rt schooner, except to make
a prize of her?"

"Oh, but that's in time of war," cried Rodd. "Ay, sir, but your private
ears aren't very particular about that. This is near enough to war time
still, and if I was our skipper I should keep a good sharp eye on that
craft. But he knows pretty well what he's about. His head is screwed
on the right way. But I say, Mr Rodd, how should you like a bit of the
real thing, same as we used to have when I was in a King's ship?"

"What, a naval action?"

"Oh, you may call it that, sir, if you like. I mean a bit of real
French and English, and see which is best man."

"Oh, nonsense! That's all over now, Joe."

"I don't know so much about that, sir."

"But we are in a friendly port, Joe, and no French ship would dare
attack one of ours."

"No, sir, I know they daren't do it," said the man stubbornly; "but if
they could catch us asleep they might have a try. But there, don't you
be uncomfortable. There's too much of the weasel about our skipper, and
he'll be too wide awake to let any Frenchman catch him asleep."

"Ah, you are thinking a lot of nonsense, Joe," said Rodd. "The war is
all at an end, and Napoleon Bonaparte shut up in prison at Saint Helena.
There'll be no more fighting now."

"Well, sir, I suppose you are right," said the man, with something like
a sigh; "but you see, like some of my mates, I have seen a bit of
sarvice in a King's ship, and we have got our guns on board, and we have
just now been lying alongside--I should say bow and stern--of a
Frenchman so as we could slew round and rake her; and it sets a man
thinking. But there, I suppose you are right, and there will be no
fighting for us this voyage."

"Of course there won't be. We are friends now with France."

"Yes, sir, and the French pretends to be friends with us; but all the
same if I was the skipper I should double my night watch and be well on
the look-out for squalls.--Ay, ay, sir!"

Joe Cross answered a hail from the skipper, and was directly after busy
at work helping his mates to make all snug aloft, for the wind had sunk
now into a pleasant soft gale which seemed to suggest fine weather; but
Captain Chubb shook his head and frowned very severely as he looked out
to windward.

"Nay, my lad," he said, "we have made our start and got as far as here,
but it don't seem to me like getting away just yet, for there's a lot of
weather hanging about somewhere, and as we are in no hurry and