“Don’t fret over it, my boy,” said his uncle, “we shall all find many things to bear up against through life. There’s a good time coming for all of us, if we’ll only wait patiently for it. I ought to have been an admiral, and so I might if my leg hadn’t been knocked away by a Turkish round shot at Navarin; but you see, notwithstanding, I am as happy as a prince. As far as I myself am concerned I have no reasonable want unsupplied, though I should like to have your very natural wish complied with.”
Still week after week went by; the lieutenant wrote several other letters, but the answers were unsatisfactory. At last he began to talk of going up himself to town to call on the Admiralty, and to beard the lions in their den; but it was an undertaking the thoughts of which he dreaded far more than had he been ordered to head a boarding party against an enemy’s ship. He talked the matter over with his sister Sally.
“If we want a thing we must go for it, if we don’t want it we may stay at home and not get it,” he observed. “If I felt anything like sure that I should succeed by pressing my claim, I’d go ten times as far; but my belief is, that I shall be sent back with a flea in my ear.”
“Still, what can poor Ned do if he doesn’t go to sea, though I wish that we could have found him some employment on shore suited to his taste,” said Miss Sarah.
“Well, I’ll make up my mind about the matter,” said the lieutenant, who was as anxious as his sister to forward Ned’s wishes. “I can but ask, you know, and if I am refused, I shall have good reason for grumbling for the next year to come, or to the end of my days. I’ll go and talk the subject over with Hanson; he knows more about the ways of the Admiralty than I do, and will give me a wrinkle or two. In the meantime do you get my old uniform brushed up and my traps ready.”
Next morning the old lieutenant, summoning Ned, set off to pay a visit to his brother officer. Ned was in high spirits at hearing that steps were actually being taken to promote his object, and he expressed his gratitude to his uncle for the effort he was about to make on his behalf. All difficulties seemed to vanish, and he already saw himself a midshipman on board a fine ship sailing down channel.
Lieutenant Hanson was not very sanguine when he heard of his friend’s intention.
“There is nothing like asking, however, and they can’t eat you, though you may be refused,” he answered. “Go by all means; get to the Admiralty early, step boldly in, and show that you fully expect to have your request granted. Say that the boy will soon be over age, and consequently there is no time to be lost.” (See Note 1.)
Although the old lieutenant had not received much encouragement from Mr Hanson, yet some of the difficulties he had apprehended appeared to clear away, and he walked home with Ned, resolved to carry out his project. The cost of his expedition was now his chief anxiety. He pictured to himself the risk of running short of funds in the great metropolis, and being unable to pay his journey back. Then Sally would be hard put to it for many a long month.
“His small income, poor lad, won’t go far to defray his outfit and allowance,” he said to himself as he walked along. “Still it must be done, and we’ll find the ways and means. If the worst comes to the worst, I’ll go to sea, and take Ned with me. I wonder I never thought of that before. It will make some amends to him for not entering the navy; he’d soon become a prime seaman under my charge, and in a few years get the command of a ship.”