Chapter Five.

Chapter Five.I must pass over the next seven years of my life and that of my young charge Harry, for that was the name Susan was certain the young lady called him. He sometimes spoke of himself as “Jack Tar,” but probably he had heard his friends call him so, because he was dressed like a little sailor. We were puzzled what surname to give him. The captain and Mrs Leslie and the young ladies and Susan and I talked it over, and at last settled to call him George, after the old ship; one of the young ladies thought Saint for saint would sound better, and so he went by the name of “Harry Saint George.”I was at first greatly afraid that he would be taken from us, for a subscription was made for the families of those who perished when the ship foundered, and when his story was known a good share was given to him, besides other contributions, and many people wanted to have him. The captain stood my friend, as he did in all other matters, and insisted that as I pulled him out of the water, and the only friend of his we knew of had stopped at our house, Susan and I ought to have charge of him. He would have taken him himself, but he had a good many young children of his own, and thought that Harry would do better with us, and that he could still look after his education and interests as he grew older.As soon as Harry could speak, he said that he would be a sailor, that his father was one, and that he would be one too; but who his father had been was a puzzle, as about that, of course, he really knew nothing. He could not tell us either anything about those he had seen on board, or how he had got hold of the sheep, though it is my belief that someone must have placed him on the animal’s back, intending to lash him to it, but that the ship had gone down before there was time to do so. Perhaps it was the last act of the poor young lady, or maybe of his father, if his father, as seemed probable, was on board.As may be supposed, that sheep was a great pet with us and the captain’s family as long as it lived. Harry was very fond of it, and would ride about on its back, holding on just as he had done when the creature saved him from drowning. People used to come and see him ride about, and the ladies made a gay silk collar for the sheep, and also a bridle, but Harry would not use it, and always held on by the wool, saying that the sheep always well knew where to go. I railed off a piece of the garden and laid it down in grass, and on one side I built a house for the animal; but as there was not food enough in the little plot, the captain had it up to a paddock near his house, where it used to scamper about with Harry on its back and enjoy itself.“It’s an ill wind that blows no one good,” and people used to say that the foundering of theRoyal Georgewas a fortunate circumstance for the sheep, as it would long before have been under the butcher’s knife.The captain, meantime, made all the inquiries he could to try and discover the friends of the little fellow, but in vain; none of those who were saved remembered to have seen the young lady talking to anyone, though two or three recollected seeing her, as I had, coming on board.Susan, like a thoughtful woman as she was, would not let the little boy wear out his clothes, but at once set to work to make him a new suit, while she carefully laid up those he had had on, with his hat, and the little picture in the case, to assist, as she said, in proving who he was should any of his relatives appear. Still time went on, and there appeared less chance of that than ever.I spent a very happy time on shore with Susan: as we had no children of our own, we loved Harry as much as if he was our own son. Still I could not be idle; had it not been, indeed, for the captain, I should have been pretty soon pressed and compelled to go to sea, whether I liked it or not. Susan would have gladly kept me at home, which was but natural; still, I was too young to settle down in idleness, and should have grown ashamed of myself; so, as seamen were badly wanted for the navy, I at last entered, with the captain’s advice, on board a fifty-gun ship, theLeander, he promising to use his influence to obtain a boatswain’s warrant for me. While I was serving on board her we had a desperate action with a French eighty-gun ship, theCouronne, when we lost thirteen killed, and many more wounded, but succeeded in beating her off and putting her to flight.Peace came soon after this, and five years passed before I obtained my warrant as boatswain. The prize-money I had received enabled me in the meantime to keep Susan and Harry as I wished; and when I became boatswain she was able to draw a fair sum of money every year. During those years I spent five months at home, which was a pretty long time considering what generally falls to the lot of seamen.Harry had grown into a fine manly boy, and the more I looked at him the more convinced I felt that he was of gentle birth; he called Susan mother, and me father, though he knew that we were not his parents. He had good manners, and, considering his age, a fair amount of learning, for he used to go up every day to the captain’s to receive instruction from the children’s governess. At last the captain considered that he ought to be sent to school, and arranged that he should go with his own son, Master Reginald, who was about his age, though Harry was the strongest, and, I may say, the most manly of the two.While I was at home I taught Harry as much as he could learn of what I may call the first principles of seamanship,—to knot and splice, and box the compass. I also built and rigged a model ship, of which he was very fond.“You will not forget all I have taught you, my boy,” I said, when I was going off to sea.“No, indeed I will not, father,” he answered; “and when you come back I hope I shall have learnt more, for I will do my best to pick up information from everybody who will teach me. The captain, I know, will, when I come home for the holidays, and there is old Dick Wright, who has been at sea all his life, settled near us, and he will tell me anything I ask him; though there is no one teaches me so well as you do, father.”In those piping times of peace the ships were not kept so long in commission as they were during the war, so after serving three years as boatswain of theHuzzarfrigate, on the West India and North American station, I once more returned home. I found Harry more determined than ever to go to sea, and he told me that Reginald Leslie had made up his mind to go also.“Does his father wish it?” I asked.“Oh yes, he has no objection to his going; and do you know, father, the captain says that he will get him and me appointed to the same ship with you, provided she is sent to a healthy station,” was the answer.“Well, Harry, I shall be very glad to have charge of you both, and I am pleased that the captain thinks so well of you; though, to be sure, he has always shown that,” said I.Susan was much cast down at the thoughts of losing Harry, but she could not help acknowledging that it was time he should go to sea, if he was going at all.“But a ship’s boy has a hard life of it, as you have often told me, Ben,” she said, “and he has been gently nurtured, and brought up, I may say, like a young gentleman.”“And a young gentleman he will still remain; for, you may depend on it, the captain intends to get him placed on the quarter-deck; and, though he himself has retired from the service, he has interest enough to get me and the lads appointed to some ship commanded by a friend of his own; and I flatter myself that, from the certificate I got from my last captain, he will have no difficulty about that.”We had almost given up any expectations of ever meeting Harry’s friends. I own that I did not care very much about this, for once on the quarter-deck I felt sure he would make his own way; and though it might be of advantage to him to find them out, it was possible that it might be very much to the contrary.I was one day going up the street of Ryde with Harry, when we saw a crowd of women and children and a few men and boys standing round the model of a full-rigged ship, and we heard a loud voice singing out—“Cease, rude Boreas, stormy railer;List, ye landsmen all, to me;Messmates, hear a brother sailorSing the dangers of the sea.”Then came the sound of a fiddle, and the singer continued his song to his own accompaniment.“Let us stop and hear the old sailor,” said Harry, drawing me towards the crowd.We found room just opposite where the man was standing. I then saw that he had a timber leg, and that the ship was placed on a stand with a lump of lead fixed to the end of a bent iron rod at the bottom, which made it rock backwards and forwards.“Oh yes! oh yes! all you good people, lend a ear to poor Jack’s yarn,” he continued; “and you pretty girls with the blue eyes and rosy cheeks, and you with the dark ones, who does more harm with your blinkers, when you’ve the mind, among the hearts of young fellows than ever our ships gets from the guns of the Frenchmen. There aren’t many men in the navy of Old England who has seen queerer sights, or gone through more ups and downs in life than the timber-toed old tar who stands afore you, and who lost his leg in action aboard theThunderer, seventy-four, when we took a Frenchman and hauled down his colours afore he knew where he was. There aren’t many either, I’ve a notion, who’ve been worse rewarded, or more kicked about by cruel fate, or you wouldn’t find him playing the fiddle and singing songs for your amusement.Howsomdever, that’s neither here nor there, and I daresay you wish to hear the end of his stave, and so you shall when each on you has helped to load this here craft with such coppers or sixpences or shillings as you may chance to have in your pockets, and I daresay now a golden guinea wouldn’t sink her. Just look at her, always a-tossing up and down on the salt sea; that’s what we poor sailors have to go through all our lives. She’s a correct model of theRoyal George, that famous ship I once served aboard when she carried the flag of the great Admiral Lord Hawke; and which now lies out there at Spithead fathoms deep below the briny ocean, with all her drownded crew of gallant fellows, no more to hear the tempest howling, or fight the battles of their king and country!”I had been looking hard at the old sailor, whose eye just then falling on me, he recognised me at once as a brother salt.“What, Jerry Dix!” I exclaimed; he looked at me very hard. “Don’t you know me, old ship? have you forgotten little Ben Truscott?”“What, Ben, my boy! Give us your flipper, old chum. I thought as how I had seen you afore when my blinkers first caught sight of you, but I didn’t like to make a wrong landfall,” he exclaimed.We shook hands heartily. I was truly glad to see the old man again.“I see that you have become a warrant officer,” he said, eyeing my uniform. “That’s better nor nothing, though I did think as how you’d have been higher up the ratlines. And are you at anchor hereabouts?”I told him that I was living in the neighbourhood, and begged him to come at once to my cottage and see my missus, and have a talk about old times.“In course I will, Ben,” he answered. Then recollecting his audience, he thought that some apology was necessary for leaving them so abruptly; turning round, therefore, and eyeing his model of theRoyal George, as he called her, though she was more like a frigate than a line-of-battle ship, he said—“You’ll excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, but you see as how I’ve fallen in with an old ship, who I’ve known as man and boy these twenty years, so I must just now keep him company; but I’ll come back to-morrow and finish that there stave I was a-singing, and spin you more of my wonderful yarns, if you’ll just be good enough to come here and meet me; now mind, my little dears, bring plenty of coppers; and you, my pretty girls, bring something in your purses for poor Jack; I never takes no money from ugly ones—it’s a rule of mine, it’s wonderful too how few I ever see’s; so good-bye, and blessings on all of you; and now, Ben, we’ll up anchor and make sail.”Jerry on this unshipped his model from the stand, which he took under his arm, while he placed the vessel on his shoulder, and with a stout stick in his hand came stumping on alongside me.“Well, Jerry, I am truly glad to see you,” I said; “what have you been doing with yourself since we parted?”“That would be a hard matter to say, Ben, except as how I’ve been knocking about the country from east to west, and north to south, spinning yarns without end, and singing and fiddling, and doing all sorts of odd dodges to pick up a living. They were honest ones though, so don’t be afraid.”“And the yarns were all quite true, Jerry, eh?” I could not help asking.“As to that, maybe I have spun a tough one now and then,” answered Jerry, with a quizzical look.“About losing your leg aboard theThunderer, for instance,” I remarked.“Well, I can’t say quite so true as that, for I did lose my leg aboard theThunderer. To be sure, it was my wooden one. Why, don’t you mind, Ben, how you got a mop-stick and helped me to splice it? It sounds better too, do you see, to talk of theThunderer. The name tickles the people’s ears, and it wouldn’t do to tell ’em I lost my leg by falling down the main hatchway when half-seas over; so, do you see, I generally sticks to theThundererstory, as it’s nearer the truth than any other, and doesn’t so much hurt my conscience.”I had till then forgotten the circumstance, and I felt that it would not do to press old Jerry too hard. I introduced him to Susan, who made him welcome, for she had often heard me speak about the old man; she soon got tea ready, and a few substantials; then I got out a bottle of rum and mixed some grog, which I knew would be more to his taste. He was very happy, and many a long yarn he spun. Harry listened to them eagerly, and seemed much taken with him. I must remark that, after Jerry had sat talking with us for some time, he completely changed his tone and style of speaking; and though he still used what may be called sailor’s language, it was such as an officer or any other educated man might have employed. Indeed, I remembered that in my early days, Jerry, when in a serious mood, often showed that he was much superior in mind to the generality of people in the position in which he was placed. He afforded a melancholy example of the condition to which drunkenness and idle habits may reduce a man, who, from birth and education, might have played a respectable part in life. “That’s a fine boy of yours,” observed Jerry when Harry had gone out of the room. “I don’t set up for a prophet, but this much I’m sure of, that if you get him placed on the quarter-deck, he will be a post-captain one of these days. Is he your only one?”I of course told Jerry that he was not my son, and described how he was rescued from theRoyal George.“Well, that’s a surprising history,” said Jerry; “it’s a wonder I never heard of it. Do you see, I was at the time down in the West of England, where my family used to live; and I thought I would go and have a look at the old place and see if any of them were above-ground—not that I intended to make myself known. Few of my relatives would have wished to own a broken-down one-legged old tar like me. I found a brother a lawyer, and a cousin a parson, and two or three other relations; but, from what I heard, I thought I should ‘get more kicks than ha’pence’ if I troubled them, so I determined to ’bout ship and stand off again. I was, howsomdever, very nearly being found out. I had got this here craft, which I called theConquerorin those days, and was showing her off and spinning one of my yarns, when who should appear at the door of a handsome house but a lady with several little girls like fairies, and two fine boys. She and the young ones came down the steps, and after listening for some time she said in a pleasant voice, taking one of the youngsters by the hand—“‘This boy is going to sea some day, and we wish him to hear about sailors, and I know what you tell about them is true, for I once had a brother who went away to sea, and used to write to me and give me accounts of what happened. Poor fellow! he lost his leg just as you have done, and after that I heard no more from him, so that I fear he died.’“‘That was very likely, marm,’ said I. ‘In case I might have fallen in with him, may I be so bold to ask his name?’“The lady, as I had a curious feeling she would, told me my own name, and then I knew for certain that she was my youngest sister Mary, the only one of the family who pitied me when others had cast me off. I had a hard matter not to make myself known, but I thought to myself that it would do no good to those pretty young ladies and gentlemen to find out their weather-beaten, rough old uncle. Mary herself, too, I had a notion would not have been really pleased; though, bless her gentle heart, I was sure that she would have been kind to me; and so I gulped down my feelings, and declared that I remembered a man of that name, who was dead and gone long ago. The words stuck in my throat, howsomdever, as I spoke them; and I was obliged to wish her good-morning and stump off, or she would have found me out. I hadn’t got far before she called me back, and putting a five-shilling piece in my hand she said—“‘Pray accept this trifle, my good man, for the sake of my lost brother, for I know what you tell me is true, and that you are a genuine sailor.’“‘May Heaven bless you, my dear,’ says I—I was as near as possible popping out the word ‘Mary,’ but I checked myself in time, and said ‘lady’ instead. The tears came to my eyes, and my voice was as husky as a bear’s. She thought it was all from gratitude for her unexpected gift, and that I wasn’t accustomed to receive so much. To be sure, she did look at me rather curiously, and, as I was going away, on turning my head I saw that she was still standing on the doorsteps watching me.“I stopped about the neighbourhood for better than a fortnight, for I could not tear myself away; it was a pleasure to get a sight of Mary driving about in her carriage with her little girls, and her fine boys on ponies trotting alongside. She was happily married, I found, to a man of good fortune.“While I was putting up at ‘The Plough,’ which I had known well in my youth, I heard a number of things about the neighbouring families, for I was curious to learn what had become of all the people I had known. There were not many of those who frequented the house who could read, and there was no newspapers taken in, and that is how I did not come to hear about theRoyal Georgetill some time afterwards. It strikes me, though I may be wrong, that by a wonderful chance I got hold of something which has to do with this fine lad here, who you have been looking after. I will think the matter over, and try and rake up what I have heard; but I don’t want to disappoint you, and I may be altogether wrong.”I was naturally curious, and tried to get more out of Jerry, but he would not say a word beyond repeating over again that he might be altogether out of his reckoning. I of course begged him to stop with us, promising him board and lodging as long as he liked to stay; for, as he was in no ways particular, I could easily manage to put him up. He thanked me heartily, and said he would stop a night or two at all events. In the evening he went back with me to the inn to get his traps, for he travelled with a sort of knapsack, which he left behind him when he went out for his day’s excursions.The next morning he had a wash and shave, and turned out neat and trim, with a clean shirt and trousers, and altogether looked a different sort of person to what he had been the day before.“You see, Ben, I have given up drinking, and like to keep a best suit of toggery, and to go to church on a Sunday in a decent fashion, which I used not to care about once upon a time. It’s little respect that I can pay to the day, but I don’t play my fiddle, nor sing songs, nor spin long yarns about things that never happened, as I think myself a more respectable sort of chap than I used to be.”I was glad to hear Jerry say this of himself, though maybe his notion that it was allowable to spin long yarns which had, as he confessed, no foundation in truth, on other days in the week, was not a very correct one. I told him so.“As to that,” he answered, “my hearers don’t take my yarns for gospel any more than the tales they read in books. Some people write long yarns which aren’t true, and I spin much shorter ones out of my mouth. Where’s the difference, I should like to know? Mine don’t do any mortal being the slightest, harm, and that’s more than can be said of some books I’ve fallen in with. My yarns go in at one ear and out at the other, and, supposing them worse than they are, they can’t be dwelt upon like those in books. I never speak of a real man except to praise him; and if I paint a scoundrel, I always give him a purser’s name. I produce many a hearty laugh, but never cause a blush to rise on a maiden’s cheeks; and so, Ben, don’t be hard on me.”I confessed that he had made out a good case, and that I was wrong to find fault with him. At this he seemed much pleased, and, laughing heartily, told me that I reminded him of the little boy who wanted to teach his grandfather to suck eggs.Jerry had been so accustomed to wandering about, that though Susan did her best to make him comfortable, and he always found a willing listener in Harry, after he had been with us three days he began to weary of staying quiet, and announced that he must get under way. The next morning he appeared in his weekday clothes, shouldering his knapsack and model ship. After wishing us all good-bye, he trudged off, intending, as he said, to go to the west end of the island.“You will not forget that matter about Harry?” I said.“No fear, Ben! It’s the main thing I have on my mind; and if I succeed in picking up any information, I will let you know—depend on that,” he answered. “Heaven bless you, and Susan and the boy!”We watched him as he trudged sturdily away over the hills towards the town, having, I observed, again assumed his independent, happy-go-lucky air, which he had laid aside during his stay with us.

