make a plunge forward. The two midshipmen were watching her,
expecting to see her rise again. They rubbed their eyes. Another sea
rolled over the spot where she had been, but no sign of her was there.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

The _Chesterfield_ packet was bound from Halifax to Falmouth.
Fortunately among the passengers was a surgeon, who was able to attend
to Paul's hurts. He set his leg, which was really broken, as were one
or more of his ribs.

The passengers, when they heard from Sir Henry Elmore and Johnny Nott of
True Blue's gallantry, were very anxious to have him into the cabin to
talk to him, and to hear an account of his adventures. The young
midshipmen, knowing instinctively that he would not like this, did not
back the passengers' frequent messages to him; besides, nothing would
induce him to leave the side of his godfather, except when the doctor
sent him on deck to take some fresh air.

A strange sail was seen on the starboard bow. In a short time she was
pronounced to be a ship, and, from the whiteness and spread of her
canvas, a man-of-war. Elmore and Nott hoped that she might be their own
frigate. They thought that it was a latitude in which she might very
likely be fallen in with. Of course, till the character of the brig had
been ascertained, she would bear up in chase. They expressed their
hopes to Captain Jones, and begged him to steer for her.

"Were I certain that she is your frigate, I would gladly do so; but as
you cannot possibly recognise her at this distance, we shall be wiser to
stand clear of her till we find out what she is. I will not alter our
course, unless when we get nearer she has the cut of an enemy."

The midshipmen, having borrowed telescopes, were continually going aloft
to have a look at the stranger.

"I say, Elmore, it must be she. That's her fore-topsail, I'll declare!"
exclaimed Johnny Nott. Elmore was not quite so certain.

After a little time, they were joined by True Blue.

"Paul Pringle, sirs, sent me up to have a look at the stranger," he
remarked.

"I am very glad you have come, Freeborn," said Sir Henry. "Your eyes
are the best in the ship. What do you make her out to be?"

True Blue looked long and earnestly without speaking. At last he
answered, in an unusually serious tone:

"She is not our frigate, sir--that I'm certain of; and I'm more than
afraid--I'm very nearly certain--that she is French. By the cut of her
sails and her general l