When I awoke next morning, the first thing I did was to reconnoitre how my little and most unexpected visitor held out. There lay the fair child, steeped in a balmy slumber, with his downy cheeks as peachlike and blooming as ever; even his hair, with the crystallized, salt sparkling amongst it, once more curled thick and clustering round his magnificent forehead. As I stooped over him he awoke, and stretched out his arms in the evident expectation of clasping some one that he had been accustomed to lie beside; alas! they touched the cold hard ship's side. He grew startled, and called on his mother and then on his father, and on his grandfather, and his dear aunt Emily waiting between each exclamation for the wonted caress or answer. His eye caught mine-he looked surprised, and peered anxiously all about the cabin, until at last, as if he had really comprehended the full extent of his desolation, he began to cry bitterly, and to sob as if his little heart would have burst. Lennox and I did all we could to pacify him, but who could come instead to him of those whose hearts were now cold for ever? I could not stand it, and went on deck, leaving him in the hands of the steward.

The weather was now clear, and the sea had gone down; the frigate was about a mile and a half on our lee-bow, carrying all sail, so that we had to crack on to keep up with her. During that forenoon and the following day we had no communication together, but about 11 A. M. on the third day after the ship had foundered, we got so well placed on her quarter as to be able to communicate without trumpets.

The Commodore hailed first"Sad accident that t'other day, Mr Brail."

he had nothing on but his little frock and shift, which had been torn in the getting of him in, so Lennox and the sailmaker had rigged him in a tiny check-shirt, with white lappels, a pair of little duck trowsers, with large horn buttons, very wide at the feet, and very tight at the waist-cut, in a word, in the very extreme of nautical dandyism; little white canvass shoes, and a small tarpauling hat completed his set out. They had even hung by a piece of spunyarn a small hornhandled knife round his neck, so that he was a complete topman in miniature.

Childlike, for he could not have been three years old at the most, he had already taken to the men, and was playing with the pet-lamb, that was making believe to buck him with its head; and indeed every now and then it would knock over the little fellow, but without hurting him, and roll about with him on the deck.

"What child is that? And I see you have some live-stock-where got you the sheep?"

"The child was picked up, lashed to the lamb, Sir Oliver, when the ship went down."

"Come on board, and dine with me at three, Mr Brail-you can tell me all about it then."

We sheered off again; and it was laughable to notice the crowd of heads out of the frigate's ports the instant the little fellow was noticed on our decks. Immediately after this a group of men were sitting in the bows of the felucca with the child amongst them. Lennox came up to me and touched his forehead-" The little fellow told me his name was William Howard, sir; probably you would like to set it down as a clew to find out his friends when we get to England."

"A very proper precaution, Lennox, and well thought of, but are you sure that was the name the child answered to."

"Quite, sir; if you will step here, sir, you will be satisfied of it." I fol lowed him a pace or two nearer the group playing with the child.

"Dogvane," said Lennox-the man answered;" Wilcox," another seaman pricked up his ears, both a good deal surprised at the steward's address, with me at his back-but all this

time the boy was tumbling about amongst the men, taking no notice either of Lennox or me.

"William Howard," said Lennox. "What you want?" promptly said the child, as he knocked off from his play, and looked steadfastly at the marine. "A good and satisfactory proof," said I; "I will make a note of it, Lennox."

Donovan and I sometime after this were walking backwards and forwards on the small quarterdeck, talking of I don't remember what, when we perceived a stir amongst the men forward, and an attempt evidently making amongst them to shove old Dogvane aft with some communication to me. He appeared reluctant to be thrust forward as spokesman, and waxed very emphatic in his gestures to the group who were all talking at the same time, and laughing with each other as they closed round the old quartermaster.

"Come, there is more rain than wind in that squall," said I, to Donovan, looking towards the group. "What request, think you, is to be made now, Dennis ?"

"Can't conjecture for the life of me," said he.

Dogvane now took a fresh quid, by way of gaining courage, I suppose, to enter on his embassage, and advancing a step from the rest, he cast his eyes on the deck, and began to thump one hand on another, and to mutter with his lips as if he had been rehearsing a speech. Presently, giving his trowsers a hitch, and his quid a cruel chirt, he looked towards us, in act to advance, as it were, but his heart again failed him, and with another pull at his waistband, and a tremendous chew of his quid, which made the tobacco juice squirt from both corners of his mouth, he hove about again, apparently in despair and discomfiture, and joined the others, who instantly set up a loud laugh.

