RTY FIVE.

A NIGHT IN THE DREADNOUGHT.

Chapter I. Stowaways.

We were spending the winter of 185--, my young brother Jack and I, with
our grandfather at Kingstairs, a quiet little seaside village not a
hundred miles from the Nore.

I am not quite clear to this day as to why we were there--whether we
were sent for a treat, or for a punishment, or whether I was sent to
take care of Jack, or Jack was sent to take care of me. I can't
remember that we had committed any unusually heinous offence at home.
Indeed, since our attempt a week or two previously to emulate history by
smothering the twins, after the manner of the princes in the Tower, we
had been particularly quiet, not to say dull, at home. For the little
accident of the squib that went off in the night nursery in the middle
of the night counted for nothing, nobody being hurt, and only the head
nurse and our aunt having hysterics.

So that when, the day after we had broken up for the holidays, our
father told us we were going to spend Christmas at grandfather's, there
was nothing in our past conduct to suggest that the step was to be
regarded in the light of a punishment.

All the same, it was no great treat. At least it would have been far
more of a treat to spend Christmas at home, and carry out our long-
cherished design of digging at the bottom of the garden till we reached
the fire in the middle of the earth, an operation which we reckoned
would occupy at least a week; to say nothing of the usual Christmas
parties, which we did not see the fun of missing, and the visits to the
Tower and the Monument, which always seemed to be part of every
Christmas holiday.

However, as it was all settled for us, and everybody seemed to think it
a great treat for us, and further, as Jack had a boat which wanted
sailing, we yielded to the general wish, and reminding everybody that
the presents could be sent down in a trunk a day or two before the 25th,
we took our leave and repaired to Kingstairs.

Our father came with us, just to see us settled down, and then returned
to town. And it was not till after he had gone that we began to think
it rather slow to be left alone down there with only grandfather and
Jack's boat for company.

Grandfather was very old. We always used to put him down at a round
hundred years, but I believe he was only seventy-five really. However,
he was not as young as we were, and being rather infirm and subject to
rheumatism, he preferr