o sent a great deal of wine and goods of that sort
up to Cairo, getting leave from the commandant here for them to go up
under the guard of any body of troops that happened to be proceeding
there, so that altogether the firm had not done badly, all things
considered."

"Are you short of cash now, Mr. Muller? for if so I can give you a draft
on my father, who has some money of mine in his hands, for a thousand
pounds, the result partly of prize-money, partly of a speculation I
made in the purchase of a prize which I went home in. I bought it in his
name, but he insists that as it was purely my speculation he should put
the profit to my account."

"Thank you; I do not require it. I have had no opportunity of sending
the money home for the last three years, and have therefore an abundance
of funds for all purposes."

"I suppose that you must be very short of timber, cordage, and ship
stores?"

"Not so much so as you would think. I am indeed very short of timber,
and would gladly take the whole cargo of a ship laden with it should it
arrive, but in other respects I am well off, for I boarded every
transport and merchantman before they left the port, and bought up all
their spare stores, which they were glad enough to part with on
reasonable terms, for there was no advantage in carrying them back to
France, and of course I could well afford to pay a considerable advance
on the prices they would obtain there. I hope that you will stay here
for the night, Mr. Blagrove, for I am anxious to hear all that you have
been doing. I can offer you nothing but horse-flesh for dinner, for the
town is in a state of starvation."

"I cannot do that. I have only leave till five o'clock, and indeed I
only obtained permission to enter the town for two hours, and the French
might object were I to stop here to-night."

Edgar wrote a long letter to his father. An hour after he had done so he
left, taking it and the trader's packet away with him. These he placed
in the headquarter-staff mail-bag. The letters were to be taken the next
morning by the _Carmine_, which carried Sir Sidney Smith and Colonel
Abercrombie, who were in charge of the naval and military official
despatches, giving an account of the successful termination of the
campaign, to England. Lord Keith was most anxious that the men-of-war
should get away from the coast before bad weather set in, and
accordingly 5000 of the troops, under the command of General Craddock,
embarke