miral, "I can't carry it on, you see. I never could
go on with anything that was not as plain as an anchor, and quite
straightforward. I must just tell all that has occurred."

"Ay, ay, sir. The best way."

"You think so, Jack?"

"I know it is, sir, always axing pardon for having a opinion at all,
excepting when it happens to be the same as yourn, sir."

"Hold your tongue, you libellous villain! Now, listen to me, Charles. I
got up a scheme of my own."

Charles gave a groan, for he had a very tolerable appreciation of his
uncle's amount of skill in getting up a scheme of any kind or
description.

"Now here am I," continued the admiral, "an old hulk, and not fit for
use anymore. What's the use of me, I should like to know? Well, that's
settled. But you are young and hearty, and have a long life before you.
Why should you throw away your life upon a lubberly vampyre?"

"I begin to perceive now, uncle," said Charles, reproachfully, "why you,
with such apparent readiness, agreed to this duel taking place."

"Well, I intended to fight the fellow myself, that's the long and short
of it, boy."

"How could you treat me so?"

"No nonsense, Charles. I tell you it was all in the family. I intended
to fight him myself. What was the odds whether I slipped my cable with
his assistance, or in the regular course a little after this? That's the
way to argufy the subject; so, as I tell you, I made up my mind to fight
him myself."

Charles looked despairingly, but said,--

"What was the result?"

"Oh, the result! D--n me, I suppose that's to come. The vagabond won't
fight like a Christian. He says he's quite willing to fight anybody that
calls him out, provided it's all regular."

"Well--well."

"And he, being the party challenged--for he says he never himself
challenges anybody, as he is quite tired of it--must have his choice of
weapons."

"He is entitled to that; but it is generally understood now-a-days that
pistols are the weapons in use among gentlemen for such purposes."

"Ah, but he won't understand any such thing, I tell you. He will fight
with swords."

"I suppose he is, then, an adept at the use of the sword?"

"He says he is."

"No doubt--no doubt. I cannot blame a man for choosing, when he has the
liberty of choice, that weapon in the use of which he most particularly,
from practice, excels."

"Yes; but if he be one half the swordsman he has had time enough,
according to all accounts, to be, what