ing their circumstances. That man Ned Wright keeps them
all in good humour. Although, as you know, he has suffered severely in
hands and feet, he feels himself well enough to limp about the room and
act the part, as he says, of `stooard and cook to the ship's company.'
He insisted on beginning last night just after you left, and I found him
hard at it this morning when I went to see them. He must have been the
life of the ship before she went ashore, for he goes about continually
trolling out some verses of his own composing, though he has got no more
idea of tune in him than the main-top-mast back-stay, to which, or
something of the same kind, he makes very frequent reference. Here is a
verse of his latest composition:--"

O-o-o-o-h! it's once I froze the end of my nose,
On the coast of Labrador, sir,
An' I lost my smell, an' my taste as well,
An' my pipe, which made me roar, sir;
But the traders come, an' think wot they done!
They poked an' pinched an' skewered me;
They cut an' snipped, an' they carved an' ripped,
An' they clothed an' fed an' cured me.

Chorus.--Hooroo! it's true
An' a sailor's life for me.

"Not bad, eh?" said Bob.

"Might be worse," answered Redding, with the air of one whose mind is
preoccupied.

"I've often wondered," continued Bob Smart, in a moralising tone, and
looking intently at the wreaths of smoke that curled from his lips as if
for inspiration, "I've often wondered how it is that sailors--especially
British sailors--appear to possess such an enormous fund of
superabundant rollicking humour, insomuch that they will jest and sing
sometimes in the midst of troubles and dangers that would take the
spirit out of ordinary men such as you and me."

"Bob Smart," said Redding earnestly.

"Yes," said Bob.

"D'you know it strikes me that I ought to go down to the wreck to see
how the McLeods are getting on."

"O ah! well, to change the subject, d'you know Mr Redding, that same
idea struck me some days ago, for Jonas Bellew has left them to look
after his own affairs, and the Indians were to go north on the 13th, so
the McLeods must have been living for some time on salt provisions,
unless they have used their guns with better success than has been
reported of them. If you remember, I have mentioned it to you more than
once, but you seemed to avoid the subject."

"Well, perhaps I did, and perhaps I had my reasons for it. However, I
am going down now, immediate