said he, "the lad's all right; 'fact, I've--
I've seen him this morning."

"This morning!" cried she, all excitement. "Why, what are you holding
the door back for? It's him--he's here!"

And, in another moment, my second mother, as I shall always call her,
was clinging round my neck with almost more than a mother's love for
me--if that were possible!

"Deary me!" she said a little while after, "isn't he like Teddy, now?"

Sam burst out laughing.

"Why, Teddy was a slim boy of fourteen, and this laddie here's a fine
strapping fellow, nearly six feet high, and as broad in the beam as a
Dutch sloop!"

However, Jane wouldn't be convinced but that I was the very image of her
own lost child; and, as I had all her wealth of affection in
consequence, I'm sure I have no reason to complain.

I took up my quarters at "Old Calabar Cottage," as Sam loved to hear
people call it, rolling out the full name himself with great gusto; and,
in a little while, as things went on in the old way, I got so accustomed
to everything around me that I could almost fancy my first voyage and
the burning of the _Esmeralda_ were a dream, as well as all my later
experiences of the sea.

But, after a time, I began to long again to be on the deep, desiring
once more to be daring its dangers and glorying in that "life on the
ocean wave" which, once tasted by the true-born sailor, can never be
given up altogether. I had just begun to deliberate with myself as to
what sort of ship I should seek, and whither I would prefer to voyage
for my next trip, when Sam came back from Plymouth one morning brimful
of news.

"Well, laddie--who d'ye think I met to-day?" he called out to me, almost
before he was quite inside the house.

"I'm sure I can't guess," I replied. "Who?"

"Why, Cap'en Billings, my cockbird!"

"Captain Billings!" I said, with surprise. "I thought he was in
China."

"No, but he's going there this voyage."

"This voyage?" I repeated questioningly, after Sam had said the words.

"Aye, laddie; he's got a bran' new ship, which the owners of the
_Esmeralda_ have had built, and just made him skipper of. And, what do
you think, laddie?"

"I'm sure I can't tell," said I.

"He's going to have a bran' new second mate, who he hears has just got
his certificate from the Trinity House Board--that is, if he'll accept
the berth under his old captain."

"What!" I exclaimed, breathless with excitement, "does he offer to take
me with