I must pass over the next seven years of my life and that of my young charge Harry, for that was the name Susan was certain the young lady called him. He sometimes spoke of himself as “Jack Tar,” but probably he had heard his friends call him so, because he was dressed like a little sailor. We were puzzled what surname to give him. The captain and Mrs Leslie and the young ladies and Susan and I talked it over, and at last settled to call him George, after the old ship; one of the young ladies thought Saint for saint would sound better, and so he went by the name of “Harry Saint George.”

I was at first greatly afraid that he would be taken from us, for a subscription was made for the families of those who perished when the ship foundered, and when his story was known a good share was given to him, besides other contributions, and many people wanted to have him. The captain stood my friend, as he did in all other matters, and insisted that as I pulled him out of the water, and the only friend of his we knew of had stopped at our house, Susan and I ought to have charge of him. He would have taken him himself, but he had a good many young children of his own, and thought that Harry would do better with us, and that he could still look after his education and interests as he grew older.

As soon as Harry could speak, he said that he would be a sailor, that his father was one, and that he would be one too; but who his father had been was a puzzle, as about that, of course, he really knew nothing. He could not tell us either anything about those he had seen on board, or how he had got hold of the sheep, though it is my belief that someone must have placed him on the animal’s back, intending to lash him to it, but that the ship had gone down before there was time to do so. Perhaps it was the last act of the poor young lady, or maybe of his father, if his father, as seemed probable, was on board.

As may be supposed, that sheep was a great pet with us and the captain’s family as long as it lived. Harry was very fond of it, and would ride about on its back, holding on just as he had done when the creature saved him from drowning. People used to come and see him ride about, and the ladies made a gay silk collar for the sheep, and also a bridle, but Harry would not use it, and always held on by the wool, saying that the sheep always well knew where to go. I railed off a piece of the garden and laid it down in grass, and on one side I built a house for the animal; but as there was not food enough in the little plot, the captain had it up to a paddock near his house, where it used to scamper about with Harry on its back and enjoy itself.

“It’s an ill wind that blows no one good,” and people used to say that the foundering of theRoyal Georgewas a fortunate circumstance for the sheep, as it would long before have been under the butcher’s knife.

The captain, meantime, made all the inquiries he could to try and discover the friends of the little fellow, but in vain; none of those who were saved remembered to have seen the young lady talking to anyone, though two or three recollected seeing her, as I had, coming on board.

Susan, like a thoughtful woman as she was, would not let the little boy wear out his clothes, but at once set to work to make him a new suit, while she carefully laid up those he had had on, with his hat, and the little picture in the case, to assist, as she said, in proving who he was should any of his relatives appear. Still time went on, and there appeared less chance of that than ever.

I spent a very happy time on shore with Susan: as we had no children of our own, we loved Harry as much as if he was our own son. Still I could not be idle; had it not been, indeed, for the captain, I should have been pretty soon pressed and compelled to go to sea, whether I liked it or not. Susan would have gladly kept me at home, which was but natural; still, I was too young to settle down in idleness, and should have grown ashamed of myself; so, as seamen were badly wanted for the navy, I at last entered, with the captain’s advice, on board a fifty-gun ship, theLeander, he promising to use his influence to obtain a boatswain’s warrant for me. While I was serving on board her we had a desperate action with a French eighty-gun ship, theCouronne, when we lost thirteen killed, and many more wounded, but succeeded in beating her off and putting her to flight.

Peace came soon after this, and five years passed before I obtained my warrant as boatswain. The prize-money I had received enabled me in the meantime to keep Susan and Harry as I wished; and when I became boatswain she was able to draw a fair sum of money every year. During those years I spent five months at home, which was a pretty long time considering what generally falls to the lot of seamen.

Harry had grown into a fine manly boy, and the more I looked at him the more convinced I felt that he was of gentle birth; he called Susan mother, and me father, though he knew that we were not his parents. He had good manners, and, considering his age, a fair amount of learning, for he used to go up every day to the captain’s to receive instruction from the children’s governess. At last the captain considered that he ought to be sent to school, and arranged that he should go with his own son, Master Reginald, who was about his age, though Harry was the strongest, and, I may say, the most manly of the two.

While I was at home I taught Harry as much as he could learn of what I may call the first principles of seamanship,—to knot and splice, and box the compass. I also built and rigged a model ship, of which he was very fond.

“You will not forget all I have taught you, my boy,” I said, when I was going off to sea.

“No, indeed I will not, father,” he answered; “and when you come back I hope I shall have learnt more, for I will do my best to pick up information from everybody who will teach me. The captain, I know, will, when I come home for the holidays, and there is old Dick Wright, who has been at sea all his life, settled near us, and he will tell me anything I ask him; though there is no one teaches me so well as you do, father.”

In those piping times of peace the ships were not kept so long in commission as they were during the war, so after serving three years as boatswain of theHuzzarfrigate, on the West India and North American station, I once more returned home. I found Harry more determined than ever to go to sea, and he told me that Reginald Leslie had made up his mind to go also.

