Out rang the whole of our larboard battery, almost like a single gun; a finer thing was never seen; and before the ring passed into a roar, the yell of Frenchmen came through the smoke. Masts and spars flew right and left with the bones of men among them, and the sea began to hiss and heave, and the ships to reel and tremble, and the roar of a mad volcano rose, and nothing kept either shape or tenor, except the faces of brave men.

and steerage was never seen. Let go the, at that moment (not from congratulation, best bower. Pass the word. Ready at so much as from my inside conscience), I quarters all of you. Now she bears clear now was beginning to fill a pipe, and to fore and aft. Damn their eyes, let them dwell upon further manoeuvres. For one have it." of the foremost points of all, after thoroughly drubbing the enemy, is to keep a fine self-control and be ready to go on with it. No sooner had I filled this pipe, and taken a piece of wadding to light it, which was burning handy (in spite of all my orders), than away went a piece of me; and down went I, as dead as a Dutch herring. At least, so everybody thought, who had time to think about it; and "the Master's dead" ran along the deck, so far as time was to tell of it. I must have lain Every ship in our fleet was prepared to numb for an hour, I doubt, with the roar anchor by the stern, so as to spring our of the guns, and the shaking of bulk-heads, broadsides aright; but the anchor of the like a shiver, jarring me and a pool of Goliath did not bite so soon as it should blood curdling into me, and another poor have done, so that we ran past the Carrier, fellow cast into the scuppers and clutchand brought up on the larboard quarter ing at me in his groaning, when the of the second French 74, with a frigate heavens took fire in one red blaze, and a and a brig of war to employ a few of our thundering roar, that might rouse the starboard guns. By this time the rapid dead, drowned all the rolling battle-din. darkness fell, and we fought by the light I saw the white looks of our crew all aghast, of our own guns. And now the skill of and their bodies scared out of death's our Admiral and his great ideas were manufacture, by this triumph of mortality; manifest, for every French ship had two and the elbows of big fellows holding the English upon it, and some of them even linstock fell quivering back to their three at a time. In a word, we began shaken ribs. For the whole sky was with the head of their line, and crushed it, blotched with the corpses of men, like the and so on joint by joint, ere even the stones of a crater cast upwards; and the centre and much more the tail could fetch sheet of the fire behind them showed their their way up to take part in it. Our knees, and their bellies, and streaming antagonist was the first that struck, being hair. Then with a hiss, like electric hail, the second of the Frenchman's line, and from a mile's height all came down again, by name the Conquer-ant. But she found corpses first (being softer things), and in Captain Foley and David Llewellyn_an ant a little to clever to conquer. We were a good deal knocked about, with most of our main rigging shot away, and all our masts heavily wounded. Nevertheless we drew ahead to double upon the third French ship, of the wonderful name of Sparticipate.

timbers next, and then the great spars that had streaked the sky like rockets.

The violence of this matter so attracted my attention, that I was enabled to rally my wits, and lean on one elbow and look at it. And I do assure you that anybody who happened to be out of sight of it, lost a finer chance than ever he can have anFrom this ship I received a shot, which, other prospect of. For a hundred-andbut for the mercy of the Lord, must have twenty-gun ship had blown up, with an made a perfect end of me. That my end Admiral and Rear-Admiral, not to mention may be perfect has long been my wish, a Commodore, and at least 700 compleand the tenor of my life leads up to it. ment. And when the concussion Nevertheless, who am I to deny that I was over, there fell the silence of death upon not ready for the final finish at that very all men. Not a gun was fired, nor an moment? And now, at this time of writ-order given, except to man the boats in ing, I find myself ready to wait a bit hopes of saving some poor fellows.

longer. What I mean was a chain-shot sailing along, rather slowly as they always do; and yet so fast that I could not either

duck or jump at sight of it, although there was light enough now for anything, with

CHAPTER LXI.

was

A SAVAGE DEED. NEVERTHELESS our Britons were forced

the French Admiral on fire. Happening to renew the battle afterwards; because to be well satisfied with my state of mind those Frenchmen had not the manners to

surrender, as they should have done. And they even compelled us to batter their ships so seriously and sadly, that when we took posesssion some were scarcely worth the trouble. To make us blow up their poor Admiral was a distressing thing to begin with; but when that was done, to go on with the battle was as bad as the dog in the manger. What good could it do them to rob a poor British sailor of half his prize-money? And such conduct becomes at least twice as ungenerous when they actually have wounded him!

