40                                       KIDNAPPED.
it, and found on the doorstep a half-grown boy in sea-
clothes. He had no sooner seen me than he began to
dance some steps of the sea-hornpipe (which I had never
before heard of, far less seen) snapping his fingers in
the air and footing it right cleverly. For all that, he
was blue with the cold; and there was something in his
face, a look between tears and laughter, that was highly
pathetic and consisted ill with this gaiety of manner.
"What cheer, mate?" says he, with a cracked
voice.
I asked him soberly to name his business.
"Oh, pleasure!" says he; and then began to sing :
"For it's my delight, of a shiny night,
In the season of the year."
"Well," said I, "if you have no business at all, I
will even be so unmannerly as to shut you out."
"Stay, brother!" he cried. "Have you no fun
about you? or do you want to get me thrashed? I've
brought a letter from old Heasy-oasy to Mr. Belflower."
He showed me a letter as he spoke. "And I say,
mate," he added, "I'm mortal hungry."
"Well," said I, "come into the house, and you
shall have a bite if I go empty for it."
With that I brought him in and set him down to
my own place, where he fell-to greedily on the remains
of breakfast, winking to me between whiles, and making
many faces, which I think the poor soul considered
manly. Meanwhile, my uncle had read the letter and