rd and forrud 'twixt Hardway and the Gosport
shore for a matter of five years or more, and not for to know and read a
common signal like that, which you must 'a seed run up at the semaphore
or on board the _Dook_ a hundred times at least. Lor'! I'm jest
'shamed of you, that's what I be!"

"But that ain't telling me, father," I retorted, "what _is_ the signal.
You needn't make such a blooming mystery of it, like that chap we saw
t'other night at the theayeter!"

In return for my `cheek' he splashed the water over me again.

"Well, if you don't know it, sonny, which I can hardly believe on, and
wants for to know to improve your mind, which needs a lot of
improvement, as I knows, that theer signal, Tom, was that cruiser we saw
out at Spithead yesterday a-trying her speed at the measured mile, the
_Mercury_, I thinks she is, axin' the port-admiral if she might have her
sailin' orders; and look there, sonny, the `affirmative' 's now run up
at the mizzen aboard the _Dook_, over yonder!"

"Yes, father," said I, playing him artfully, like the wily old fish he
was, with an object which you will soon learn--"and what does that
mean?"

"What does that mean? You blessed young h'ignoramus! Why, Tommy, your
brains be all wool-gathered this mornin'! Can't you see that old Sir
Ommaney is tellin' the cruiser to `carry on' as soon as she likes, and
bid adoo to Spithead when she's weighed her anchor? See, too, sonny,
the old _Vict'ry_ and the _Saint Vincent_ be now a-repeatin' the signal
arter the _Dook_, the same as they did that first h'ist, jest now!"

"That is, father," said I innocently like--"the port-admiral gives that
cruiser outside permission to go to sea?"

"Aye, Tom," he answered, without suspecting what my inquiry was leading
up to--"that's just it. You've reckoned it up to a nicety, my hearty."

Now came the opportunity for which I had been waiting.

"The old port-admiral may be a martinet, as they say, in the dockyard,"
I said; "but he's a kinder chap than you are, father."

"The admiral kinder than me, sonny," he repeated, in a surprised
tone--"why, how's that, Tom?"

"Because he gives leave when he's asked for a fellow to go to sea."

We were just then about midway between the _Saint Vincent_ and the old
_Victory_; and, startled by my thus unexpectedly broaching my masked
battery, father dropped his oar and let the wherry drift along the
almost motionless tideway towards the stern of Nelson's whilom fl