"I'm afraid it's rather weaker stuff than you're used to," I remarked deprecatingly, handing my pouch across. "Yus," he agreed, examining its contents and proceeding to fill his pipe. "It do look a bit like 'ay, don't it? 'Owever, seein' as 'ow I carn't git no more I'm werry much obliged, sir, I'm sure." "It's expensive hay," I said weakly, as he handed my property back and lit his pipe. "It costs well over ten shillings a pound." The ungrateful old sinner puffed out a cloud of smoke. "'Arf a Bradbury[1]!" he grunted unsympathetically. "You're jokin', sir." I shook my head. "But we pays a bob a pound fur 'bacca on board o' the ship," he expostulated. "It's something like 'bacca; grips you by the neck, like." Evidently the delicate flavour of my best John Cotton did not sufficiently tickle his brazen palate. For a moment or two there was silence between us as we watched the gulls screaming and wheeling over some object in the water far beneath us. "Well," I asked, merely to start a conversation, "how d'you like the Navy?" "Suits me all right, sir," he said, "seein' as 'ow I've bin in it a matter o' fifteen year. But between you an' me, sir," he hastened to add, "it ain't like wot it wus when I fust jined. It's full o' noo-fangled notions an' sichlike." "What d'you mean?" I asked in some amazement. "Carn't say no more, sir. Afore we wus sent on leaf we wus all cautioned special not to git talkin' abart the Service wi' civvies." I suppose I did look rather unlike a member of His Majesty's land forces, for I was wearing plain clothes and had only come out of hospital four days before, after being wounded for the second time on the western front. (I am speaking of the fighting line in France, not anatomically.) I hastened to explain who I was. "Sorry I spoke, sir," he apologised. "I thought you wus one o' these 'ere la-de-dah blokes out fur an arrin'. Wot did you say your corpse wus?" "Corpse! What corpse?" "Corpse, sir. Rig'mint." "Oh, I see. I'm only a doctor, a Lieutenant in the R.A.M.C. I'm on sick leave, and crawled up here to-day to get some fresh air and to ... er, meet someone I know." I looked at my wrist watch and glanced over my shoulder. "Young lady, sir?" he queried in a husky, confidential whisper. I nodded. "I'm on the same lay meself," he told me, with a throaty sigh and a lovelorn look in his blue eyes. "Expectin' 'er any minit now, seein' as 'ow it's 'er arternoon art. 'Er name's Hamelia, an' I don't come up 'ere to look at the perishin' sea, not 'arf I don't. I gits fair sick o' lookin' at it on board o' the ship." I was not in the mood for exchanging confidences as to my prospective matrimonial affairs, and my silence must have said as much. "Beggin' your pardon, sir; but seein' as 'ow you're a doctor, I wonder if you 'appens to know our bloke in the _Jackass_?" "Who, your doctor?"