aving-mirror as a heliograph, evidently either trying to attract the
attention of someone on shore, or sending a message: it did not much
signify which, for Frobisher was easily able to pick out the spot on
shore where the light impinged. This was a window in a small,
whitewashed house standing by itself in a large garden, situated about
half-way up the hill; and that the message or signal was expected was
soon proved to Frobisher when he saw, through his telescope, a man
hurriedly dash out of the house and make his way through the garden
toward the beach, where several boats could be made out, drawn up on the
sand.

By this time, however, the gig had reached the _Chih' Yuen_, and
Frobisher was unable to spend any more time watching the strange game
that seemed to be going on, being fully occupied as soon as he got on
board in giving orders to his officers to prepare the ship for
proceeding to sea, the signal for which, as Ting had said, was now
flying from the signal-yard of the _Ting Yuen_.

Just as the anchor was in process of being catted, however, he chanced
to glance again in the direction of the flagship, and saw, lying right
under her stern, and concealed from the view of those on deck by the
stern gallery, a small boat; and in that small boat was the man to whom
the signal had been heliographed. He was evidently talking to somebody
through the open port of the captain's cabin; and a few seconds later
Frobisher saw a hand appear through the same port holding something
white that looked suspiciously like a letter or packet. The man in the
boat at once seized it and thrust it into his bosom; then, after a hasty
glance round, he seated himself, and pulled slowly back again toward the
shore with an exaggerated air of nonchalance.

Frobisher could not avoid wondering who was the man that had been so
anxious to send a message ashore, and also what the nature of the
message might be that the sender was so intensely eager to dispatch at
the very last moment. It must certainly be an important one to render
it advisable to send for a special bearer to take it, instead of letting
it go ashore in the usual way by the boat in which the admiral would
send off his last official dispatches, notifying his departure to the
Navy Council.

But, as a matter of fact, Frobisher could hardly be said to wonder very
much about these points; for if he had been put to it he felt almost
certain that he could have named both the send