“Does his father wish it?” I asked.

“Oh yes, he has no objection to his going; and do you know, father, the captain says that he will get him and me appointed to the same ship with you, provided she is sent to a healthy station,” was the answer.

“Well, Harry, I shall be very glad to have charge of you both, and I am pleased that the captain thinks so well of you; though, to be sure, he has always shown that,” said I.

Susan was much cast down at the thoughts of losing Harry, but she could not help acknowledging that it was time he should go to sea, if he was going at all.

“But a ship’s boy has a hard life of it, as you have often told me, Ben,” she said, “and he has been gently nurtured, and brought up, I may say, like a young gentleman.”

“And a young gentleman he will still remain; for, you may depend on it, the captain intends to get him placed on the quarter-deck; and, though he himself has retired from the service, he has interest enough to get me and the lads appointed to some ship commanded by a friend of his own; and I flatter myself that, from the certificate I got from my last captain, he will have no difficulty about that.”

We had almost given up any expectations of ever meeting Harry’s friends. I own that I did not care very much about this, for once on the quarter-deck I felt sure he would make his own way; and though it might be of advantage to him to find them out, it was possible that it might be very much to the contrary.

I was one day going up the street of Ryde with Harry, when we saw a crowd of women and children and a few men and boys standing round the model of a full-rigged ship, and we heard a loud voice singing out—

“Cease, rude Boreas, stormy railer;List, ye landsmen all, to me;Messmates, hear a brother sailorSing the dangers of the sea.”

“Cease, rude Boreas, stormy railer;List, ye landsmen all, to me;Messmates, hear a brother sailorSing the dangers of the sea.”

Then came the sound of a fiddle, and the singer continued his song to his own accompaniment.

“Let us stop and hear the old sailor,” said Harry, drawing me towards the crowd.

We found room just opposite where the man was standing. I then saw that he had a timber leg, and that the ship was placed on a stand with a lump of lead fixed to the end of a bent iron rod at the bottom, which made it rock backwards and forwards.

“Oh yes! oh yes! all you good people, lend a ear to poor Jack’s yarn,” he continued; “and you pretty girls with the blue eyes and rosy cheeks, and you with the dark ones, who does more harm with your blinkers, when you’ve the mind, among the hearts of young fellows than ever our ships gets from the guns of the Frenchmen. There aren’t many men in the navy of Old England who has seen queerer sights, or gone through more ups and downs in life than the timber-toed old tar who stands afore you, and who lost his leg in action aboard theThunderer, seventy-four, when we took a Frenchman and hauled down his colours afore he knew where he was. There aren’t many either, I’ve a notion, who’ve been worse rewarded, or more kicked about by cruel fate, or you wouldn’t find him playing the fiddle and singing songs for your amusement.Howsomdever, that’s neither here nor there, and I daresay you wish to hear the end of his stave, and so you shall when each on you has helped to load this here craft with such coppers or sixpences or shillings as you may chance to have in your pockets, and I daresay now a golden guinea wouldn’t sink her. Just look at her, always a-tossing up and down on the salt sea; that’s what we poor sailors have to go through all our lives. She’s a correct model of theRoyal George, that famous ship I once served aboard when she carried the flag of the great Admiral Lord Hawke; and which now lies out there at Spithead fathoms deep below the briny ocean, with all her drownded crew of gallant fellows, no more to hear the tempest howling, or fight the battles of their king and country!”

I had been looking hard at the old sailor, whose eye just then falling on me, he recognised me at once as a brother salt.

“What, Jerry Dix!” I exclaimed; he looked at me very hard. “Don’t you know me, old ship? have you forgotten little Ben Truscott?”

“What, Ben, my boy! Give us your flipper, old chum. I thought as how I had seen you afore when my blinkers first caught sight of you, but I didn’t like to make a wrong landfall,” he exclaimed.

We shook hands heartily. I was truly glad to see the old man again.

“I see that you have become a warrant officer,” he said, eyeing my uniform. “That’s better nor nothing, though I did think as how you’d have been higher up the ratlines. And are you at anchor hereabouts?”

I told him that I was living in the neighbourhood, and begged him to come at once to my cottage and see my missus, and have a talk about old times.

“In course I will, Ben,” he answered. Then recollecting his audience, he thought that some apology was necessary for leaving them so abruptly; turning round, therefore, and eyeing his model of theRoyal George, as he called her, though she was more like a frigate than a line-of-battle ship, he said—

“You’ll excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, but you see as how I’ve fallen in with an old ship, who I’ve known as man and boy these twenty years, so I must just now keep him company; but I’ll come back to-morrow and finish that there stave I was a-singing, and spin you more of my wonderful yarns, if you’ll just be good enough to come here and meet me; now mind, my little dears, bring plenty of coppers; and you, my pretty girls, bring something in your purses for poor Jack; I never takes no money from ugly ones—it’s a rule of mine, it’s wonderful too how few I ever see’s; so good-bye, and blessings on all of you; and now, Ben, we’ll up anchor and make sail.”

Jerry on this unshipped his model from the stand, which he took under his arm, while he placed the vessel on his shoulder, and with a stout stick in his hand came stumping on alongside me.

“Well, Jerry, I am truly glad to see you,” I said; “what have you been doing with yourself since we parted?”

“That would be a hard matter to say, Ben, except as how I’ve been knocking about the country from east to west, and north to south, spinning yarns without end, and singing and fiddling, and doing all sorts of odd dodges to pick up a living. They were honest ones though, so don’t be afraid.”

“And the yarns were all quite true, Jerry, eh?” I could not help asking.

“As to that, maybe I have spun a tough one now and then,” answered Jerry, with a quizzical look.

“About losing your leg aboard theThunderer, for instance,” I remarked.

“Well, I can’t say quite so true as that, for I did lose my leg aboard theThunderer. To be sure, it was my wooden one. Why, don’t you mind, Ben, how you got a mop-stick and helped me to splice it? It sounds better too, do you see, to talk of theThunderer. The name tickles the people’s ears, and it wouldn’t do to tell ’em I lost my leg by falling down the main hatchway when half-seas over; so, do you see, I generally sticks to theThundererstory, as it’s nearer the truth than any other, and doesn’t so much hurt my conscience.”

I had till then forgotten the circumstance, and I felt that it would not do to press old Jerry too hard. I introduced him to Susan, who made him welcome, for she had often heard me speak about the old man; she soon got tea ready, and a few substantials; then I got out a bottle of rum and mixed some grog, which I knew would be more to his taste. He was very happy, and many a long yarn he spun. Harry listened to them eagerly, and seemed much taken with him. I must remark that, after Jerry had sat talking with us for some time, he completely changed his tone and style of speaking; and though he still used what may be called sailor’s language, it was such as an officer or any other educated man might have employed. Indeed, I remembered that in my early days, Jerry, when in a serious mood, often showed that he was much superior in mind to the generality of people in the position in which he was placed. He afforded a melancholy example of the condition to which drunkenness and idle habits may reduce a man, who, from birth and education, might have played a respectable part in life. “That’s a fine boy of yours,” observed Jerry when Harry had gone out of the room. “I don’t set up for a prophet, but this much I’m sure of, that if you get him placed on the quarter-deck, he will be a post-captain one of these days. Is he your only one?”

I of course told Jerry that he was not my son, and described how he was rescued from theRoyal George.

“Well, that’s a surprising history,” said Jerry; “it’s a wonder I never heard of it. Do you see, I was at the time down in the West of England, where my family used to live; and I thought I would go and have a look at the old place and see if any of them were above-ground—not that I intended to make myself known. Few of my relatives would have wished to own a broken-down one-legged old tar like me. I found a brother a lawyer, and a cousin a parson, and two or three other relations; but, from what I heard, I thought I should ‘get more kicks than ha’pence’ if I troubled them, so I determined to ’bout ship and stand off again. I was, howsomdever, very nearly being found out. I had got this here craft, which I called theConquerorin those days, and was showing her off and spinning one of my yarns, when who should appear at the door of a handsome house but a lady with several little girls like fairies, and two fine boys. She and the young ones came down the steps, and after listening for some time she said in a pleasant voice, taking one of the youngsters by the hand—

“‘This boy is going to sea some day, and we wish him to hear about sailors, and I know what you tell about them is true, for I once had a brother who went away to sea, and used to write to me and give me accounts of what happened. Poor fellow! he lost his leg just as you have done, and after that I heard no more from him, so that I fear he died.’

“‘That was very likely, marm,’ said I. ‘In case I might have fallen in with him, may I be so bold to ask his name?’

“The lady, as I had a curious feeling she would, told me my own name, and then I knew for certain that she was my youngest sister Mary, the only one of the family who pitied me when others had cast me off. I had a hard matter not to make myself known, but I thought to myself that it would do no good to those pretty young ladies and gentlemen to find out their weather-beaten, rough old uncle. Mary herself, too, I had a notion would not have been really pleased; though, bless her gentle heart, I was sure that she would have been kind to me; and so I gulped down my feelings, and declared that I remembered a man of that name, who was dead and gone long ago. The words stuck in my throat, howsomdever, as I spoke them; and I was obliged to wish her good-morning and stump off, or she would have found me out. I hadn’t got far before she called me back, and putting a five-shilling piece in my hand she said—

“‘Pray accept this trifle, my good man, for the sake of my lost brother, for I know what you tell me is true, and that you are a genuine sailor.’

“‘May Heaven bless you, my dear,’ says I—I was as near as possible popping out the word ‘Mary,’ but I checked myself in time, and said ‘lady’ instead. The tears came to my eyes, and my voice was as husky as a bear’s. She thought it was all from gratitude for her unexpected gift, and that I wasn’t accustomed to receive so much. To be sure, she did look at me rather curiously, and, as I was going away, on turning my head I saw that she was still standing on the doorsteps watching me.

“I stopped about the neighbourhood for better than a fortnight, for I could not tear myself away; it was a pleasure to get a sight of Mary driving about in her carriage with her little girls, and her fine boys on ponies trotting alongside. She was happily married, I found, to a man of good fortune.

“While I was putting up at ‘The Plough,’ which I had known well in my youth, I heard a number of things about the neighbouring families, for I was curious to learn what had become of all the people I had known. There were not many of those who frequented the house who could read, and there was no newspapers taken in, and that is how I did not come to hear about theRoyal Georgetill some time afterwards. It strikes me, though I may be wrong, that by a wonderful chance I got hold of something which has to do with this fine lad here, who you have been looking after. I will think the matter over, and try and rake up what I have heard; but I don’t want to disappoint you, and I may be altogether wrong.”

I was naturally curious, and tried to get more out of Jerry, but he would not say a word beyond repeating over again that he might be altogether out of his reckoning. I of course begged him to stop with us, promising him board and lodging as long as he liked to stay; for, as he was in no ways particular, I could easily manage to put him up. He thanked me heartily, and said he would stop a night or two at all events. In the evening he went back with me to the inn to get his traps, for he travelled with a sort of knapsack, which he left behind him when he went out for his day’s excursions.

The next morning he had a wash and shave, and turned out neat and trim, with a clean shirt and trousers, and altogether looked a different sort of person to what he had been the day before.

