n
contact; and I don't think many were sorry when he left the service
subsequently to our cruise, starting in some line of civil life where
his uncivil demeanour has probably gained him as many friends as he got
afloat!

"I don't want any of your opinions, my man," said he; "and, if you talk
of gallantry, I don't think she has stuck to us as she might have done
in the gale. Probably, though, she couldn't help this; for she's a
wretched tub and has the misfortune of having a nincompoop for a
commander besides!"

Luckily for the sour-tempered chap, whom I had time to reckon up since I
had been on board the corvette, the commodore did not hear what he said,
or he would most probably, officer of the watch though he might be, have
given him a `dressing down' before us all.

The fact of our having sighted the _Ruby_ had already been communicated
by one of the midshipmen to our chief, who was down in his cabin having
a rest, never having left the deck either day or night, I believe, since
the gale overtook us; and, as soon as we got within signalling distance,
he ordered the yeoman at the signal halliards to make our number.

Although the weather was becoming finer, as I have said, the wind was
still gusty and chopping about between the east and nor'-east quadrants;
and, hardly had our pennant been run up to the mizzen truck than the
`fly' of the flag got foul of the halliards.

"Hi, boy!" cried Lieutenant Robinson, wishing to be very smart, now the
commodore was on deck. "'Way aloft there and free that flag!"

I thought he spoke to me, and jumped towards the weather shrouds to obey
the order, but as I got into the rigging I saw `Ugly' was before me.

He was in the chains and on his way up to the top before the lieutenant
spoke, and naturally he had first addressed him.

`Ugly,' however, was so sluggish in his movements through the corvette
rolling a bit and the ratlines being none too steady, that Lieutenant
Robinson grew impatient.

"Here, you boy!" he roared at me even louder than Jones had spoken to
him shortly before. "See if you can't teach that lubber how to climb
aloft and free a flag when he is told, without taking a month of Sundays
over the job!"

Almost before he had spoken I had sprung into the rigging after `Ugly';
and by the time the lieutenant's last word was uttered I was more than
half-way up to the top, overhauling `Ugly' at the crosstrees.

From thence, he and I proceeded upward, he on one s