“Something like a seal, squire, but I should say it was more like a walrus. It hasn’t got the great tusks of the walrus, though. You can see it well, eh?”
“Capitally,” replied Brace. “Not dangerous, are they?”
“Not that I ever heard of, squire. They’re great stupid innocents, as far as I know. That one wouldn’t wait for a boat to get anywhere near it; but if it did I daresay in its fright it might upset the craft. I fancy all they want is to be let alone. Pretty good size, eh?”
“Yes,” said Brace; “I wish my brother were here to see it.”
“Very tempting for a shot,” said Briscoe, fingering his gun.
“Very,” said the captain sarcastically. “Couldn’t well miss it, sir, eh?”
“Oh, I daresay I could,” said the American; “I’m very clever that way, skipper, sometimes. But there, I don’t want to kill the poor thing. Would you like to shoot, Brace Leigh?”
“No,” said the young man. “It seems such a stupid, inoffensive-looking beast. I should like a shot at a jaguar or a leopard, and I could not resist having a shot at one of those loathsome old alligators if I saw one.”
“There you are then,” said Briscoe softly, as he pointed to what seemed to be a trunk of an old tree floating along not very far away from the brig between the verdant bank of the river and the side of the vessel.
Brace looked at it hard before he fully grasped what the object was, and then cocked the left-hand barrel of his gun.