“I intended to keep him for that purpose myself, if I could ascertain who his friends were, and make an arrangement with them, for I will not encourage any boy in running away from his employers. Very likely we shall find him again in the course of the day.”
“Very well, sir; if you want him, I will look out for some one on shore,” added Paul. “At what time do you pipe to lecture, Mr. Lowington?”
“Not before to-morrow forenoon, at two bells.”
“I want to hear the lecture.”
“So do I,” laughed Mrs. Kendall. “I think it is a capital idea to have a professor tell us all about a country before we attempt to see it. I used to read about the Norsemen, but I have forgotten all about them now, and I want to refresh my memory.”
“I wish all our boys had the same view of the matter,” said Mr. Lowington.
“We will come on board before nine to-morrow morning, sir,” added Paul, as he handed his lady up the steps over the rail.
Descending to the boat, the three oarsmen shoved off, and pulled for the shore, where they landed. The boat had not reached the land, before another barge, the counterpart of the first, and similarly manned, left the Feodora, and pulled alongside the ship. Mr. Robert Shuffles, the owner and commander of the second yacht, assisted his wife up the ladder to the deck of the ship, where they were cordially received by the principal. The yacht Feodora was only six months older than the Grace, for which she had served as the model. Shuffles had not come into possession of any inheritance yet, but his father was as liberal as he was wealthy, and gave his son an annual allowance, which enabled him to marry and keep a yacht. He and Paul had been intimate friends since they were graduated from the Academy ship, and they had made their plans in concert. He had married Lady Feodora a year before, and she had now dropped her aristocratic title, and become a republican lady. Like her husband, she had acquired nautical tastes, and was even more enthusiastic than he in anticipating the pleasures of a yacht cruise up the Baltic, and up the Mediterranean. Shuffles had not been so fortunate as Paul in finding needy graduates of the Academy to officer his yacht, and a fat old shipmaster served as first officer in the Feodora, while the second mate was a young tar, not yet of age. Having paid their respects to the principal, the young couple returned to the boat, and followed Paul to the hotel on shore.
“That’s the way to go about Europe,” said Sanford, who was sitting on the rail with several of his shipmates.
“What’s the way?” asked Stockwell.