Scenes of intense joy cannot be adequately described, and there are meetings in this world which ought not to be too closely touched upon.  Such was the present.  We will therefore leave Captain Ellice and his wife and son to pour out the deep feelings of their hearts to each other, and follow the footsteps of honest John Buzzby, as he sailed down the village with his wife and children, and a host of admiring friends in tow.

Buzzby’s feelings had been rather powerfully stirred up by the joy of all around, and a tear would occasionally tumble over his weather-beaten cheek, and hang at the point of his sunburnt and oft frost-bitten nose, despite his utmost efforts to subdue such outrageous demonstrations.

“Sit down, John dear,” said Mrs. Buzzby in kind but commanding tones, when she got her husband fairly into his cottage, the little parlour of which was instantly crowded to excess.  “Sit down, John dear, and tell us all about it.”

“Wot! begin to spin the whole yarn o’ the Voyage afore I’ve had time to say, ‘How d’ye do?’” exclaimed Buzzby, at the same time grasping his two uproarious sons, who had, the instant he sat down, rushed at his legs like two miniature midshipmen, climbed up them as if they had been two masts, and settled on his knees as if they had been their own favourite cross-trees!

“No, John, not the yarn of the voyage,” replied his wife, while she spread the board before him with bread and cheese and beer, “but tell us how you found old Captain Ellice and where, and what’s comed of the crew.”

“Werry good! then here goes.”

Buzzby was a man of action.  He screwed up his weather-eye (the one next his wife, of course, that being the quarter from which squalls might be expected). and began a yarn which lasted the better part of two hours.

It is not to be supposed that Buzzby spun it off without interruption.  Besides the questions that broke in upon him from all quarters, the two Buzzbys junior scrambled, as far as was possible, into his pockets, pulled his whiskers as if they had been hoisting a main-sail therewith, and, generally, behaved in such an obstreperous manner as to render coherent discourse all but impracticable.  He got through with it, however; and then Mrs. Buzzby intimated her wish, pretty strongly, that the neighbours should vacate the premises, which they did laughingly, pronouncing Buzzby to be “a trump,” and his better half “a true blue.”

“Good day, old chap,” said the last who made his exit; “tiller’s fixed agin—­nailed amid-ships, eh?”

“Hard and fast,” replied Buzzby, with a broad grin, as he shut the door and returned to the bosom of his family.

Two days later a grand feast was given at Mrs. Bright’s cottage, to which all the friends of the family were invited to meet with Captain Ellice and those who had returned from their long and perilous voyage.  It was a joyful gathering that, and glad and grateful hearts were there.