throats, we saw wisdom for a moment and then rejected it and forgot it. We have discarded the lesson which might have meant our salvation,which was our own by right of purchase in blood and treasure. It would have come easy to us, because it suits our natural bent; our colonial irregulars would have readily grasped it-they are half-way there already-if our regular Cavalry had given the lead and indicated the true lines of training; and our whole imperial mounted forces could have worked in unison, giving us the numbers and the homogeneity we so sadly need. Its possibilities are beyond conception. Sir G. Chesney, speaking of the American Cavalry, says: "30,000 such

horsemen would, if handled boldly, cripple and confound an opposing army of 300,000," and our experience in South Africa points the same moral. Lord Roberts, our most experienced and most successful soldier, has, again and again, preached the great truth, but we will not believe him in spite of all his deep sagacity and knowledge of war. This is no mere academic question to be discussed by Cavalry soldiers : it is a question of broad imperial military policy for the new General Staff to decide. Are we going to let the lesson slip away from us, and content ourselves with tamely imitating our "potential enemies" their blind adherence to a discredited faith and an obsolete arm? DUFFADAR.

THE winter day was cold and clear. The wind, a biting blast from the north, with the free sweep of over two hundred miles of open water behind it, had raised great whitecapped waves, which dashed madly over the newly constructed breakwater. Inside the haven of safety anchored vessels tossed restlessly, while the craft tied up to the piers grated and ground against the bulkheads to the accompaniment of the sound of fastsplintering fenders. Few there were who exposed themselves to the hurtling force and biting cold of the gale; it was the greatest "blow" ever known upon the Lakes. At six o'clock the night before the weather had been thick and "muggy," but quiet, with what little wind there was at south; by seven o'clock it had veered, first to north-west, then to north, and by eight o'clock it had reached a velocity of nearly sixty miles an hour.

"A puff from the north," said the experienced watermen who gathered in the bar-room of the tavern upon the lake front that evening to "talk it over." "A puff from the north -'twill blow itself out by midnight."

Upon this point all agreed save "Jimmy" Dalton, commander of the Chemical Company's tank barge, the Osiris, then lying at the Company Wharf, her tanks full of vitriol, ready to start out upon her

long journey up the lake to Clairton, one hundred and fifty miles north. He puffed moodily upon his pipe and said nothing.

Dalton had sailed aboard the Osiris more years than he or most of the men present cared to remember. He had followed the sea as a young man, and when, some forty-odd years before, he had landed in the "States," he had drifted west to "see the country." An empty pocket-book had driven him to seek employment at the Chemical Works, where his knowledge of ropes and knots made him a valuable man as a "rigger." He liked the place, it was within sight of a body of water which resembled his beloved ocean, and so he stayed on and on, each year promising himself that it would be his last year ashore, but always finding himself still employed at the Works when the twelvemonth had rolled around. Then the Osiris was launched, and he had applied for a position as her mander, and it had been given to him. In all the years which had passed since his appointment he had never missed a trip. Captain and barge had grown old together; the Company had added new barges to its fleet; most of them had gone to the "marine graveyard" or had been lost on the lakes; but the old Osiris still held on, where newer, larger, and stronger barges failed.

Dalton had married soon after he obtained command of the Osiris Jeanie Downs, the daughter of one of the acidmakers at the Works, had been the bride. The young couple travelled together upon the Osiris, and life seemed very fair to them. Their happiness was but short-lived. Less than a year after they were married Jeanie stayed ashore while Dalton made a trip up the lake: when he returned, those with whom he had left her met him at the wharf, where, with white drawn faces and bated breath, they told him that at the house there awaited his coming something which had once been his wife-and a little daughter. The child had lived.

Dalton's grief had been silent but terrible to witness. After the funeral he made arrangements with the good people of the house to care for the child. The next trip of the Osiris found him at his post.

As the years passed by life held but two things of interest to Dalton-his barge and the child. As she grew older he took her with him upon the boat. A saving man, he spent money like water upon her; she wanted for nothing that his hard-earned wages could provide for her.

At last she married; the captain of another of the Company's barges was the bridegroom; he had sailed long with Dalton as mate. Soon after his marriage he retired from the lakes and sought work ashore. Dalton often

visited their snug home, and delighted to have his grandchildren climb upon his knees and pull at his grizzled beard and search his pockets for the goodies which he always brought them; but he never slept ashore.

Now, at sixty-seven, he was tall-over six feet, — broadshouldered and muscular, with a bronzed and weather-beaten face, which framed a pair of keen, piercing, grey eyes. He looked younger than his years, and, in a physical way, was a better man than many who were years younger than himself.

"Ye've said nothin', Dalton," at last observed the waterman nearest to him. "What think

ye of the weather?"

Dalton slowly removed the pipe from his mouth and for a moment stared, uncomprehendingly, at the speaker, who repeated his question.

"The weather?" he said at last,-"the weather? The gale will last all night-mayhap 'til to-morrow noon, then 'twill fall flat-for a time; but we'll have more of it, by to-morrow night, come supper-time; more of it— and worse, mayhap."

