t of their quiet sleep to
wonder what it was all about. However, it would never have done for me
to lay on my oars to watch the fun, because I thought it just as likely
as not, when the tide rose, that the noisy brutes might shove through
and be after me again, so I pulled away as hard as ever right up the
Solent, till I got safe back again into Portsmouth harbour. Luckily, I
had the whole of the flood with me, or I never could have done it. My
arms ached as it was not a little. I moored my boat securely, and as it
wasn't yet daybreak, I lay down in the bottom of the boat, and fell
asleep. I never slept so soundly in my life, and no wonder, after the
pull I had had.

"When I awoke the sun was shining out brightly, and I heard some one on
board a vessel coming up the harbour hail and call somebody or other a
drunken old rascal. Who he meant of course I couldn't tell; that was
nothing to me. At last I sat up in my boat, and rubbed my eyes, and
there was the doctor's bottles and the empty rum bottle and the can,
without any water in it, just as I left them when I was taken ill. I
half expected to see the whole troop of wriggling, twisting,
forked-tailed smoke-worms coming up the harbour with the last of the
flood; but though I looked out till the tide had done, they didn't come,
and it's my belief that they knocked themselves about so much against
the Needle rocks, that they put about and went down Channel; and all I
can say is that I hope that every one of 'em was drowned or came to some
other bad end out at sea, and that I may never as long as I live have
such a night as the one I spent after taking Doctor Gulliman's physic.
Sarvant, marm and gentlemen, you'll agree that story is worth five
shillings. Howsomedever, I never charges my friends, but gives them all
free gratis and for nothing." And old Jerry gave one of his most
knowing winks as he finished off his glass and took up his hat to
prepare for his departure.

I ought perhaps to apologise for giving such a story; but it is a fair
specimen of the style of narrative in which old seamen of Jerry
Vincent's stamp are apt to indulge, and I have heard many such, though
seldom told with so much spirit, during my career at sea.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

VISIT TO PLYMOUTH--BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT--MISS RUNDLE'S ACCOUNT OF
CHARLEY--VOYAGE TO SHETLAND--WRECKED AGAIN--FALL AMONG FRIENDS--NEAR
DEATH'S DOOR--HAPPY ENCOUNTER--DESCRIPTION OF SHETLAND--MY RESIDENCE
THERE--M