"So he says," resumed the convict I had recognized,--"it was all said and done in half a minute, behind a pile of timber in the Dock-yard,--'You're a going to be discharged?' Yes, I was. Would I find out that boy that had fed him and kep his secret, and give him them two one pound notes? Yes, I would. And I did."

     "More fool you," growled the other. "I'd have spent 'em on a Man, in wittles and drink. He must have been a green one. Mean to say he knowed nothing of you?"

     "Not a ha'porth. Different gangs and different ships. He was tried again for prison breaking, and got made a Lifer."

     "And was that--Honor!--the only time you worked out, in this part of the country?"

     "The only time."

     "What might have been your opinion of the place?"

     "A most beastly place. Mudbank, mist, swamp, and work; work, swamp, mist, and mudbank."

     They both execrated the place in very strong language, and gradually growled themselves out, and had nothing left to say.