“Sir Hurricane,” said I, “it’s always unlucky to sailors, if they meddle with cats.  You will have a gale of wind, in some shape or another, before long.”

These words were hardly uttered, when, as if by preconcerted arrangement, the door opened, and in sailed Mrs Jellybag, the housekeeper, an elderly woman, somewhere in the latitude of fifty-five or sixty years.  With a low courtesy and contemptuous toss of her head, she addressed Sir Hurricane Humbug.

“Pray, Sir Hurricane, what have you been doing to my cat?”

The admiral, who prided himself in putting any one who applied to him on what he called the wrong scent, endeavoured to play off Mrs Jellybag in the same manner.

“What have I done to your cat, my dear Mrs Jellybag?  Why, my dear Madam” (said he, assuming an air of surprise), “what should I do to your cat?”

“You should have left him alone, Mr Admiral; that cat was my property; if my master permits you to ill-treat the poultry, that’s his concern; but that cat was mine, Sir Hurricane—­mine, every inch of him.  The animal has been ill-treated, and sits moping in the corner of the fireplace, as if he was dying; he’ll never be the cat he was again.”

“I don’t think he ever will, my dear Mrs Housekeeper,” answered the admiral, drily.

The lady’s wrath now began to kindle.  The admiral’s cool replies were like water sprinkled upon a strong flame, increasing its force, instead of checking it.

“Don’t dear me, Sir Hurricane.  I am not one of your dears—­your dears are all in Dutchtown—­more shame for you, an old man like you.”

“Old man!” cried Sir Hurricane, losing his placidity a little.

“Yes, old man; look at your hair—­as grey as a goose’s.”

“Why, as for my hair, that proves nothing, Mrs Jellybag, for though there may be snow on the mountains, there is still heat in the valleys.  What d’ye think of my metaphor?”

“I am no more a metafore than yourself, Sir Hurricane; but I’ll tell you what, you are a cock-and-hen admiral, a dog-in-the-manger barrownight, who was jealous of my poor tom cat, because—­, I won’t say what.  Yes, Sir Hurricane, all hours of the day you are leering at every young woman that passes, out of our windows—­and an old man too; you ought to be ashamed of yourself—­and then you go to church of a Sunday, and cry, ‘Good Lord, deliver us.’”

The housekeeper now advanced so close to the admiral, that her nose nearly touched his, her arms akimbo, and every preparation for boarding.  The admiral, fearing she might not confine herself to vocality, but begin to beat time with her fists, thought it right to take up a position; he therefore very dexterously took two steps in the rear, and mounted on a sofa; his left was defended by an upright piano, his right by the breakfast-table, with all the tea-things on it; his rear was against the wall, and his front depended