or comparing notes, but all three resting so as to be ready for
the work in hand.

It was one glorious evening when Frank was leaning over the side gazing
forward towards the land that they were soon to reach, and where they
would give up the inert life they were leading for one of wild and
stirring adventure, that the young man suddenly started out of his
dreamy musings, for a voice behind him said softly--

"Beg pardon, sir." Frank turned sharply round. "Don't mind me
speaking, sir, I hope?"

"No, Sam," said Frank, rousing himself and speaking in a tone which
plainly suggested, "_Go on_."

"Thankye, sir. Don't seem to have had a chance to speak to you in all
this rumble tumble sort of look-sharp-or-you'll-be-left-behind time."

"No, we haven't seen much of one another, Sam."

"We ain't, sir, and I don't know as I've wanted to talk much, for it's
took all my time to think and make out whether it's all true."

"All true?"

"Yes, sir. Seems to me as if I'm going to wake up directly to find I've
been having a nap in my pantry in Wimpole Street."

"Hah! It has been a rush, Sam."

"Rush, sir? It's wonderful. Seems only yesterday we were packing up,
and now here we are--down here on the map. One of the sailors put his
finger--here it is, sir, signed Jack Tar, his mark, for it was one of
the English sailors, not one of the Lascar chaps. That's where we are,
sir."

Sam held up a conveniently folded map, surely enough marked by the tip
of a perspiring finger.

"He says we shall be in port to-morrow, and have to shift on to the rail
again, and in a few hours be in Cairo on the River Nile."

"That's quite correct, Sam," said Frank, smiling; "and then our work
will begin."

"And a good job too, sir; I want to be at it. But my word! it seems
wonderful. Me only the other day in my pantry, Wimpole Street, W., and
to-morrow in King Pharaoh's city where there were the plagues and
pyramids."

"And now hotels and electric lights, and the telegraph to communicate
with home."

"Yes, sir, it's alarming," said Sam. "Pity it don't go right up to
Khartoum--that's the place, ain't it, sir?"

"Yes, Sam."

"So as we could send a message to Mr Harry: `Keep up your spirits;
we're on the way.'"

"Ah, if we could, Sam!" said Frank, with a sigh.

"Never mind, sir; we're not losing much time. But who'd ever think it!
I used to fancy that foreign abroad would look foreign, but it don't a
bit. Here's the sea and