Max Pemberton

“ Here was one who should have been a king among men, not an outcast upon the broad of the deep.
"Osbart is readier with the lancet than with good common sense," he began. "I'd sooner trust him with the outside of my body than the inside of my ship. You think you'll tell the world something about the Zero some day, just as you told them all about the other. Well, say that Guichard, who built her, has the best engineering brains in Europe, and that the Government which passed him by should be under lock and key. ”

“ Don't drink my health, Osbart, for that's better ashore."
Black put down his glass and looked at me a tittle curiously.
"Boy," he said, quite in the old kindly way, "what good or evil destiny put you athwart my hawse, I wonder? That's a question I've asked myself a hundred times. Here's a lad does what the guns of his navies cannot do, and I tell myself that I could have crushed him with my two fingers any day these three years. And here he is—on the Zero: because the men won't sail while he's ashore. Is that what your world calls destiny, or what do you make of it?" ”

“ Why won't I go there?"
"That's rank madness," says Osbart.
Black roared with laughter.
"What goes so well in the world as rank madness? Answer me that. Would I leave Ned Jolly in the forts at the Humber's mouth when I can take him for the asking? Is it like me to do that? You know it isn't, Osbart. We'll just pick him up in the river, and then head south for the Bay. I've a mind to see the Mediterranean this time; and when I've the mind to do a thing it's as good as done. You'll be gleg at the prancing in Algiers, Doctor. ”

“ One of the officers of the Vespa feared death so little, it appeared, that he had drawn a revolver and fired at the wretches who assailed him. Black's fellows now began to roar like bulls; some that we should go astern, others that we should race ahead, but altogether as wild a crew of cowards as sailed the seas that day. ”

“ When I choose to go different, and have a fancy for the land—why, then I'll ride in like a gentleman. There are new republics I could buy to-morrow—lock, stock, and barrel—if I had the fancy. But I've my work to do afloat first, and that's work to make the world talk. ”

“ There's nothing like this boat afloat and there won't be unless Guichard builds it. She's driven by electricity, with accumulators compared with which Edison's are child's toys. We've electric projectors by which we can see nearly half a mile under water. If the air falls short, we've liquid oxygen aboard ”

“ And if I were you, I wouldn't be very ready to spout fine things before the crew. They're in no mood to hear tall talk now, and some of them are pretty quick with their side-arms. Just you lie to and bide your time. There's no sense in knocking out good brains against a baulk that hasn't got any brains at all ”