i.

the sun shone so bright at portsmouth harbor that afternoon that everything was gold and green and white except the black hulls of the ships and the great gray forts, out of which the guns sometimes bellowed warnings to boney across the water. and right out in the golden light lay his majesty's ship-of-the-line xantippe, riding statelily at anchor, like a queen of the seas upon her throne, so noble and commanding was she. but all the beauty and glory of sunlit harbor and white-walled town and sky and ships was as black as midnight to dicky carew when the dreadful summons came:

"please, sir, the captain wants to see you in his cabin."

when dicky stood inside the cabin facing the captain, stern, handsome, and as neat as wax, a sorrier-looking object than dicky carew would have been hard to find. his cap, which he held in his hand and twirled dolefully, had a big hole

[58]

torn in the top, his jacket was white with dust, and right across his nose was a large black smut. captain sarsfield examined him carefully from the top of his tousled yellow head down to his unblacked shoes, dicky blushing furiously all the while.

"a pretty spectacle you are, mr. carew, for an officer and a gentleman!" for although dicky was only fifteen and barely five feet high, he was a middy and a gentleman.

dicky said nothing, but continued to twirl his cap, while his eyes roamed uneasily around the captain's orderly cabin. and there, sitting on a sofa, with a dolly in her lap, was a little dark-eyed girl dressed in mourning, who was watching dicky with great interest.

"what have you been doing, sir, to get yourself in such a mess as you are?"

"catching cockroaches down in the hold, sir, with barham," answered dicky, in a quavering voice.

"a nice employment for two young gentlemen. when i was a midshipman, i employed my leisure in studying my profession."

"yes, sir. that's what all the officers tell us. barham and i are the only fellows i ever heard of that did anything but study their profession."

captain sarsfield looked very hard indeed at dicky. was it possible that this dirty and ingenuous youth was poking fun at a post-captain? but could deceit reside in those innocent eyes and that timid, boyish voice? the captain was in doubt.

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"at all events," he continued, with an appalling look at the smut on dicky's sunburned nose, "your appearance, sir, is disgraceful. i believe you are the dirtiest midshipman in his majesty's service, and you will be docked of leave to go ashore for the next eight days."

the captain was about to deliver dicky a lecture, when an orderly tapped at the cabin door and saluted.

"the new cutter has come, sir, and is about to be taken aboard."

the captain got up and went out without remembering to send dicky back into the steerage, where he belonged.

as dicky continued to stand, cap in hand, he would certainly have boohooed right out if he had not been an officer and a gentleman. dicky, when he remembered that, gulped down two large sobs that rose in his throat, and winked his eyes to keep the tears back. was there ever another such unlucky fellow as he, dicky carew, he asked himself, dismally. there was barham, that was just as busy with the cockroaches as he was, and yet barham's jacket wasn't dirty nor his nose smutted, and if the captain had sent for him he would have turned up as trig as the captain himself. and how many times a week dicky was mast-headed for untidiness, and how often had he ridden to london and back on the spanker boom for that same fault, only dicky himself could tell.

while he was pursuing these melancholy reflec

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tions the little girl on the sofa had fixed her dark eyes on him.

"what's the matter with you?" she asked.

"i'm dirty," answered dicky, desperately. "i tub and scrub as much as any of 'em, but the captain can't see what i am underneath, and he thinks because i'm dirty outside i'm dirty all over."

"the captain is my papa," said miss bright eyes.

"i wish he was my papa," remarked dicky, sadly, "if he'd be any easier on me."

girls, as a rule, possessed no charm for dicky; but this was such a very little one—not more than ten years old—that he regarded her as an infant, and rather a pretty one.

"i'm staying in portsmouth," she continued, nursing her dolly very carefully, "with my governess and my nurse. my mamma is dead. she died only a month ago—before papa's ship got here—and i come on board nearly every day to see my papa. sometimes, if it rains, i stay all night. i have a funny little bed made up in papa's sleeping cabin, and in the morning i get up and make his tea for him."

that story about her mamma went to dicky's heart.

"and my mother got to portsmouth this morning to see me, and she hasn't much money, and can only stay a week, and i can't go ashore to see her because i didn't keep my face clean and mussed my jacket."

"why didn't you behave yourself, then?"

