You are probably enjoying your deepest, sweetest sleep, rocked in the cradle of the deep, and gently swaying to and fro in your little cot; you had turned in with the delicious consciousness of safety, for well you knew that the ship was far away at sea, far from rock or reef or deadly shoal, and that the night was clear and collision very improbable, so you are slumbering like a babe on its mother's breast--as you are for that matter--for the second night-watch is half spent; when, mingling confusedly with your dreams, comes the roll of the drum; you start and listen. There is a moment's pause, when birr-r-r-r it goes again, and as you spring from your couch you hear it the third time. And now you can distinguish the shouts of officers and petty officers, high over the din of the trampling of many feet, of the battening down of hatches, of the unmooring of great guns, and of heavy ropes and bars falling on the deck: then succeeds a dead silence, soon broken by the voice of the commander thundering, "Enemy on the port bow;" and then, and not till then, do you know it is no real engagement, but the monthly night-quarters. And you can't help feeling sorry there isn't a real enemy on the port bow, or either bow, as you hurry away to the cockpit, with the guns rattling all the while overhead, as if a real live thunderstorm were being taken on board, and was objecting to be stowed away. So you lay out your instruments, your sponges, your bottles of wine, and your buckets of water, and, seating yourself in the midst, begin to read `Midsummer Night's Dream,' ready at a moment's notice to amputate the leg of any man on board, whether captain, cook, or cabin-boy. Another nice little amusement the officer of the watch may give himself on fine clear nights is to set fire to and let go the lifebuoy, at the same time singing out at the top of his voice, "Man overboard." A boatswain's mate at once repeats the call, and vociferates down the main hatchway, "Life-boat's crew a-ho-oy!" In our navy a few short but expressive moments of silence ever precede the battle, that both officers and men may hold communion with their God. The men belonging to this boat, who have been lying here and there asleep but dressed, quickly tumble up the ladder pell-mell; there is a rattling of oars heard, and the creaking of pulleys, then a splash in the water alongside, the boat darts away from the ship like an arrow from a bow, and the crew, rowing towards the blazing buoy, save the life of the unhappy man, Cheeks the marine. And thus do British sailors rule the waves and keep old Neptune in his own place. CHAPTER NINE. CONTAINING--IF NOT THE WHOLE--NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH.