lightness of a boy, and went round to Frank Darling, with his thin

figure leaning forward, and his gray unpowdered hair tossed about, and

upon his wrinkled face that smile which none could ever resist, because

it was so warm and yet so sad.

"Shake hands, my dear young friend," he cried, "though I can not offer

the right one. I was wrong to call you a fool because you don't look at

things as I do. Poets are almost as good as sailors, and a great deal

better than soldiers. I have felt a gift that way myself, and turned out

some very tidy lines. But I believe they were mainly about myself, and I

never had time to go on with them."

Such little touches of simplicity and kindness, from a man who never

knew the fear of men, helped largely to produce that love of Nelson

which England felt, and will always feel.

"My lord," replied the young man, bending low--for he was half a cubit

higher than the mighty captain--"it is good for the world that you have

no right arm, when you disarm it so with your left one."

CHAPTER VI

AS OTHERS SEE US

Admiral Darling was very particular in trying to keep his grounds and

garden tolerably tidy always. But he never succeeded, for the simple

reason that he listened to every one's excuses; and not understanding a

walk or a lawn half so well as the deck of a battle-ship, he was always

defeated in argument.

"Here's a state of things!" he used to say in summer-time; "thistles

full of seed within a biscuit-heave of my front door, and other

things--I forget their names--with heads like the head of a capstan

bursting, all as full of seeds as a purser is of lies!"

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