This clear proof that Mr. Smith did not respect them and was kind was received without a murmur. And as the boss did not return, the tide of conversation drifted in the narrower more personal channels of the marvels that had happened in the "last ship." And in the meantime H.M.S. _Triumphant_, known familiarly on the Pacific Coast station as "the _Nonsuch_, two decks and no bottom," was bringing Rear-Admiral Sir Richard Dunn, K.C.B., to his fate in San Francisco. "Was there ever such luck--was there ever such luck?" murmured Mr. Shanghai Smith. "To think of him turnin' up, all of his own accord, on my partic'lar stampin' ground! And I'll lay odds he's clean forgot me. I'll brighten up his memr'y with sand and canvas and souji-mouji, so I will! Holy sailor, was there ever such luck?" The morning of the following day H.M.S. _Triumphant_ lay at her anchors off Saucelito in San Francisco Bay, and was glad to be there. For this was in the times when the whole British fleet was not absolutely according to Cocker. She leaked not a little and she rolled a great deal, and she would not mind her helm except upon those occasions when the officer in charge of the deck laid his money and his reputation on her going to starboard when, according to all rules, she should have altered her course to port. But though she was a wet ship with a playful habit of trying to scoop the Pacific Ocean dry, and though her tricks would have broken the heart of the Chief Naval Constructor had he seen her at them, she was the flagship in spite of her conduct, because at that time she was half the whole Pacific Squadron. The other half was lying outside Esquimault Dry Dock waiting for it to be finished. And when the _Chronicle_ said that "Dicky Dunn" was the admiral, it had not lied. If any of that paper's reporters had known "Dicky" as his men knew him, he would have spread himself in a column on the admiral's character and personal appearance. "He's the dead-spit of a boson's mate, to be sure," said the crew of the _Triumphant_ when they received him at Esquimault. "An 'ard nut he looks!" And a "hard nut" he certainly was. Though he stood five feet nine in height, he looked two inches less, for he was as broad as a door and as sturdy as the fore-bitts. His complexion was the colour of the sun when it sets in a fog for fine weather: the skin on his hands shone and was as scaly as a lizard's hide. His teeth were white and his eyes piercing. He could roar like a fog-horn, and sing, as the crew said, "like any hangel." There wasn't the match of "Dicky" on any of the seas the wide world over. The only trouble was that he looked so much like the traditional sailor and buccaneer that no one could believe he was anything higher than a warrant officer at the most when he had none of his official gear about him.