to try and break off the intimacy (I cannot call it friendship) between the two; but my feeling against the man being rather an instinct than anything substantial I had to say against him, she thought me somewhat unjust towards him. To her question, "What has he done, Charles?" what answer had I to give? None that was reasonable; therefore I went away, and left him in possession of the field.

seas.

CHAPTER V.

"BARBADOES.

It was a dull and dreary day on which we set sail from the Portsmouth harbour, where we had embarked for the West Indies; the wind, however, was fair, and we made good way. In the Bay of Biscay we encountered a heavy gale-the ship laboured fearfully, and seemed to leak from stem to stern. Our very beds were saturated with salt water, which in some parts of the vessel was ankle deep; by night and by day the men were employed in pumping it out. This bad weather lasted for several days, the ship completely burying herself in the heavy Rheumatism and sore throats were complained of on all sides, and great discomfort existed. My cabin. was in so bad a state that it was facetiously called "Port Pleasant" by my brother officers. We had run some 1300 miles before there was any material improvement in our condition. We expected to put into Madeira, to get our leaks attended to, but to our disappointment the captain decided otherwise, and we saw the beautiful little. island, with its picturesque gardens and vineyards, only in the distance, then on to Teneriffe, where we anchored close to its principal town, Santa Cruz, or Holy Cross-a neat, Spanish-looking place, built at the foot of lofty hills;

superior as a town to Madeira, but inferior in point of surrounding country. We landed, of course, and went to see "the Lions." There stood the battery from which the shot was fired that deprived Lord Nelson of an arm at his disastrous attack upon Teneriffe. In the large church we also saw the colours which they took from us ; and it was somewhat galling to our national pride to be shown the flags of Nelson and of England adorning the walls of a foreign shrine, as trophies captured from our countrymen. We saw also the convent into which the British marines were driven, and where they bravely defended themselves, so long as defence was possible, but were compelled at length to surrender. We went as far as the Laguna; the country was wild, rough, and volcanic, but the long-tailed little horse which I had hired, accustomed to the road, carried me well, springing from rock to rock with the agility of a cat, and going at breakneck speed up hill and down dale. We passed through some extensive vineyards, and had some favourable views of the magnificent" Peak." It is a splendid object, rearing its lofty head above the clouds to the height of about two miles and a half; the eternal snows which crown its summit glittering in the sunshine, while vegetation in various stages of advancement clothes its sides. We met numbers of camels on the road, carrying merchandize; they were more numerous than either horses or mules. One tall fellow, I suppose not liking my red coat, made a bolt at me, and would have rolled me over into the dust, and probably placed his broad foot upon me (which is a way they have when angry), but, thanks to the quickness of my little steed, I escaped him. We had some refresh

ment at the Laguna, and returned to the town to dine, drinking punch iced from the "Peak ; " promenaded the "Alameida," where a band was playing to the dark-eyed Spanish beauties of Santa Cruz, and got on board tired out with our day's adventures and the heat of the sun, for the temperature had risen to 75 degrees, and the skies had become blue and cloudless. We took some wine on board, and our leaks being stopped, started off again on our voyage. When we were seventy miles from Teneriffe, the Peak was still visible above the clouds. The heat now daily increased. We crossed the tropic of Cancer, and had some heavy squalls, with thunder and lightning; then came calms and "doldrums;" after which a veritable trade-wind, before which we ran, sometimes amid torrents of rain, sometimes under a burning sun, and at others by the light of a brilliant tropical moon, ploughing through a sea radiant with phosphoric coruscations. The voyage, like most voyages, had been monotonous in the extreme; the sea, always the sea, sometimes still as a mill-pond, sometimes raging in angry foam, rising to our topmasts like mountains, and sinking into a devouring maëlstrom, from which escape seemed impossible. One sad excitement had occurred—a sailor had been lost overboard in the hurry of one of the sudden squalls, and was seen no more.

Just five weeks from the time we left England we sighted the island of Barbadoes, and anchored before night in Carlisle Bay. Our run along the land had afforded us some picturesque views of the island, the most remarkable feature of which appeared to be the lofty cocoanut trees, the finest of which had, however, unfortunately been

destroyed by the fearful hurricane which had swept over Barbadoes a few years before. As soon as we anchored, it was not a little amusing to see the black women, who came off to petition for our washing and to sell fruit, their white teeth gleaming in the sunshine, in peculiar contrast to their black skins. They all wanted to shake hands in the most friendly fashion.

"How you do, sare?" said one to me; "I be berry glad to do de washin' ob so fine a gentleman!" with the drawl common to her caste.

It may be interesting here to mention a few facts about Barbadoes, which is the most eastern of the Caribbee Islands, and the most ancient of the British settlements in these seas. We know little of it prior to the year 1600. It is supposed to have derived its name from the Portuguese, and to have obtained it from the Indian figtrees growing on the island, which were called by them Barbadas,” or bearded. The first English ship known to have touched there was the Olive, in 1605, on her return from Guinea, when some of her crew landed, erected a cross, and took possession of it in the king's name, inscribing on a tree, “James, King of England, and of this island." For many years Barbadoes seems to have been forgotten, till a favourable report of the place having reached a large London merchant, he formed the idea of making a settlement on the island, and Lord Ley (afterwards the Earl of Marlborough) obtained a grant of it from James the First, and the merchant (one Sir William Courteen), with his sanction, sent out requirements for the projected colony. One ship only, with thirty men, reached there in 1624, and landed on the