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promptly and severely asked his young friend. "papa always behaved himself when he was a little boy like you."

this last very much incensed dicky.

"now look here, young lady," he said, "i'm an officer and a gentleman! didn't you hear your father call me so just now? and if people in this ship call the officers 'little boys,' they'll get put in irons as likely as not. as for the officers behaving themselves when they were midshipmen, everybody knows they were angels—sea-angels—and the steerage was a little heaven. oh, they didn't catch cockroaches—not they! and all the time they weren't on duty they were studying or saying their prayers. and as for skylarking, why, they never heard of such a thing! i'll tell you what—eh, what's your name?"

"polly," answered bright eyes.

"well, polly, it ain't true that 'whom the gods love die young'; for if it were, there wouldn't be an officer of this ship alive to-day. barham and i ain't going to die young, though. the gods don't love us, nor the captain neither."

"you oughtn't to talk so about dying," answered polly, gravely. "you never had your mamma to die. sometimes, when i've stayed on board all night, i've waked up and seen papa sitting by me, looking so strange and sad, and i know he is thinking about mamma, although he says, 'go to sleep, my dear, nothing is the matter!' and i can see the tears on his cheek; and my papa is a brave sailor too. he says he knows i ought to go to

[62]

school, but he can't bear to part with me." this very proudly.

"i dare say," said dicky, mournfully, "it will break my mother's heart when she has come all this long way to see me, and can't see me. and she will be sure to think i have done something scandalous. i know she will!"

this worked so upon polly's feelings that she said:

"come here, and i'll get some pictures and show you."

"i can't," answered dicky. "i've got to stand here until the captain comes back."

"then i'll come to you," said polly.

when the captain got back he found polly sitting on the floor, with her lap full of pictures, and dicky on the floor too, explaining them to her. the captain was quite in the cabin before dicky heard a step. then he jumped up, stood perfectly rigid, and blushed scarlet. it was bad enough to be caught at boyish tricks on the quarter-deck, which had sometimes happened, but to be found playing on the floor with a little girl was a reflection on his manhood. however, the captain did not seem very angry. he only said, "you may go, sir, and don't let me have to speak to you again about your personal appearance!" and dicky fancied he saw something like a smile on captain sarsfield's face. dicky said, "yes, sir," and bowed to the captain, and then to the little girl.

"good-by, miss polly," said he. it had been "polly" and "dicky" before the captain came in.

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"ain't you going to give me a kiss?" asked polly in a surprised voice.

dicky could get no redder than he was, but his hair almost stood on end, while he darted out and down the ladder, never stopping until he got to his own nook in the steerage.

"girls are deuced bothersome—damme if they ain't," he remarked to barham—these young gentlemen, in privacy, swearing quite mannishly, and discussing the feminine sex with a great assumption of knowingness.

up in the cabin, the captain had said, "polly!" in a reproving voice, and polly had climbed up on his knee and kissed him, by way of answer.

"do you know, papa, dicky's mother is poor. she is the widow of an officer who was killed by that wicked boney at the battle of the nile"—for in those days boney was supposed to command on sea as well as on land—"and dicky was only ten years old, and his mother has come to portsmouth to see him, and she can only stay a week, so dicky won't be able to see her."

"ah," said the captain, stroking his little daughter's hair.

"and she is staying in a little gray house, the next but one to the gate leading into the great dock yard. papa, i would like to go to see dicky's mother the next time we go ashore, and tell her that dicky hasn't done anything very bad—because he says she'll think he has been very, very naughty—and tell her it's only because he is so dirty."

"you may go this afternoon," said the captain;

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"and perhaps i may let dicky off before the week is out."

the next day, as dicky was rather disconsolately poring over a book on seamanship, another summons came to the cabin. dicky was in perfect order, for a wonder, and looked considerably less frowsy and blowzy than he had the day before. when he entered the captain's room the captain was at the table, writing, and polly, on her knees on the cushioned seat, was peering out of the port-hole; but she turned around when dick entered.

"mr. carew," said the captain, sternly, "i hope i impressed upon you yesterday the necessity for absolute personal neatness in your attire. the punishment i gave you, however, i have concluded to partially remit. after to-day, you may go ashore when you can get leave."

"thank you, sir," replied dicky, blushing with pleasure; "and—and—captain sarsfield, i'm not—as dirty as i look."

