table. You can
hear them if you cannot see them--hear them groaning, sometimes even
shrieking, in their agony; and the mournful call for "Water! water!" is
heard in every lull of the fight or momentary cessation of cannon's
roar. And bending low as they move among them are the stewards and
idlers of the ship, serving out the coveted draught. But down the
blood-slippery companion-ladder come the bearers incessantly, carrying
as gently as a Jack can their sorely-stricken messmates. Verily a sad
scene! On deck war is witnessed in all its pomp and its panoply, on deck
is honour and glory; the dark side is seen in the cockpit--the sorrow,
the despair, the hopelessness, the agony, the death.

CHAPTER XX.

NELSON AND THE NILE.

"With one of his precious limbs shot away,
Bold Nelson knowed well how to trick 'em;
So, as for the French, 'tis as much as to say,
We can tie up one hand, and then lick 'em."
DIBDIN.

Things in England began to look up. Those who preached revolution were
forced to hide their heads with shame after the great battle of
Camperdown. For this fight had completely restored confidence in our
country's powers, and for the time being the fears of invasion had fled
far away.

In many a lordly hall over all the land the feast was laid, on many a
lofty hill the bonfires blazed; it was indeed a season of great
rejoicing.

In one of the window recesses of Mr. Keane's somewhat lonesome and
dreary suburban mansion, as the shadows of evening fell on the almost
leafless elms around the house, sat Gerty. She was looking out into the
gathering night, looking out at the slowly-falling leaves; for though a
book lay in her lap, it was almost too dark to read. By her side sat a
beautiful deer-hound, with his muzzle leaning on her knee, and gazing up
into her face with his brown earnest eyes, as if he knew there was
sorrow at her heart.

He--Jack--had given her that dog as a puppy, and no power on earth could
make her part with him. As she turned her eyes from the window, she
noted his speaking look, and as she bent to caress him, a tear fell on
his rough gray neck.

Presently there was a knock at the door, and in rushed Mary the maid.

Mary seemed about half daft. She was waving aloft a copy of the _Times_,
and scarce could speak for excitement. But she managed to point to a
certain column.

"What is it, Mary? I cannot see."

"Which it's ou