I do think it would have huv' the shot the best part
of a mile!"

--But this digression is leading me from the narrative. My Lord
Chatterino turned his head a little on one side as we were passing,
and I was deliberating whether, under the circumstances, it would be
well-bred to remind him of our old acquaintance, when the question was
settled by the decision of Captain Poke, who placed himself in such a
position that it was no easy matter to get round him, through him, or
over him--or who laid himself what he called "athwart hawse."

"Good morning, my lord," said the straightforward seaman, who generally
went at a subject as he went at a seal. "A fine warm day; and the smell
of the land, after so long a passage, is quite agreeable to the nose,
whatever its ups and downs may be to the legs."

The companions of the young peer looked amazed; and some of them,
I thought, notwithstanding gravity and earnestness are rather
characteristic of the monikin physiognomy, betrayed a slight disposition
to laugh. Not so with my Lord Chatterino himself.

He examined us a moment through a glass, and then seemed suddenly, and
on the whole, agreeably struck at seeing us.

"How, Goldencalf!" he cried in surprise, "you in Leaphigh! This is
indeed an unexpected satisfaction; for it will now be in my power
to prove some of the facts that I am telling my friends, by actual
observation. Here are two of the humans, gents, of whom I was but this
moment giving you some account--"

Observing a disposition to merriment in his associates, he continued,
looking exceedingly grave:--

"Restrain yourselves, gentlemen, I pray you. These are very worthy
people, I do assure you, in their own way, and are not at all to be
ridiculed. I scarcely know, even in our own marine, a better or a
bolder navigator than this honest seaman; and as for the one in the
parti-colored skin, I will take upon myself to say, that he is really a
person of some consideration in his own little circle. He is, I believe,
a member of par--par--par--am I right, Sir John?--a member of--"

"Parliament, my lord--an M.P."

"Ay--I thought I had it--an M.P., or a member of Parliament, in his own
country, which, I dare say now, is some such thing among his people, as
a public proclaimer of those laws which come from his majesty's eldest
first cousin of the masculine gender, may be among us. Some such
thing--eh--now--eh--is it not, Sir John?"

"I dare say it is, my lord."

"All