Hesse Darmstadt, and the Earls of Galway
and Peterborough, and probably every one of them with his own ideas and
opinions, it will be hard to come to any arrangement. Besides there will
be dispatches from the British court, and the court of the Netherlands,
and the Austrian emperor, all of whom will probably differ as to what
is the best thing to be done. There will be a nice to do altogether.
There's one thing to be said, our chief can out talk them all; and he
can say such disagreeable things when he likes that he will be likely
to get his own way, if it's only to get rid of him. There goes his boat
into the water. What an impatient fellow he is, to be sure."

No sooner had Peterborough landed than he turned all his energies to
obtain the supplies which had been denied to him at home, and after much
difficulty he succeeded in borrowing a hundred thousand pounds from
a Jew named Curtisos on treasury bills on Lord Godolphin, with the
condition that the lender should be given the contract for the supply of
provisions and other requisites for the army. The day that the earl had
carried out this arrangement he returned on board radiant. Hitherto
he had been terribly out of temper, and Jack, who had become his
amanuensis, had written at his dictation many very sharp notes to every
one with whom he had come in contact. As soon as he came on board he
sent for Jack to his cabin.

"Sit down, Mr. Stilwell. I have a dispatch for you to write to the lord
treasurer. I have got my money, so that difficulty is at an end. It is
glorious! I couldn't get a penny out of them before I sailed, now I have
got as much as I want. I would give a thousand guineas out of my own
pocket to see Godolphin's face when he reads my dispatch, and finds that
he's got to honor bills for a hundred thousand pounds; it will be better
than any comedy that ever was acted. How the pompous old owl will fret
and fume! But he will have to find the money for all that. He can't
begin the campaign by dishonoring bills of her majesty's general, or no
one would trust us hereafter. You haven't seen my lord treasurer, Mr.
Stilwell?"

"No, sir, I have not been at court at all."

"That's a pity," the earl said; "for you lose the cream of the joke.
Now, I shall go on shore tomorrow and get everything that is wanted, and
then the sooner we are off the better; we have been here a fortnight,
and I am sick of the place."

Jack was by no means sick of Lisbon, for he enjoye