Suddenly Ben spied a French frigate looming against the darkening sky and showed it to Archie through the telescope. He explained all the parts of the ship and dwelt long in his answers to the lad's questions. He told little Archie how, early one stormy morning, he had been awakened from his bed in the cottage by the sound of guns away at sea, how he had descended to the beach with a lot of the villagers, to find the waves beating mercilessly over a great broken ship. He told how they had all stood, in the leaden morning, stricken with dread at the sight of the disaster they were all powerless to prevent; leaning hard against the wind, their breath and vision often failing as the sleet and spray rushed at them from the great mountain of foaming sea which kept breaking on the rocks in the cove. He told farther, how, before all their eyes, the vessel had given one great heave backwards and sank beneath the waves forever; how they could faintly hear the heart-rending screams of women and children above the storm as the great waste of waters covered the struggling vessel. He told Archie that, on the following evening, while he was mending a boat down the bay, he came across something lying amongst a mass of sea-weed, and on turning it over had found it to be the dead body of a sailor--a fair, curly-headed youth. "He was clad," said Ben, "in a pair of linen trowsers and a sea shirt, and the weeds and sand were all tangled in his hair. I raised him up from the beach and a small bundle fell out of his bosom. I laid him in my boat and went for Doctor Hart. It was the talk of the village for days. Dr. Hart found the bundle to contain a packet of letters written in a feeble hand and signed by the dead sailor's mother. They were loving letters of expected joy at her boy's return." Ben would have gone on with the story, but he was attracted by the appearance of Archie. The little lad was sitting, with his pale face turned up to Ben, and with two great tears, as large as horse beans, in the corners of his eyes. On meeting Ben's gaze he broke down thoroughly and burst into a flood of tears, throwing his arms round the honest boat-builder's neck, sobbing on his breast. "Oh, Ben, I don't want to leave mother; I am a wicked boy. If she were to die, Ben, what should I do? Do you think she is alive now, Ben? I don't want to go away, Ben." The boat-builder soothed the little lad and smiled at the success of his purpose to divert the boy's mind. It was now nearly night, and time for Archie to go home, so Ben took him on his shoulders and carried him to Mr. Archer's house, where the family were all waiting supper for the little boy. Archie ran to his mother as soon as he got in and kissed her over and over again. He told her his little story, making the good woman's heart overflow with love for her little son.