“It would be wrong for either of us to take any part in the action, since we have nothing to do with the quarrel.  Still, we may appear on deck, unless ordered below; and I dare say opportunities will offer to be of use, especially in assisting the hurt.  I shall go on the quarter-deck, but I would advise you not to go higher than the gun-deck.  As for Neb, I shall formally offer his services in helping to carry the wounded down.”

“I understand you—­we shall all three sarve in the humane gang—­well, when a man has no business with any other, that may be better than none.  Your standing idle in a fight must be trying work!”

Marble and I conversed a little longer on this subject, when a gun fired from the upper-deck gave us notice that the game was about to begin.  Each hastened to his intended post without more words.  When I reached the quarter-deck, everything denoted the eve of a combat.  The ship was under short canvass, the men were at quarters, the guns were cast loose, and were levelled; the tompions were all out, shot was distributed about the deck; and here and there some old salt of a captain might be seen squinting along his gun, as if impatient to begin.  A silence like that of a deserted church reigned throughout the ship.  Had one been on board her intended adversary, at that same instant, be would have been deafened by the clamour, and confused with the hurried and disorderly manner in which preparations that were long before completed on board the British, were still in progress on board the Frenchman.  Four years earlier, the same want of preparation had given Nelson his great victory at the Nile.  The French, in order to clear their outer batteries, had lumbered those in-shore; and when half their enemies unexpectedly passed inside, they found their ships were not prepared to fire; ships that were virtually beaten, before they had discharged an effective shot.

“Wallingford,” said my old friend the captain, as soon as I approached him, “you have nothing to do here.  It would not be proper for you to take a part in this action, and it would be folly to expose yourself without an object.”

“I am quite aware of all this, Captain Rowley, but I have thought your kindness to me was so great as to permit me to be a looker-on.  I may be of some service to the wounded, if to nothing else; and I hope you think me too much of an officer to get in the way.”

“I am not certain, sir, I ought to permit anything of the sort,” returned the old man, gravely.  “This fighting is serious business, and no one should meddle with it whose duty does not command it of him.  See here, sir,” pointing at the French frigate, which was about two cable’s-lengths distant, with her top-gallant-sails clewed up and the courses in the brails; “in ten minutes we shall be hard at it, and I leave it to yourself to say whether prudence does not require that you should-go below.”