“You see, Ben, I have given up drinking, and like to keep a best suit of toggery, and to go to church on a Sunday in a decent fashion, which I used not to care about once upon a time. It’s little respect that I can pay to the day, but I don’t play my fiddle, nor sing songs, nor spin long yarns about things that never happened, as I think myself a more respectable sort of chap than I used to be.”

I was glad to hear Jerry say this of himself, though maybe his notion that it was allowable to spin long yarns which had, as he confessed, no foundation in truth, on other days in the week, was not a very correct one. I told him so.

“As to that,” he answered, “my hearers don’t take my yarns for gospel any more than the tales they read in books. Some people write long yarns which aren’t true, and I spin much shorter ones out of my mouth. Where’s the difference, I should like to know? Mine don’t do any mortal being the slightest, harm, and that’s more than can be said of some books I’ve fallen in with. My yarns go in at one ear and out at the other, and, supposing them worse than they are, they can’t be dwelt upon like those in books. I never speak of a real man except to praise him; and if I paint a scoundrel, I always give him a purser’s name. I produce many a hearty laugh, but never cause a blush to rise on a maiden’s cheeks; and so, Ben, don’t be hard on me.”

I confessed that he had made out a good case, and that I was wrong to find fault with him. At this he seemed much pleased, and, laughing heartily, told me that I reminded him of the little boy who wanted to teach his grandfather to suck eggs.

Jerry had been so accustomed to wandering about, that though Susan did her best to make him comfortable, and he always found a willing listener in Harry, after he had been with us three days he began to weary of staying quiet, and announced that he must get under way. The next morning he appeared in his weekday clothes, shouldering his knapsack and model ship. After wishing us all good-bye, he trudged off, intending, as he said, to go to the west end of the island.

“You will not forget that matter about Harry?” I said.

“No fear, Ben! It’s the main thing I have on my mind; and if I succeed in picking up any information, I will let you know—depend on that,” he answered. “Heaven bless you, and Susan and the boy!”

We watched him as he trudged sturdily away over the hills towards the town, having, I observed, again assumed his independent, happy-go-lucky air, which he had laid aside during his stay with us.

Chapter Six.Harry had been greatly taken with Jerry, and seemed to miss him very much. He used to go out most days to play with his schoolfellow, the captain’s son; but while Jerry was with us he preferred stopping and listening to his yarns. The time, however, for both the boys to return to school was now approaching. I saw that Harry had something on his mind.“Father,” he said, “am I not old enough to go to sea? and, if I am, had I not better be looking out for a ship?”“As we are no longer fighting the French, there are not many put in commission,” I observed; “so maybe you will have to wait for some time.”As it happened, the very next day I got an order to join theNymph, thirty-six gun frigate, just commenced fitting out at Portsmouth, commanded by Captain Edward Pellew.“So soon, Ben!” said Susan, looking pale as soon as she saw the letter; “I thought you would have had a longer spell on shore; but I am thankful it’s peace time, and I shall not be trembling at the thoughts of your having to fight the French.”“That’s the very thing we would rather be doing, my dear girl,” I answered, smiling, and trying to raise her spirits.I at once went up to the captain and told him.“I am glad of it,” he answered. “There is not a better officer in the service than Captain Pellew, and, as he is a friend of mine, I have no doubt that I shall be able to get him to take the two youngsters. I will go over to Portsmouth this very day and see about it.”As I had to join at once, the captain took me over in his wherry. In about a couple of hours he came on board, and told me it was all settled, and he should trust to me to look after his son as well as Harry, as he was sure I should do my best for the lad.I had taken lodgings for Susan, and she joined me two days afterwards, bringing Harry with her. She had plenty to do in preparing his outfit, and that kept her mind from dwelling too much on our approaching parting. Harry was the first midshipman to join, and he had the advantage of seeing the ship fitted out from the beginning. The captain brought Reginald over about a week later, and Harry was proud in being able to teach him all he knew. He had thus as it were got the lead, and he kept it, though he did not let Reginald feel that he thought himself superior to him in any way. The two lads were fast friends, as they had always been, for both were honest, kind-hearted, and good-tempered. There was no difficulty in getting hands; and as I knew where to find the best men, we soon had a first-rate ship’s company without much pressing.We stood down Channel, bound out for Lisbon, with some official characters on board. The captain’s great aim was to get the ship’s company into good order, and we were continually exercising the guns and shortening and making sail. This was an advantage to the youngsters, as they learnt much faster than they would otherwise have done. They used to come to my cabin, and I taught them all I could, though with my duties I had not much time to myself. I had advised Harry not to call me “father”; not that he should have been ashamed of his father being a boatswain had I been his father, but, as I was not, I thought it would be better for him to be independent. I felt for him the same as if he was my son. He and young Leslie got on very well in the berth, and, young as they were, gained the respect of their messmates. Thus a year or more passed by; we had visited Cadiz, and had taken a trip up the Mediterranean, when we were ordered home with despatches. One day I observed Harry was looking less merry than usual; I asked him what was the matter. At first he did not like to tell me. At last he said—“The truth is, father, that my messmates have found out that I was saved when theRoyal Georgewent down, and that Saint George is not my real name.”“Never mind that, Harry,” I answered; “you have as much right to it as they have to theirs. Tell them you hope to make it some day as well known to fame as Hawke’s, Collier’s, or Rodney’s.”Harry promised to follow my advice; at the same time he confessed that it made him more anxious than ever to find out who his parents really were, and whether or not they were both on board theRoyal Georgewhen she went down.“You tell me that you think the poor lady who took me on board was not my mother, and so perhaps my mother was on shore.”“But the young lady was in black, and so it’s possible that your mother may have died, and that she took you to see your father, to whom, for some reason or other, she wanted to introduce you. That’s how I read the riddle, but maybe I am mistaken.”Harry was satisfied.“When we return to England, you will try and get Jerry Dix to come to see you, and learn if he has heard anything more?” he said.Of course I replied that I would if I could; but that Jerry Dix had not left me any address, and it might be a hard matter to find him. I did not think that he had played me false, but I was afraid that some accident might have happened to him, or that he might be dead, and then the clue which he fancied he had found would be lost.After visiting Cadiz and Gibraltar, we were on our way home, just entering the chops of the Channel, after being kept at sea by calms and contrary winds for three weeks or more, when a frigate hove in sight and hoisted English colours. She made her number, and we knew her to be the thirty-two gun frigateVenus. Captain Faulknor, who commanded her, came on board, and we soon heard the news. The French Republicans had risen up against their king, and cut his head off, and as the English Government did not approve of that, they had ordered the French ambassador to leave the country. The National Convention, as it was called, had therefore declared war against Great Britain, and we were now going to thrash the French Republicans soundly, wherever we could find them, afloat or on shore.This was, of course, considered to be glorious news; and all hands fore and aft were in high glee at the thoughts of the work cut out for us.TheVenussoon after parted company with us to go and look out for the enemy, while we made the best of our way up Channel to Portsmouth, to fill up with ammunition and stores. Before Susan could come over to see me we had sailed for the westward. On our way down Channel we again fell in with theVenus, which had had a sharp action with two French frigates, theSémillanteandCléopâtre, when she beat off the first, and escaped from the latter. We sailed together in search of the two frigates. We sighted them three days afterwards, when they, having nimble heels, escaped us and got into Cherbourg.Having cruised together for some time, we parted company, and we put into Falmouth. We had now been a year in commission, and all hands were eager to meet an enemy of equal force. My fear was for Harry; I don’t know how I should have felt had he been my own son, but I doubt that I should have been as anxious as I was about him, and I knew it would go well-nigh to break Susan’s heart should he be killed.He and Reginald were in high spirits, and could talk of nothing else but the battle in which they hoped to be engaged, and were always asking me questions about those I had seen fought in my younger days. You see, after the long peace, we had a good many officers and men on board, who had never seen a shot fired in anger.Our captain, however, and his brother, Commander Israel Pellew, had been through the American War of Independence while they were midshipmen; the latter had lately joined us as a volunteer. We sailed again on the 17th of June on a cruise. When nearly abreast of the Start we stood out for the southward, in the hopes of falling in with one of the two frigates we had chased into Cherbourg. We were about six leagues from the Start, when the look-out from the masthead hailed—“A sail on the starboard beam.”This was as we were standing to the south-east. You may be sure that we at once bore up in chase, under all sail. The stranger, as we got nearer, was seen carrying a press of canvas, as we fancied, to get away from us. We came up with her, however, and by the evening made her out to be no other than theCléopâtre, one of the frigates of which we were in search. Finding that she could not escape, even if she intended to do so, she hauled up her foresail, and lowered her topgallant-sail, bravely waiting for us. The men were at quarters, and the officers at their stations, while the captain conning the ship stood at the gangway with his hat in his hand. We were close up to each other and not a shot had been fired; the French captain hailed, when our captain cried out—“Ahoy! ahoy!”On which our crew gave three hearty cheers, and shouted—“Long live King George!”“Reserve your fire, my lads, till you see me put my hat on my head,” cried our captain; “then blaze away and thrash the Frenchmen as soon as you can.”The word was passed along the deck, and all hands eagerly looked out for the signal.The Frenchmen tried to imitate our cheer, but made a bad hand of it. Captain Mullon, as we afterwards heard was his name, the commander of the French frigate, was seen holding the red cap of liberty in his hand, and making a speech to his crew, on which they all sang out at the top of their voices,Vive la République, and one of the sailors, running up the main rigging, secured the red cap to the masthead. We stood on till our foremost guns could bear on the starboard quarter of the enemy.The French captain held his hat, like our captain, in his hand. They bowed to each other, when ours was seen to place his on his head. It was the looked-for signal. At that instant we opened fire, which the Frenchmen were not slow in returning. We were running before the wind, within rather less than hailing distance of the Frenchman, who was on our larboard beam. In little more than half an hour we had shot away the Frenchman’s mizzenmast and wheel; but our mainmast was badly wounded, and every instant I expected it to fall. Having lost command of her rudder, theCléopâtrefell aboard us, her jib-boom passing through our fore and mainmast. I thought that this would finish our mainmast, but, fortunately, the Frenchman’s jib-boom gave way.We were blazing away all this time, raking theCléopâtrefore and aft. We had lost a good many officers and men, and I saw two midshipmen knocked over not far from me. I looked out for Harry and Reginald Leslie, and I caught sight of them, still standing unharmed amid the smoke, but I had not much time even to think about them or anything else except my duty.We now fell alongside the enemy head and stern, being still foul of each other. Her larboard-main-topsail studden-sail-boom iron having hooked the leach-rope of our maintop-sail, I had still good reasons to tremble for our mainmast. I saw a youngster spring aloft. It was Harry. He made his way along the yard, and with his knife cut the leach-rope; and though many a shot from the Frenchmen was fired at him, he came down safely. I felt my heart beat with pride as I saw him, for he had saved the mast. The next moment the cry was heard—“Boarders, away!”Our brave first lieutenant, Mr Norris, leading the boarders, cutlass in hand, leapt from the quarter-deck on to the forecastle of the French frigate, while our master, Mr Ball, at the head of another party, made his way through the bow-ports of the enemy. On they rushed, one party on the upper and the other on the main-deck, sweeping all before them. The Frenchmen, though they numbered half as many again as our crew, gave way; some springing down the hatchway, others flying aft, and in fifty minutes from the commencement of the action the Republican colours were hauled down, and the Frenchmen from all directions cried for quarter.The brave French captain was found lying on the deck, his back torn open by a round shot, and part of his hip carried away. He was seen gnawing at a piece of paper, which he continued to bite till his hand dropped, and, his head sinking down, he ceased to breathe. He fancied that he was destroying a list of coast signals used by the French, which he had found in one of his pockets; but he was mistaken, for the paper he wished to prevent falling into our hands was discovered on him covered with blood. He was a brave fellow—there was no doubt about that. We had not gained our victory without a heavy loss, for we had eighteen seamen and marines, three midshipmen and two other officers, killed, and twenty-seven wounded; while the French lost sixty-three men. I do not think there was ever during the war a more equal or better-fought battle, except that the Frenchmen had eighty more men to begin with than we had; but then theNymphhad slightly heavier metal, and was a few tons larger than our antagonist. However, I believe that if it had been the other way, we should, notwithstanding, have won the day.As soon as we had repaired damages we made sail, though it was four days before we reached Portsmouth with our prize. The brave French captain was buried the next day in Portsmouth churchyard, the surviving officers being permitted to attend him to the grave. A few days afterwards His Majesty, George the Third, came aboard our frigate, when our captain and his brother, Commander Pellew, and all the officers of the ship, were presented to him.The king was highly pleased with the way the action had been fought, and at once knighted our brave captain, and presented his brother with his commission as post-captain, while Lieutenant Norris was made a commander. The king made inquiries as to what others had done.“They all did their duty, your Majesty,” answered the captain.“No doubt about it. That is what I know my officers and seamen always do,” observed the king.The captain then told him of the way Harry had behaved.“I am pleased to hear it, my lad,” said the king; “and I hope some day that I shall have the pleasure of placing the flat of my sword on your shoulders. What’s your name?” asked the king.The captain told him, and mentioned how he had been saved from theRoyal George.“What! are you the ‘Child of the Wreck’ I have been told of?” asked the king. “I wish that more like you had been saved; you have begun well, and will prove an honour to the service, no doubt about that.”The king spoke in a like fashion to several others. As may be supposed, I felt prouder than ever of Harry, and was sure that if his life was preserved he would not disappoint the good king or anyone else.

