"A very pretty speech, Archie Broadbent. But mind you this—a hut on solid ground is better far than a castle in the air. And it is better that I should storm and capsize your cloud-castle, than that an absolute stranger did so."
"Well, I suppose you are right. Forgive me for being cross."
"Spoken like his father's son," said Captain Vesey, grasping and shaking the hand that Archie extended to him. "Now we know each other. Ding! ding! ding! there goes the dinner-bell. Sit next to me."
CHAPTER II
"KEEP ON YOUR CAP. I WAS ONCE A POOR MAN MYSELF."
The voyage out was a long, even tedious one; but as it has but little bearing on the story I forbear to describe it at length.
The ship had a passenger for Madeira, parcels for Ascension and St. Helena, and she lay in at the Cape for a whole week.
Here Captain Vesey left the vessel, bidding Archie a kind farewell, after dining with him at the Fountain, and roaming with him all over the charming Botanical Gardens.
"I've an idea we'll meet again," he said as he bade him adieu. "If God spares me, I'll be sure to visit Sydney in a year or two, and I hope to find you doing well. You'll know if my little yacht, the Barracouta, comes in, and I know you'll come off and see me. I hope to find you with as good a coat on your back as you have now."
Then the Dugong sailed away again; but the time now seemed longer to Archie than ever, for in Captain Vesey he really had lost a good friend—a friend who was all the more valuable because he spoke the plain, unvarnished truth; and if in doing so one or two of the young man's cherished idols were brought tumbling down to the ground, it was all the better for the young man. It showed those idols had feet of clay, else a little cold water thrown over them would hardly have had such an effect. I am sorry to say, however, that no sooner had the captain left the ship, than Archie set about carefully collecting the pieces of those said idols and patching them up again.