The craft we were about to attack, and hoped to capture, was the Chevrette, a ship corvette, mounting twenty guns--a powerful vessel, and not likely to be taken without a severe struggle. Notice was given that volunteers would be required for the service, and immediately the greater part of the officers and crews of the three frigates came forward. Among those who volunteered from the Doris was Mr Bryan, the second lieutenant; Mr Johnson, the boatswain; and Edkins, the captain's coxswain. All were allowed to go. The captain had great confidence in Mr Bryan; and I suspect that he had a fancy to ascertain what Mr Johnson really was made of. We brought up at our usual anchorage, and the remainder of the day was occupied in making preparations for the expedition. I saw Mr Johnson very busily employed in his cabin in cleaning his pistols. "Come in, Mr Merry," he said, as he caught sight of me. "These are old friends of mine: they have served me many a good turn before now. If it was not for these pistols I should not have been in the land of the living: some day I'll tell you how it happened. Well, we are likely to have some desperate work to-night, and no one can tell whose lot it will be to fall. That reminds me, Mr Merry, I have written a letter to my wife, and I will intrust it to you. That is more than I would do to any other midshipman in the ship. She is a charming person--every inch a lady, and a lady of rank, too. One thing I must charge you--do not speak of me as a boatswain. She has no idea that I hold so subordinate a rank. She believes that I am an officer, and so I am; only I am a warrant and not a commissioned officer. Just tell her that I died fighting bravely for my country. Her name--for she is not called Mrs Johnson--and address you will find within that enclosure. If I come back, you will restore it to me as it is; if I fall, you will know what to do with it." I thanked Mr Johnson very much for the confidence he reposed in me, but told him that I had come for the very purpose of asking him to let me go in his boat. "You, Mr Merry?" exclaimed the boatswain. "You'll be made into mince-meat--cut to atoms--annihilated. It's no child's play, that cutting-out work we are going on, let me tell you. Time enough when you are bigger." "But I want to go, that I may know how to do it," I argued; "I have come to sea to learn to be a sailor and an officer, and the captain says we should lose no opportunity of gaining knowledge; and I could not find a better occasion than the present for gaining an insight into what, I fancy, is of very considerable importance." I went on for some time arguing in this way, and coaxing the boatswain. "Well! well! I cannot give you leave, youngster--you know that; but I have heard of boys stowing themselves away under a sail in the bows of a boat, and coming out to play their part right manfully when the time for action had arrived. I am to have the pinnace, you know."