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Rh walked up and down several times, then lit a cigar, and continued his exercise. It as not until Jack had been seized with several very violent fits of coughing that the object of his exertions bestowed the least attention on him; he then advanced, and noticing some strange and unusual substance protruding from the man's mouth, he wiped his spectacles, and regarding him with amazement for a time, exclaimed, "Why what on earth are you eating my good fellow?"

"Nuffln thir: I'm chawing."

"Chewing what?" said the astonished passenger.—"It is hay!", he said in a positive tone, after a minute examination.

"Yes," said Jack in a melancholy voice, "it is hay, and no mistake—worse luck;" and then he whispered in a very confidential tone, as if the sad fact were a secret to all else on board, "there a'int an ounce of baccy in the ship, Sir."

"Indeed!" said the passenger: "No tobacco, Eh? Could you make shift with a cigar, do you think?"

"Try me," replied Jack, with a knowing wink at his comrade, who was enjoying the success of the trick.

Just at this juncture one of the petty officers came on deck—he was no favourite—and addressing the tall passenger said, "No talking to the man at the wheel, if you please, Sir:" and turning round sharply to the steersman, he exclaimed, "D—e what kind of steering d'ye call this?—where are you taking the vessel to?—what's her course?"

"I'm hard o'hearing," replied Jack.

"I said, where are you taking the ship to?" bawled out the petty officer: "and what course are you steering?"

"Taking her!" said Jack with well assumed surprise, "I'm a taking of her from the port o'London to the port o'Melbourne, and her course is sow west by sow, Sir," said Jack: whose temper was ruffled by the loss of the tobacco which