There was a chorus of dissent: the men around him had faith in his judgment, but upon this point he stood alone in his belief. He listened patiently while they again advanced their opinions.

"That's all well enough for an ordinary storm," he said, "but this isn't an ordinary storm; it's a gale of wind, out of a clear sky. I've been through one like it. 'Twas

just after I got the Osiris, and I nearly lost her-and myself with her. We were out on the lake, maybe fifty miles from here. It came on just like this, and it blew for hours. The tug and the tow-there were three barges on weathered the first blow. But the second —man alive!—the tug held us up to wind'ard as long as she could; but at last she had to give in. The Osiris was the barge next to her. I stood in the bow and Archie Campbell was at the wheel-poor Archie, he's been dead these thirty years agone; they gave him a barge the next winter, and the ice finished her and her crew before the end of the season. I stood in the bow and saw one of the deckhands aboard the tug cut the hawser; they had given up the fight and meant to run for it. I saw the tug's head come around, as they tried to get her before the wind, but she never got around. She turned broadside on to the rollers, then a great 'lipper' of a wave came along and swept right over her. She never came up; her yawl, filled with water, drifted past us, and that was all that we ever saw of her afterward. The other two barges parted their towlines and drifted away to leeward, and that was the last we ever saw of them, too. They were the Rameses and the Cleopatra, both new boats, not a year old."

He paused for a moment, lost in gloomy reflection, then he roused himself

"Once you see a gale like that and live through it

VOL. CLXXXVIII.—NO. MCXXXVIII.

you'll never forget it, nor the signs that go with it," he said.

"And what did you do with the Osiris?" asked one of the younger among the crowd of listeners; most of the older men had heard the tale before. "How did you manage to weather the storm?"

"We got sail on the Osiris and lay to; we drifted until the gale blew itself out, and for two days afterward, until we made port."

A few minutes later Dalton arose from his place by the fireside, and bidding the company a cheery "good-night" started for the wharf.

The same-the very same," he muttered, as he strode along, leaning heavily forward to counterbalance the force of the gale; "but this time the old Osiris and I are in harbour, and 'tis well that we are; she's not the barge she once was, nor am I the man."

He stepped aboard, looked carefully at the hawsers, altered one or two that seemed to be chafing, fumbled for a moment with the latch upon the cabindoor, then opened it and went below for the night.

By noon of the next day the gale had apparently blown itself out, the wind had settled down to a steady breeze from the north, and the waves, although still running high, were rapidly diminishing in force; they no longer broke over the breakwater, and inside of it the water was almost as motionless as on a still summer day.

The tug Storm King, one of the largest and fastest of the

M

harbour tugs, drew slowly up alongside of the Osiris, and her captain hailed Dalton.

"Hurry up, Dalton," he called. "Cast off and we'll make fast to you. We've lost We've lost a lot of time already-eighteen hours of it but I'll make some of that up after we get under way."

"Don't be in a hurry, Graham," replied Dalton slowly; "to my mind, we

haven't seen the last of this

blow yet, there's more coming."

a

"More coming!" cried Graham. "Why, man, all the signs point to clear weather."

"To clear weather, but not to calm weather," was Dalton's reply. "The old Osiris is too weak to be trusted in a heavy seaway, such as we'll have in a few more hours."

"I have my orders to get under way as soon as possible. Got yours?"

"Yes. But I'm going up to see the superintendent first."

A tall, angular figure, Dalton strode away up the wharf and through the yard to the office. Here he found Hallock, the superintendent.

"I thought that you were away by this time, Dalton," observed that gentleman rather sharply. "That's a rush order for the Kaska Company, and we are over eighteen hours behind withit now. I have ordered Graham to drive the Storm King for all she is worth. Hasn't he hooked-up' yet?"

"He's alongside,' replied Dalton coldly. Few of the men liked Hallock, and least of all Dalton. Hallock's manner to

"Mr Hallock," said Dalton steadily, "it's no time to be going now. This gale

"Is over," replied Hallock sharply. "There is no excuse for further delay."

"I beg your pardon, sir, but it isn't over; we'll get more of it before night, and worse, mayhap. The old Osiris isn't strong enough to stand it, if it comes on to blow again like it did last night. She needed repairs in the Fall, but she didn't get 'em, and she's weak."

The question of repairs to the Osiris was a sore one between Dalton and Hallock. The former had asked for them, and the latter had refused to have them made.

"She has run all right in some pretty stiff blows this winter," observed Hallock acidly.

"But no gales, sir. If you want to be sure of delivering that vitriol, Mr Hallock, you'd better wait until this second Norther' blows itself out. We'll get it up there in a jiffy, then."

6

"If you are afraid to take the Osiris out, Dalton, just say so," observed Hallock, "and I'll get someone else to do it." To himself, he thought-"The man is getting old, and we'll soon have to lay him aside."

Dalton's face flushed redly, and his big, strong hands clenched the railing upon