Lennox, I saw, had now slid round to the men, and with a most quizzical cast of his eye, was using his powers of persuasion with old Dogvane, to get him to weigh anchor once more, and to set forth on his mission again, but the quartermaster shook his head, and seemed to refuse point-blank. At length, after a great deal of bother, the steward ap

peared to have screwed his courage to the sticking place, for he now advanced to within a couple of yards of where we stood, the group behind creeping up after him. He kept rubbing the back of his hand across his muzzle, and coughing and clearing his voice, and every now and then he took a squint over his shoulder, to see that, in case his memory should fail him, he was in immediate communication with his reserve. After another stiff chew of his quid, and a devil of a hitch of the waistband of his trowsers, and a smoothing down of his forelock, he tore his hat off his head, as if it had been a divot, as Lennox might have said, and broke ground to the following purport

"You sees, your honour, and Mr Donovan, there-gentlemen both"A considerable pause, during which he seemed awfully puzzled.

"I am gravelled already, Lennox, you see," quoth he, over his shoulder.

I could not help smiling for the soul of me. Why, Dogvane, I have reason good to know that, but what would you be after? Come to the point, man."

"And so I would, captain, if I only knowed how to get thereI fear the point he speaks of lies in the wind's eye, and that I sha'n't fetch it," (aside to Lennox)" but as I says before, your honour, we had a sniffler some two days agone, and the parrot, Wapping Poll, your honour-why, she was blown overboard, your honour, and as a parrot is not of the gull specie, your honour, I fears as how poor Poll may have been drowned."

I could scarcely keep my gravity. "Why, assume that the bird is drowned, then, Dogvane, and get on."

"No, sir, with all submission, I have no sartainty of that. A bird that can speak, must think; and it's no impossibility, in my mind, in Poll being at this moment cruising as mate of the watch on the back of a wild-duck-but then a duck does dive now and then, to be sure."

I now suspected he had strengthened his nerves a little with a glass of grog.-"However, Poll might take a flight the time the other was below, you know, sir, if she only knowed where he might rise again. Still a gull would be her chance as for that no diving in a gull, your honour."

«

"But, my good man"-I was not over well pleased with what I thought I had discovered, especially with the freedom of the jest, if jest it was meant for " will you, I again ask you, come to the point, Dogvane-what would you be at? I can't stand all day palavering here, unless you know your own mind," and I turned away. My rebuke seemed to rouse Dogvane, who, making a sudden effort, sung out quick and sharp

"Then the parrot's overboard and drowned, sir. And the monkey is drowned too, sir, and the old cat is dead below with the damp and cold, and we shall all be starved for want of a pet, sir.-D-n your eyes, Jack Lennox, will that serve your turn, now?"

"Oh, I see, I see," said I.

"There," said Dogvane, giving a skip, and turning ajoyful countenance over his shoulder to the group behind him-"There, his honour sees-did not I tell you so ?-why, I thank your honour-we all thanks you kindly, sir; and such care as we shall take of him-ob, my eye! But all I says is, thank your honour again in the name of the whole bunch of us." He made his salaam, and he and his tail turned to bundle forward.

"I guess I know now what you would be at, Dogvane," said I, my tone approaching to a shrill shout in order to arrest his retreat. On this the old quartermaster hove about, his face evincing great chagrin and vexation at the idea, that after all his lucid explanation, I was still unenlightened. "I presume," I continued, "that having lost all your pets"

"Ah yes, sir-that's it."

"That having lost all your pets, you want to ask me for the sheep that we have picked up."

"No, no, no,"- -ran amongst the men; and old Dogvane slid out with a jet of tobacco juice-" D-n the sheep entirely-but, Jack Lennox,

there, take my oar now, will ye-I can make nothing of it, I can't pull a-head at all-it has been all back water with me;" and so saying he made his obeisance, and slunk away amongst the people, slewing his head from side to side, and smiting his thigh, as if he were saying-" Poo, poo, you see the captain won't understand, do as you will-indeed, he does not want to understand, you see."

The marine, on the retreat of the quartermaster, now came forward as a reserve, and in good set terms, leaving his northern accent out of the account, preferred a request on behalf of his shipmates, not for the sheep, but in the destruction of all the other pet creatures during the gale, he made out a strong case, which could only be met by my giving up the child, which he promised should succeed the defunct monkey, Dicky Phantom; and “although we all know his name to be Will Howard," said he, in conclusion, "we request your permission, sir, to christen him afresh, and to give him the same name, as a tribute of respect to the poor brute, who has hitherto afforded us so much amusement."

