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and in walking up Milsom Street she had the good fortune to meet with the Admiral.  He was standing by himself at a printshop window, with his hands behind him, in earnest contemplation of some print, and she not only might have passed him unseen, but was obliged to touch as well as address him before she could catch his notice.  When he did perceive and acknowledge her, however, it was done with all his usual frankness and good humour.  "Ha! is it you?  Thank you, thank you.  This is treating me like a friend.  Here I am, you see, staring at a picture.  I can never get by this shop without stopping.  But what a thing here is, by way of a boat!  Do look at it.  Did you ever see the like?  What queer fellows your fine painters must be, to think that anybody would venture their lives in such a shapeless old cockleshell as that?  And yet here are two gentlemen stuck up in it mightily at their ease, and looking about them at the rocks and mountains, as if they were not to be upset the next moment, which they certainly must be.  I wonder where that boat was built!" (laughing heartily); "I would not venture over a horsepond in it.  Well," (turning away), "now, where are you bound?  Can I go anywhere for you, or with you?  Can I be of any use?"

"None, I thank you, unless you will give me the pleasure of your company the little way our road lies together.  I am going home."