“Not he,” says another; “not if he was ten baronites in one; all the same, he’s a manly-looking chap and shows blood.”

This was the sort of talk we used to hear all round us—from the miners, from the storekeepers, from the mixed mob at the Prospectors’ Arms, in the big room at night, and generally all about. We said nothing, and took care to keep quiet, and do and say nothing to be took hold of. All the same, we were glad to see Sir Ferdinand. We’d heard of him before from Goring and the other troopers; but he’d been on duty in another district, and hadn’t come in our way.

One evening we were all sitting smoking and yarning in the big room of the hotel, and Jim, for a wonder—we’d been washing up—when we saw one of the camp gentlemen come in, and a strange officer of police with him. A sort of whisper ran through the room, and everybody made up their minds it was Sir Ferdinand. Jim and I both looked at him.

“Wa-all” said one of our Yankee friends,“what ‘yur twistin’ your necks at like a flock of geese in a corn patch? How d’ye fix it that a lord’s better’n any other man?”

“He’s a bit different, somehow,” I says. “We’re not goin’ to kneel down or knuckle under to him, but he don’t look like anyone else in this room, does he?”

“He’s no slouch, and he looks yer square and full in the eye, like a hunter,” says Arizona Bill; “but durn my old buckskins if I can see why you Britishers sets up idols and such and worship ‘em, in a colony, jest’s if yer was in that benighted old England again.”

We didn’t say any more. Jim lit his pipe and smoked away, thinking, perhaps, more whether Sir Ferdinand was anything of a revolver shot, and if he was likely to hit him (Jim) at forty or fifty yards, in case such a chance should turn up, than about the difference of rank and such things.

While we were talking, we saw Starlight and one of the Honourables come in and sit down close by Sir Ferdinand, who was taking his grog at a small table, and smoking a big cigar. The Honourable and he jumps up at once and shook hands in such a hurry so as we knew they’d met before. Then the Honourable introduces Starlight to Sir Ferdinand. We felt too queer to laugh, Jim and I, else we should have dropped off our seats when Starlight bowed as grave as a judge, and Sir Ferdinand (we could hear) asked him how many months he’d been out in the colony, and how he liked it?