"Not unlikely, Willis; but the miracle!"
"I was going along quietly, not thinking I was being led anywhere in particular, when, all at once, I was hove up by—If a bullet had hit me right in the breast, I could not have been more staggered."
"Whatever hove you up then, Willis?"
"I was hove up by the sloop."
"What sloop?"
"The Nelson."
"Was it taking a walk, Willis?" inquired Jack.
"Have you been to sea since we saw you last?" asked Fritz.
"If I had fallen in with the craft at sea, Master Fritz, I should not have been half so much astonished. The sea is the natural element of ships; we do not find gudgeons in corn fields, nor shoot hares on the ocean. But it was on land that I hailed the Nelson."
"Was it going round the corner of a street that you stumbled upon it, Willis?" inquired Jack.