My wound was sore, and so was I, on the following day, I can tell you; for not being now such a very young man, I found it a precious hard thing to renew the power of blood that was gone from me. And after the terrible scene that awoke me from the first trance of carnage, I was thrown by the mercy of Providence into pure insensibility. This I am bound to declare; because the public might otherwise think itself wronged, and perhaps even vote me down as of no value, for failing to give them the end of this battle so brilliantly as the beginning. I defy my old rival, the Newton tailor (although a much younger man perhaps than myself, and with my help a pretty good seaman), to take up the tucks of this battle as well as I have done though not well done. Even if a tailor can come up and fight (which he did, for the honour of Cambria), none of his customers can expect any more than French-chalk flourishes when a piece of description is down in his books. However, let him cut his cloth. He is still at sea, or else under it; and if he ever does come home, and sit down to his shopboard as his wife says he is sure to do - his very first order shall be for a churchgoing coat, with a doubled-up sleeve to it. For the Frehchmen took my left arm away in a thoroughly lubberly manner. If they had done it with a good cross-cut, like my old wound of forty years' standing, I would have set it down to the credit of their nation. But when I came to dwell over the subject (as for weeks my duty was), more and more clear to me it became, that instead of an honour they had now incurred a lasting national disgrace. The fellows who charged that gun had been afraid of the recoil of it. Half a charge of powder makes the vilest fracture to deal with-however, there I was by the heels, and now for nobler people. Only while my wound is green, you must not be too hard on me.

together with the Theseus and a frigate called the Leader. This frigate was commanded by the Honourable Rodney Bluett, now a post-captain, and who had done wonders in the height of last night's combat. He had brought up in the most brazen-faced manner, without any sense of his metal, close below the starboard bow of the great three-decker Orient and the quarter of the Franklin, and thence he fired away at both, while all their shot flew over him. And this was afterwards said to have been the cleverest thing done by all of us, except the fine helm and calm handling of H. M. ship Goliath.

The two ships, in chase of which we were despatched, ran ashore and surrendered, as I was told afterwards (for of course I was down in my berth at the time, with the surgeon looking after me); and thus out of thirteen French sail of the line, we took or destroyed eleven. And as we bore up after taking possession, the Leader ran up under our counter and hailed us, "Have you a Justice of the Peace on board?" Our Captain replied that he was himself a member of the quorum, but could not attend to such business now as making of wills and so on. Hereupon Captain Bluett came forward, and with a polite wave of his hat called out that Cap-. tain Foley would lay him under a special obligation, as well as clear the honour of a gallant naval officer, by coming on board of the Leader, to receive the deposition of a dying man. In ten minutes' time our good skipper stood in the cockpit of the Leader, while Captain Bluett wrote down the confession of a desperately-wounded seaman, who was clearing his conscience of perilous wrong before he should face his Creator. The poor fellow sate on a pallet propped up by the bulkhead and a pillow; that is to say if a man can sit who has no legs left him. A round-shot had caught him in the tuck of both thighs, and the surgeon could now do no more for him. Indeed he was only enabled to speak, or to gasp out his last syllables, by gulps of raw brandy which he was taking, with great draughts of water between them. On the other side of his dying bed stood Cannibals Dick and Joe, howling, and nodding their heads from time to time, whenever he lifted his glazing eyes to them for confirmation. For it was my honest and highly-respected friend, the poor Jack Wildman, who now lay in this sad condition, upon the very brink of another world. And I cannot do better The Goliath was ordered to chase down than give his own words, as put into the bay, on the morning after the battle, 'shape by two clear-witted men, Captains

Foley and Rodney Bluett. Only for the reader's sake I omit a great deal of groaning.

