Corner, were devoted to practice with the big guns that are used in
modern ships of war; and these, I may add, are so unlike the old twenty-
four and thirty-two and sixty-four pounders that had been used in our
early training, that any drill with them would have failed to have been
of much assistance to us in getting the cross-cannon badge on our
sleeve.

So, for these seven weeks, all of us first-class boys who were near the
end of our term had to go to the _Excellent_ every day to go through a
course of gunnery; and were sent out to sea in sections in the _Blazer_
or _Handy_, or some other gunboat attached to the gunnery school, so as
to gain some sort of preliminary insight into the ways of the big
breech-loading guns used in the armour-clads of to-day, as well as being
made acquainted with their lesser satellites quick-firing and machine-
guns.

We did not leave our old ship altogether yet, though; for we used to
take our dinners with us when we went away from her of a morning,
returning back to the _Saint Vincent_ of a night to sleep, when we would
retail all of our experiences to our comrades who had remained behind.

At last the day came, a day I shall remember all my life, when Mick and
I, for we both went away together even as we had joined on the same day,
left the _Saint Vincent_ for good and all.

One forenoon, just before `cooks to their messes' sounded, and prior to
our dispersing after the usual assembly for `divisions' on the upper
deck, the captain ordered Mick and myself, with some half a dozen other
first-class boys belonging to the starboard watch and a like number from
the port, to step out of the ranks; when, telling us we were drafted to
the guardship for service with the fleet, he addressed a few kindly
words of advice to us as to our future conduct and then dismissed us to
our dinner, telling us we were to pack up our gear and leave the ship
early in the afternoon.

He sent for me soon after I had disposed of the `two spuds and a Jonah,'
which composed the meal of the day, and on my going to his cabin he
spoke to me very nicely, saying that I might write to him should I ever
need help in getting on in the service, and that he would always, as he
had previously promised, `keep an eye on me'!

"Faith," said Mick, on my telling him this, "it'll be moighty onplisint
fur ye, Tom, me bhoy; thet gimblet oye ov his sames to go roight thro'
an' thro' me, begorrah, if he ivver onst looks at me sure