affair would be settled without troubling us to come into council.
On she came, till we could see the guns in her bow ports, and almost
count the meshes in her hammock netting. The shadow of her lofty sails
was already fallen upon us before she gave a sign of recognition. Then
her bow gave a wide sheer, and her whole broadside came into view, as
she glided by the spars where we were crouching. An officer appeared at
her quarter and waved his gold-banded cap to us, as the frigate rounded
to, to the leeward of us,--and the glorious stripes and stars blew out
clear against the hot sky. A light dingey was in the water before the
main yard had been well swung aback, and a midshipman was urging the
men, who needed no urging, to give way strong. I didn't know how weak I
had got, till they were lifting me aboard the boat. An hour after, when
I had had something to eat and was a little restored and had told my
story, the officer of the deck was relieved and came below to see me.

"'I fancy, Sir, we've just passed something of your steamer,' he
said,--'a yawlboat, bottom up, with a name on the stern which we
couldn't well make out: _Erco_ something, it looked like. Hadn't been
long in the water, I should say.'

"And that was the last of the steamer. Fritzeli and I were the sole
survivors."

THE JOLLY MARINER:

A BALLAD.

It was a jolly mariner
As ever hove a log;
He wore his trousers wide and free,
And always ate his prog,
And blessed his eyes, in sailor-wise,
And never shirked his grog.

Up spoke this jolly mariner,
Whilst walking up and down:--
"The briny sea has pickled me,
And done me very brown;
But here I goes, in these here clo'es,
A-cruising in the town!"

The first of all the curious things
That chanced his eye to meet,
As this undaunted mariner
Went sailing up the street,
Was, tripping with a little cane,
A dandy all complete!

He stopped,--that jolly mariner,--
And eyed the stranger well;--
"What that may be," he said, says he,
"Is more than I can tell;
But ne'er before, on sea or shore,
Was such a heavy swell!"

He met a lady in her hoops,
And thus she heard him hail:--
"Now blow me tight!--but there's a sight
To manage in a gale!
I never saw so small a craft
With such a spread o' sail!

"Observe the craft before and aft,--
She'd