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The next day–though it blew a short squall of tears when I took leave of my mother and climbed aboard the coach–was scarcely less glorious. I wore my uniform, and nursed my toasting-fork proudly across my knees; and the passengers one and all made much of me, in a manner which I never allowed to derogate into coddling. At The Swan with Two Necks, Cheapside, when the coach set me down, I behaved as a man should; ordered supper and a bed; and over my supper discussed the prospects of peace with an affable, middle-aged bagman who shared my box. He thought well of the prospects of peace. For me, I knitted my brows and gave him to understand that circumstances might alter cases.

From The Swan with Two Necks I took coach next morning–proceeding from the bar to the door between two lines of smiling domestics–and travelled down to the Blue Posts, the famous Blue Posts, at Portsmouth. In the Blue Posts there was a smoking-room, and across the end of it ran a sofa on which (tradition said) you might count on finding a midshipman asleep. I was not then aware of the tradition; but sure enough a midshipman reclined there when I entered the room. He was not asleep, but engaged in perusing something which he promptly, even hastily, stowed away in the breast of his tunic–a locket, I make no doubt. He sat up and regarded me; and I stared back at him, how long I will not say, but long enough for me to perceive that his jacket buttons were as glossy as my own. I noted this; but it conveyed little to me, for my imagination clothed in equal splendour everyone in his Majesty’s service.

He appeared to be young, even delicately youthful; but I felt it necessary to assert my manhood before him, and rang for the waiter.

“A glass of beer, if you please,” said I.

The waiter lifted his eyebrows and looked from me to the sofa.

“One glass of beer, sir?” he asked.

“I hardly like to offer–” I began lamely, following his glance.

“It is more usual, sir. In the Service. Between two young gentlemen as, by the addresses on their chestes, is both for the Melpomeny: and newly joined.”

“Hulloa!” said I, turning round to the sofa, “are you in the same fix as myself?”

Reading in his face that it was so, I corrected my order, and waved the waiter to the door with creditable self-possession. As soon as he had withdrawn, “My name’s Rodd,” said I. “What’s yours?”

“Hartnoll,” he said; “from Norfolk.”

“I come from the West–Devonshire,” said I, and with an air of being proud of it; but added, on an afterthought, “Norfolk must be a fine county, though I’ve never seen it. Nelson came from there, didn’t he?”

“His place is only six miles from ours,” said Hartnoll. “I’ve seen it scores of times.”

And with that he stuck his hands suddenly in his pockets, turned away from me, and stared very resolutely out of the dirty bow-window.

When the waiter had brought the drinks and retired again, Hartnoll confessed to me that he had never tasted beer. “You’ll come to it in time,” said I encouragingly: but I fancy that the tap at the Blue Posts was of a quality to discourage a first experiment. He tasted his, made a face, and suggested that I might deal with both glasses. I had, to begin with, ordered the beer out of bravado, and one gulp warned me that bravado might be carried too far. I managed, indeed–being on my mettle–to drain my own glass, and even achieved a noise which, with Hartnoll, might pass for a smacking of the lips: but we decided to empty his out of window, for fear of the waiter’s scorn. We heaved up the lower sash–the effort it cost went some way to explaining the fustiness of the room–and Hartnoll tossed out the beer.