"'Faith,' broke in the captain of the _Hebe_, 'you've a better memory than I have--I do not recollect any chasse-marées at all that time, Mr Collins!' 'Why,' said I, 'I got a knock on the head from a fellow in a red shirt--that always kept me in mind.' 'Oh,' remarked the Admiral to Captain Wallis, laughing, 'Lord Frederick Bury must have had so many little parties of the kind that his memory can't be expected to be very nice! However, I shall go ashore at present, gentlemen, leaving the _Hebe_ and you to dispose of this runaway lieutenant in some way or other. Only you'd better settle it before Admiral Plampin arrives!' 'Have you seen the--the--Longwood lately, Sir Dudley?' asked the captain of the _Podargus_ carelessly. 'Yes, not many days ago I had an interview,' said the Admiral gravely; 'proud as ever, and evidently resolved not to flinch from his condition. 'Tis wonderful the command that man has over himself, Wallis--he speaks of the whole world and its affairs like one that sees into them, and had them still nearly under his foot! All saving those miserable squabbles with Plantation House, which--but, next time I shall take my leave, and wash my hands of the whole concern, I am glad to think!' "Lord Frederick was talking to me meanwhile at the other end of the cabin, but I was listening in spite of myself to Sir Dudley Aldcombe, and noticed that Captain Wallis made no answer. 'By-the-way, Wallis,' continued the Admiral, ''tis curious that he seemed anxious more than once to know what you think of him--I believe he would like to see you!' 'To see _me_!' said the commander of the _Podargus_, suddenly. 'At last, does he! No, Sir Dudley, he and I never _will_ meet; he ought to have thought of it twelve years sooner! God knows,' he went on, 'the commander of a ten-gun brig is too small a man to see the Emperor Napoleon a prisoner; but in ten years of war, Sir Dudley, what mightn't one have been, instead of being remembered after as only plain John Wallis, whom Bonaparte kept all that time in prison, and who was sent in course of time, to cruise off St Helena?' Here the Admiral said something about a British sailor not keeping malice, and Captain Wallis looked up at him gravely. 'No,' replied he; 'no, Sir Dudley, I shouldn't have _chosen_ the thing; but in the meantime I'm only doing my duty. There's a gloomy turn in my mind by this time, no doubt; but you've no idea, Sir Dudley, how the thought of other people comes into one's head when he's years shut up--so _I_ may stand for many a one Bonaparte will never see more than myself, that'll ring him round surer than those rocks there, though they're dead and in their graves, Sir Dudley!' The Admiral shook his head, observing that Napoleon was no common man, and oughtn't to be judged as such. 'Too many victories in that eye of his, I suspect, Captain Wallis,' said he, 'for either Plantation House or his own conscience to break his spirit!'