"i am glad to hear it, sir," responded captain sarsfield, gravely. "good afternoon."

still dicky lingered. he wanted to say a word to polly, but he couldn't do it with the captain's grave eyes fixed on him. so he only hung about for a moment, then said, "good-by, miss polly," and vanished.

dicky's mother was delighted to see him next day, and dicky gave her such a bear hug, as he sometimes did barham, that his mother shrieked, while she laughed and covered his face with kisses.

"and dicky, such a dear little girl, all dressed

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in black, came here yesterday with her nurse! she was little polly sarsfield, the captain's daughter, and she told me why you couldn't come ashore, and that the captain, hearing i was here, had concluded to remit your punishment. i knew my dear boy wasn't punished for insubordination, or swearing, or gambling. if i thought that possible, it would break your mother's heart."

dicky felt rather uncomfortable at his mother's supreme confidence in him, and was glad she didn't know everything that went on among the young gentlemen in the steerage.

"and polly is a jolly little thing," remarked dicky. "nothing but a baby, though."

"polly will be a young lady by the time you are a man," answered his mother, who did not take dicky's assumption of manliness seriously.

"oh, pshaw!" remarked dicky, with a blush.

ii.

in those days, when england was at war with france and half of europe, promotion was sometimes rapid; and when dicky had not got very far in his twenties he had been gazetted three times, and actually commanded a little eighteen-gun brig that carried as much manliness and courage as anything afloat. dicky walked the deck of his little vessel, the hornet, as proudly as captain sarsfield walked his splendid quarter-deck on his new line-of-battle ship—the indomptable, finer even than the old xantippe. and dicky had developed

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into a model of sailor-and-officer-like neatness, and kept his ship as clean as a lady's boudoir. and one bright day the hornet came sailing into portsmouth harbor, her sails and rigging roughly patched where the shot had torn through, with holes covered with bright new planking in her black sides, with four of her guns shattered at their muzzles, but bravely towing a french sloop of war almost twice as big as the little hornet. the frenchman, too, could barely keep afloat, but he had ten good guns that dicky had brought home in place of the four he had lost. and dicky, seeing the great, big, splendid indomptable anchored in the harbor, stood boldly in and dropped his anchor just astern of her. dicky knew well enough who commanded the indomptable.

oh, what shouting and hurrahing there was when the people in the ships and those on shore made out the little hornet! and what dipping of flags and waving of caps and cheering when the little vessel had come to anchor! and then, when dicky, in a very small and shabby gig, with only four men at the oars, and some of them with their heads or their legs bound up, was rowed to the admiral's ship, there was more cheering and shouting, which made dicky's heart swell.

that very afternoon, by the time dicky had got back on board the hornet, a gig very unlike the hornet's gig put off from the big indomptable, and presently captain sarsfield clambered up the side, and dicky, looking very red and pleased, holding his cap in his hand very much as he had

[67]

done when captain sarsfield sent for him to scold him about his untidiness and general naughtiness, received the captain at the gangway.

"let me congratulate you," said captain sarsfield, shaking his hand warmly. "what a trouncing you gave the frenchman to be sure! how you managed to keep afloat i can't see."

"we are badly knocked to pieces," answered dicky, "and on that account i hope you will excuse the appearance of things. the ship isn't as clean as i'd like her to be."

the hornet was, though, as clean as hands could make her, her brass-work shining and her deck snow-white, although some of her spars were in splinters and things generally broken up. as for dicky, he looked as if he had been parboiled and sand-papered and then hung out to dry, so clean was he; and he had the air of having just stepped out of a bandbox. captain sarsfield grinned at dicky.

"you are certainly cleaner than you used to be," said he.

the captain had to hear all about the fight off cherbourg, where dicky sailed in under the very guns of the forts and made the frenchman come out to fight. it seemed very unequal at first, as the frenchman had the most men and the most metal. but dicky plainly had the most seamanship, and, in a running fight that lasted four hours, he cut the french ship up so that at last, when she struck, nothing but a tow line and her nearness to portsmouth saved her from going to the bottom.

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both the frenchman and dicky were too far gone to carry the prisoners back to portsmouth. these had been transferred to another vessel, but dicky had the frenchman's captain and her ensign and ten guns, which was good for dicky.

dicky was dying to ask captain sarsfield about polly; but, although he had been gazetted three times, he was so afraid of the captain that he could not get it out to save his life until just as captain sarsfield was leaving.