Harry had been greatly taken with Jerry, and seemed to miss him very much. He used to go out most days to play with his schoolfellow, the captain’s son; but while Jerry was with us he preferred stopping and listening to his yarns. The time, however, for both the boys to return to school was now approaching. I saw that Harry had something on his mind.

“Father,” he said, “am I not old enough to go to sea? and, if I am, had I not better be looking out for a ship?”

“As we are no longer fighting the French, there are not many put in commission,” I observed; “so maybe you will have to wait for some time.”

As it happened, the very next day I got an order to join theNymph, thirty-six gun frigate, just commenced fitting out at Portsmouth, commanded by Captain Edward Pellew.

“So soon, Ben!” said Susan, looking pale as soon as she saw the letter; “I thought you would have had a longer spell on shore; but I am thankful it’s peace time, and I shall not be trembling at the thoughts of your having to fight the French.”

“That’s the very thing we would rather be doing, my dear girl,” I answered, smiling, and trying to raise her spirits.

I at once went up to the captain and told him.

“I am glad of it,” he answered. “There is not a better officer in the service than Captain Pellew, and, as he is a friend of mine, I have no doubt that I shall be able to get him to take the two youngsters. I will go over to Portsmouth this very day and see about it.”

As I had to join at once, the captain took me over in his wherry. In about a couple of hours he came on board, and told me it was all settled, and he should trust to me to look after his son as well as Harry, as he was sure I should do my best for the lad.

I had taken lodgings for Susan, and she joined me two days afterwards, bringing Harry with her. She had plenty to do in preparing his outfit, and that kept her mind from dwelling too much on our approaching parting. Harry was the first midshipman to join, and he had the advantage of seeing the ship fitted out from the beginning. The captain brought Reginald over about a week later, and Harry was proud in being able to teach him all he knew. He had thus as it were got the lead, and he kept it, though he did not let Reginald feel that he thought himself superior to him in any way. The two lads were fast friends, as they had always been, for both were honest, kind-hearted, and good-tempered. There was no difficulty in getting hands; and as I knew where to find the best men, we soon had a first-rate ship’s company without much pressing.

We stood down Channel, bound out for Lisbon, with some official characters on board. The captain’s great aim was to get the ship’s company into good order, and we were continually exercising the guns and shortening and making sail. This was an advantage to the youngsters, as they learnt much faster than they would otherwise have done. They used to come to my cabin, and I taught them all I could, though with my duties I had not much time to myself. I had advised Harry not to call me “father”; not that he should have been ashamed of his father being a boatswain had I been his father, but, as I was not, I thought it would be better for him to be independent. I felt for him the same as if he was my son. He and young Leslie got on very well in the berth, and, young as they were, gained the respect of their messmates. Thus a year or more passed by; we had visited Cadiz, and had taken a trip up the Mediterranean, when we were ordered home with despatches. One day I observed Harry was looking less merry than usual; I asked him what was the matter. At first he did not like to tell me. At last he said—

“The truth is, father, that my messmates have found out that I was saved when theRoyal Georgewent down, and that Saint George is not my real name.”

“Never mind that, Harry,” I answered; “you have as much right to it as they have to theirs. Tell them you hope to make it some day as well known to fame as Hawke’s, Collier’s, or Rodney’s.”

Harry promised to follow my advice; at the same time he confessed that it made him more anxious than ever to find out who his parents really were, and whether or not they were both on board theRoyal Georgewhen she went down.

“You tell me that you think the poor lady who took me on board was not my mother, and so perhaps my mother was on shore.”

“But the young lady was in black, and so it’s possible that your mother may have died, and that she took you to see your father, to whom, for some reason or other, she wanted to introduce you. That’s how I read the riddle, but maybe I am mistaken.”

Harry was satisfied.

“When we return to England, you will try and get Jerry Dix to come to see you, and learn if he has heard anything more?” he said.

Of course I replied that I would if I could; but that Jerry Dix had not left me any address, and it might be a hard matter to find him. I did not think that he had played me false, but I was afraid that some accident might have happened to him, or that he might be dead, and then the clue which he fancied he had found would be lost.

After visiting Cadiz and Gibraltar, we were on our way home, just entering the chops of the Channel, after being kept at sea by calms and contrary winds for three weeks or more, when a frigate hove in sight and hoisted English colours. She made her number, and we knew her to be the thirty-two gun frigateVenus. Captain Faulknor, who commanded her, came on board, and we soon heard the news. The French Republicans had risen up against their king, and cut his head off, and as the English Government did not approve of that, they had ordered the French ambassador to leave the country. The National Convention, as it was called, had therefore declared war against Great Britain, and we were now going to thrash the French Republicans soundly, wherever we could find them, afloat or on shore.

This was, of course, considered to be glorious news; and all hands fore and aft were in high glee at the thoughts of the work cut out for us.

TheVenussoon after parted company with us to go and look out for the enemy, while we made the best of our way up Channel to Portsmouth, to fill up with ammunition and stores. Before Susan could come over to see me we had sailed for the westward. On our way down Channel we again fell in with theVenus, which had had a sharp action with two French frigates, theSémillanteandCléopâtre, when she beat off the first, and escaped from the latter. We sailed together in search of the two frigates. We sighted them three days afterwards, when they, having nimble heels, escaped us and got into Cherbourg.

Having cruised together for some time, we parted company, and we put into Falmouth. We had now been a year in commission, and all hands were eager to meet an enemy of equal force. My fear was for Harry; I don’t know how I should have felt had he been my own son, but I doubt that I should have been as anxious as I was about him, and I knew it would go well-nigh to break Susan’s heart should he be killed.

He and Reginald were in high spirits, and could talk of nothing else but the battle in which they hoped to be engaged, and were always asking me questions about those I had seen fought in my younger days. You see, after the long peace, we had a good many officers and men on board, who had never seen a shot fired in anger.

Our captain, however, and his brother, Commander Israel Pellew, had been through the American War of Independence while they were midshipmen; the latter had lately joined us as a volunteer. We sailed again on the 17th of June on a cruise. When nearly abreast of the Start we stood out for the southward, in the hopes of falling in with one of the two frigates we had chased into Cherbourg. We were about six leagues from the Start, when the look-out from the masthead hailed—

“A sail on the starboard beam.”

This was as we were standing to the south-east. You may be sure that we at once bore up in chase, under all sail. The stranger, as we got nearer, was seen carrying a press of canvas, as we fancied, to get away from us. We came up with her, however, and by the evening made her out to be no other than theCléopâtre, one of the frigates of which we were in search. Finding that she could not escape, even if she intended to do so, she hauled up her foresail, and lowered her topgallant-sail, bravely waiting for us. The men were at quarters, and the officers at their stations, while the captain conning the ship stood at the gangway with his hat in his hand. We were close up to each other and not a shot had been fired; the French captain hailed, when our captain cried out—

“Ahoy! ahoy!”

On which our crew gave three hearty cheers, and shouted—

“Long live King George!”

“Reserve your fire, my lads, till you see me put my hat on my head,” cried our captain; “then blaze away and thrash the Frenchmen as soon as you can.”

The word was passed along the deck, and all hands eagerly looked out for the signal.

The Frenchmen tried to imitate our cheer, but made a bad hand of it. Captain Mullon, as we afterwards heard was his name, the commander of the French frigate, was seen holding the red cap of liberty in his hand, and making a speech to his crew, on which they all sang out at the top of their voices,Vive la République, and one of the sailors, running up the main rigging, secured the red cap to the masthead. We stood on till our foremost guns could bear on the starboard quarter of the enemy.

The French captain held his hat, like our captain, in his hand. They bowed to each other, when ours was seen to place his on his head. It was the looked-for signal. At that instant we opened fire, which the Frenchmen were not slow in returning. We were running before the wind, within rather less than hailing distance of the Frenchman, who was on our larboard beam. In little more than half an hour we had shot away the Frenchman’s mizzenmast and wheel; but our mainmast was badly wounded, and every instant I expected it to fall. Having lost command of her rudder, theCléopâtrefell aboard us, her jib-boom passing through our fore and mainmast. I thought that this would finish our mainmast, but, fortunately, the Frenchman’s jib-boom gave way.

We were blazing away all this time, raking theCléopâtrefore and aft. We had lost a good many officers and men, and I saw two midshipmen knocked over not far from me. I looked out for Harry and Reginald Leslie, and I caught sight of them, still standing unharmed amid the smoke, but I had not much time even to think about them or anything else except my duty.

We now fell alongside the enemy head and stern, being still foul of each other. Her larboard-main-topsail studden-sail-boom iron having hooked the leach-rope of our maintop-sail, I had still good reasons to tremble for our mainmast. I saw a youngster spring aloft. It was Harry. He made his way along the yard, and with his knife cut the leach-rope; and though many a shot from the Frenchmen was fired at him, he came down safely. I felt my heart beat with pride as I saw him, for he had saved the mast. The next moment the cry was heard—

“Boarders, away!”

Our brave first lieutenant, Mr Norris, leading the boarders, cutlass in hand, leapt from the quarter-deck on to the forecastle of the French frigate, while our master, Mr Ball, at the head of another party, made his way through the bow-ports of the enemy. On they rushed, one party on the upper and the other on the main-deck, sweeping all before them. The Frenchmen, though they numbered half as many again as our crew, gave way; some springing down the hatchway, others flying aft, and in fifty minutes from the commencement of the action the Republican colours were hauled down, and the Frenchmen from all directions cried for quarter.

