"The more's the pity," exclaimed Mrs. Crank, "that youth should be brought up so very irreligiously, and that you, brother, should allude to it so irreverently."

"Why, how now ?-The maxim's a good one, and moreover, my own:-and as to preferring discipline to their prayers, there's nothing, I hope, immoral in that ;-though you're always throwing morality up in one's face, you can't say there's any commandment cracked therethat's if I understand the decalogue."

"Brother, brother," rejoined Mrs. Crank, in the deep peculiar tone so often assumed by that class of people, self-denominated, the “serious," "why talk only of morality? I would speak of a higher motive," and she would have proceeded, but that the captain rather peevishly stopped her short, by saying

"See here, old girl, you might as well try to bring up* the Royal Billyt in the middle of the Atlantic, as to prevent a sea-faring man from indulging in an odd damme, now and then,-if it's only to give weight to his words.— What the deuce would you do of a squally night, if you were to be squeamish about letting fly an oath at a fellow. for keeping fast the taupsle haliards, or delicate about damning the watch sky-high, for not jumping up to the main-clue garnets? Why d'ye know, that a roaring thumper through a trumpet has often had the effect of saving the ship from jeopardy!"

"At perhaps the expense of the swearer's soul," interrupted his sister.

"Now, stand fast there!-The less you say on that subject, the better;-and if you wish to retain your rating on your brother's books, you'll clap a stopper on your petticoat preaching."

The cloud that was gathering on the grave brow of the saintly matron as she meditated a reply to the unceremonious rebuke of our veteran, was dispersed by the entrance of a personage who may be best described as the captain's factotum.

*To anchor.

†The "Royal William," which lay for many years guard-ship at Spithead. She was said to have been the oldest ship in the service, before broken up.

When the captain was afloat, Tom Tiller had served him as coxswain in every ship he commanded; and now, on shore, his duties, though of a different nature, were not less multifarious.

“I axes your pardon, Sir,” said Thomas, as he opened the door, "but in course, as there's a man-of-war brig brought up below, you'll hoist the big ensign to-day.”

"Right, Thomas, right.-Shift the colours, and let me see every thing ship-shape about the grounds and garden. I hope now, the fly o' the ensign won't be fagging out the way it was on Sunday last. Tack taught down, you know; —and, for heaven's sake, don't let Ram be howling about and throwing up his eyes like a parson."

“I'll see to it all, Sir," said Tom.-" But if so be, Sir, the brig salutes us, how many guns shall we retarn?"

"Salute!-No, no, Thomas," rejoined Crank, with a smile,—" no, no! young as he is, he is not so young as to expend his powder on an unemployed officer.-But who knows, but he might be one of my old mids?-He might, to be sure, Thomas, wish to pay his old captain a compliment, and call it scaling his guns, if he liked.-Well, poor boys! I'm sure they all loved me, though, at times, I used to work them to a jelly."

To explain Tom Tiller's last interrogatory, it may be necessary to inform the reader, that, in addition to the flag-staff, the captain had placed in his garden two brass ship's swivels, which had originally been taken from the taffrail of a French-privateer; and which were afterwards promoted to the main-top of the last line-of-battle ship which Crank had commanded, from whence they had been removed hither, as some of the personal spoils of war. These swivels were duly employed to announce the anniversary of every naval victory and royal birth day; and, thanks to the gallantry of our tars, and the numerous fine progeny of our late gracious Queen Charlotte, these opportunities were so numerous, that, like the saints in the French calendar, there was a shot for almost every day in the year. On these occasions, too, the veteran considered it to be an indispensable point of his duty to expend his prize money as fast as he did the powder which gained it, in jubilee dinners, at which he filled as many

rounds of bumpers during the night, as he had fired rounds of blank in the morning.

The captain, per

To return to the breakfast room. ceiving the subject of his present curiosity "working a traverse" up the narrow way, which led to his cottage, -bethought him that he might yield so far to the sugges tions of Emily respecting hospitality, as to meet the stranger half-way, without entrenching on his notions of naval etiquette. Thus resolved, he addressed his niece,-"Well, come, Emily,-clap on your head gear. I don't care if I do accompany you to reconnoitre. this cruizer ;-besides, it's not every day the port is honoured with a pennant.'

