be listening attentively. I heard his deep voice saying something
about the 'work of God in this place.' But what I noticed
specially - and the sight made me forget my aching hinder
parts - was that he had a swollen eye, and two strips of
sticking-plaster on his cheek.



CHAPTER II
FURTH! FORTUNE!


In this plain story of mine there will be so many wild doings
ere the end is reached, that I beg my reader's assent to a
prosaic digression. I will tell briefly the things which happened
between my sight of the man on the Kirkcaple sands and my
voyage to Africa.
I continued for three years at the burgh school, where my
progress was less notable in my studies than in my sports. One
by one I saw my companions pass out of idle boyhood and be
set to professions. Tam Dyke on two occasions ran off to sea
in the Dutch schooners which used to load with coal in our
port; and finally his father gave him his will, and he was
apprenticed to the merchant service. Archie Leslie, who was a
year my elder, was destined for the law, so he left Kirkcaple
for an Edinburgh office, where he was also to take out classes
at the college. I remained on at school till I sat alone by myself
in the highest class - a position of little dignity and deep
loneliness. I had grown a tall, square-set lad, and my prowess
at Rugby football was renowned beyond the parishes of