to the majority of his mates, who seem to imagine that neatness and cleanliness form no part of their duty whilst on shore. He was always well and smartly dressed. His uniform showed traces of careful handling, and his peaked cap, with its gaily-embroidered badge, evidently received due attention from the clothes-brush. His boots shone with blacking, and his golden-flecked head was as perfectly groomed as if he were about to stroll through Hyde Park. Though, truth to say, you might have covered Jack Blythe with mud, and ducked him in a horse-pond, and he would still have emerged looking like a gentleman. It was this trait, as much as his beauty, that attracted the other sex to him. Women detest a slovenly man. Miss Vansittart’s evident liking for the young officer was viewed with jealous alarm by Godfrey Harland. He had not forgotten his causeless grudge against Blythe, and he was determined he should not take the wind out of his sails now. ‘What do you want to talk to that fellow for, Miss Vansittart?’ he asked, as Jack was called away to the main hatch. ‘Why should I not?’ inquired Grace. ‘Do you dislike him, Mr Harland? I think he is such a very pleasant young man.’ ‘_Pleasant young man!_’ sneered Harland. ‘Do you suppose, Miss Vansittart, for an instant that any of these fellows are gentlemen? Why, they have all risen from common seamen.’ ‘I am _sure_ Mr Blythe is a gentleman,’ retorted Grace warmly. ‘Then I suppose you call Mr Coffin and the old skipper _gentlemen_? They have quite as much right to the title as young Blythe.’ ‘I don’t agree with you,’ said Grace; ‘I know a gentleman when I speak to him, Mr Harland; and so long as my parents raise no objection to it, I shall continue my acquaintanceship with Mr Blythe.’ This answer nettled and alarmed Godfrey Harland. He had been on such friendly terms with the heiress hitherto, that he was jealous of the influence exercised over her by the second officer. Had he dared, he would have said anything to lower his rival in her estimation, but he was sharp enough to see that such a course would only injure his own cause. So he turned his attention to patching up the slight breach between them instead. ‘My dear Miss Vansittart,’ he commenced, ‘you must forgive me if I have spoken too strongly on the subject. You know how miserable it makes me to hear you speak in praise of any other fellow, and will excuse my transient ill-humour for the sake of its cause.’ He had never said so much to her before, and he waited rather nervously for her reply. He had not intended to give her an intimation even of his wishes until he was safe in New Zealand, and had had an opportunity of sounding her father’s mind upon the subject. But if other people were going to intrude their officious attentions upon her, it would be as well perhaps to let her have some inkling of his preference. And Grace Vansittart did not resent it.