While the doctor, like a good Catholic, put a polish on the tropical moment by a little gloss of speculation over the mystery of Eden, some passengers presently came on board for the homeward voyage, and among them was Gaetano Carbuccia, an Italian, who was originally a silk-merchant, but owing to Japanese competition, had been forced to change his _metier_, and was now a dealer in curiosities.

His numerous commercial voyages had made them well acquainted with each other, but on the present occasion Carbuccia presented an appearance which alarmed his friend; a _gaillard grand et solide_ had been metamorphosed suddenly into an emaciated and feeble old man.

There was a mystery somewhere, and the ship's doctor was destined to diagnose its character.

After wearing for a certain period the aspect of a man who has something to tell, and cannot summons courage to tell it--a position which is common in novels--the Italian at length unbosomed himself, beginning dramatically enough by a burst of tears, and the terrific information that he was damned.

But the Carbuccia of old was a riotous, joyful, foul-tongued, pleasure-loving atheist, a typical commercial traveller, with a strain of Alsatia and the mountain-brigand.