rise out of me. "You think that funny, I suppose; but, I call
it both silly and vulgar!"

"`Silly!' `vulgar!' You very small fragment of impudence," rejoined
Larkyns, highly delighted at being thus successful in "pulling my leg"
and making me angry, "I'll have you keel-hauled for speaking so
disrespectfully to your superior officer, sir. Beg my pardon instantly,
or--"

What he would have done, however, in case of my non-compliance with his
imperative request remains a mystery to the present day; for, as at that
moment, the commander, who had been surveying the maintop from the
poop-rail above us, hearing my funny gentleman's voice, which he had
raised in speaking to me, called out to him--

"Below there," he cried--"Mr Larkyns!"

"Yes, sir," answered my "superior officer" humbly enough, touching his
cap and looking up at Commander Nesbitt. "Want me, sir?"

"Yes," said the other, "There's something wrong with the bunt of that
tops'l, I think. It does not appear to me quite ship-shape somehow or
other, Mr Larkyns. Go up to the maintop and see what's the matter with
it at once."

"Ay, ay, sir," replied my tormentor, springing nimbly into the rigging
and shinning up the ratlines almost as soon as the words were out of the
commander's mouth, "I'll see, sir."

I looked up at the moment, and, catching Commander Nesbitt's eye I'm
sure he gave a sort of sly wink, the which impressed on my mind the
conviction that he must have overheard our conversation and, wishing to
give Master Larkyns some employment for his spare time, had sent him
aloft on a wild-goose chase.

The topsail was stowed snugly enough, so, my friend the middy's missive
was set-off to his chaff at my expense.

This conviction was confirmed when the commander immediately afterwards
ordered me to go forwards and tell the boatswain to get the fish tackle
clear for hoisting in the lower deck guns as soon as they came alongside
next morning in the dockyard lighters.

The old _Candahar_, you must know, although she was described in the
"Navy List" of that day as a "two-decker," had really four decks--the
upper deck, main deck, lower deck and orlop deck.

The distinction of the designation lay in the fact that she carried guns
on two decks besides her upper one, the armament of which, as well as
that of her main deck had been got on board easily enough when she was
in harbour; but, as she was then lashed alongside the hulk and the lower
tier of guns