like that. Why, he walks every bit as well as I do, and
his watch-ribbon covers it. And nine children! Lord bless my heart! I
scarcely know which way to turn, with only four!"

Within a short fortnight Captain Stubbard was appointed, with an
office established at the house of Widow Shanks--though his real office
naturally was at the public-house--and Royal Proclamations aroused the
valour of nearly everybody who could read them. Nine little Stubbards
soon were rigged too smart to know themselves, as the style is of all
dandies; and even Mrs. Stubbard had a new belt made to go round her,
when the weather was elastic.

"These are the things that prove the eye of an All-wise Providence over
us," said the Captain to the Admiral, pointing out six pairs of short
legs, galligaskined from one roll of cloth; "these are the things that
make one feel the force of the words of David."

"Certainly, yes, to be sure!" replied the gallant senior officer, all
at sea as to the passage suggested. "Good legs they have got, and no
mistake; like the polished corners of the temple. Let them go and dip
them in the sea, while you give the benefit of your opinion here. Not
here, I mean, but upon Fox-hill yonder; if Mrs. Stubbard will spare you
for a couple of hours, most kindly."

Of the heights that look down with a breezy air upon the snug nest of
Springhaven, the fairest to see from a distance, and to tread with brisk
foot, is Fox-hill. For the downs, which are channelled with the springs
that form the brook, keep this for their own last spring into the air,
before bathing in the vigorous composure of the sea. All the other hills
fall back a little, to let Fox-hill have the first choice of aspect--or
bear the first brunt, as itself would state the matter. And to anybody
coming up, and ten times to a stranger, this resolute foreland offers
more invitation to go home again, than to come visiting. For the bulge
of the breast is steep, and ribbed with hoops coming up in denial,
concrete with chalk, muricated with flint, and thornily crested with
good stout furze. And the forefront of the head, when gained, is stiff
with brambles, and stubbed with sloes, and mitred with a choice band of
stanch sting-nettles.

"It would take a better Frenchman," said the Admiral, with that brevity
which is the happy result of stoutness up steep hill, "than any of 'they
flat-bottoms,' as Swipes, my gardener, calls them, to get through
these prickles, Stubbard,