By this time the news of Jack’s return had spread through the ship.  The midshipmen had all run on deck, and the men crowded the waist, or, regardless of discipline, stood on the bulwarks.  Jack had been a general favorite.  The gallantry which he and his comrade had displayed on the night of the storm had greatly endeared them to the crew, and the men had bitterly regretted that they had not stood with him over Hawtry’s body; but, indeed, it was not until they had passed on, and it was too late to return, that they had noticed his absence.

As Jack turned from Mr. Hethcote, his messmates crowded round him, and the men broke into a hearty cheer, again and again repeated.  Jack, gratified and touched by this hearty welcome, could scarce reply to the questions which his comrades poured upon him, and was speedily dragged below to the midshipmen’s berth, where he gave a very brief outline of what had happened since he saw them, a story which filled them with astonishment and some little envy.

“I will tell you all about it fully, later on,” Jack said, “but it would take me till night to give you the full yarn now.  But first you must tell me what has happened here.  You know I have heard nothing, and only know that Sebastopol is not yet taken.”

The recital was a long one, and Jack was fain to admit that the hardships which he had gone through were as nothing to those which had been borne by our soldiers in the Crimea during the six months he had been away from them.  The trials and discomforts of the great storm had been but a sample of what was to be undergone.  After Inkerman, it had been plain to the generals in command that all idea of taking Sebastopol must be abandoned until the spring, and that at the utmost they could do no more than hold their position before it.  This had been rendered still more difficult by the storm, in which enormous quantities of stores, warm clothing, and other necessaries had been lost.

It was now too late to think of making a road from Balaklava to the front, a work which, had the authorities in the first place dreamt that the army would have to pass the winter on the plateau, was of all others the most necessary.  The consequence of this omission was that the sufferings of the troops were terrible.

While Balaklava harbor was crowded with ships full of huts, clothing, and fuel, the men at the front were dying in hundreds from wet, cold, and insufficient food.  Between them and abundance extended an almost impassable quagmire, in which horses and bullocks sank and died in thousands, although laden only with weights which a donkey in ordinary times could carry.  Had the strength of the regiments in front been sufficient, the soldiers might have been marched down, when off duty, to Balaklava, to carry up the necessaries they required.  But so reduced were they by over-work and fatigue, that those fit for duty had often to spend five nights out of seven in the trenches, and