The brave French captain was found lying on the deck, his back torn open by a round shot, and part of his hip carried away. He was seen gnawing at a piece of paper, which he continued to bite till his hand dropped, and, his head sinking down, he ceased to breathe. He fancied that he was destroying a list of coast signals used by the French, which he had found in one of his pockets; but he was mistaken, for the paper he wished to prevent falling into our hands was discovered on him covered with blood. He was a brave fellow—there was no doubt about that. We had not gained our victory without a heavy loss, for we had eighteen seamen and marines, three midshipmen and two other officers, killed, and twenty-seven wounded; while the French lost sixty-three men. I do not think there was ever during the war a more equal or better-fought battle, except that the Frenchmen had eighty more men to begin with than we had; but then theNymphhad slightly heavier metal, and was a few tons larger than our antagonist. However, I believe that if it had been the other way, we should, notwithstanding, have won the day.

As soon as we had repaired damages we made sail, though it was four days before we reached Portsmouth with our prize. The brave French captain was buried the next day in Portsmouth churchyard, the surviving officers being permitted to attend him to the grave. A few days afterwards His Majesty, George the Third, came aboard our frigate, when our captain and his brother, Commander Pellew, and all the officers of the ship, were presented to him.

The king was highly pleased with the way the action had been fought, and at once knighted our brave captain, and presented his brother with his commission as post-captain, while Lieutenant Norris was made a commander. The king made inquiries as to what others had done.

“They all did their duty, your Majesty,” answered the captain.

“No doubt about it. That is what I know my officers and seamen always do,” observed the king.

The captain then told him of the way Harry had behaved.

“I am pleased to hear it, my lad,” said the king; “and I hope some day that I shall have the pleasure of placing the flat of my sword on your shoulders. What’s your name?” asked the king.

The captain told him, and mentioned how he had been saved from theRoyal George.

“What! are you the ‘Child of the Wreck’ I have been told of?” asked the king. “I wish that more like you had been saved; you have begun well, and will prove an honour to the service, no doubt about that.”

The king spoke in a like fashion to several others. As may be supposed, I felt prouder than ever of Harry, and was sure that if his life was preserved he would not disappoint the good king or anyone else.

Chapter Seven.The grass did not grow in the streets of Portsmouth in those busy times; I managed, however, to get leave to run over to Ryde for a couple of days, and took Harry and Reginald Leslie with me. The youngsters got a hearty welcome; and when I told the captain how Harry had behaved, he complimented him greatly. The youngsters were made much of by the ladies, and they ran no small risk of being spoilt, so it seemed to me. Miss Fanny especially, the captain’s youngest daughter, seemed never tired of talking to Harry, and asking him questions which he was well pleased to answer. She was a pretty, fair-haired, blue-eyed little girl, about three years younger than him. Neither the captain nor his lady troubled themselves about the matter, looking upon them as children; of course they were not much more. Harry, however, came home in the evening to Susan and me, and I was pleased to see that he was not a bit set up, but just as affectionate to my wife as he had ever been.The day after I got home I received the long-looked-for letter from Jerry; but there was not much in it which I could make out, except that he had come to an anchor near his old home, and had half-resolved not to go wandering any more. He had made himself known to his sister, who was trying to persuade him to remain quiet. He was very mysterious about the affair I had at heart. He still insisted that he was on the right track; but as he might spoil all if it was discovered what he was about until the right time came, it would be wiser not to mention names, in case anybody should get hold of his letter.“The youngster has friends,” he added, “and is doing very well, and can wait without damage for a few years. There is another person also for whose sake, even more than for his, I should like to have the mystery cleared up, but the risk is too great to make the attempt. We must, therefore, as I have said, let both wait till the proper opportunity, and that is in the hands of One who orders all things for the best.”I should say that Jerry wrote in a very different way to that in which he spoke, and it seemed to me that when he got a pen in his hand he was no longer the rough sailor, but the educated man he had once been before he got into bad ways and ran off to sea. He signed his letter “JD,” and told me to send my answer to the post-office, but on no account to direct my letter by the name I knew him by. I of course did as he desired, thanking him heartily for what he had already done, and expressing a hope that he would not neglect the interests of one whom my wife and I loved so much.I have not time to describe one-tenth part of the events in young Harry’s career.After serving in theNymphsome time longer, I was transferred to theJunofrigate; and Captain Leslie succeeded in getting the two youngsters appointed to her. I had belonged to her when she was first in commission in the West Indies, commanded by Captain Hood. A braver man never stepped. I remember an incident which will show his character. We were lying at Saint Anne’s Harbour, Jamaica, a heavy gale of wind blowing, when the look-out from the masthead discovered far out at sea a raft; tossing about on the foaming waves, which threatened every moment to wash off three men who were seen clinging to it. The captain at once ordered a boat to put off to their assistance, but the sea was so heavy that the boat’s crew held back, thinking that they should lose their own lives if they made the attempt.“I never order men to undertake what I dare not do myself,” exclaimed Captain Hood, springing into the boat.Away he pulled amid the foam-crested, tumbling seas. Every moment we thought that the boat and all on board would be lost; but he at last succeeded in reaching the raft, and taking the three poor men off it just as they were exhausted, and would have in another minute been washed away.Such a man I was heartily glad to serve under again. We sailed immediately for the Mediterranean, where we joined Lord Hood’s fleet lying in the harbour of Toulon. The French Royalists had given up the city to the English and Spaniards, who were at that time our allies, and their troops assisted to man the fortifications. A Republican army, however, invested the place, and a good deal of fighting had been going on. The English had, however, not quite two thousand men on shore, and, though they could trust the French Royalists, the Spaniards, Neapolitans, and other troops could not be relied on. Serving in the Republican army was Napoleon Buonaparte, then an officer of artillery; not that I knew of it at the time, but I afterwards heard that he had been there when he became Emperor of the French.The French had one night surprised a detachment of Spanish troops posted on an important height above Toulon, and thereby got possession of it. No time was to be lost in driving them out, and the marines and a party of bluejackets from the ships close at hand were ordered on shore to assist the Spaniards in storming the heights and turning out the Republicans. The seamen, twenty of whom went from our ship, were headed by Lieutenant Seagrave: I went to assist in the landing. We had shoved off, when I found that Reginald Leslie and Harry had jumped into the boat. Reginald said that he was resolved to see the fun. Harry told me that he had been ordered to take charge of the men instead of a master’s mate, who was unable to go, so he was all right; but Reginald had no business to be where he was, and had there been time I should have sent him on board again. It was dark by the time we had reached the shore; the troops and bluejackets, mustering eight hundred, formed as they landed, and were immediately ordered to push forward. I had intended, as in duty bound, to keep Reginald Leslie in the boat, but he leapt on shore among the first, and I was too busy to see what became of him. The hills which rose above our heads were steep and rugged, notwithstanding which, soldiers and bluejackets pushed up them by a long and narrow path, with a rugged precipice on one side. At any moment they might arouse the enemy, who would soon have stopped their progress.I knew it would take a couple of hours or more, from the distance they had to go, before the party could be back. I waited anxiously, thinking more perhaps of Harry and his messmate than of the success of the expedition, about which I had little doubt. The time seemed very long. At last, hearing the sound of firing from among the hills, I knew that the batteries were being attacked. The firing then ceased, the sound of only an occasional shot reaching my ears. I now waited more anxiously than before for the return of the party. Suddenly the sound of great guns and musketry came down from over the hills, and I began to fear that our party were being again attacked by a superior force. I had posted a couple of lookouts on the neighbouring heights which commanded the path, to give notice of the approach of either friends or foes. One of them came running down, crying out—“They are coming, sir, they are coming!”“Our people or the French?” I asked.“Sure it must be our people, sir,” answered the man, who was Irish but as he seemed somewhat doubtful about the matter, I ordered the men into the boats, to be ready to shove off, should by any chance our party have been cut off. At last I saw a large body of men coming down the hill, and was greatly relieved when I discovered that they were Spaniards, and that our other allies were following close behind. Soon afterwards the English troops came in sight, the bluejackets bringing up the rear. They were at once embarked, and I heard that they had stormed and captured the batteries, and spiked the guns, but had been attacked on their way back by a large body of Republicans, who, however, had been defeated with great loss. I anxiously looked out for the two midshipmen, but could nowhere find them. I made inquiries, and was told that they had been seen with the sailors, unhurt, just before the last attack, but that several men had fallen just as they had received orders to charge the enemy. It was very evident, I feared, that they had either been killed or taken prisoners. Still, as I could not bear the thoughts of leaving them, I obtained permission from the commanding officer to take a party of men and to go in search of them, as, should they have been only wounded, they might not be far off. I had plenty of volunteers, but chose only ten men, with a French Royalist officer who had been aboard our ship and knew the country. There was no time to be lost, so we started at once up the steep path. I felt my heart greatly cast down, for I would have sooner lost my life than have had the brave boys cut off. Still I had some faint hopes of finding them; but should they have been taken prisoners by the Republicans, I had too much reason to fear that they would be shot; for those fellows were terrible savages, and many of their Royalist countrymen who had fallen into their hands had been mercilessly put to death. As we approached the spot where the Republicans had attacked our friends, we carefully examined the ground on either side. Pushing on, we came upon several dead bodies of men who had been shot, two or three of whom were Spaniards, the others Neapolitans; and farther on were a still greater number of Republicans who had been killed in the attack on the troops; still we went on till we got near the batteries, when our guide, though a brave man, refused to go farther, saying that we should probably lose our own lives, as the enemy were likely to be in the neighbourhood, and that it was most probable the midshipmen had been taken prisoners. Very unwillingly, therefore, I agreed to return. We still examined every place on either side of the road into which a person could have crept for concealment, for my idea was that one of the youngsters had been wounded, and that the other had refused to desert him. All this time we had been careful not to speak above a whisper, for fear, should an enemy be in the neighbourhood, of giving notice of our approach. We had got more than half-way down the hill, when, just as we turned a sharp angle of the path, I caught sight, through the gloom, of a figure, some fifty yards ahead of us, moving on, it seemed slowly; the person, whoever he was, must have heard our footsteps, for he appeared to run on, we of course making chase; presently he stopped, and the next instant we lost sight of him. Some of the men fancied that he must have gone over the precipice. We were quickly up to the spot, and were speaking pretty loudly about what had become of the man, when I heard a voice crying out my name, and, turning round, there in a hole of the rock I discovered Harry supporting Reginald in his arms.“Thank Heaven!” he exclaimed; “I thought you were Republicans, and that we should have been taken off by them.”All hands were very glad to find the young gentlemen, but we lost no time in talking. It had been just as I had supposed; Reginald had been wounded, and falling by the edge of a bank had rolled down it, and Harry, who had been at his side at the time, followed him. Just then the Republicans who had been coming up had charged our men, and, in the darkness, the lads being unable to tell which party had gained the victory, they had been afraid to climb up the bank till all was again silent. By this time Reginald’s wound prevented him from walking, and Harry had had great difficulty in getting him up the bank; he then had taken him on his shoulders, intending to carry him down the hill, but when he had got some way Reginald fainted from pain and loss of blood. On this he had carried him to a copse on the hillside, some little way off; here he had put him down, and had done his best to bind up his wound, intending to go on again as soon as Reginald was somewhat recovered. He had heard us hunting about, but thinking that we might be enemies he had kept silent, though it was a wonder that no one had discovered the youngsters. After we had passed by, Reginald having come to, Harry had taken him on his back, and was proceeding down the hill when he overtook them as I have mentioned. We, of course, lifted up Reginald, and hurried as fast as we could down to the boat.Harry, as he deserved, gained great credit for the way he had behaved, for he had undoubtedly saved Reginald’s life; and, in consideration of his wound, the captain forgave Reginald for having left the ship without leave.I never had a fancy for fighting on shore, and I was not sorry when we were ordered to Malta, to bring away a party of Maltese marines, engaged to serve on board the fleet.We had light and unfavourable winds going, and, on returning with the soldiers aboard, we met with a succession of strong contrary gales from the eastward, and a lee current, which prevented us from arriving abreast of the harbour’s mouth till about ten o’clock at night on the 11th of January. The captain, not wishing to run the risk of being thrown to leeward, considering the number of men we had on board, determined to sail into the harbour at once. We had no pilot, but the master felt confident that he could take the ship in without risk. The hands were at their stations, and the captain ordered Harry and another midshipman to go forward with night-glasses and look out for the fleet. We had a moderate leading wind, which sent us under our topsails at a fair rate through the water. As we neared the outer roads of Toulon we were somewhat surprised at not seeing any of the fleet, but the captain concluded that the ships had run for shelter into the inner harbour.The night, was clear, the moon was shining brightly, and the water smooth. As we advanced we made out a brig ahead, and beyond her the lights of several others. The captain, therefore, had no doubt but that he was right in his conjectures. Having passed the forts, we were standing on, when we found that we could not weather the brig-of-war we had seen ahead of us. We were close to her stern, when a hail came from her, but what was said we could not make out. The captain, however, supposing that the brig was Spanish, and wanted to know what ship ours was, answered—“His Britannic Majesty’s frigateJuno!”Again a hail came from the brig, and several people shouted out, “Viva!” The captain then inquired what English ships were in the harbour, but we could not make out a word of what was said in reply; still, of course, taking her for Spanish, this did not surprise us, except that it seemed somewhat strange that an English vessel should not have been stationed at the mouth of the harbour. Just as we passed under the stern of the brig, someone again hailed from her—“Luff! luff!”The captain, fearing that we had shoal water aboard, ordered the helm to be put a-lee, but before the frigate got her head to the wind we were aground. The captain immediately ordered the sails to be clewed up and handed. While the people were on the yards, we caught sight of a boat pulling from the brig towards the town. Just then, before the people were off the yards, a sudden flaw of wind drove the ship’s head off the bank. Hoping now to get off, the order was given to hoist the driver and mizzen-staysail, and to keep the sheets to windward. The instant the ship lost her way, the bower-anchor was let go, on which she tended to the wind; but the after-part of her keel was still aground. The launch and cutter were now hoisted out, and I jumped into the first to carry out the kedge-anchor, with two hawsers, in order to warp the ship clear. We worked away with a will, for we did not like the thoughts of being seen on shore by the rest of the fleet at daybreak. That was all we just then thought about. At length we succeeded in getting her completely afloat, and were returning to the ship, when we saw a boat go alongside, and being hailed, she answered, “Captain Someone,” but we did not catch the name, and up the side he went with two other persons, who seemed to be officers. On reaching the deck he introduced himself as a French captain, and said that it was the regulation of the port, and according to the commands of the admiral, that vessels should go into another part of the harbour and do ten days’ quarantine.On this, Captain Hood asked where theVictory, the admiral’s ship, lay. The French officer hesitated, and then said she was far up the harbour.Just then Harry, who had a sharp eye, exclaimed somewhat loudly to a messmate—“Why, the fellows have the Republican cockades in their hats!”The captain overheard him; and, looking more earnestly at the Frenchmen’s hats, he saw by the light of the moon, to his dismay, the three Republican colours. He put another question about the admiral, when the French officer, finding that he and his companions were suspected, replied—“Make yourselves easy; the English are good people, and we will treat them kindly; the English admiral has departed some time.”I can just fancy how our brave captain felt.“We are prisoners!” exclaimed one of the officers; and the word, like wildfire, ran along the deck, while several of the officers hurried up to the captain to learn the truth. We all knew what we had to expect—a French prison till the end of the war, even if we escaped being shot by the Republicans. I never felt more cast down in all my life, and I believe that was the case with everyone on board. To be caught like a rat in a trap, without a chance of escape, seemed too bad. We were all standing, not knowing what to do, some proposing one thing and some another, expecting the French boats to come alongside and take possession of our tidy little frigate, when a flaw of wind came down the harbour. Scarcely had we felt it than our third lieutenant, Mr Webley, exclaimed—“I believe, sir, we shall be able to fetch out if we can get her under sail.”“We will try it at all events, and Heaven grant we may,” answered the captain; “we will not give up our ship without doing our best to save her. All hands to their stations! Send the Frenchmen below.”I never saw such a wonderful change as in a moment came over everybody on board. The Frenchmen began to bluster and drew their sabres, but our jollies quickly made them sheath them again, and they had to submit with remarkably bad grace, hoping, I daresay, that we should again get on shore. Officers and men flew to their stations, and in less than three minutes we had the canvas on her, and the yards braced ready for casting. The head sails filled.“Cut the cable!” shouted the captain.The ship quickly gathering way, began to glide down the harbour. Our launch and cutter, and the Frenchmen’s boat, were at once cut adrift, so as not to impede us, while a favourable flaw of wind gave the ship additional way. We had still, however, the heavy batteries to pass, and it was not likely that they would allow us to go by without a warm peppering; not that we thought much about that, for I know my heart bounded as light as a cork, and so I am pretty sure did the hearts of everyone on board at the thoughts that we were free.Directly we began to loose our sails, the French brig opened her fire, and we saw lights bursting out on all the batteries; while one, a little on the starboard bow, was blazing away at us. As we glided on, the guns of all the forts opened fire as they could be brought to bear. The wind was very scant, and it seemed impossible that we could weather the point without tacking, and, of course, while we were in stays, the enemy would have taken steady aim; but again a favourable flaw of wind helped us. As soon as the ship was well under command, the order was given to man the guns, and we began returning the enemy’s fire with good effect, as far as we could judge. The Frenchmen’s shot came flying through our sails, considerably cutting up our rigging, and two thirty-six pound shot struck our hull; but we repaired damages as fast as we could, and, nothing daunted, stood on. Wonderful to relate, all the time not a man had been hit; and if we felt happy when we first got the frigate under way, we had reason to be doubly so when we found ourselves clear of the harbour and not a ship following us. We should have had no objection to it had a frigate of our own size come out, as to a certainty we should have given her a sound drubbing, and finished by carrying her off as a prize.

