This arrangement, on the part of the three last mentioned, was much against the will of Ran, who would gladly have provided his brother-in-law and his two friends with the best accommodations the ship afforded, but that from very delicacy of feeling toward them he could not offer to do so. Besides, he knew that all three of these men had money enough to pay for a first-class passage each, had they desired it, but that for prudential reasons Dandy and Longman did not choose to squander their savings in that needless manner, and that Mike cast in his lot with his two friends; and so their little party voyaged in the plain but clean and wholesome second cabin. There could not, however, be much communication between the three in the first cabin and the three in the second, though they met occasionally on the common ground of the forward deck. Here Ran had long talks with his friends, and learned much more of the past history of Dandy and Longman than he had ever known before. Here, Judy, wrapped from head to heel in her heavy fur cloak, would often join them, for the weather continued fine. “Wonderful!—just wonderful!” was the verdict of all the ship’s passengers; the oldest “salt” declaring that never, at this season of the year, had he known such weather in crossing the Atlantic. Not one of our party suffered from seasickness. The only effect the voyage seemed to have upon them was an increase of health, vigor and appetite. Their ship was rather a slow one, that was all. It was a splendid winter morning about the seventh day out. The sky, of a clear, deep blue, without a single cloud, and on fire with a sun too dazzling to be seen, overhung a sea whose waves were like molten sapphires. The ship, with all her snowy sails spread and filled, was flying on before a fresh, fair wind. On the forward deck, grouped together, were Ran, Judy, Mike, Dandy and Longman. The hunter had been telling his story for the first time to Ran and Judy. “And so you are from Chuxton! Is not that a strange coincidence? Haymore Hall and hamlet is in the neighborhood of Chuxton, I think,” said Ran. “About ten miles off, sir. Chuxton is the nearest market town and railway station to Haymore,” replied Longman. “Well, my dear fellow, as you say you would never have left your native country if you could have obtained employment to suit you——” Ran said in a modest and hesitating way. “Among guns and game,” Longman interjected with a laugh. “Exactly—’among guns and game?—I do earnestly hope that it may be in my way to suit you. Longman, I know nearly nothing of my patrimonial estate, but I have heard my father say that there was no such place for game in all the North Riding. I hope and trust and pray,” added Ran, with boyish earnestness, “that I may be able to make you head gamekeeper at Haymore without injustice to others.” “I would not take another man’s place to his hurt, sir,” said the hunter.