“I do like this sort o’ thing,” said a beardless young fellow, as a number of the men sat on camp-stools, or stood on the weather-side of the deck, chatting together about past times and future prospects.

“Ha!” exclaimed a seaman, who stood near them coiling up a rope; “hold on till you’ve got a taste o’ the Bay. This is a mill-pond to that. And you’ll have the chance to-night. If you don’t, I’m a Dutchman.”

“If I do, you’ll have a taste of it too, old salt-water, for we’re in the same boat,” retorted the young red-coat.

“True, but we ain’t in the same body;” returned the sailor. “I should just like to see your four-futt legs wobblin’ about in a nor’-west gale. You’d sing another song.”

“Come, Macleod,” cried Moses Pyne, “tip us a Gaelic song.”

“Hoots, man, wull ye be wantin’ to be made sea-seek?—for that’s what’ll do it,” said the big Scotsman. “Na, na, let Gaspard sing us ‘The Bay o’ Biscay O!’ That’ll be mair appropriate.”

There was a general chorus of assent to this; and as Gaspard Redgrave was an obliging man, untroubled by false modesty, he cleared his throat and began. His voice, being a really splendid one, attracted all the men who chanced to be within range of it: among others, Miles, who was passing at the moment with a bag of biscuits in one hand and a meat-can in the other. He leaned up against one of those funnels which send fresh air down to the stokers of steam-ships. He had listened only a few moments when Marion Drew glided amongst the men, and seemed to stand as if entranced with delight in front of him, steadying herself by a rope, for the vessel was pitching a good deal as well as rolling considerably.

At the first chorus the crowd burst forth with wild enthusiasm—

“As we lay, on that day,
In the Bay of Biscay O!”

Dwelling with unnecessary length and emphasis on the “O!”

At the close of the second verse the men were preparing to burst forth again when Miles observed an approaching billow which caused him to start in alarm. Although unused to the aspect of waves, he had an instinctive feeling that there was danger approaching. Voices of warning were promptly raised from different parts of the vessel, but already the loud chorus had begun and drowned every other sound. Miles dropped his biscuits and sprang towards Marion, who, with flashing eyes and parted lips, was gazing at Gaspard. He just reached her when the wave burst over the side, and, catching most of the men quite unprepared, swept them with terrible violence towards the lee-side of the deck.

Marion was standing directly in the line of this human cataract, but Miles swung her deftly round into the lee of the funnel, a handle of which she happily caught, and clung to it like a limpet.

Her preserver was not so fortunate. The edge of the cataract struck him, swept him off his legs, and hurled him with many comrades against the lee bulwarks, where he lay stunned and helpless in the swishing water.

Of course soldiers and sailors ran from all parts of the vessel to the rescue, and soon the injured men were carried below and attended to by the doctors; and, considering the nature of the accident, it was matter for surprise that the result was no worse than some pretty severe contusions and a few broken ribs.

When Miles recovered consciousness, he found himself in his hammock, with considerable pain in various parts of his body, and the Reverend James Drew bending over him.

“You’re all right now, my fine fellow,” he said, in a low comforting voice. “No bones broken, so the doctors say. Only a little bruised.”

“Tell me, sir,” said Miles, rousing himself, “is—is your daughter safe?”

“Yes, thanks be to God, and to your prompt assistance, she is none the worse—save the fright and a wetting.”

Miles sank back on his pillows with a feeling of profound satisfaction.

“Now, you must try to sleep if you can,” said the clergyman; “it will do you good.”

But Miles did not want anything to do him good. He was quite content to lie still and enjoy the simple fact that he had rescued Marion, perhaps from death—at all events from serious injury! As for pain—what was that to him? was he not a soldier—one whose profession requires him to suffer anything cheerfully in the discharge of duty! And was not love the highest duty?

On the strength of some such thoughts he forgot his pain and calmly went to sleep.

Chapter Eight.
Has Reference to many Things connected with Mind, Matter, and Affections

The wave which had burst with such disastrous effect on the deck of the troop-ship was but the herald of one of those short, wild storms which occasionally sweep with desolating violence over the Atlantic Ocean, and too frequently strew with wreck the western shores of Europe.

In the Bay of Biscay, as usual, the power of the gale was felt more severely than elsewhere.

“There’s some sort o’ mystery about the matter,” said Jack Molloy to William Armstrong, as they cowered together under the shelter of the bridge. “Why the Atlantic should tumble into this ’ere bay with greater wiolence than elsewhere is beyond my comprehension. But any man wi’ half an eye can see that it do do it! Jist look at that!”

There was something indeed to look at, for, even while he spoke, a mighty wave tumbled on board of the vessel, rushed over the fore deck like Niagara rapids in miniature, and slushed wildly about for a considerable time before it found its way through the scuppers into the grey wilderness of heaving billows from which it sprang.

