bucketing as you have had. It has been a dreadful passage, you know, and you must want something."

"It was not dreadful at all," said Tom; "and I don't want anything."

"Ah, yes; you feel a little squeamish still, I dare say; giddy and up-and-downish. I know what it is;" and he began to wave his hand before him in half-circles in imitation of the rolling of a ship at sea. "Now, I tell you what. Have a briled bone for supper, that's the best thing; that's what our gents mostly calls for when they comes ashore after knocking about in rough weather."

"I'm not squeamish," Tom replied; "but I don't want anything to eat, thank you."

At this moment Mrs. Roseberry sailed into the room, smiling all over, from her cap ribbons down to her shoes. She took the poor boy, whose teeth were beginning to chatter in spite of his efforts to control them, under her wing at once, carried him off to the bar parlour, where a fire was burning, closed the door, desired him to change his wet garments, patting him on the back, and calling him "my dear" every time she spoke to him, and made him feel at home, as much at least as outward circumstances could allow of such a persuasion.

"And now, my dear, about the broiled bone: will you have it in here or in the coffee-room? Sam is quite right, it is the best thing you can have, and eat you must, so I ordered it to be done at once."

By this time Tom Howard had begun to feel a little appetite, or rather a sense of something wanting; and though he had but little desire to sit down and eat, he consented to the bone. He would have liked to accept the lady's invitation to take his supper in the bar parlour, but thought it would be more manly and becoming to go into the coffee-room. Besides which, good, kind-hearted Mrs. Roseberry had begun to offer a word or two of

consolation, understanding how he was circumstanced; and he feared that if she should continue in that strain he would not be able to swallow a mouthful, but might even break down altogether in the attempt to answer her, and so betray a weakness of which he would have been ashamed. He thanked her, therefore, as bravely as he could for her kindness, and said he would have his supper in the coffee-room.

CHAPTER V.

A GREAT MAN.

He sat upon a rock, and bobbed for whale.-William King.

TOM

OM HOWARD had been waiting in the coffee-room at the Old Ship only a few minutes when the door was flung wide open and a gentleman entered. His voice had been heard in the passage before he made his appearance, and he came in talking loudly, and puffing, and stamping, and shaking himself, and making such a commotion in the quiet hostelry, that it might have been supposed that half-a-dozen guests had arrived instead of one. The waiter remarked to Tom, when he was alone with him soon afterwards, that "he thought it was the Hemperor of Japan at least, by the noise and fuss he made." He was not at all like the Emperor of Japan, however, nor like any other emperor, but a plain British subject, who had a way of making himself at home wherever he went, according to his own ideas of what home ought to be. He did not remove his hat, except to shake some raindrops from it and replace it; and throwing back the skirts of his overcoat, stood with arms akimbo, his hands resting on his hips, and, with his back to the empty fireplace, looking about him in a dignified and self-asserting He was tall and broad; a large man in every

manner.

respect; and had a way of spreading himself out so as to give full effect to his size, and make him appear even more bulky than he really was.

No fire such a

"What, waiter!" he cried; "what, what! No fire, such a night as this! Bring a shovel of coals at once out of the kitchen, and wood, and—and everything else. night as this! what are you thinking about?" The waiter was thinking that it was yet early in September; but he only said, "Yes, sir," and repeated what the new-comer had said to his mistress.

"Hullo, youngster!" said the great man, presently, catching sight of our hero in a corner of the room.

"Hullo!" the boy replied, mechanically, as he had heard the seamen answer one another in the boat.

The first speaker looked surprised, but smiled, as if pleased at the readiness of his reply.

"A wet night," he said, presently.

"Is it?" Tom answered.

"Is it? Yes. Haven't you been out? Don't you hear it coming down? What-what!"

"Oh, yes, I remember," said Tom; "it is rather wet out of doors."

"Out of doors I meant, of course," said the other; "not indoors; it's blowing hard, too. I should not like to be at sea to-night. What!"

Tom had not spoken, but the stranger seemed to expect an answer; and, without waiting for one, said again, brusquely, "I should not like it, I say. What!"

"I should," said Tom, finding that he must say something. "Gammon!" said the other; "I don't believe it; but that's the way young fellows talk. They think it very fine, I suppose. I don't believe anybody likes being at sea, especially in rough weather, if they would only say so."

Tom felt very indignant at first, but seeing that his new acquaintance laughed and winked, and had evidently no idea of being offensive, he restrained his wrath and said nothing.

"Where do you hail from?" the stranger asked, presently. Tom told him that he had just landed from the ship Neptune, having left his friends to prosecute their voyage to India, and that he should like to be going with them instead of going to bed.

"That accounts for it," said the other, "though I would rather wait for a fair passage myself. So you have said good-bye to all your friends, have you, and come ashore alone? Poor lad, poor lad! What will you take? Have a glass of wine-do you good."

Tom felt something rising up in his throat at this unexpected expression of sympathy; he could not speak, and began to wish he had remained in the bar parlour. He rose and went to the door, as if to look for the waiter.

Coming, sir," said Sam, who caught sight of him; “briled bone, and nice little tart to follow; ready in a minute."

Tom turned away with a wry face. It seemed as if everybody had conspired to torment him by forcing him to eat and drink.

"What did he say?" the stranger asked. "Bone! Who wants bones? Cui bono? as the saying is. Nobody can live

Cui bono?

upon bones; come and sup with me; draw near the fire, it's beginning to burn up at last. Now, waiter, bring everything you have got in the house except bones; we don't want bones."

The waiter would have remonstrated, but the "Hemperor ordered him off in a peremptory manner, and putting down upon a side table the despised morsel which he had just brought into the room, he hastened to obey orders.

"Do as I tell you, and make no bones about it," the imperious,