on many occasions turned the
scale the other way. A strong, tall, stiffly upright and slow-moving
frame, led one to look only for elephantine force, but when
circumstances required prompt action our sergeant displayed powers of
cat-like activity, which were all the more tremendous that they seemed
incongruous and were unexpected. From his lips you looked for a voice
of thunder--and at drill you were not disappointed--but on ordinary
occasions his speech was soft and low; bass indeed as to its quality,
but never harsh or loud.

"A gale is brewing up from the nor'-west, so Jack Molloy says," remarked
Hardy, as he was about to pass on.

"Why, I thought it was blowing a gale _now_!" returned Miles. "At least
it seems so, if we may judge from the pitching and plunging."

"Ah, lad, you are judging from the landlubber's view-point," returned
the sergeant. "Wait a bit, and you will understand better what Molloy
means when he calls this only a `capful of wind.'"

Miles had not to wait long. The gale when fully "brewed up" proved to
be no mean descendant of the family of storms which have tormented the
celebrated bay since the present economy of nature began; and many of
those who were on board of the troop-ship at that time had their eyes
opened and their minds enlarged as to the nature of a thorough gale;
when hatches have to be battened down, and the dead-lights closed; when
steersmen have to be fastened in their places, and the maddened sea
seems to roar defiance to the howling blast, and all things movable on
deck are swept away as if they were straws, and many things not meant to
be movable are wrenched from their fastenings with a violence that
nothing formed by man can resist, and timbers creak and groan, and loose
furniture gyrates about until smashed to pieces, and well-guarded glass
and crockery leap out of bounds to irrecoverable ruin, and even the
seamen plunge about and stagger, and landsmen hold on to ring-bolts and
belaying-pins, or cling to bulkheads for dear life, while mighty
billows, thundering in-board, hiss along the decks, and everything,
above, below, and around, seems being swept into eternity by the besom
of destruction!

But the troop-ship weathered the storm nobly; and the good Lord sent
fine weather and moderate winds thereafter; and ere long the soldiers
were enjoying the sunshine, the sparkling waters, and the sight of the
lovely shores of the blue Mediterranean.

Soon after that broken