The great ship quivered, and seemed for a moment to stagger under the blow, while the wind shrieked through the rigging as if laughing at the success of its efforts, but the whitey-grey hull rose heavily, yet steadily, out of the churning foam, rode triumphant over the broad-backed billow that had struck her, and dived ponderously into the valley of waters beyond.

“Don’t you think,” said the young soldier, whose general knowledge was a little more extensive than that of the seaman, “that the Gulf Stream may have something to do with it?”

Molloy looked at the deck with philosophically solemn countenance. Deriving no apparent inspiration from that quarter, he gazed on the tumultuous chaos of salt-water with a perplexed expression. Finally and gravely he shook his weather-beaten head—

“Can’t see that nohow,” he said. “In course I knows that the Gulf Stream comes out the Gulf o’ Mexico, cuts across the Atlantic in a nor’-easterly direction, goes slap agin the west of England, Ireland, and Scotland, and then scurries away up the coast o’ Norway—though why it should do so is best known to itself; p’r’aps it’s arter the fashion of an angry woman, accordin’ to its own sweet will; but what has that got for to do wi’ the Bay of Biscay O? That’s wot I wants to know.”

“More to do with it than you think, Jack,” answered the soldier. “In the first place, you’re not quite, though partly, correct about the Gulf Stream—”

“Well, I ain’t zactly a scienkrific stoodent, you know. Don’t purfess to be.”

“Just so, Jack. Neither am I, but I have inquired into this matter in a general way, an’ here’s my notions about it.”

“Draw it fine, Willum; don’t be flowery,” said the sailor, renewing his quid. “Moreover, if you’ll take the advice of an old salt you’ll keep a tighter grip o’ that belayin’-pin you’ve got hold of, unless you wants to be washed overboard. Now then, fire away! I’m all attention, as the cat said at the mouth o’ the mouse-hole.”

“Well, then,” began Armstrong, with the slightly conscious air of superior knowledge, “the Gulf Stream does not rise in the Gulf of Mexico—”

“Did I say that it did, Willum?”

“Well, you said that it came out of the Gulf of Mexico—and, no doubt, so far you are right, but what I mean is that it does not originate there.”

“W’y don’t you say what you mean, then, Willum, instead o’ pitchin’ into a poor chap as makes no pretence to be a purfessor? Heave ahead!”

“Well, Jack,” continued the soldier, with more care as to his statements, “I believe, on the best authority, that the Gulf Stream is only part of a great ocean current which originates at the equator, and a small bit of which flows north into the Atlantic, where it drives into the Gulf of Mexico. Finding no outlet there it rushes violently round the gulf—”

“Gits angry, no doubt, an’ that’s what makes it hot?” suggested the sailor.

“Perhaps! Anyhow, it then flows, as you say, in a nor’-easterly direction to the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland. But it does more than that. It spreads as it goes, and also rushes straight at the coasts of France and Spain. Here, however, it meets a strong counter current running south along these same coasts of France an’ Spain. That is difficulty number one. It has to do battle wi’ that current, and you know, Jack, wherever there’s a battle there’s apt to be convulsions of some sort. Well, then, a nor’-westerly gale comes on and rolls the whole o’ the North Atlantic Ocean against these coasts. So here you have this part of the Gulf Stream caught in another direction—on the port quarter, as you sailors might call it—”

“Never mind wot us sailors might call it, Willum. Wotever you say on that pint you’re sure to be wrong. Heave ahead!”

“Well, then,” continued Armstrong, with a laugh, “that’s trouble number two; and these troubles, you’ll observe, apply to the whole west coast of both countries; but in the Bay of Biscay there is still another difficulty, for when these rushing and tormented waters try to escape, they are met fair in the face by the whole north coast of Spain, and thus—”

“I sees it!” exclaimed Molloy, with a sudden beam of intelligence, “you’ve hit the nail on the head, Willum. Gulf Stream flies at France in a hot rage, finds a cool current, or customer, flowin’ down south that shouts ‘Belay there!’ At it they go, tooth an’ nail, when down comes a nor’-wester like a wolf on the fold, takes the Stream on the port quarter, as you say, an’ drives both it an’ the cool customer into the bay, where the north o’ Spain cries ‘Avast heavin’, both o’ you!’ an’ drives ’em back to where the nor’-wester’s drivin’ ’em on! No wonder there’s a mortal hullaballoo in the Bay o’ Biscay! Why, mate, where got ye all that larnin’?”

Before his friend could reply, a terrific plunge of the vessel, a vicious shriek of the wind, and the entrance of another tremendous sea, suggested that the elements were roused to unusual fury at having the secrets of their operations thus ruthlessly revealed, and also suggested the propriety of the two friends seeking better shelter down below.

While this storm was raging, Miles lay in his hammock, subjected to storms of the bosom with occasional calms between. He was enjoying one of the calms when Armstrong passed his hammock and asked how he was getting on.