91

love
ing. I had never heard such a thing be-
was playing, and people were danc-
keep me in the black trees out of sight of
fore; and my father had all he could do to
them. And among the thick of the going
about we saw our master Chouane in his
hunting-dress.

"This is the solemn and dying delivery of me, known as 'Jack Wildman,' A. B. seaman of H. M. frigate Leader, now off the coast of Egypt, and dying through a hurt in battle with the Frenchmen. I cannot tell my name, or age, or where I was born, people call a 'masked ball,' I am sure of "This must have been what great or anything about myself; and it does not it; since I saw one, when, in the Bellona, matter, as I have nothing to leave behind there were many women somewhere. But me. Dick and Joe are to have my clothes, at the end of the great light place, looking and my pay if there is any; and the wom-out over the water, there was an that used to be my wife is to have my medals for good behaviour in the three battles I have partaken of. My money would be no good to her, because they never use it; but the women are fond of

ornaments.

"I was one of a race of naked people, living in holes of the earth at a place we did not know the name of. I now know that it was Nympton in Devonshire, which is in England, they tell me. any right to come near us, except the No one had great man who had given us land, and defended us from all enemies.

"His name was Parson Chouane, I believe, but I do not known how to spell it. He never told us of a thing like God; but I heard of it every day in the navy whenever my betters were angry. learned to read wonderful writings; but I Also I can speak the truth all the same.

"Ever since I began to be put into clothes, and taught to kill other people, I have longed to tell of an evil thing which happened once among us. I cannot tell, for we never count time as How long ago you do, but it must have been many years back, for I had no hair on my body except my head. We had a man then who took lead among us, so far as there was any lead; and I think that he thought himself father, because he gave me the most victuals. At any rate we had no other man to come near him in any cunningess. Our master Chouane came down sometimes, and took a pride in watching him, and liked him so much that he laughed at him, which he never did to the rest of us.

my

"This man, my father as I may call him, took me all over the great brown moors one night in some very hot weather. In the morning we came to a great heap of houses, and hid in a copse till the evening. At dusk we set out again, and came to a great and rich house by the side of a river. The lower portholes seemed full of lights, and on the flat place in front of them a band of music-such as now I

a quiet

shady place for tired people to rest a bit. When the whole of the music was crashing like a battle, and people going round like great flies in a web, my father led me down by the river-side, and sent me up two little babies. The whole of the bussome dark narrow steps, and pointed to iness was all about these, and the festival was to make much of them. The nurse for a moment had set them upright, while crawling, as all of us can, I brought down she just spoke to a young sailor-man; and these two babies to my father; and one was heavy, and the other light.

them, and the nurse had not yet missed "My father had scarcely got hold of them, when on the dark shore by the riverside, perhaps five fathoms under the gaiety, and whispered, and gave orders. I know Parson Chouane came up to my father, tongues then, nor desired it; for we knew not what they said, for I had no sense of what we wanted by signs, and sounds, and saved a world of trouble so. Only I having the girl-child brought away. He thought that our master was angry at wanted, only the boy perhaps, who was sleepy and knew nothing. But the girlchild shook her hand at him, and said, 'E bad man, Bardie knows 'a.' so very small "I-every one of usno more, I think."

was amazed Oh, sir, I can tell you

cried Captain Foley, with spirit enough to
"Indeed then, but you must, my friend,"
set a dead man talking; "finish this story,
you thief of the_world, before you cheat
the hangman. Two lovely childer stolen
of that kind
away from a first-rate family to give a ball
of it!"
and devil a bit you repent

then at the place where his legs should
Poor dying Jack looked up at him, and
have been, and he seemed ashamed for the
want of them. Then he played with the
sheet for a twitch or two, as if proud of
his arms still remaining; and checked
back the agony tempting him now to bite
it with his great white teeth.

