At first, Ben pretended not to hear; but on being sung out for again and again, bluntly refused; at the same time, casting some illiberal reflections on the Mowree's maternal origin, which the latter had been long enough among the sailors to understand as in the highest degree offensive.

So just after the men came up from below, Bembo singled him out, and gave him such a cursing in his broken lingo that it was enough to frighten one.

The convict was the worse for liquor; indeed the Mowree had been tippling also, and before we knew it, a blow was struck by Ben, and the two men came together like magnets.
The Ticket-of-Leave-Man was a practised bruiser; but the savage knew nothing of the art pugilistic: and so they were even.

It was clear hugging and wrenching till both came to the deck.

Here they rolled over and over in the middle of a ring which seemed to form of itself.
At last the white man's head fell back, and his face grew purple.
Bembo's teeth were at his throat.