“Very well, Willie. Soon be all right, I think,” he replied, with a contented smile.

For at that moment he had been dwelling on the agreeable fact that he had really rescued Marion Drew from probable death, and that her parents gratefully recognised the service—as he learned from the clergyman himself, who expressed his gratitude in the form of frequent visits to and pleasant chats with the invalid.

The interest and sympathy which Miles had felt on first seeing this man naturally increased, and at last he ventured to confide to him the story of his departure from home, but said nothing about the changed name. It is needless to relate all that was said on the occasion. One can easily imagine the bearing of a good deal of it. The result on Miles was not very obvious at the time, but it bore fruit after many days.

The calm in our hero’s breast was not, however, of long duration. The thought that, as a private in a marching regiment, he had not the means to maintain Marion in the social position to which she had been accustomed, was a very bitter thought, and ruffled the sea of his feelings with a stiff breeze. This freshened to something like a gale of rebellion when he reflected that his case was all but hopeless; for, whatever might have been the truth of the statement regarding the French army under Napoleon, that “every soldier carried a marshal’s baton in his knapsack,” it did not follow that soldiers in the British army of the present day carried commissions in their knapsacks. Indeed, he knew it was by no means a common thing for men to rise from the ranks, and he was well aware that those who did so were elevated in virtue of qualities which he did not possess.

He was in the midst of one of his bosom storms when Sergeant Hardy came to inquire how he did.

Somehow the quiet, grave, manly nature of that sergeant had a powerful effect, not only on Miles but on every one with whom he came in contact. It was not so much his words as his manner that commended him. He was curiously contradictory, so to speak, in character and appearance. The stern gravity of his countenance suggested a hard nature, but lines of good-humour lurking about the eyes and mouth put to flight the suggestion, and acts of womanly tenderness on many occasions turned the scale the other way. A strong, tall, stiffly upright and slow-moving frame, led one to look only for elephantine force, but when circumstances required prompt action our sergeant displayed powers of cat-like activity, which were all the more tremendous that they seemed incongruous and were unexpected. From his lips you looked for a voice of thunder—and at drill you were not disappointed—but on ordinary occasions his speech was soft and low; bass indeed as to its quality, but never harsh or loud.

“A gale is brewing up from the nor’-west, so Jack Molloy says,” remarked Hardy, as he was about to pass on.

“Why, I thought it was blowing a gale now!” returned Miles. “At least it seems so, if we may judge from the pitching and plunging.”

“Ah, lad, you are judging from the landlubber’s view-point,” returned the sergeant. “Wait a bit, and you will understand better what Molloy means when he calls this only a ‘capful of wind.’”

Miles had not to wait long. The gale when fully “brewed up” proved to be no mean descendant of the family of storms which have tormented the celebrated bay since the present economy of nature began; and many of those who were on board of the troop-ship at that time had their eyes opened and their minds enlarged as to the nature of a thorough gale; when hatches have to be battened down, and the dead-lights closed; when steersmen have to be fastened in their places, and the maddened sea seems to roar defiance to the howling blast, and all things movable on deck are swept away as if they were straws, and many things not meant to be movable are wrenched from their fastenings with a violence that nothing formed by man can resist, and timbers creak and groan, and loose furniture gyrates about until smashed to pieces, and well-guarded glass and crockery leap out of bounds to irrecoverable ruin, and even the seamen plunge about and stagger, and landsmen hold on to ring-bolts and belaying-pins, or cling to bulkheads for dear life, while mighty billows, thundering in-board, hiss along the decks, and everything, above, below, and around, seems being swept into eternity by the besom of destruction!

But the troop-ship weathered the storm nobly; and the good Lord sent fine weather and moderate winds thereafter; and ere long the soldiers were enjoying the sunshine, the sparkling waters, and the sight of the lovely shores of the blue Mediterranean.

Soon after that broken bones began to mend, and bruises to disappear; and our hero, thoroughly recovered from his accident, as well as greatly improved in general health, returned to his duties.

But Miles was not a happy man, for day by day he felt more and more severely that he had put himself in a false position. Besides the ever-increasing regret for having hastily forsaken home, he had now the bitter reflection that he had voluntarily thrown away the right to address Marion Drew as an equal.

During the whole voyage he had scarcely an opportunity of speaking a word to her. Of course the warm-hearted girl did not forget the important service that had been rendered to her by the young soldier, and she took more than one occasion to visit the fore part of the vessel for the purpose of expressing her gratitude and asking about his health, after he was able to come on deck; but as her father accompanied her on these occasions, the conversation was conducted chiefly between him and the reverend gentleman. Still, it was some comfort to hear her voice and see her eyes beaming kindly on him.

