“Here’s diversion, Jack!” chuckled Dennis; “he’s going to tip us for our assistance in the gunpowder plot.  Look at him now!  Faith, he’s as short of change as myself.  How that half-crown’s eluding him in the corner of his pocket!  It’ll be no less, I assure ye.  He’s a liberal soul.  Now for it!”

And as the young lieutenant drew near, Dennis performed an elaborate salute.  But his eyes were brimming with roguishness, and in another moment he burst out laughing, and after one rapid glance, and a twist of his moustache that I thought must have torn it up by the roots, the young officer exploded in the same fashion.

“DENNIS!—­What in the name of the mother of mischief (and I’m sure she was an O’Moore) are you masquerading in that dress for, out here?” But before Dennis could reply, the lieutenant became quite grave, and turning him round by the arm, said, “But this isn’t masquerading, I see.  Dennis, my dear fellow, what does it mean?”

“It means that I was a stowaway, and my friend here a castaway—­I mean that I was a castaway, and Jack was a stowaway.  Willie, do you remember Barton?”

“Old Barney?  Of course I do.  How did he come to let you out of his sight?”

Dennis did not speak.  I saw that he could not, so I took upon me to explain.

“They were out in the hooker, off the Irish coast, and she went to pieces in a gale.  Old Barney was lost, and we picked Dennis up.”

He nodded to me, and with his hand through Dennis O’Moore’s arm, said kindly, “We’ll go to my quarters, and talk it over.  Where are you putting up?”

“We’re only just paid off,” said I.

“Then you’ll rough it with me, of course, both of you.”

I thanked him, and Dennis said, “Willie, the one thing I’ve been wanting to ask you is, if you know where that cousin of my father’s lives, who is in business out here.  Do you know him?”

“Certainly.  I’m going there to-night, for a dance, and you shall come with me.  I can rig you out.”

They went ahead, arm-in-arm, and I followed at just sufficient distance behind to catch the backward looks of amazement which the young officer’s passing friends were too polite to indulge when exactly on a level with him.  He capped first one and then another with an air of apparent unconsciousness, but the contrast between his smart appearance and spotless white uniform, and the patched remains of Dennis’s homespun suit (to say nothing of the big bundle in which he carried his “duds"), justified a good deal of staring, of which I experienced a humble share myself.

Very good and pleasant are the comforts of civilization, as we felt when we were fairly established in our new friend’s quarters.  Not that the first object of life is to be comfortable, or that I was moved by a hair’s-breadth from my aims and ambitions, but I certainly enjoyed it; and, as Dennis said, “Oh, the luxury of a fresh-water wash!”—­for salt water really will not clean one, and the only way to get a fresh-water wash at sea is to save out of one’s limited allowance.  We had done this, to the extent of two-thirds of a pailful, as we approached Guiana, and had been glad enough all to soap in the same bucket (tossing for turns) and rinse off with clean sea-water, but real “tubs” were a treat indeed!