On the contrary, he was the representative of a much more common type which is the antithesis of the conventional sailor.

He was a thin, hard-featured man, with an ascetic, acquiline cast of face, grizzled and hollow-cheeked, clean-shaven with the exception of the tiniest curved promontory of ash-colored whisker.

An observer, accustomed to classify men, might have put him down as a canon of the church with a taste for lay costume and a country life, or as the master of a large public school, who joined his scholars in their outdoor sports.

His lips were firm, his chin prominent, he had a hard, dry eye, and his manner was precise and formal.

Forty years of stern discipline had made him reserved and silent.