I put it to the ladies whether this was not a case of real distress, after all my hardships and my constancy, to be put off with such an excuse?  The answer from the Admiralty was so far favourable, that I was assured I should be promoted as soon as my time was served, of which I then wanted two months.  I was appointed to a ship fitting at Woolwich, and before she could be ready for sea, my time would be completed, and I was to have my commission as a commander.  This was not the way to ensure her speedy equipment, as far as I was concerned; but there was no help for it; and as the ship was at Woolwich, and the residence of my fair one at no great distance, I endeavoured to pass my time, during the interval, between the duties of love and war; between obedience to my captain, and obedience to my mistress; and by great good fortune, I contrived to please both, for my captain gave himself no trouble about the ship or her equipment.

Before I proceeded to join, I made one more effort to break through the inflexibility of my father.  I said I had undergone the labours of Hercules; and that if I went again on foreign service, I might meet with some young lady who would send me out of the world with a cup of poison, or by some fatal spell break the magical chain which now bound me to Emily.  This poetical imagery had no more effect on them, than my prose composition.  I then appealed to Emily herself.  “Surely,” said I, “your heart is not as hard as those of our inflexible parents? surely you will be my advocate on this occasion?  Bend but one look of disapprobation on my father with those heavenly blue eyes of yours, and, on my life, he will strike his flag.”

But the gipsy replied, with a smile (instigated, no doubt, from head-quarters), that she did not like the idea of her name appearing in the Morning Post as the bride of a lieutenant.  “What’s a lieutenant, now-a-days?” said she; “nobody.  I remember when I was on a visit at Fareham, I used to go to Portsmouth to see the dock-yard and the ships, and there was your great friend the tall admiral, Sir Hurricane Humbug, I think you call him, driving the poor lieutenants about like so many sheep before a dog; there was one always at his heels, like a running footman; and there was another that appeared to me to be chained, like a mastiff, to the door of the admiral’s office, except when the admiral and family walked out, and then he brought up the rear with the governess.  No, Frank, I shall not surrender at discretion, with all my charms, to any thing less than a captain, with a pair of gold epaulettes.”

“Very well,” replied I, looking into the pier glass, with tolerable self-complacency; “if you choose to pin your happiness on the promises of a first lord of the Admiralty, and a pair of epaulettes, I can say no more.  There is no accounting for female taste; some ladies prefer gold lace and wrinkles, to youth and beauty—­I am sorry for them, that’s all.”