he was in the water, and when day dawned it seemed all
over with him, so overpowering was his despair. Consciousness had
quite abandoned him, and he was almost at the last gasp when he was
seen and picked up by a passing steamship, the _Burlington Castle_.

"Where am I?" he asked, faintly, on coming to himself. He was in a
snug cot, in a small but cosy cabin.

"Where you'd never have been but for the smartness of our look-out
man," said a steward at his bedside. "Cast away, I suppose, in the
gale?"

"No: washed overboard," replied McKay, "last evening."

"Thunder! and in the water all those hours! But what was your craft?
Who and what are you?"

"I was on board the yacht _Arcadia_. My name is Stanislas McKay. I am
an officer of the Royal Picts--aide-de-camp to General Wilders. Where
am I?" he repeated.

"You'll learn that fast enough; with friends, anyhow. Doctor said you
weren't to talk. But just drink this, while I tell the captain you've
come to. He hasn't had sight of you yet; we hauled you aboard while it
was his watch below."

Five minutes more and the captain, a jolly English tar, red in face
and round in figure, came down, with a loud voice and cheering manner,
to welcome his treasure-trove.

"Well, my hearty, so this is how I find you, eh? Soused in brine. Why,
I hear they had to hang you up by the heels to let the water run out
of your mouth. Come, Stanny, my boy, this won't do."

"Uncle Barto!"

"The same: master of the steamship _Burlington Castle_, deep in
deals--timbers for huts--and other sundries, now lying in Balaclava,
waiting to be discharged. But, my dearest lad, you've had a narrow
squeak. Tell me, how did it happen, and when?"

"I fell overboard, and I've been all night in the water: that's all."

He did not choose as yet to make public his suspicions as to the real
origin of his nearly fatal accident.

"I always said you had nine lives, Stanny, only don't go using them up
like this. There's not a tom-cat could stand it."

"Were you out in the gale, uncle?"

"Ay; and weathered it. At dawn, after the first puff, I knew we'd have
a twister, so I got up steam and regularly worked against it. Made a
good offing that way, and when the storm abated came back here. We
were close in when we picked you up on a log."

"It was a providential escape," said Stanislas, thankfully. "I thought
it was all over with me."

"We'll set you up in no time, never fear. But tell more about
yourself.