ey's "Nelson" an account of what he
did there. "The signal" (that famous one which Nelson looked at with his
blind eye), "the signal, however, saved Riou's little squadron, but
did not save its heroic leader. The squadron, which was nearest the
commander-in-chief, obeyed and hauled off. It had suffered severely in
its most unequal contest. For a long time the _Amazon_ had been firing
enveloped in smoke, when Riou desired his men to stand fast, and let
the smoke clear off, that they might see what they were about. A fatal
order, for the Danes then got clear sight of her from the batteries,
and pointed their guns with such tremendous effect that nothing but
the signal for retreat saved this frigate from destruction. 'What will
Nelson think of us!' was Riou's mournful exclamation when he unwillingly
drew off. He had been wounded in the head by a splinter, and was sitting
on a gun, encouraging his men, when, just as the _Amazon_ showed her
stern to the Trekroner Battery, his clerk was killed by his side,
and another shot swept away several marines who were hauling in
the main-brace. 'Come, then, my boys!' cried Riou, 'let us die all
together!' The words had scarcely been uttered before a raking shot cut
him in two. Except it had been Nelson himself, the British Navy could
not have suffered a severer loss."

JACK RENTON

Some yarns of an exceedingly tough and Munchausen-like character have
been spun and printed by men of their adventures in Australian waters
or the South Seas, but an examination of such stories by any one with
personal knowledge of the Pacific and Australasia has soon, and very
deservedly so, knocked the bottom out of a considerable number of them.
Yet there are stories of South Sea adventure well authenticated, which
I are not a whit less wonderful than the most marvellous falsehoods that
any man has yet told, and the story of what befell John Renton is one
of these. A file of the _Queenslander_ (the leading Queensland weekly
newspaper) for 1875 will corroborate his story; for that paper gave the
best account of his adventures in one of their November (1875) numbers,
and the story was copied into nearly every paper in Australasia.

Like Harry Bluff, John Renton "when a boy left his friends and his home,
o'er the wild ocean waves all his life for to roam." Renton's home was
in Stromness, in the Orkneys, and he shipped on board a vessel bound to
Sydney, in 1867, as an ordinary seaman, he then bein