boy has done really very creditably. The work is not at all the
work for one of his condition."

The Duke rewarded me with his languid beautiful smile.

"Who lives will see," he said. "A King never forgets a faithful
servant."

The phrase seemed queer on the lips of that man's father's son; but I
bowed very low, for I felt that I was already a captain of a man-of-war,
with a big blazing decoration on my heart. Well, who lives, sees. I
lived to see a lot of strange things in that King's service.

CHAPTER VII. LAND RATS AND WATER RATS

I will say no more about our passage except that we were three days at
sea. Then, when I woke one morning, I found that we were fast moored to
a gay little wharf, paved with clean white cobbles, on the north side of
the canal. Strange, outlandish figures, in immense blue baggy trousers,
clattered past in wooden shoes. A few Dutch galliots lay moored ahead of
us, with long scarlet pennons on their mastheads. On the other side of
the canal was a huge East Indiaman, with her lower yards cockbilled,
loading all three hatches at once. It was a beautiful morning. The sun
was so bright that all the scene had thrice its natural beauty. The
clean neat trimness of the town, the water slapping past in the canal,
the ships with their flags, the Sunday trim of the schooner, all filled
me with delight, lit up, as they were, by the April sun. I looked about
me at my ease, for the deck was deserted. Even the never-sleeping mate
was resting, now that we were in port. While I looked, a man sidled
along the wharf from a warehouse towards me. He looked at the schooner
in a way which convinced me that he was not a sailor. Then, sheltering
behind a bollard, he lighted his pipe.

He was a short, active, wiry man, with a sharp, thin face, disfigured by
a green patch over his right eye. He looked to me to have a horsey look,
as though were a groom or coachman. After lighting his pipe, he advanced
to a point abreast of the schooner's gang-way, from which he could look
down upon her, as she lay with her deck a foot or two below the level of
the wharf.

"Chips aboard?" he asked, meaning, "Is the carpenter on board?"

"Yes," I said. "Will you come aboard?"

He did not answer, but looked about the ship, as though making notes of
everything. Presently he turned to me.

"You're new," he said. "Are you Mr. Jermyn's boy?" I told him that I
was.

"How is Mr. Jermyn keeping?" he asked. "Is that cough of his b