" said the captain.

The first lieutenant, as he was walking forward, caught sight of Bill
and Jack.

"Why, lads, where do you come from?" he asked.

As he spoke he recognised Bill.

"Are you not the lad who gave notice of the plot of the American captain
to capture our ship?" he asked.

Bill acknowledged that such was the case.

"I am truly glad that you have escaped. I promised our late captain
that I would keep an eye on you," he continued, "and I shall now have
the opportunity. I thought you, with the rest of our poor fellows, had
been lost when our ship blew up."

Bill briefly described their adventures, and the lieutenant seemed much
interested. He said he would have them at once entered on the ship's
books, for as they were likely soon to be engaged with the enemy, it
might be of importance to them.

He accordingly sent for the purser, to whom he gave the proper
directions. Bill and Jack then made their way below.

On passing the galley they saw a boy busily employed, assisting the
cook's mate in cleaning pots and pans. He looked up at them and
started, letting drop the pot at which he was scrubbing.

"What! Bill! Jack! I thought you had gone to Davy Jones's locker," he
exclaimed. "Are you really yourselves?"

"No doubt about it, Tom," answered Bill and in a few words they again
told their adventures.

Tom soon recovered from his astonishment. He appeared somewhat ashamed
of his present occupation. He had got into a scrape, he acknowledged,
and had been ordered to assist the cook's mate.

"I wish you would tell him, Tom, that we are very hungry, as we have had
a long pull, and that if he would give us something to eat we should be
very much obliged to him. If he's a good-natured fellow, I daresay he
will."

Tom undertook to plead for them with the cook himself, who just then put
his head out of the galley. The cook, without hesitation, on hearing
their story, gave them each a basin of broth and a handful of biscuit.

While they were eating they asked Tom to tell them how he had escaped.

"I've no very clear notion about the matter," he answered; "I must have
been in the water, for I found myself lying at the bottom of a boat wet
to the skin, and more dead than alive. There were a dozen or more of
our fellows in her, and Mr Saltwell, our first lieutenant, who had been
picked up, I supposed, as I had been. They thought I was done for, and,
as the boat was overloaded, they were abo