an-o'-war
anchorage. Nothing that could, even by the most hypersensitive, be
construed into an act of discourteous behaviour was shown to either the
officers or men of the ship; on the contrary, the Spaniards, no doubt
shrewdly suspecting that the eye of the United States, quickened by
recent events to a state of preternaturally acute perception, was
suspiciously watching their every action, were at the greatest pains to
exhibit the utmost courtesy, not only official but also non-official, to
their visitors, to whom the officials and residents alike extended the
most generous hospitality, in return for which several receptions were
held on board the ship by Captain Sigsbee and his officers.

Now it happened that on February 15th--which fell on a Tuesday--Don
Hermoso Montijo, his son Carlos, and Jack Singleton, completely worn out
by many months of campaigning among the mountains, and several sharp
attacks of fever, having amalgamated their considerably augmented band
with that of another insurgent leader, and turned the command over to
him, succeeded in entering the city of Havana unrecognised, and made
their way on board the _Thetis_--which had then been for some time lying
idle in the harbour--with the intention of recruiting their health by
running across the Atlantic for the purpose of procuring a further
supply of arms and ammunition, which the continual accessions to the
revolutionary ranks caused to be most urgently needed. They were most
enthusiastically welcomed by Milsom, who, having heard nothing from any
of them for more than three months, was beginning very seriously to fear
that, like many others of the revolutionaries, they had been "wiped out"
in one or another of the countless skirmishes that were constantly
occurring with the Spanish troops. He was delighted to learn that they
were all to make a run across the Atlantic and back together; and within
an hour of their arrival on board set to work upon the necessary
preparations for the trip, which, however, he explained, it would be
scarcely possible to complete under a couple of days, in the then
disordered state of the city, with its attendant disorganised business
conditions.

But, great as Milsom's pleasure at their appearance undoubtedly was,
Singleton soon became aware of a certain subtle constraint and
uneasiness in his friend's manner toward him; and as soon as he had
satisfied himself that it really existed, and was not the result of his
own