The grass did not grow in the streets of Portsmouth in those busy times; I managed, however, to get leave to run over to Ryde for a couple of days, and took Harry and Reginald Leslie with me. The youngsters got a hearty welcome; and when I told the captain how Harry had behaved, he complimented him greatly. The youngsters were made much of by the ladies, and they ran no small risk of being spoilt, so it seemed to me. Miss Fanny especially, the captain’s youngest daughter, seemed never tired of talking to Harry, and asking him questions which he was well pleased to answer. She was a pretty, fair-haired, blue-eyed little girl, about three years younger than him. Neither the captain nor his lady troubled themselves about the matter, looking upon them as children; of course they were not much more. Harry, however, came home in the evening to Susan and me, and I was pleased to see that he was not a bit set up, but just as affectionate to my wife as he had ever been.

The day after I got home I received the long-looked-for letter from Jerry; but there was not much in it which I could make out, except that he had come to an anchor near his old home, and had half-resolved not to go wandering any more. He had made himself known to his sister, who was trying to persuade him to remain quiet. He was very mysterious about the affair I had at heart. He still insisted that he was on the right track; but as he might spoil all if it was discovered what he was about until the right time came, it would be wiser not to mention names, in case anybody should get hold of his letter.

“The youngster has friends,” he added, “and is doing very well, and can wait without damage for a few years. There is another person also for whose sake, even more than for his, I should like to have the mystery cleared up, but the risk is too great to make the attempt. We must, therefore, as I have said, let both wait till the proper opportunity, and that is in the hands of One who orders all things for the best.”

I should say that Jerry wrote in a very different way to that in which he spoke, and it seemed to me that when he got a pen in his hand he was no longer the rough sailor, but the educated man he had once been before he got into bad ways and ran off to sea. He signed his letter “JD,” and told me to send my answer to the post-office, but on no account to direct my letter by the name I knew him by. I of course did as he desired, thanking him heartily for what he had already done, and expressing a hope that he would not neglect the interests of one whom my wife and I loved so much.

I have not time to describe one-tenth part of the events in young Harry’s career.

After serving in theNymphsome time longer, I was transferred to theJunofrigate; and Captain Leslie succeeded in getting the two youngsters appointed to her. I had belonged to her when she was first in commission in the West Indies, commanded by Captain Hood. A braver man never stepped. I remember an incident which will show his character. We were lying at Saint Anne’s Harbour, Jamaica, a heavy gale of wind blowing, when the look-out from the masthead discovered far out at sea a raft; tossing about on the foaming waves, which threatened every moment to wash off three men who were seen clinging to it. The captain at once ordered a boat to put off to their assistance, but the sea was so heavy that the boat’s crew held back, thinking that they should lose their own lives if they made the attempt.

“I never order men to undertake what I dare not do myself,” exclaimed Captain Hood, springing into the boat.

Away he pulled amid the foam-crested, tumbling seas. Every moment we thought that the boat and all on board would be lost; but he at last succeeded in reaching the raft, and taking the three poor men off it just as they were exhausted, and would have in another minute been washed away.

Such a man I was heartily glad to serve under again. We sailed immediately for the Mediterranean, where we joined Lord Hood’s fleet lying in the harbour of Toulon. The French Royalists had given up the city to the English and Spaniards, who were at that time our allies, and their troops assisted to man the fortifications. A Republican army, however, invested the place, and a good deal of fighting had been going on. The English had, however, not quite two thousand men on shore, and, though they could trust the French Royalists, the Spaniards, Neapolitans, and other troops could not be relied on. Serving in the Republican army was Napoleon Buonaparte, then an officer of artillery; not that I knew of it at the time, but I afterwards heard that he had been there when he became Emperor of the French.

The French had one night surprised a detachment of Spanish troops posted on an important height above Toulon, and thereby got possession of it. No time was to be lost in driving them out, and the marines and a party of bluejackets from the ships close at hand were ordered on shore to assist the Spaniards in storming the heights and turning out the Republicans. The seamen, twenty of whom went from our ship, were headed by Lieutenant Seagrave: I went to assist in the landing. We had shoved off, when I found that Reginald Leslie and Harry had jumped into the boat. Reginald said that he was resolved to see the fun. Harry told me that he had been ordered to take charge of the men instead of a master’s mate, who was unable to go, so he was all right; but Reginald had no business to be where he was, and had there been time I should have sent him on board again. It was dark by the time we had reached the shore; the troops and bluejackets, mustering eight hundred, formed as they landed, and were immediately ordered to push forward. I had intended, as in duty bound, to keep Reginald Leslie in the boat, but he leapt on shore among the first, and I was too busy to see what became of him. The hills which rose above our heads were steep and rugged, notwithstanding which, soldiers and bluejackets pushed up them by a long and narrow path, with a rugged precipice on one side. At any moment they might arouse the enemy, who would soon have stopped their progress.