"and—how—how is miss polly?" asked dicky, looking sheepish and blushing furiously.

"very well," answered the captain, "and at present paying me a little visit. when you come to dinner to-morrow you will see her. she is quite a young lady—sixteen her last birthday."

young ladies grew up earlier then, and sixteen was considered quite old. so dicky went, and found polly a grown-up young lady, with full muslin skirts down to her heels, a short-waisted bodice belted just under her arms, and a large poke-bonnet. dicky was very shy, but polly was not, and rallied him unmercifully, even cruelly alluding to the smut on his nose, which she had remembered all those years.

things were very pleasant about that time to dicky; but then the war closed soon after, much to dicky's disgust, who had wild dreams of commanding a fifty-gun sloop of war at least before boney was finally done for; and dicky saw, disconsolately enough, that he was well off to have

[69]

got the little hornet, and that he would not get anything better for a long while.

meanwhile, dicky had been making hay while the sun shone, and a day had come when he went on board the indomptable to ask captain sarsfield a very important question indeed—which was whether polly and himself could get married. dicky was terribly frightened, but managed to appear tolerably self-possessed as he sat in captain sarsfield's cabin, although he could not help twiddling his cap desperately under the table. the captain was as grave and stern as ever, and gave dicky no manner of help while he was blundering and floundering about, trying to tell the captain how much he loved polly, although it was perfectly plain that captain sarsfield, or anybody with half an eye, for that matter, must have known directly what ailed dicky.

then dicky told the captain that he had a snug sum of prize money put by, which should be polly's, and the captain had said that polly was not quite dowerless, and the whole thing was arranged, captain sarsfield shaking dicky's hand formally, and wishing the young couple might be as happy as he and polly's mother had been, long years ago. and for a wonder, captain sarsfield appeared to think that perhaps polly and dicky might have something to say to each other, and considerately stalked up and down the quarter-deck for a full hour, while the young ones had a rapturous interview in the cabin. when dicky got back to the hornet, he sent for barham, who was his first-lieuten

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ant, and they hugged each other and danced round in the cabin very much as they had done when they found amusement in catching cockroaches in the old xantippe.

polly and dicky were to be married in the spring. dicky was cruising about the english channel, getting into portsmouth for a few days every month, where the indomptable was lying awaiting her turn to be overhauled and repaired, for she too had got a shot or two from boney before he got away to elba.

one bright day in spring, as bright as the one on which dicky first met polly, the hornet was coming into portsmouth. there was a spanking breeze from the sea that tossed the white caps high, and the little hornet was skimming along under all the sail she could carry. now, although french ships had begun to appear again in english ports by that time, they were rather unusual; so dicky, who was on the bridge of the hornet, was rather surprised to see a big french frigate, the alceste, sailing slowly out of the inner harbor. she was a fine ship, but she was sailing like a hay-stack, one mile ahead and three miles to leeward. the passage into the harbor of portsmouth is narrow—not more than four or five hundred yards across—and from the lubberly way the alceste was tacking about, she would probably take all the room there was, and considerably more if she could get it, to come out, and leave none at all for the little hornet; but dicky wasn't afraid of that. when it came to navigating a ship in a tight place, young

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captain carew was a match for any man who sailed the seas. in those days england claimed the sovereignty of the narrow seas, and exacted that a man-of-war, of any other nation whatsoever, on meeting a british war-ship in those waters, should salute the british ensign by lowering her topsails. naturally, this was peculiarly hateful to french captains, who not infrequently omitted it, when the french ship was very big and the british ship very little. then a long official correspondence would follow, but no french captain was ever punished for this defiance of the might of england. dicky carew, however, was not the man to consider the difference between a big ship and a little one where the respect due the flag he carried was at stake. his ensign was set, which was a hint to the french ship that her topsails must come down.

but the alceste seemed in no hurry to show her manners. the fresh breeze that filled her ill-set sails kept most of her people busy, the sailors bustling about the decks with more chattering and noise than captain carew would have allowed on his ship in a month. but not a man went near her topsail halliards.

