a mere floating coffin. The fighting _Temeraire_, and
the saucy _Arethusa_, and Nelson's _Victory_ itself, would be nothing
but targets for deadly fire from active and irresistible foes. The odds
would be about the same as the odds of javelins and crossbows against
modern fire-arms. Steam alone had made a revolution in naval warfare;
but when we add to this the armour-plating of vessels, and the terrible
artillery of modern times, "the wooden walls of old England" are only
fit to be used as store-ships or hospitals for a few years, and then
sent to the ship-yards to be broken up for firewood. But though
material conditions have changed, the moral forces are the same as ever,
and courage, daring, skill, and endurance are the same in ships of oak
or of iron:--

"Yes, the days of our wooden walls are ended,
And the days of our iron ones begun;
But who cares by what our land's defended,
While the hearts that fought and fight are one?
'Twas not the oak that fought each battle,
'Twas not the wood that victory won;
'Twas the hands that made our broadsides rattle,
'Twas the hearts of oak that served each gun."

These are words from one of the "Songs for Sailors," by W.C. Bennett,
who has written better naval poems for popular use than any one since
the days of Dibdin. The same idea concludes a rattling ballad on old
Admiral Benbow:--

"Well, our walls of oak have become just a joke
And in tea-kettles we're to fight;
It seems a queer dream, all this iron and steam,
But I daresay, my lads, it's right.
But whether we float in ship or in boat,
In iron or oak, we know
For old England's right we've hearts that will fight,
As of old did the brave Benbow."

But, after all, even in war, fighting is only a small part of the sum of
any sailor's life, and the British flag floats over ships on every sea,
whether under sail or steam, in the peaceful pursuits of commerce. The
same qualities of heart and mind will have their play, which Mr
Kingston has described in his stirring story,--a story which will be
read with profit by the young, and with pleasure by both young and old.

DR. MACAULAY, FOUNDER OF "BOY'S OWN PAPER."

CHAPTER ONE.

PREPARING TO START.

No steamboats ploughed the ocean, nor were railroads thought of, when
our young friends Jack, Tom, and Bill lived. They first met each other
on board the _Foxhound_ frigate, on the deck of which ship a scor