I knew it would take a couple of hours or more, from the distance they had to go, before the party could be back. I waited anxiously, thinking more perhaps of Harry and his messmate than of the success of the expedition, about which I had little doubt. The time seemed very long. At last, hearing the sound of firing from among the hills, I knew that the batteries were being attacked. The firing then ceased, the sound of only an occasional shot reaching my ears. I now waited more anxiously than before for the return of the party. Suddenly the sound of great guns and musketry came down from over the hills, and I began to fear that our party were being again attacked by a superior force. I had posted a couple of lookouts on the neighbouring heights which commanded the path, to give notice of the approach of either friends or foes. One of them came running down, crying out—

“They are coming, sir, they are coming!”

“Our people or the French?” I asked.

“Sure it must be our people, sir,” answered the man, who was Irish but as he seemed somewhat doubtful about the matter, I ordered the men into the boats, to be ready to shove off, should by any chance our party have been cut off. At last I saw a large body of men coming down the hill, and was greatly relieved when I discovered that they were Spaniards, and that our other allies were following close behind. Soon afterwards the English troops came in sight, the bluejackets bringing up the rear. They were at once embarked, and I heard that they had stormed and captured the batteries, and spiked the guns, but had been attacked on their way back by a large body of Republicans, who, however, had been defeated with great loss. I anxiously looked out for the two midshipmen, but could nowhere find them. I made inquiries, and was told that they had been seen with the sailors, unhurt, just before the last attack, but that several men had fallen just as they had received orders to charge the enemy. It was very evident, I feared, that they had either been killed or taken prisoners. Still, as I could not bear the thoughts of leaving them, I obtained permission from the commanding officer to take a party of men and to go in search of them, as, should they have been only wounded, they might not be far off. I had plenty of volunteers, but chose only ten men, with a French Royalist officer who had been aboard our ship and knew the country. There was no time to be lost, so we started at once up the steep path. I felt my heart greatly cast down, for I would have sooner lost my life than have had the brave boys cut off. Still I had some faint hopes of finding them; but should they have been taken prisoners by the Republicans, I had too much reason to fear that they would be shot; for those fellows were terrible savages, and many of their Royalist countrymen who had fallen into their hands had been mercilessly put to death. As we approached the spot where the Republicans had attacked our friends, we carefully examined the ground on either side. Pushing on, we came upon several dead bodies of men who had been shot, two or three of whom were Spaniards, the others Neapolitans; and farther on were a still greater number of Republicans who had been killed in the attack on the troops; still we went on till we got near the batteries, when our guide, though a brave man, refused to go farther, saying that we should probably lose our own lives, as the enemy were likely to be in the neighbourhood, and that it was most probable the midshipmen had been taken prisoners. Very unwillingly, therefore, I agreed to return. We still examined every place on either side of the road into which a person could have crept for concealment, for my idea was that one of the youngsters had been wounded, and that the other had refused to desert him. All this time we had been careful not to speak above a whisper, for fear, should an enemy be in the neighbourhood, of giving notice of our approach. We had got more than half-way down the hill, when, just as we turned a sharp angle of the path, I caught sight, through the gloom, of a figure, some fifty yards ahead of us, moving on, it seemed slowly; the person, whoever he was, must have heard our footsteps, for he appeared to run on, we of course making chase; presently he stopped, and the next instant we lost sight of him. Some of the men fancied that he must have gone over the precipice. We were quickly up to the spot, and were speaking pretty loudly about what had become of the man, when I heard a voice crying out my name, and, turning round, there in a hole of the rock I discovered Harry supporting Reginald in his arms.

“Thank Heaven!” he exclaimed; “I thought you were Republicans, and that we should have been taken off by them.”

All hands were very glad to find the young gentlemen, but we lost no time in talking. It had been just as I had supposed; Reginald had been wounded, and falling by the edge of a bank had rolled down it, and Harry, who had been at his side at the time, followed him. Just then the Republicans who had been coming up had charged our men, and, in the darkness, the lads being unable to tell which party had gained the victory, they had been afraid to climb up the bank till all was again silent. By this time Reginald’s wound prevented him from walking, and Harry had had great difficulty in getting him up the bank; he then had taken him on his shoulders, intending to carry him down the hill, but when he had got some way Reginald fainted from pain and loss of blood. On this he had carried him to a copse on the hillside, some little way off; here he had put him down, and had done his best to bind up his wound, intending to go on again as soon as Reginald was somewhat recovered. He had heard us hunting about, but thinking that we might be enemies he had kept silent, though it was a wonder that no one had discovered the youngsters. After we had passed by, Reginald having come to, Harry had taken him on his back, and was proceeding down the hill when he overtook them as I have mentioned. We, of course, lifted up Reginald, and hurried as fast as we could down to the boat.

Harry, as he deserved, gained great credit for the way he had behaved, for he had undoubtedly saved Reginald’s life; and, in consideration of his wound, the captain forgave Reginald for having left the ship without leave.

I never had a fancy for fighting on shore, and I was not sorry when we were ordered to Malta, to bring away a party of Maltese marines, engaged to serve on board the fleet.

We had light and unfavourable winds going, and, on returning with the soldiers aboard, we met with a succession of strong contrary gales from the eastward, and a lee current, which prevented us from arriving abreast of the harbour’s mouth till about ten o’clock at night on the 11th of January. The captain, not wishing to run the risk of being thrown to leeward, considering the number of men we had on board, determined to sail into the harbour at once. We had no pilot, but the master felt confident that he could take the ship in without risk. The hands were at their stations, and the captain ordered Harry and another midshipman to go forward with night-glasses and look out for the fleet. We had a moderate leading wind, which sent us under our topsails at a fair rate through the water. As we neared the outer roads of Toulon we were somewhat surprised at not seeing any of the fleet, but the captain concluded that the ships had run for shelter into the inner harbour.

The night, was clear, the moon was shining brightly, and the water smooth. As we advanced we made out a brig ahead, and beyond her the lights of several others. The captain, therefore, had no doubt but that he was right in his conjectures. Having passed the forts, we were standing on, when we found that we could not weather the brig-of-war we had seen ahead of us. We were close to her stern, when a hail came from her, but what was said we could not make out. The captain, however, supposing that the brig was Spanish, and wanted to know what ship ours was, answered—

“His Britannic Majesty’s frigateJuno!”

Again a hail came from the brig, and several people shouted out, “Viva!” The captain then inquired what English ships were in the harbour, but we could not make out a word of what was said in reply; still, of course, taking her for Spanish, this did not surprise us, except that it seemed somewhat strange that an English vessel should not have been stationed at the mouth of the harbour. Just as we passed under the stern of the brig, someone again hailed from her—

“Luff! luff!”

The captain, fearing that we had shoal water aboard, ordered the helm to be put a-lee, but before the frigate got her head to the wind we were aground. The captain immediately ordered the sails to be clewed up and handed. While the people were on the yards, we caught sight of a boat pulling from the brig towards the town. Just then, before the people were off the yards, a sudden flaw of wind drove the ship’s head off the bank. Hoping now to get off, the order was given to hoist the driver and mizzen-staysail, and to keep the sheets to windward. The instant the ship lost her way, the bower-anchor was let go, on which she tended to the wind; but the after-part of her keel was still aground. The launch and cutter were now hoisted out, and I jumped into the first to carry out the kedge-anchor, with two hawsers, in order to warp the ship clear. We worked away with a will, for we did not like the thoughts of being seen on shore by the rest of the fleet at daybreak. That was all we just then thought about. At length we succeeded in getting her completely afloat, and were returning to the ship, when we saw a boat go alongside, and being hailed, she answered, “Captain Someone,” but we did not catch the name, and up the side he went with two other persons, who seemed to be officers. On reaching the deck he introduced himself as a French captain, and said that it was the regulation of the port, and according to the commands of the admiral, that vessels should go into another part of the harbour and do ten days’ quarantine.

On this, Captain Hood asked where theVictory, the admiral’s ship, lay. The French officer hesitated, and then said she was far up the harbour.

Just then Harry, who had a sharp eye, exclaimed somewhat loudly to a messmate—

“Why, the fellows have the Republican cockades in their hats!”

The captain overheard him; and, looking more earnestly at the Frenchmen’s hats, he saw by the light of the moon, to his dismay, the three Republican colours. He put another question about the admiral, when the French officer, finding that he and his companions were suspected, replied—

“Make yourselves easy; the English are good people, and we will treat them kindly; the English admiral has departed some time.”

I can just fancy how our brave captain felt.

“We are prisoners!” exclaimed one of the officers; and the word, like wildfire, ran along the deck, while several of the officers hurried up to the captain to learn the truth. We all knew what we had to expect—a French prison till the end of the war, even if we escaped being shot by the Republicans. I never felt more cast down in all my life, and I believe that was the case with everyone on board. To be caught like a rat in a trap, without a chance of escape, seemed too bad. We were all standing, not knowing what to do, some proposing one thing and some another, expecting the French boats to come alongside and take possession of our tidy little frigate, when a flaw of wind came down the harbour. Scarcely had we felt it than our third lieutenant, Mr Webley, exclaimed—

“I believe, sir, we shall be able to fetch out if we can get her under sail.”

“We will try it at all events, and Heaven grant we may,” answered the captain; “we will not give up our ship without doing our best to save her. All hands to their stations! Send the Frenchmen below.”

I never saw such a wonderful change as in a moment came over everybody on board. The Frenchmen began to bluster and drew their sabres, but our jollies quickly made them sheath them again, and they had to submit with remarkably bad grace, hoping, I daresay, that we should again get on shore. Officers and men flew to their stations, and in less than three minutes we had the canvas on her, and the yards braced ready for casting. The head sails filled.

“Cut the cable!” shouted the captain.

The ship quickly gathering way, began to glide down the harbour. Our launch and cutter, and the Frenchmen’s boat, were at once cut adrift, so as not to impede us, while a favourable flaw of wind gave the ship additional way. We had still, however, the heavy batteries to pass, and it was not likely that they would allow us to go by without a warm peppering; not that we thought much about that, for I know my heart bounded as light as a cork, and so I am pretty sure did the hearts of everyone on board at the thoughts that we were free.

Directly we began to loose our sails, the French brig opened her fire, and we saw lights bursting out on all the batteries; while one, a little on the starboard bow, was blazing away at us. As we glided on, the guns of all the forts opened fire as they could be brought to bear. The wind was very scant, and it seemed impossible that we could weather the point without tacking, and, of course, while we were in stays, the enemy would have taken steady aim; but again a favourable flaw of wind helped us. As soon as the ship was well under command, the order was given to man the guns, and we began returning the enemy’s fire with good effect, as far as we could judge. The Frenchmen’s shot came flying through our sails, considerably cutting up our rigging, and two thirty-six pound shot struck our hull; but we repaired damages as fast as we could, and, nothing daunted, stood on. Wonderful to relate, all the time not a man had been hit; and if we felt happy when we first got the frigate under way, we had reason to be doubly so when we found ourselves clear of the harbour and not a ship following us. We should have had no objection to it had a frigate of our own size come out, as to a certainty we should have given her a sound drubbing, and finished by carrying her off as a prize.

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