chains, were as mysterious as the figures of some dance one does not know. As to the noises

they made, men and boys anywhere are given to help on their work with sounds of some sort, but I could not have believed in anything approaching to these, out of a lunatic asylum, unless I had heard them.

I could hear quite well, I could hear what was said, and a great deal of it, I am sorry to say, would have been better unsaid. But the orders which rang out interested me, for I tried to fit them on to what followed, though without much result. At last the dock seemed to be moving away from me—I saw men, but not the same men—and every man’s eye was fixed on us. Then the thick brown rope just below my window quivered like a bow-string, and tightened (all the water starting from it in a sparkling shower) till it looked as firm as a bar of iron, and I held on tight, for we were swinging round. Suddenly the voice of command sang out—(I fancied with a touch of triumph in the tone)—“Let go the warp!” The thick rope sprang into the air, and wriggled like a long snake, and it was all I could do to help joining in the shouts that rang from the deck above and from the dock below. Then the very heart of the ship began to beat with a new sound, and the Scotch lad leaped like a deerhound to the window, and put his arm round my shoulder, and whispered, “That’s the screw, man! we’re off!”

CHAPTER IV.

“He that tholes o’ercomes.”
“Tak’ your venture, as mony a gude ship has done.”
Scotch Proverbs.

I am disposed to think that a ship is a place where one has occasional moments of excitement and enthusiasm that are rare elsewhere, but that it is not to be beaten (if approached) for the deadliness of the despondency to be experienced therein.

For perhaps a quarter of an hour after our start I felt much excited, and so, I think, did my companion. Shoulder to shoulder we were glued to the little round window, pinching each other when the hurrying steps hither and thither threatened to come down our way. We did not talk much, we were too busy looking out, and listening to the rushing water, and the throbbing of the screw. The land seemed to slip quickly by, countless ships, boats, and steamers barely gave us time to have a look at them, though Alister (who seemed to have learned a good deal during his four days in the docks) whispered little bits of information

about one and another. Then the whole shore seemed to be covered by enormous sheds, and later on it got farther off, and then the land lay distant, and it was very low and marshy and most dreary-looking, and I fancied it was becoming more difficult to keep my footing at the window; and just when Alister had been pointing out a queer red ship with one stumpy mast crowned by a sort of cage, and telling me that it was a light-ship, our own vessel began to creak and groan worse than ever, and the floor under our feet seemed to run away from them, and by the time you had got used to going down, it caught you and jerked you up again, till my head refused to think anything about anything, and I half dropped and was half helped by Alister on to the flat of my back as before.

As to him, I may as well say at once, that I never knew him affected at sea by the roughest wind that could blow, and he sat on a box and looked at me half pityingly, and half, I suppose, with the sort of curiosity I had felt about him.

“I’m feared the life ‘ll be a bit over rough for ye,” he said kindly. “Would ye think of going up and disclosing yourself before we’re away from all chance of getting ashore?”

“No, no!” said I, vehemently, and added more feebly, “I dare say I shall be all right soon.”

“Maybe,” said the Scotchman.

He went back to the window and gazed out, seeing, I have no doubt, plenty to interest him; though my eyes, if opened for a moment, only shrank back and closed again instinctively, with feelings of indescribable misery. So indefinite time went on, Alister occasionally making whispered comments which I did not hear, and did not trouble myself to ask questions about, being utterly indifferent to the answers. But I felt no temptation to give in, I only remember feeling one intense desire, and it amounted to a prayer, that if these intolerable sensations did not abate, I might at any rate become master enough of them to do my duty in their teeth. The thought made me more alert, and when the Scotch lad warned me that steps were coming our way, I implored him to hide deeper under the sails, if he wished, without consideration for me, as I had resolved to face my fate at once, and be either killed or cured.

“Thank ye kindly,” said Alister, “but there’s small use in hiding now. They can but pitch us overboard, and I’ve read that drowning is by far an easier death than being starved, if ye come to that.”

It was in this frame of mind that a sailor found us, and took us prisoners with so little difficulty that he drew the scarcely fair conclusion that we were the

cheekiest, coolest hands of all the nasty, sneaking, longshore loafers he had ever had to deal with in all his blessed and otherwise than blessed born days. And wrathful as this outburst was, it was colourless to the indignation in his voice, when (replying to some questions from above) he answered,

“Two on ’em!”

Several other sailors came to the help of our captor, and we were dragged up the ladder and on deck, where the young Scotchman looked to better advantage than down below, and where I made the best presentment of myself that my miserable condition would allow. We were soon hauled before the captain, a sensible-faced, red-bearded man, with a Scotch accent rather harsher than Alister’s, in which he harangued us in very unflattering phrases for our attempt to “steal a passage,” and described the evil fate of which we were certain, if we did not work uncommonly hard for our victuals.

With one breath I and my companion asserted our willingness to do anything, and that to get a free passage as idlers was our last wish and intention. To this, amid appreciating chuckles from the crew, the captain replied, that, so sneaks and stowaways always said; a taunt which was too vulgar as repartee to annoy me, though I saw Alister’s thin hands clenching at his sides. I don’t know if the captain did, but he

called out—“Here! you lanky lad there, show your hands.”

“They’re no idle set,” said Alister, stretching them out. He lifted his eyes as he said it, and I do not think he could have repressed the flash in them to save his life. Every detail of the scene was of breath-less interest to me, and as I watched to see if the captain took offence, I noticed that (though they were far less remarkable from being buried in a fat and commonplace countenance) his eyes, like Alister’s, were of that bright, cold, sea-blue common among Scotchmen. He did not take offence, and I believe I was right in thinking that the boy’s wasted hands struck him much as they had struck me.

“Don’t speak unless I question you. How long will ye have been hanging round the docks before ye’d the impudence to come aboard here?”

“I slept four nights in the docks, sir.”

“And where did ye take your meals?”

A flush crept over Alister’s bony face. “I’m no’ a great eater, sir,” he said, with his eyes on the deck: and then suddenly lifting a glance at me out of the corner of them, he added, “The last I had was just given me by a freen’.”

“That’ll do. Put your hands down. Can you sew?”

“I ask your pardon, sir?”

“Is the fool deaf? Can ye use a needle and thread?”

“After a rough fashion, sir, and I can knit a bit.”

“Mr. Waters?”