from the way the alceste was lurching about, it began to look very doubtful if the little hornet could pass in the narrow passage to the harbor, where it was plain they would meet; but dicky carew had no notion of shortening sail and hanging around outside until the frenchman had got out. so in contrast to the great lumbering alceste, the little hornet came dashing on, with a free wind,

[72]

making about two knots to the alceste's one, and her course as straight as the crow flies. the french captain, who was also on his bridge, saw that the hornet had no mind to stand out of his way, but he laughed as he looked at his own big hull and towering masts, and saw the little hornet, whose mainmast was no higher than the alceste's lower spars. and not the slightest sign was made that his topsails were to be lowered.

now dicky could stand the alceste's bad seamanship, but it didn't suit him to take the alceste's snub, and then sit down and write to the admiralty and complain about it. he had been used to teaching frenchmen to behave themselves, and he meant to do so now.

"barham," said he to his first lieutenant, "the rascals don't mean to salute."

"report 'em to the admiralty as soon as we come to anchor," responded barham.

"wouldn't it be better to smash his cabin windows, and splinter one of his starboard boats beforehand—eh?"

"decidedly better," said barham, whose blood was up too. "with such a lot of landsmen and marines as they've got aloft, it will go hard if the hornet can't scrape some of the paint off his sides."

by this time the french captain saw what was coming. the hornet was standing up beautifully to the breeze, and apparently making straight for the alceste. in two minutes more she was right on his starboard quarter, and the french sailors began to yell. barham had taken the wheel, and

[73]

kept his eye on captain carew, when, as dicky waved his hand, barham threw down the helm, and the little hornet scraped so close to the alceste that the quartermaster, taking up a boat-hook, jammed it through the alceste's cabin windows, bawling:

"take that for yer manners, ye ornsightly lubbers!"

and then there was a crash—a boat on the alceste's starboard quarter was gone, and as the big frigate lurched across the yard of blue water between them, the little hornet's stanch mizzen mast struck the alceste's lower spars, that were only half secured, and tore through the rigging as if it were a cobweb. in another minute the hornet with her helm righted had danced off, her men cheering and jeering, while the french captain fairly danced with rage, and shook his fist at captain carew, who raised his cap, and bowed and smiled politely.

of course it was very wrong, and captain carew knew it, particularly when he saw the alceste deliberately put about to return to portsmouth. dicky began to have dreadful visions of being obliged to go on the alceste in full uniform, and make an apology to the french captain, than which he would much rather have had an arm cut off.

but all this was forgotten when dicky caught sight of the indomptable, for polly was still in portsmouth, and not many days passed without the captain's daughter coming on board the big frigate with her father for an hour or two. polly loved the indomptable, as she had done the old xantippe, and was quite as much at home on her,

[74]

although she no longer had a little bed in her father's cabin. captain sarsfield looked very serious when dicky told him about it, and things generally began to look grave when the french ambassador came down to portsmouth and looked at the alceste, and then took the french captain back to london with him. dicky was not a whit behindhand in making his report to the admiralty about the french ship's omission—but that was all he was entitled to do. the jabbing the boat-hook through the alceste's cabin windows, and the smashing her boat, while the hornet's first lieutenant was at the wheel and her captain on the bridge, was altogether another thing. and in a very little time indeed came the order for a court-martial, and young captain carew was ordered to turn his ship over to his first lieutenant, and consider himself under arrest. what a stir it made! and the people all said, "if they break him for crippling a ship twice his size, without getting a scratch, they will have hard work finding another captain who can do it; and if every man resented an affront to the british ensign like that, why, it never would be safe to affront it."

the captains, sitting stern and solemn around the table in the admiral's cabin, heard the whole story. in vain they tried to bring out that accident had something to do with it; but dicky, cool and calm, declared openly that he had done it on purpose, and would do it again, to any man that did not salute the ensign flying on his majesty's ship hornet—if he could.

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the courts-martial in those times did not keep a man long in suspense. there was indeed a fearful dispatch in taking an officer's commission away from him. one whole may day was dicky on the rack, and he knew his fate before he left the admiral's ship. he left it a free man—free with the dreadful freedom of a man whose country disowns him. track would be kept of him, so the admiralty could set its seal of condemnation on him too, but otherwise he could go where he pleased.

the first use he made of this new and terrible liberty, was to go on board the indomptable, where he was shown into the captain's cabin. dicky was as white as a sheet, but he held his head up manfully.

