er keeps a man's youth in pickle. No
valentine for me! Paid off my ship yesterday at Spithead, and here I am
again on Valentine's Day.'

Temple and I stared hard at a big man with a bronzed skin and a rubicund
laugh who expected to receive valentines.

My aunt thrust the letter back to me secretly. 'It must be from a lady,'
said she.

'Why, who'd have a valentine from any but a lady?' exclaimed the
captain.

The squire winked at me to watch his guest. Captain Bulsted fed
heartily; he was thoroughly a sailor-gentleman, between the old school
and the new, and, as I perceived, as far gone in love with my aunt as
his brother was. Presently Sewis entered carrying a foaming tankard of
old ale, and he and the captain exchanged a word or two upon Jamaica.

'Now, when you've finished that washy tea of yours, take a draught of
our October, brewed here long before you were a lieutenant, captain,'
said the squire.

'Thank you, sir,' the captain replied; 'I know that ale; a moment, and
I will gladly. I wish to preserve my faculties; I don't wish to have it
supposed that I speak under fermenting influences. Sewis, hold by, if
you please.'

My aunt made an effort to retire.

'No, no, fair play; stay,' said the squire, trying to frown, but
twinkling; my aunt tried to smile, and sat as if on springs.

'Miss Beltham,' the captain bowed to her, and to each one as he spoke,
'Squire Beltham, Mr. Harry Richmond; Mr. Temple; my ship was paid off
yesterday, and till a captain's ship is paid off, he 's not his own
master, you are aware. If you think my behaviour calls for comment,
reflect, I beseech you, on the nature of a sailor's life. A three-years'
cruise in a cabin is pretty much equivalent to the same amount of time
spent in a coffin, I can assure you; with the difference that you're
hard at work thinking all the time like the--hum.'

'Ay, he thinks hard enough,' the squire struck in.

'Pardon me, sir; like the--hum--plumb-line on a leeshore, I meant to
observe. This is now the third--the fourth occasion on which I have
practised the observance of paying my first visit to Riversley to know
my fate, that I might not have it on my conscience that I had missed a
day, a minute, as soon as I was a free man on English terra firma. My
brother Greg and I were brought up in close association with Riversley.
One of the Beauties of Riversley we lost! One was left, and we both
tried our luck with her; honourably, in turn, each of us, no