Just then as the bronze-faced captain was ascending to the poop from his cabin; a small barefooted boy came aft, and, touching his hat, said,—
'Av ye plaze, sor, won't ye let me go in the boat, sor?'
'Why, Maurice, my boy, there's quite enough of us going in her as it is,' said the captain, kindly, for the dirty-faced but bright-eyed Maurice Kinane was a favourite with everyone on board.
'Ah, but shure, sor,' pleaded the boy, 'av yer honour would just let me go, av it was only to pluck a blade av the foine green grass, and lave me face in the swate clane wather I'll be beholden—'
'Well, well, my lad, jump in then,' said Captain Williams, with a smile, and buckling his cutlass belt around his waist he sent the lad down the ladder before him and the boat pushed off.
Ten months before, this poor Irish lad, who was but thirteen years of age, had lost both his parents through the upsetting of a boat in Sydney Harbour. His father was a sergeant in the 77th Regiment, and had only arrived in the colony a few months previous to the accident, and the boy was left without a relative in the world. But the captain of his father's company and the other officers of the regiment were very kind to him, and the colonel said he would get him enlisted as a drummer.
And so for a time Maurice lived in the barracks under the care of Sergeant MacDougall, a crusty old warrior, who proved a hard master and made the boy's life anything but a happy one. And Maurice, though he was proud of the colonel's kind words and of serving with the regiment, fretted greatly at the harsh manner of the old sergeant.
One morning he was reported as missing. Little did those who looked for him all the next day think that the boy was far out at sea, for he had stowed away on board the Boadicea; and although Captain Williams was very angry with him when he was discovered and led aft, the lad's genial temper and bright, honest face soon won him over, as, indeed, it did everyone else on board.
For nearly an hour after the boat had landed at the mouth of the little stream the seamen were busily-engaged in filling the water casks. Not a sign of a native could be seen, and then, regardful of the longing looks that the sailors cast at the grove of coco-nuts, the captain, taking with him Maurice and four hands, set out along the beach for the purpose of gathering a few score of the young nuts to give to his men to drink.