392 Notes on Sport and Travel iv 



they made a Lord of and is gone to glory, a terrible 

 old chap for buznacking about where he had no call 

 so to do — used to go in to his dinner, the boatswain 

 used to observe, in a low tone of voice, ' For what 

 you are going to receive, the Lord make us truly 

 thankful ! We have got rid of you for the next 

 twenty minutes, you blessed buznacking old buffer.' 

 At least those weren't exactly the words he used, but 

 they was the effect of them, as one might say. 



2'^th Novejuber 1862 — off Algiers. — A summer 

 sky, a summer sea and a summer sun, a perfect 

 collar of SS' to the south, a black broken outline 

 of hills, with a glorious snow range traversing above 

 it ; Mount Juyera looking like perpetual snow, but 

 from its height as marked on the charts, some six 

 or seven thousand feet, it must be merely a winter 

 blanket. The day inexpressibly calm and quiet, 

 so much so as to render it necessary to do some- 

 thing to prevent our going to sleep. Let us to 

 great gun practice, — bright red flame, thick spouts 

 of white and yellowish smoke, the blue sea suddenly 

 spouting up tall columns of spray ; big shells burst- 

 ing just where they are told, with a bright intense 

 flame and a round, hard cloud of woolly smoke, 

 ploughing and tearing the sea far and near with 

 the splinters that fall, first in sheets, then by dozens, 

 and lastly, by single dropping masses long after 

 you thought all was over, and far, far away from 

 where the shell burst ; the big 6 8 -lb shot and shell 

 clearly visible, like black pills as they curve through 



