The widow was also stout-hearted, and, evidently considering it right to take the only young lady under her chaperonage, advised her after breakfast to remain below and work with her.  Bluebell was of a grateful disposition, and acquiesced, but secretly thought it rather dismal, so, when Mr. Dutton came down and begged her to go on deck, as they were passing through some magnificent icebergs, she willingly pocketed her tatting and went up.  The young lieutenant got a couple of rugs and arranged her comfortably.  Certainly the roll of the ship was much more bearable on deck.

Mr. Dutton remained to amuse her, and, both being young, they speedily became confidentially communicative.  She learnt from him that he had just been promoted out of his ship, and was going home till he got another.  “At least,” he amended, “it is more my home than any other.  I am going to stay with my uncle, who would like me to give up the service, and remain with him altogether.”

“Is he so very fond of you?”

“Why, yes, in a sort of way.  You see he has got no one else.  He never wished me to go to sea, but when I was at school a brother of one of the fellows came, who had just passed as naval cadet, and he had such a lot of tuck, and tin, and presents, that we were all wild to go too.  My governor had some interest, and I never ceased tormenting him, till at last he got me appointed to the ‘Sorceress.’  After I had been a month at sea I had had quite enough of it; but we were on a five years’ cruise, and by the end of that time I liked the life as well as any other.”

“Then why should your uncle want you to give up your profession?”

“Because,” blushing slightly, “he always says I shall be his heir, and he wishes me to take an interest in the estate, and learn to be a country gentleman.  But after I have been on shore a month or so the monotony of it is awful, and I feel as if I must do something desperate if I stop quiet longer.”

“I thought English country gentlemen found plenty of excitement in hunting and shooting.”

“Not all the year round,” with a smile; “and, besides, I can’t ride!  Now, Miss Leigh, if you were an English girl, you would never speak to me again!  I don’t fear the obstacle, and would ride anything anybody likes to trust me with; but I know, and the horse knows, he could get rid of me at any minute.  I hunt sometimes, and go straight if the quad.  I am on is fond of jumping; but I cut a voluntary as often as not, and then some fool is sure to come up and say,—­’You had no business to have parted at that fence, Dutton; the horse took it well enough!’ Then I have no ‘hands,’ I am told.  Certainly, whenever I take up the rudder-lines to put his head for any particular course the brute takes it as a personal affront, and begins to fret, go sideways, and bore and all but tell me what a duffer he thinks me.  There’s my cousin Kate, who will spoon with me by the hour in a greenhouse, and