"Ask the rest of us, Captain," he said; "My father before we got home stripped "Joe, you know it; Dick, you know it, off the little boy's clothes, and buried them now that I am telling you. The boy was in a black moorhole full of slime, with a brought up with us, and you call him great white stone in the midst of it. And Harry Savage. I knew the great house the child himself was turned over naked to when I saw it again. And I longed to tell herd with the other children (for none of the good old man there; but for the sake our women look after them), and nobody of our people. Chouane would have de- knew or cared to know who he was, or stroyed them all. I was tempted after whence he came, except my poor father, they had pelted me so, and the old man and our master- and I myself, many years was so good to me; but something always afterwards. But now I know well, and I stopped me, and I wanted poor Harry to cannot have quiet to die, without telling go to Heaven Oh, a drink of water!" somebody. The boy-baby I was compelled Captain Foley was partly inclined to to steal was Sir Philip Bampfylde's grandtake a great deal of poor Jack's confession son, and the baby-girl his grand-daughter. for no more than the raving of a light- I never heard what became of her. She headed man; but Rodney Bluett conjured must have been drowned, or starved, most him to take down every word of it. And likely. But as for the boy, he kept up his when this young officer spoke of his former life; and the man who took us most in chief and well-known friend, now Com- hand, of the name of Father David,' gave modore Sir Drake Bampfylde (being the names to all of us, and the little one, knighted for service in India), and how all'Harry Savage,' now serving on board of his life he had lain under a cloud by rea- the Vanguard. I know nothing of the son of this very matter, not another word did our Captain need from him, but took up his pen again.

"I ought to have told," said the dying man, slowly; "only I could not bring myself. But now you will know, you will all know now. My father is dead; but Dick and Joe can swear that the boy is the baby. He had beautiful clothes on, they shone in the boat; but the girl-child had on no more than a smock, that they might see her dancing. Our master did not stay with us a minute, but pushed us all into a boat on the tide, cut the rope, and was back with the dancers. My father had learned just enough of a boat to keep her straight in the tide way, and I had to lie down over the babies, to keep their white clothes from notice. We went so fast that I was quite scared, having never been afloat before, so there must have been a strong ebb under us. And the boat, which was white, must have been a very light one, for she heeled with every motion. At last we came to a great broad water, which perhaps was the river's mouth, with the sea beyond it. My father got frightened perhaps; and I know that I had been frightened long ago. By a turn of the eddy, we scrambled ashore, and carried the boy-baby with us; but the boat broke away with a lurch as we jumped, for we had not the sense to bring out the rope. In half a minute she was off to sea, and the girl-baby lay fast asleep in her stern. And now after such a long voyage in the dark, we were scared so that we both ran for our lives, and were safe before daybreak at Nympton.

buried images found by Father David. My father had nothing to do with that. It may have been another of Chouane's plans. I know no more of anything. There, let me die, I have told all I know. I can write my nickname, I never had any other Jack Wildman."

At the end of this followed the proper things, and the forms the law is made of, with first of all the sign-manual of our noble Captain Foley, who must have been an Irishman, to lead us into the battle of the Nile, while in the commission of the Peace. And after him Captain Bluett signed, and two or three warrant-officers gifted with a writing elbow; and then a pair of bare-bone crosses, meaning Cannibals Dick and Joe, who could not speak, and much less write, in the depth of their emotions.

CHAPTER LXII.

A RASH YOUNG CAPTAIN.

Now if I had been sewn up well in a hammock, and cast overboard (as the surgeon advised), who, I should like to know, would have been left capable of going to the bottom of these strange proceedings? Hezekiah was alive, of course, and prepared to swear to anything, especially after a round shot must have killed him, but for his greasiness. And clever enough no doubt he was, and suspicious, and busyminded, and expecting to have all Wales under his thumb, because he was somewhere about on the skirts of the great battle I led them into. But granting him skill, and that narrow knowledge of the

world which I call "cunning; " granting | grace, even under such doctrine as mine him also a restless desire to get to the bot- was. Captain Bluett spoke much of this, tom of everything, and a sniffing sense like a turnspit-dog's, of the shank-end bone he is roasting, none the more for all that could we grant him the downright power, now loudly called for, to put two and two together.

