Thus Dormer Colville found two points of sympathy with this skipper
of a slow coaster, who had never made a mistake at sea nor done an
injustice to any one serving under him: a simple faith in the
Almighty Purpose and a very honest respect for money. This was the
beginning of a sort of alliance between four persons of very
different character which was to influence the whole lives of many.

They sat on the tarred seat set against the weather-beaten wall of
"The Black Sailor" until darkness came stealing in from the sea with
the quiet that broods over flat lands, and an unpeopled shore.
Colville had many questions to ask and many more which he withheld
till a fitter occasion. But he learnt that Frenchman had himself
stated his name to be Barebone when he landed, a forlorn and
frightened little boy, on this barren shore, and had never departed
from that asseveration when he came to learn the English language
and marry an English wife. Captain Clubbe told also how Frenchman,
for so he continued to be called long after his real name had been
written twice in the parish register, had soon after his marriage
destroyed the papers carefully preserved by the woman whom he never
called mother, though she herself claimed that title.

She had supported herself, it appeared, by her needle, and never
seemed to want money, which led the villagers to conclude that she
had some secret store upon which to draw when in need. She had
received letters from France, which were carefully treasured by her
until her death, and for long afterward by Frenchman, who finally
burnt all at his marriage, saying that he was now an Englishman and
wanted to retain no ties with France. At this time, Clubbe
remembered, Louis XVIII. was firmly established on the throne of