However ambitious of display his fair niece might have been, yet her knowledge of the capriciousness of her uncle's temper induced her to interpose no delay to the completion of his wishes, by any studied effort to increase her attractions. Possibly, vanity suggested it was unnecessary. Her toilette was quickly made; and linking her arm in her uncle's, who had already stood with his bamboo extended in the direction they were to take, she deftly tripped down the winding alley, to the manifest annoyance of her graver companion, who in a tone half serious, half bantering, muttered,

"Come, child;—you 're carrying-on too much canvass for me--I can never stand up to my sticks at this rate.You'll have me springing some o' my spare spars, and I'm sure they're quite ticklish enough already."

Anxious as other writers may be of achieving the picturesque in description, we must prune our wing to a soberer flight. Although it could not be denied that Emily was a fine girl, yet the group was any thing but picturesque. In fact, it bordered much nearer on the grotesque. Her symmetrical figure, and buoyant step, were strangely in contrast with the jocund obesity, and hobbling gait of the principal figure.--He might be about sixty, and carried his years well; rather portly in person, and of a fresh and healthy complexion; the ravages of time or clime were not very apparent. The only evidence of his years consisted in an exuberance of venerable milk-white hair, which, though suffered to luxuriate in

front, was compressed behind in a neatly tied queue, which, without disparagement to the perspicacity displayed by money-lenders in our time, might have been discounted at sight, for thousands, any day between three and five, on the Royal Exchange.-To prove that Bellona was no stepdame, she had complimented him by a scratch in the face (which lubbers would have denominated a frightful gash), inflicted by a splinter from a two-and-thirty pounder, as it winged its wanton way through the quarter deck bulwark of the R-r in Rodney's ever memorable victory. This, in those days, was a species of reminiscence of services, which was somehow very sillily appreciated by our officers, when the cheap distinctions of commemorative ribbons and medals were not the only blazonry of valorous achievements.

A blue coat, stand-up collar, long in the waist, a "square tuck," with kerseymere vest, ambitiously displaying on each button an anchor, the only exterior symbol of his profession; with a pair of blue "unmentionables," white fleecy stockings, and short black gaiters, composed the attire of the veteran.

Tiller completed a triumph on which Hogarth would have exercised his pencil with pleasure. He was a tough tar, so nearly his master's age, that the old gentleman, when in very good humour, used to joke with him familiarly on their close approximation in this respect, always affecting to forget who was the elder of the two.-They had entered the profession nearly at the same period of boyhood; had seen, therefore, nearly equal periods of service, for Tiller retired with his master.-Tom, too, had reaped his share of honours, as well as the veteran, having been for several years previously, a captain also—that is, of a top. He was of a spare habit, extremely bow-legged, small in the waist, and long in the arms; his eye (for he had but one, the other having been whisked out by the explosion of a powder-horn, when priming his carronade in action) always resting on his commander's; his complexion mahogany, enlivened with an odd streak here and there (particularly on the nose) of vermilion, and betokening long service in a variety of climates, as he contended-possibly, an undue preference to strong potations.

He, too, sported a tolerable tail, which, on ordinary occasions, was bent up in a-bight; but, on Sundays and holydays, was uncoiled, and displayed in all its fair proportions. He wore the ordinary dress of a sailor, marked by a scrupulous exactness; and a rigid attention to cleanliness, as an atonement for a peculiar feeling, which had well nigh robbed Camperdown cottage of not the least worthy of its inmates. This arose from an attachment to his profession, and old habits. In fact, no earthly consideration could have induced him to substitute a livery for the blue jacket and white trowsers of the tar. Indeed, when his mistress had alluded sometimes to the circumstance of his appearing in a gentleman's family so singularly attired, Tiller uniformly accompanied the remark with an unconscious stare, as if ignorant of her meaning, and an obvious anxiety to leave the room; though the next morning, while dressing his master, he never neglected to signify his unalterable dislike to the proposed innovation, by alluding to an intention he had long cherished, though as often postponed, to give up service, and go into the country to see his friends.-This would have been to Crank a separation of soul and body, so that Tiller was sure to gain his object, and the point was decided by the captain at last jocosely observing to his sister, that "it was quite out of the question, to expect a square-rigged craft, like Tom, ever to bend a fore-and-aft suit of sails."

The above sketches from the life will suffice to introduce to the reader's acquaintance a few of the dramatis persona who figure in these volumes.

VOL. I.-2