position."

"Just take care when it's your watch that you don't run the ship ashore
in a fit of poetical abstraction," said Green, laughing; "your Byronic
enthusiasm would not be received as a valid excuse at a court-martial."

Besides the officers named, Jack had several of his own and Murray's old
shipmates--Dick Needham as gunner, Ben Snatchblock as boatswain, with
the two midshipmen, Dicky Duff and Billy Blueblazes; Jerry Bird; the
Irishman, Tim Nolan; and several others, all good men and true.

With patriotic pride Jack saw the magnificent fleet under Admiral Dundas
lying at anchor in Cavarna Bay as the _Tornado_ steamed into that
roadstead. It lies on the western side of the Black Sea, a little to
the north of Varna. There lay the _Britannia_ and _Trafalgar_, of 120
guns, the admiral's flag flying at the masthead of the first; the
_Queen_, of 116 guns; the _Agamemnon_, a name renowned in naval story,
of 101 guns, carrying the flag of Rear-Admiral Sir Edmund Lyons; the
_Albion_, of 91 guns; the _Rodney_ and _London_, of 90; the _Vengeance,
Bellerophon_, and _Sanspareil_, of 84, 80, and 70 guns respectively; the
_Arethusa_, of 50 guns, twice the size of her predecessor, known in song
as the "gallant _Arethusa_;" and numerous other frigates and steamers,
the smallest equal in power to any frigate of the olden times. There
too lay the French fleet, fifty sail of the line and twenty-one frigates
and smaller vessels, with the flag of Admiral Hamelin flying on board
the _Ville-de-Paris_, of 120 guns, and that of the second in command,
Admiral Bruat, on board the _Montebello_, of the same force. What might
not these fleets accomplish if only the Russians would dare to sail out
from amid their stone walls and fight? There was the rub.

Jack, having paid his respects to the admiral, made his way on board the
_Briton_, accompanied by Archie, whom he knew Murray would be glad to
see. Jack, of course, brought despatches from Stella. "Now, Alick," he
said, after the first greetings were over, "you read those quietly,
while Gordon and I look up some of our old shipmates whom you have on
board."

Jack was not disappointed, for though he could not boast of having as
many friends as Jos Green, he seldom went anywhere without finding some
former shipmates. All were in high spirits at the thoughts of active
service, though as yet nothing of importance had been done. A very
gallant act, however, had been performed, of whi