Presently I stepped leisurely into the recess under the poop where the soldiers and the women were. One was the pretty young woman who had given me a smile when I came on board the ship at Woolwich. She viewed me with her soft, dark eyes with a wistful admiration, but I could not observe that she remembered me. The three or four soldiers without belts, their jackets unbuttoned, lounged against the bulkhead, smoking their pipes. I was now used to being stared at, and gave them no heed. Whilst I thus stood waiting for what was next to happen, Will came along from his berth forward. When he saw me, he seemed to pause, as though not knowing what to do. With the most pronounced air I could contrive I averted my face and looked into the saloon through the window, and when I glanced again my cousin was out of sight. I was very much in earnest that he should not get in trouble through me; nay, I desired that for a long time yet he and I should keep as wide apart as the two ends of the ship. He was boyish and imprudent, and might at any moment say or do something that would lead to the disclosure of my sex, and, for all I knew, to the revelation of my motive in hiding in this ship. The soldiers talked of the convicts, and I pricked up my ears, thirsty for all information of the gloomy, hidden quarters where Tom lived. One asked if the people were kept in irons throughout the voyage. Another answered, No; he believed the irons were taken off after the ship was out of the Bay of Biscay. ‘I couldn’t ’elp laughing,’ said one of the soldiers. ‘I was on sentry below and heard a chap say to some others: “I don’t mind praying, but cussed if I’m going to pray for the Governor of Tasmania! I’ll pray for rain if it’s wanted, but not for a bloomed Governor.” “Who asks ye?” says one of the convicts. “It’s to be a part of the prayers,” said the other. “Me pray for the Governor of Tasmania!”--and here he swore and used such language that I had to caution him.’ ‘I wouldn’t pray for ne’er a Governor if I was a convick,’ said the pretty young woman, with a toss of her head and a side-glance at me. ‘It’s a shame to make a joke of sacred things. Should a convick be made to pray for his jailer? Would the Lord listen to the prayer of a sailor who asks a blessing on the bo’sun who’s just been flogging him?’ ‘There’s some queer chaps downstairs,’ said one of the soldiers. ‘There’s a fellow they call the smasher--a little, gray-haired man with the kindest of faces, and speaks as soft as pouring out milk; he’s lagged for one of the most awful crimes. There’s a play-actor--dunno what right he’s got down there. They sails under false colours. Dessay if he’d got his right name ye’d find him some one as had been tiptop at Drury Lane and the best of theayters. There’s a quiet, pleasing-looking chap, lagged for scuttling.’ A woman asked what that was. ‘Sinking a ship by making a hole in her.’