’t you obey my signals to heave-to?”
“Signals! I never see no signals.”
“How dare you, sir! you know I fired.”
“Oh, them! We thought you was practisin’, and hauled down till you’d done, for the balls was flying very near.”