The French officers listened to these and similar speculations with utter indifference; probably to many of them the geographical question was a difficulty that stopped any further inquiry, while others felt no further interest than what a campaign promised. All the enthusiastic narratives, then, of high rewards and splendid trophies that awaited us, fell upon inattentive ears, and at last the word Ireland ceased to be heard amongst us. Play of various kinds occupied us when not engaged on duty. There was little discipline maintained on board, and none of that strictness which is the habitual rule of a ship-of-war. The lights were suffered to burn during the greater part of the night in the cabins; gambling went on usually till daybreak; and the quarter-deck, that most reverential of spots to every sailor-mind, was often covered by lounging groups, who smoked, chatted, or played at chess, in all the cool apathy of men indifferent to its claim for respect. Now and then, the appearance of a strange sail afar off, or some dim object in the horizon, would create a momentary degree of excitement and anxiety; but when the ‘lookout’ from the mast-head had proclaimed her a ‘schooner from Brest,’ or a ‘Spanish fruit-vessel,’ the sense of danger passed away at once, and none ever reverted to the subject. With General Humbert I usually passed the greater part of each forenoon--a distinction, I must confess, I owed to my skill as a chess-player, a game of which he was particularly fond, and in which I had attained no small proficiency. I was too young and too unpractised in the world to make my skill subordinate to my chiefs, and beat him at every game with as little compunction as though he were only my equal, till, at last, vexed at his want of success, and tired of a contest that offered no vicissitude of fortune, he would frequently cease playing to chat over the events of the time, and the chances of the expedition.