Happily for all parties, poor Hezekiah was not required to make any further fool of himself. The stump of my arm was in a fine condition, when ordered home with the prizes; and as soon as I felt the Bay of Biscay, over I knocked the doctor. He fitted me with a hook after this, in consistence with an old fisherman; and now I have such a whole boxful of tools to screw on, that they beat any hand I ever had in the world if my neighbours would only not borrow them.

although his religious convictions were not by any means so intense as mine, while my sinews were under treatment; but even with only one arm and a quarter, I seemed to be better fitted to handle events than this young Captain was. His ability was of no common order, as he had proved by running his frigate under the very chains of the thundering big Frenchman, so that they could not be down on him. And yet he could not see half the bearings of Jack Wildman's evidence. We had a long talk, with some hot rum-and-water, for the evenings already were chilly; and my natural candour carried me almost into too much of it. And the Honourable Rodney gazed with a flush of colour at me, when I gave him my opinions, like a raking broadside.

"You may be right," he said; "you were always so wonderful at a long shot, Llewellyn. But really it does seem impossible."

"Captain," I answered; "how many things seem so, yet come to pass continually!"

"I cannot gainsay you, Llewellyn, after all my experience of the world. I would give my life to find it true. But how are we to establish it?"

Tush-I am railing at myself again! Always running down, and holding up myself to ridicule, out of pure contrariety, just because every one else overvalues me. There are better men in the world than myself; there are wiser; there are braver; - I will not be argued down about it there are some (I am sure) as honest, in their way; and a few almost as truthful. However, I never did yet come across any other man half so modest. This I am forced to allude to now, in departure from my usual practice, because this quality and nothing else had prevented me from dwell-ett; if it can be done it shall be done. ing upon, and far more from following up. some shrewd thoughts which had occurred to me, loosely, I own, and in a random manner, still they had occurred to me once or twice, and had been dismissed. Why so? Simply because I trusted other men's judgment, and public impression, instead of my own superior instinct, and knowledge of weather and tideways.

"Leave me alone for that, Captain Blu

The idea is entirely my own, remember.
It had never occurred to you, had it?"

"Certainly not," he replied, with his usual downright honesty; "my reason for coming to you with that poor fellow's dying testimony was chiefly to cheer you up with the proofs of our old Captain's innocence, and to show you the turn of luck for young Harry, who has long been so shamefully treated. And now I have another thing to tell you about him; that is if you have not heard it."

66

'No, I have heard nothing at all. I did not even know what had become of him, until you read Jack's confession. With Nelson, on board the Vanguard!

How bitterly it repented me now of this ill-founded diffidence, when, as we lay in the Chops of the Channel about the end of October, with a nasty head-wind baffling us, Captain Rodney Bluett came on board of us from the Leader! He asked if the doctor could report the Master as strong enough to support an interview; where- "That was my doing," said the Honupon our worthy bone-joiner laughed, and ourable Rodney: "I recommended him to showed him in to me where I sate at the volunteer, and he was accepted immedilatter end of a fine aitch-bone of beef.ately, with the character I gave him. And then Captain Rodney produced his But it is his own doing, and proud I am papers, and told me the whole of his story. of it that he is now junior lieutenant of was deeply moved by Jack Wildman's Lord Nelson's own ship the Vanguard. death, though edified much by the manner Just before Nelson received his wound, of it, and some of his last observations. and while powder was being handed up, For a naked heathen to turn so soon into a there came a shell hissing among them, trousered Christian, and still more a good and hung with a sputtering fuse in the fore-top-man, was an evidence of unusual coil of a cable, and the men fell down to