* * * * *

GOOD-BYE TO THE AUXILIARY PATROL.

II.--THE SHIP'S COMPANY.

Demobilisation in the Navy, whatever it may be in the Army, is a
simple affair. You are first sent for by the Master-at-Arms, who
glares, thrusts papers into your trembling hand and ejects you
violently in the direction of the Demobilising Office. Here they
regard you curiously, stifle a yawn, languidly inspect your papers and
send you to the Paymaster, who, after wandering disconsolately round
the Pay Office, exclaiming pathetically, "I say, hasn't _anyone_ seen
that Mixed Muster book? It must be _somewhere_, you know," returns you
without thanks to the D.O., where they tell you to call again in three
days' time. On returning you are provided with a P.I.O. and numerous
necessary papers, requested to sign a few dozen forms, overwhelmed
with an unexpected _largesse_ of pay and sent forth on that
twenty-eight days' leave from which no traveller returns. There's
nothing in it at all; the whole thing only lasts four days. They do it
by a system, I believe.

As we assembled on board for the last time, awaiting our railway
warrants, there were some moving spectacles. The Mate and the
Second-Engineer were bidding each other affectionate and tearful
farewells behind the winch. "You won't quite forget me, Bill, will
yer?" I heard the Second exclaim brokenly, but the only reply was a
strangled sob. The Steward, seated on his kit-bag, was murmuring a
snatch of song that asserted the rather personal fact that "our gel's