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"Oh, by George, but wouldn't it!" said Ferguson. "Then we'd have seen scientific work. Intellect just pure intellect away up on the upper levels, dontchuknow. Archy is all right, and it don't become anybody to belittle him, I can tell you.
Arcedeckne was about five feet three inches, round as a cask, with a small singularly round face and head, closely cropped hair, and large soft eyes, in a word, so like a seal, that he was as often called 'Phoca' as Archy. Do you recognise the portrait? And would you not like to hear him talk? Here is a specimen in his best manner.
If the lost letter really was Robert Roy's and though she had no positive proof, she had the strongest conviction, remembering the thick fog of that Tuesday morning, how easily Archy might have dropped it out of his hand, and how, during those days of soaking rain, it might have lain, unobserved by any one, under the laurel branches, till the child picked it up and hid it as he said if Robert Roy lad written to her, written in any way, he was at least not faithless.
Archy listened attentively to what the captain said, and tried to understand it, but the danger which had alarmed his conscience had passed away, and when he went forward and mixed again with his careless shipmates, he forgot much that had been said.
I have never read his history, and I speak of it only at second hand; but I had read, before I met him, his novel of 'Archy Moore, or The White Slave', which left an indelible impression of his imaginative verity upon me. The impression is still so deep that after the lapse of nearly forty years since I saw the book, I have no misgiving in speaking of it as a powerful piece of realism.
Now I remember, he gave me a paper to Captain Scarsdale, and put his name to it, and we saw him do it; and we that is, Archy Eagleshay and I did; and the captain put his name, and we put ours after that, though we didn't read the paper, but the captain said that it was all right, and that it was what he wanted, and he took it below; and so I supposed that it would make everything square for the poor boy."
"Though it was more than I meant you should have, I hope you will remember it a long time," added Archy. "I shall, master." "My eye is not in very good condition," said he, wiping the injured organ with his handkerchief. "It was a hard blow you gave me." Dandy wished he would leave him, and he did not care to argue the matter with him, even if he had been privileged to do so.
The black boys did not regard their labors as work, and took so much pride in making themselves proficient in their duties, that they might well have challenged comparison with the best boat club in the country. Master Archy was very dignified and magnificent as he reclined in the stern of the beautiful craft.
Though they did not understand each other's language, yet their hearts were lifted up together to the same merciful Being, the God alike of the dark-skinned Esquimaux and the civilised Englishman. When Archy awoke he was somewhat alarmed on finding that the hunter and his dogs had left the hut. The lamp was still burning, and a large piece of seal's flesh lay on the floor.
"I have found out what it is, and I wish that I had not been fool enough to come," answered Archy, with some bitterness. Max laughed. "Many a lad thinks like you," he said. "They get accustomed to it, and so must you, though the training is not pleasant, I'll allow."
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