[Away up to the top he went, and, curling his tail around a rope, there he sat.]
"Make him come down!" cried the captain. "I can't have a monkey on top of my ship's mast! Somebody climb up after him and bring him down."
"I'll go," said a sailor.
Now a sailor is a good climber, but not nearly so good as a monkey. Mappo waited until the sailor was almost up to him, and then, quick as a flash, Mappo swung himself out of the way by another rope, and, just as he had done in the jungle, he went over to the top of another mast.
"There he goes!" cried the sailors on deck.
"Yes, I see he does," said the sailor who had tried to catch Mappo.
"You had better come down," spoke the man who had let Mappo out of the cage. "I think he'll come down for me." In his hand he held some lumps of sugar, of which Mappo was very fond.
"Come on down, old chap," called the sailor. "No one will hurt you. Come and get the sugar."
Now whether Mappo had had enough of being loose, or whether it was too cold for him up on the mast, I can't say. Perhaps he wanted the sugar, and, again, he might not have wanted to make trouble for his kind friend, the sailor, who had let him out.
Anyhow, Mappo came slowly down, and took some of the sugar from the sailor's hand. The sailor took hold of the collar around Mappo's neck.