And you were the little boy that was taken out of the water, and poor Jim was the brave man who swam into the great big waves to save you!"  
Pat was the speaker, and the beautiful little boy the listener. They were sitting together in the hot sunshine, just beneath the south wall of the lighthouse, well sheltered from the wind; and the sun was shining with all the that it sometimes can in early February on the south coast, though the sea tumbled and beneath the strong which still blew day by day, and cut off Rock from the mainland. But the weather began to show signs of modifying. The careful keeper of the lighthouse had that day told his wife that he believed a few more days would see the end of this of rough weather. The glass was beginning to rise after its long period of depression, and this was the third day on which the sun had shone out brightly and bravely, the two children out upon the rocks for several hours, in the brightest part of the day. By this time the two boys were the best of friends. They were not happy for a moment if separated. Pat took the lead in devising amusement for his small guest, and was in one sense of the word the leading spirit, yet it was the little prince who really ruled the pair, for his word was law to his comrade, who could have sat and looked at him, or listened to his merry for hours. The little gentleman had a way with him which had captivated every heart within the lighthouse. Nat and Eileen were almost as much his slaves as Pat. He could twist any one of the three round his little fingers, and this was plainly no new art to him. Those merry ways of his, half-coaxing, half-commanding, had plainly been practised before. He was no in the art of getting what he wanted, this beautiful little prince (as Pat firmly and believed him to be); and it seemed to Eileen a pathetic thing that the little fellow should thus be cast among strangers, and those of a rank in life so much humbler than his own, without being able to explain to them who he was, nor whence he had come, although in other ways he could prattle away fast enough, and tell little stories, too, in his own fashion.
 
Eileen had listened in vain for any illusions to his parents in his talk; but the name of father or mother was never on his lips. Once, when she asked him where mother was, he out over the sea; but she could not make out whether he meant anything by the gesture; and the only relative he ever of was "Auntie;" whilst he did not appear to be pining after anybody, but was as merry as a from morning to night; very different from what Pat would have been, even as a little child, if suddenly robbed of all those whom he had learned to love.
 
"I sometimes think the water has washed the memory of what went before clean out of his head," Eileen had said to her husband, in some disappointment at her failure to learn anything of the boy's history from him. "It seems strange he should have forgotten everything, such a quick, noticing little fellow as he is. He talks a little about a ship to Pat; but never seems to remember the people who were with him. I can't make it out. At his age, Pat would have been able to tell anybody where he lived, and what his name was, and who his father and mother were. It puzzles me altogether, that it does. And we want to send a message when the relief boat comes. I'd have liked to be able to say who the boy was."
 
"Well, we'll say enough for his relations to know him by, if he's got any living claim to him, poor little chap. I suppose the children of the , who always have a nurse beside them, don't learn to be as knowing and independent as our little ones, who have to for themselves so much sooner. Pat may be will find out something more sooner or later. He away to him like a young . The child looks a deal better since his little prince came. It's good for boys to be together. I'll not if his folks don't come for him in a hurry. Look at them now; why, they are as happy as kings together—and a deal happier than many kings, I take it, if all we hear of the ways of the world is true."
 
The two boys were sitting in the hot sunshine in the lee of the lighthouse, and the tame sea- was about near to them, sometimes diving into a pool after a dainty that caught his eye, sometimes flapping his wings, and uttering his harsh cries, which seemed those of joy at seeing the sunshine again. Pat was evidently telling a tale to the little one of more than usual interest. The little prince's eyes were upon his face with a look of wrapped absorption, his lips were parted, and his whole expression was one of deep and undivided attention. He was in reality hearing the story of the little boy who had been seen a few nights ago, just as it was growing to be dawn, floating on the water on a broken spar; and of the brave man in the lighthouse, who had swum out amongst the great waves to bring him in safe to shore; and Prince Rupert had been more fascinated by this tale—told with all the power of which the youthful eye-witness was capable—than by any other from Pat's store; and when at the close he was told that he himself had been the little boy, and that it was Jim who had gone into the boiling sea to fetch him out, he looked fairly bewildered at the idea, and turning his dark eyes towards the lighthouse behind, he looked up and down, and then asked—
 
"And where is poor Jim?—does he live here, too?"
 
"Yes, he lives here," answered Pat. "But he got hurt that night. He has to lie in bed. I go to see him every day. Poor Jim looks very sad and poorly. Father says he won't be better till we can get a doctor to him."
 
Little Rupert's eyes were wide with sympathy and interest. He was quite a kind-hearted little fellow, though he had been taught to think first of himself and his own wishes, as too many little children are, whether those about them know it or not.
 
"Did he get hurted coming into the water after me?" he asked, in a voice that was quite soft and with surprise and thought.
 
"Yes, Prince Rupert, he did," answered Pat. "I don't quite know how it was; but there was a big black thing floating in the water, too. I saw it, and a great wave came and carried it right against Jim. I think it might have hit you, perhaps, only Jim saw it coming, and turned over so that it came against him instead, and a big wave broke all over him then, and I couldn't see what happened. But I know he got hurt then, for after that he couldn't help himself a bit; and father and mother could only pull you both in, for Jim never let go of you. And it seemed like as if you were both dead at first. But mother took care of you, and father took care of Jim, and you both got better. But Jim has to lie in bed, and his side hurts him dreadfully when he moves. But you can run about and play. I'm so glad you weren't hurt, too. Do you remember being washed into the water?"
 
But the child did not answer the question. He seemed to be watching the gull at his queer play; but he was evidently thinking of something else, for he turned presently to Pat, and said with a lip that quivered a little—
 
"I don't like Jim to be hurted in getting me out. Where does Jim live?"
 
"In there," answered Pat, indicating the lighthouse behind. "When he was well, he helped father to take care of her—the big lamp, you know, that you went to see last night. He can't help now, because he's ill. But when he gets better he will again."
 
"I'd like to go and see Jim," said the child, suddenly to his feet. "I fink Jim must be a very good man. I'll go and tell him so."
 
"Yes, do!" answered Pat eagerly. "I'm sure he would like it. I tell him about you every day, Prince Rupert. He likes to hear about you, I know, though he can't talk hardly at all. You must talk to him. He can't say hardly anything himself. It hurts him so; and mother says he mustn't."
 
"I'll talk," answered the little prince . "I can talk very well, if I like. I've heard people say so, though they don't always understand when I do. Why didn't you take me to see Jim before?"
 
"I don't know. I didn't think perhaps you'd care to come. You see, he has only a poor little dark room, and you are a little prince." Pat's loving was betrayed in every word he spoke, and in the glance of his smiling eyes. He thought Rupert looked prettier than ever with his golden curls blowing about in the breeze, and his little face, with the peach bloom tanned by the kisses of the sunbeams which had been it these past days. His own little sailor suit had been mended, too, and had not suffered so very much by the long in salt water. The child had an air of and sovereignty about him of which Pat's sensitive Irish nature was keenly conscious. He felt he could lay down his life for this princely child; and understood very well now how it was that real kings and princes in history had got hundreds and thousands of to go with them to victory or death. Sometimes before, his mother's stories had puzzled him. He did not quite understand how men had been so easily led to fight against fearful . But it was no puzzle to him now. The spirit of hero-worship had entered into his being, and ha............