"captain sarsfield" he said "i am a ruined man. i have been dismissed the service of my country. i came to say that although i am not conscious of having done anything to disgrace my name, i can no longer ask your daughter to accept it."

captain sarsfield too was pale. he loved dicky, but he could not bring himself to give polly to a cashiered officer, and he said so. but just then polly herself appeared, and marching up to dicky, with blazing eyes, she put her hand on his arm.

"but i want to marry him, and i will!" she said. "he is the best sailor in the british navy, and if they cashier him because he can do what hardly anybody else can do, very well. papa, i shall marry him."

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captain sarsfield rubbed his eyes to see if he were awake or dreaming. was this his quiet, gentle polly? as for dicky, his heart swelled, but he removed her hand gently from his arm.

"no, polly," he said; "your father is right. i could not bring you down to be the wife of a man counted unfit to serve his king and his country."

"but i am not afraid of being poor," said polly, with tears in her eyes.

"it is not that, my dear," answered dicky, in a husky voice. "it is because i am broken—don't you see? i shall have to take off the uniform that i had hoped to wear as long as i lived. i shall have to either live in my own country as a discredited man, or carry my discredit with me to another country; no, polly."

"but i say i will!" answered polly, fiercely.

"good-by," said dicky, taking her hand. "you are too generous; it would be cruel to take advantage of you, dear polly—"

the captain had been standing there all the time. both dicky and polly had forgotten him until he spoke.

"now, polly," said he, firmly, "this must stop. carew is right."

"well, then," said polly, standing up very straight and bold, "he may refuse to marry me now; but i mean to let him know once a year that i am ready and waiting for him, until—until he finds somebody else."

"there's no danger of that," said dicky, kiss

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ing her hand; "but you and i can never be married now, polly."

dicky did not go back to the hornet, but went ashore and to an inn, where, calling for a private room, he sat and tried to look the thing in the face like a man; but he couldn't. his profession gone, his mother's heart broken, separated from polly, no longer captain carew, commanding his majesty's ship hornet, but plain dicky carew commanding nothing at all.

oh, poor dicky! how much easier would it have been to be killed in those sea-fights with boney's ships! what was he to do? all night long dicky sat up and walked the floor, and when day broke he was so haggard and miserable that he was ashamed to show himself. all day he sat in his little room; he would wait until nightfall before he took the coach for london. disgraced men ought to hide themselves from the light of day. toward evening, just as he was preparing to go out, a furious knocking came at his door. dicky opened it, and there stood a functionary all in scarlet and gold—a king's messenger, so dicky knew. the messenger, making a low bow, handed a packet to dicky. "i was directed to deliver this into mr. carew's own hands," he said.

dicky winced. it was the first time that he had been called "mr. carew."

dicky broke the big red seal, and found two documents inclosed. one was a letter from the admiralty, and this is what it said:

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richard carew, esq.: sir.—i am directed by the lords of the admiralty to inform you that the sentence of the late court-martial, finding you guilty of willfully running into the french frigate alceste, coming out of portsmouth harbor, on the 25th of march, has been submitted to his majesty in council, and the decision of the court—viz., that you be deprived of your commission as commander—has been approved by his majesty, without regarding the provocation you were under, or the great skill, daring, and capable seamanship you displayed on the occasion. but his majesty herewith incloses you a commission under the royal seal as post-captain, and directs you to take command of his majesty's ship hornet, now lying in portsmouth harbor; and may all impudent frenchmen be served like the alceste, as long as british hearts of oak endure!"

and then followed signatures and seals. but dicky could read no more; and although he was as brave a fellow as ever stepped, he fell down on his knees and cried like a woman or a baby.

within a month dicky and polly were married. the day was beautiful and bright, and the little hornet was dressed with bunting from rail to main-truck, and the wedding bells clashed so merrily that they were heard half across the water to cherbourg.

note.—in thackeray's roundabout papers he says: "in george ii's time there was a turbulent young lieutenant, tom smith by name, who was broke on complaint of the french

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ambassador for obliging a french ship of war to lower her topsails to his ship at spithead. but by the king's orders, tom was next day made a captain." tom's picture is at greenwich. he was called "handsome smith," but his portrait is by no means so handsome as his conduct.