MEN OF THE DAY. No. 167.

SIR ALLEN YOUNG.

ALLEN YOUNG went into the merchant service at fourteen, and rose through the grades of ranks so rapidly that at twenty-one he was in command of an East Indiaman with which he twice sailed round the world, immediately after which he commanded a troopship during the Crimean War in a manner which won for him the thanks of the Admiralty. But he was always full of the same spirit of adventure which had first made him leave the dry land for the sea, and when in 1857 Sir Leopold McClintock fitted out the expedition which recovered the records of Sir John Franklin's lost ships, he obtained the post of navigating officer of the *Fox*, and went a sleigh-voyage of six months across the ice. In 1862 he commanded the North Atlantic Telegraph Expedition, and during the Taeping rebellion he did good service with a Chinese man-of-war. After this he passed sufficient time ashore to become well-known to, and one of the great favourites in, that section of Society which delights in Cowes, and which for once showed a creditable desire to entertain a real sailor. He was much courted and caressed, and being well-found in money, generous, modest, and admirably mannered, he soon became favoured by women and popular with men under the name of "Alleno." Three years ago, however, the old restless roving spirit seized him, and he fitted out a yacht and went to the Carlist War to assist the sick and wounded, and following upon this he in 1875 went out in the *Pandora* to try the North-West Passage, when he penetrated Peel's Straits to the seventy-second degree of latitude, and brought home the news of the *Alert* and *Discovery*. Last year he was again in the Arctic Seas with the *Pandora*, and on his return he was knighted by the Queen. Besides the accolade he has received numerous medals and orders, he is a Younger Brother of the Trinity House, and a Lieutenant in the Naval Reserve.

There is no better seaman or better fellow living than Alleno. Delighting in danger and adventure he is yet as modest as a girl, accustomed to rough men and rough scenes he is nevertheless gentle and polished, and he has thus been blessed by much success without ever having excited the active jealousy of those who cannot endure overpowering brilliancy.