he bulwarks at eight o'clock the next morning.
White mist was all around us, a sea with no horizon. Suddenly, like the
curtain of a theatre, the mist rose. Gradually the horizon-line
appeared, then a line of low coast, which, muddy-looking as it was, made
one's heart beat thick and fast. Then lines of dark wood; then the shore
was dotted with grey huts; then the sun came out, the breeze was soft
and mild, and the air became strangely scented, and redolent of pine
forests. Nearer the coast took more shape, though it was still low,
rather bare and dotted with brushwood and grey stones low down, and
always crowned with pines. Then habitations began to sparkle along the
shore. Red roofs, cardboard-looking churches, little white wooden
houses, and stiffish trees mixed everywhere. And the pine odour on the
breeze was sweeter and sweeter with every breath one drew.

Suddenly I found Alister's arm round my shoulder.

"Isn't it glorious?" I exclaimed.

"Aye, aye," he said, and then, as if afraid he had not said enough, he
added with an effort: "The toun's built almost entirely of wood, I'm
told, with a population of close on 30,000 inhabitants."

"What a fellow you are!" I groaned: "Alister, aren't you glad we're safe
here? Are you ever pleased about anything?"

He didn't speak, and I turned in his arm to look up at his face. His
eyes, which always remind me of the sea, were looking away over it, but
he brought them back to meet mine, and pressed my shoulder.

"It is bonnie," he said, "verra bonnie. But eh, man! if strange land
shines like yon, hoo'll oor ain shores look whenever we win Home?"

CHAPTER IX.

"One, two, three, and away!"

We three were fast friends when our voyage ended, and in planning our
future we planned to stick together, "Like the three leaves of the
shamrock," as Dennis O'Moore said.

The captain would have kept Alister as one of his crew, but the Scotch
lad had definite plans for looking up a cousin on this side of the
Atlantic, and pushing his fortunes by the help of his relative, so he
did not care to make the return voyage. The captain did not offer the
berth to me, but he was very kind, and returned my money, and gave us a
written paper testifying to our good conduct and capabilities. He also
gave Alister his address, and he and the other officers collected a
small sum of money for him as a parting gift.

That afternoon we three crossed the harbour, and went fo