I found myself seated by a tall man with a huge red nose, like the beak of an eagle, a copper complexion, jet black piercing eyes, and enormous black bushy whiskers. He looked down at me, I thought, with ineffable contempt. His clothes were of blue cloth, and his hands, which were very large and hairy, were marked on the back with strange devices, among which I observed an anchor, a ship, and a fish, which made me suspect that he must be a nautical character of some sort. He addressed the coachman and the passenger on the box seat several times in a wonderfully loud gruff voice, but as they showed by their answers that they were not inclined to enter into conversation with him, he at last turned his attention to me. "Why are you going down to Portsmouth, little boy?" he asked, in a tone I did not like. "I suppose because I want to get there," I answered. "Ho! ho! ho!" His laugh was like the bellowing of a bull. "Going to sea, I fancy," he remarked. "Yes, going to see Portsmouth," said I, quietly, "if I keep my eyes open." "Ho! ho! sharp as a needle I see," observed the big man. "Sharpness runs in the family," I replied. We were well up to this sort of repartee among each other at home. "Your name is Sharp, I suppose," said my friend. "No, only my nature, like a currant or a sour gooseberry," I replied, not able to help laughing myself. "Take care, youngster, you don't get wounded with your own weapon," said the big man. "Thank you," I answered, "but I am not a tailor." "No--ho, ho, ho,--perhaps not; but you are little more than the ninth part of a man," said the giant. "The ninth part of you, you mean; but I am half as big as most men now, and hope to be a whole man some day, and a captain into the bargain." "Then I take it you are that important character, a new fledged midshipman," observed my huge companion. "Judging of you by your size, I should suppose on the same grounds that you are nothing less than an admiral," I retorted. "I should be, if I had my deserts, boy," he replied, drawing himself up, and swelling out his chest. "Then are you only a captain?" I asked. "I once was, boy," he replied with a sigh which resembled the rumbling of a volcano. "Captain of the main-top," said the gentleman on the box without turning round. "What are you now, then?" I asked. "A boatswain," uttered the gentleman on the box. "Yes, young gentleman, as our friend there says, I am a boatswain," he exclaimed in a voice of thunder, "and a very important person is a boatswain on board ship, let me tell you, with his call at his mouth, and colt in his hand, as your silent companion there will very soon find out, for I presume, by the cut of his jib, that he is not a midshipman." "And what is a boatswain on board ship?" I asked, with unfeigned simplicity.