In the above pages I have endeavoured to give some notion of what used to go on in old times when there were no steam launches, and when, I may be forgiven for saying it, sailors were in every sense of the word sailors. I could recount many more adventures somewhat similar to those I have described, but I do not wish to bore my readers or appear egotistical in their eyes. The only comparison I would make in regard to our doings in those days is with the work done by the blockading squadron during the civil war in America; for if ever men required plucky endurance and self-denial it was the poor fellows who had to keep, or endeavour to keep, blockade-runners if not slavers from communicating with the stormy shores of Florida and South Carolina. They are too modest now to tell us what they went through. Perhaps forty years hence they will do as I am doing, and recount some of their adventures, which I am convinced would quite put into the shade anything I or my boat's crew ever did. I do not wish to be mistaken in my remarks about the black race. I will not venture to give an opinion as to what Providence meant to be done with those interesting creatures. I only assert, and this I do from my own personal experience, that a black man is a happier and wiser man in America than he is in his own wretched country, North and South. CHAPTER VIII. THE QUEEN'S YACHT. I returned from the Cape to England. On arriving there I was appointed to the Queen's yacht, as a reward for what their lordships at the Admiralty were good enough to designate my active and zealous services while employed in suppression of the slave trade. To be appointed to Her Majesty's yacht was in those days considered a very great distinction. Even now the Queen invariably chooses officers who have seen what is called 'service.' Such an appointment, apart from the honour of being so near Her Majesty, always tends to rapid promotion. The Queen at the time I write of was very fond of cruising in her yacht, paying visits to foreign potentates, &c. Her Majesty had been then five years married, with a young family springing up around her, and her beloved husband the Prince Consort always with her, participating in all her pleasures; so we, the officers of the Royal yacht, had a rare time of it, were made a lot of wherever we went, and thought ourselves very great men indeed. Amongst other trips, we conveyed the Royal family up the Rhine, where Her Majesty visited the King of Prussia at Stolzenfels. Afterwards we went to the Château d'Eu, where Her Majesty was received by King Louis Philippe and the Reine Amélie. I shall never forget the condescending kindness of Her Majesty and Prince Albert to all on board the Royal yacht. As to the Prince Consort, he treated the officers more in the light of companions than subordinates, always ready to join us in a cigar and its accompanying friendly conversation.