I was a good deal tickled at all this.

"But, men, you all heard Sir Oliver desire the child to be sent on board the frigate."

Here several voices grumbled"Why, they have two monkeys on board, and a kangaroo, and a hog in armour, and-oh, surely, they won't grab him too."

"Why, sir, we must leave it to you," said Lennox; "if the Commodore is in earnest in taking Dicky Phantom from us, surely he will spare us one of the monkeys. But I am sure no one will take such care of him as I should here, sir."

"Very well," said I, "I will see what can be done; in the meantime, get the child ready to go in the boat when I go on board to dinner. But where are his clothes?-you can't send him in that rig?"

The marine laughed. "Why, sir, his own clothes are all torn in pieces, and he has no others made; indeed, our sail-maker says he could no more make a petticoat than a lady's gown."

There was no help for it; and at

half past two, Donovan and I found ourselves in the stern-sheets of the small boat, with Dicky Phantom sitting between us, dressed out like a Lilliputian_boarder. As we pulled on board, I had time to look more minutely at the equipment of the boy. As already mentioned, he was dressed in trowsers, check shirt, and little tarpawling hat, with the word Midge painted in large letters on a scroll on the front of it; but they had now added a little cutlass, ground down from a piece of iron hoop, and bound round his waist by a black belt, and as a tiptop finish to his equipment, they had fastened an oakum queue to his curly wig, that hung down over the waistband of his little breeches. My natural bashful ness was sorely tested, when we got alongside, and found the ship swarming in all directions with busy grinning faces, wherever they could get a squint at us, and our little passenger; and when I stepped on deck, I had not the courage to take the child up, but left him in the

boat.

"How are you, Mr Brail-glad to see you, Mr Donovan, I hope you are better," said Sir Oliver. We made our acknowledgments. "Where is your little passenger, Mr Brail; have you brought him on board?"

"Why, yes, Sir Oliver, he is in the boat alongside, but the people have so monkeyfied him, that he is scarcely presentable on the quarterdeck."

And

was

"Never mind, hand him uphand him up-let us see him." poor little Dicky Phantom straightway transferred from the stern-sheets of the boat to the frigate's deck, amidst a buzz of laughter from officers and men.

The poor child was frightened, and ran crying to me, when Sir Oliver, with his innate right feeling and kindliness of heart, asked me to bring him down into the cabin, which I did, where the little fellow soon became quite at home, and began to amuse himself with some books of plates, and little Chinese figures, that Sir Oliver took out of a locker for his entertainment.

I related the particulars of my interview with his parents and kinsfolk on board the ship, which moved the kind old man exceedingly; but

dinner was now announced, and Dicky was handed over to Lennox, who had come on board in the novel capacity of dry- nurse. I could see the whole crew clustered on the gun-deck, in expectation of his coming out of the cabin; and the moment he made his appearance,― "Lennox, pass him forward."—“I say, Jack, Jack Lennox, lend him to me, man."-" Oh! d-n my eyes, man, do lend us a spell of the piccaniny."-" No, no-hand him to me first-here to me, man-I bespoke him, Jack, before Bill, there," resounded on all hands; and the two monkeys and hog in armour were as dust in the balance compared with Dicky Phantom. We sat down to dinner. Mr Donovan, and old Sprawl, along with one of the mates, were present, and every thing went on very much as usual.

"We must endeavour," said Sir Oliver, "to find out that poor little fellow's family and relations when we get to England, but what are we to do with him until we get there?"

I cheerfully offered to keep him on board the Midge.

"You are very good, Mr Brail, but in so small a hooker it would be inconvenient, so I shall make shift the best way I can here."

I laughed and said, "that next to a round-robin had been signed by the Midges, petitioning you would let them have the boy for the cruise, sir, in consequence of their having lost the ship's monkey and parrot." I noticed the Commodore's servant prick up his ears at this, and that same evening, before we got away from Gazelle, a deputation waited on Sprawl to offer both monkeys and the kangaroo, and the_hog_in armour, to the Midges, in fee simple, in exchange for Dicky Phantom. The Commodore had recovered his looks and spirits greatly since I last saw him, and gave us some of his old stories that I had heard before certainly. They were chiefly relating to the countries on the borders of the Mediterranean, and the following tickled me a good deal at the time :

Sir Oliver had been one of old Sir J. D's lieutenants on that station, and it was his watch on deck on a certain forenoon" a fine fresh breezy day, clear and sunshiny, and the