Once the youth inadvertently expressed his feelings in his look, so that Marion’s eye-lids dropped, and a blush suffused her face, to hide which she instantly became unreasonably interested in the steam-winch beside which they were standing, and wanted to understand principles of engineering which had never troubled her before!

“What is the use of that curious machine?” she asked, turning towards it quickly.

“W’y, Miss,” answered Jack Molloy, who chanced to be sitting on a spare yard close at hand working a Turk’s head on a manrope, “that’s the steam-winch, that is the thing wot we uses w’en we wants to hoist things out o’ the hold, or lower ’em into it.”

“Come, Marion, we must not keep our friend from his duties,” said Mr Drew, nodding pleasantly to Miles as he turned away.

The remark was called forth by the fact that Miles had been arrested while on his way to the galley with a dish of salt pork, and with his shirt-sleeves, as usual, tucked up!

Only once during the voyage did our hero get the chance of talking with Marion alone. The opportunity, like most pieces of good fortune, came unexpectedly. It was on a magnificent night, just after the troop-ship had left Malta. The sea was perfectly calm, yet affected by that oily motion which has the effect of breaking a reflected moon into a million fragments. All nature appeared to be hushed, and the stars were resplendent. It was enough, as Jack Molloy said, to make even a bad man feel good!

“Do ’ee speak from personal experience, Jack?” asked a comrade on that occasion.

“I might, Jim, if you wasn’t here,” retorted Molloy; “but it’s not easy to feel bad alongside o’ you.”

“That’s like a double-edged sword, Jack—cuts two ways. W’ich way d’ee mean it?”

“‘W’ichever way you please,’ as the man said w’en the alligator axed ’im w’ether he’d prefer to be chawed up or bolted whole.”

Concluding that, on the whole, the conversation of his friends did not tend to edification, Miles left them and went to one of the starboard gangways, from which he could take a contemplative view of Nature in her beautiful robe of night. Curiously enough, Marion chanced to saunter towards the same gangway, and unexpectedly found him there.

“A lovely night, Mr Miles,” she remarked.

Miles started, and turned with slight confusion in his face, which, happily, the imperfect light concealed.

“Beautiful indeed!” he exclaimed, thinking of the face before him—not of the night!

“A cool, beautiful night like this,” continued the girl—who was of the romantic age of sixteen—“will remain long, I should think, in your memory, and perhaps mitigate, in some degree, the hardships that are before you on the burning sand of Egypt.”

“The memory of this night,” returned Miles, with fervour, “will remain with me for ever! It will not only mitigate what you are pleased to call hardships, but will cause me to forget them altogether—forget everything!”

“Nay, that were impossible,” rejoined Marion, with a slight laugh; “for a true soldier cannot forget Duty!”

“True, true,” said Miles dubiously; “at least it ought to be true; and I have no doubt is so in many cases, but—”

What more he might have said cannot now be told, for they were interrupted at the moment by Captain Lacey, who, happening to walk in that direction, stopped and directed Miss Drew’s attention to a picturesque craft, with high lateen sails, which had just entered into the silver pathway of the moon on the water.

Miles felt that it would be inappropriate in him to remain or to join in the conversation. With a heart full of disappointment and indignation he retired, and sought refuge in the darkest recesses of the pantry, to which he was welcome at all times, being a great favourite with the steward.

Whether it was the smell of the cheese or the ketchup we know not, but here better thoughts came over our hero. Insignificant causes often produce tremendous effects. The touching of a trigger is but a small matter; the effects of such a touch are sometimes deadly as well as touching. Possibly the sugar, if not the cinnamon, may have been an element in his change of mind. At all events it is safe to say that the general smell of groceries was associated with it.

Under the benign influence of this change he betook himself to the berth of the chief ship’s-carpenter, with whom also he was a favourite. Finding the berth empty, and a light burning in it, he sat down to wait for his friend. The place was comparatively quiet and retired. Bethinking himself of the little packet which he had received at Portsmouth, and which still lay unopened in the breast-pocket of his shell-jacket, he pulled it out. Besides a Testament, it contained sundry prettily covered booklets written by Miss Robinson and others to interest the public in our soldiers, as well as to amuse the soldiers themselves. In glancing through “Our Soldiers and Sailors,” “Institute Memories,” “Our Warfare,” “The Victory,” “Heaven’s Light our Guide,” “Good-bye,” and similar works, two facts were suddenly impressed upon his mind, and strongly illuminated—namely, that there is such a thing as living for the good of others, and that up to that time he had lived simply and solely for himself!

The last sentence that had fallen from the lips of Marion that night was also strongly impressed upon him:– “a true soldier cannot forget Duty!” and he resolved that “Duty” should be his life’s watchword thenceforward. Such is the influence that a noble-minded woman may unconsciously have over even an unsteady man!

Soon after this the troop-ship reached the end of her voyage, and cast anchor off the coast of Egypt, near the far-famed city of Alexandria.