the course of the night the learned professor had polished up all his
little speeches to be recited before the minister, and probably before
the king; had nicely adjusted all his bows and gestures, and laid up a
magazine of expedients for possible emergencies, such as the presence of
the Duke of Brabant, Prince Leopold, and even of "La Reine de Belge;"
but the dreamer was glad when the morning came; for the night had been
very long, though he had probably slept three quarters of the time;
gladder still when he heard the water splashing on the deck above him,
as the watch washed down the quarter-deck, for now he could get up. He
did get up, and went out to taste the freshness of the early air.

The young seamen had finished their labor on the quarters, and were at
work in the waist. A kind of force-pump, or fire-engine, was attached to
the Josephine, to save labor in washing down the decks, and to be used
in case of fire below. It was provided with a sufficient length of hose
to reach all parts of the vessel, and was worked by a single brake,
manned by four hands. With this apparatus the boys were deluging the
decks with water, one of them holding the pipe, and half a dozen
scrubbing the planks with long-handled brushes.

A fire-engine, or indeed anything that will squirt, is a great luxury to
the boys, with whom "running with the machine" is a constitutional
tendency. The novelty of the Josephine's force-pump had not yet worn
away, and it contributed in no small degree to alleviate the hard and
ungentlemanly labor of washing down decks.

Mr. Hamblin was not a boy, and he had a constitutional dislike of
fire-engines and all hydraulic apparatus, partly, perhaps, because the
boys liked it. The quarter-deck was still wet with the drenching it had
received, and the professor did not like to dampen his feet on the one
hand, or retreat to the close cabin on the other. He did what Americans
are very apt to do when situated between the two horns of a dilemma--he
compromised between the difficulties by seating himself on the fife-rail
between a couple of belaying-pins. He was careful to place himself
abaft the mainmast, so that the wicked engine would not spatter him.

He sat on the fife-rail and began to think of the king and the minister
again; but his reflections this time were very brief, and if his fancy
burned again with glowing anticipation, the flame was suddenly quenched
by a stream of water directed at the foot of the