ip,--to knot and splice, and
box the compass. I also built and rigged a model ship, of which he was
very fond.

"You will not forget all I have taught you, my boy," I said, when I was
going off to sea.

"No, indeed I will not, father," he answered; "and when you come back I
hope I shall have learnt more, for I will do my best to pick up
information from everybody who will teach me. The captain, I know,
will, when I come home for the holidays, and there is old Dick Wright,
who has been at sea all his life, settled near us, and he will tell me
anything I ask him; though there is no one teaches me so well as you do,
father."

In those piping times of peace the ships were not kept so long in
commission as they were during the war, so after serving three years as
boatswain of the _Huzzar_ frigate, on the West India and North American
station, I once more returned home. I found Harry more determined than
ever to go to sea, and he told me that Reginald Leslie had made up his
mind to go also.

"Does his father wish it?" I asked.

"Oh yes, he has no objection to his going; and do you know, father, the
captain says that he will get him and me appointed to the same ship with
you, provided she is sent to a healthy station," was the answer.

"Well, Harry, I shall be very glad to have charge of you both, and I am
pleased that the captain thinks so well of you; though, to be sure, he
has always shown that," said I.

Susan was much cast down at the thoughts of losing Harry, but she could
not help acknowledging that it was time he should go to sea, if he was
going at all.

"But a ship's boy has a hard life of it, as you have often told me,
Ben," she said, "and he has been gently nurtured, and brought up, I may
say, like a young gentleman."

"And a young gentleman he will still remain; for, you may depend on it,
the captain intends to get him placed on the quarter-deck; and, though
he himself has retired from the service, he has interest enough to get
me and the lads appointed to some ship commanded by a friend of his own;
and I flatter myself that, from the certificate I got from my last
captain, he will have no difficulty about that."

We had almost given up any expectations of ever meeting Harry's friends.
I own that I did not care very much about this, for once on the
quarter-deck I felt sure he would make his own way; and though it might
be of advantage to him to find them out, it was possible that it might
be very