spent some months a prisoner in France. He had on that
occasion picked up a fair knowledge of French, which much assisted him,
he said, in his present vocation. He was always on good terms with the
mounseers, he told me, though he amused himself sometimes at their
expense.

"Some of my chaps and I were ashore one night, not long ago, taking a
glass at a wine shop near the harbour, when a frigate came in, and a
beauty she was, no doubt about that." He continued: "The Frenchmen
began to praise her, and says one of them to me--

"`There, you haven't got a craft like that in the whole of your navy.'

"`I don't know what we've got,' says I; `but if there comes a war we
should precious soon have one, for we should have she.'

"You should have seen the rage the Frenchmen were in when I said that,
and heard how they _sacred_ and swore. But I calmed them down by
reminding them that they had taken some of our frigates, and that it was
only to be expected that we should take some of theirs in return."

The captain gave me a side-berth in the little cabin, occupied
generally, I found, by one of the mates. It was somewhat close, but I
was soon asleep, and slept soundly until daylight the next morning.

By noon a breeze sprang up from the eastward, and under all sail we
stood away to the southward. By nightfall we were well in with the
French coast, but farther to the west than I expected.

"The tide will soon make in shore, and we must beat back to the
eastward," observed the skipper. "You mustn't hope, howsomdever, young
gentleman, to get ashore till to-morrow morning."

This mattered little to me, as I had no great objection to spend a few
hours more on board.

During the night I awoke, and found the vessel perfectly motionless.

"Can another calm have come on?" I thought.

I was going off to sleep again, when I heard a footstep in the cabin,
and, looking out of my bunk, by the light from the swinging lamp I saw
the skipper examining some papers at the table.

"Has the wind dropped again?" I inquired.

"No, we are at anchor; we have been chased by a _chasse-maree_, and so,
to escape her, we slipped in here; and here we shall remain perhaps for
some days, till the coast is clear," he answered.

"In that case, captain, I shall prefer going on shore, and making my way
overland to my friend's house. I shall find conveyances of some sort, I
suppose?" I said.

"As to that I can't say. It isn't much of a pla