on bark, the _Bess_ was now
herself again. And she had need to be for the work before her.

Captain Blaise ordered her foresails brailed in to the mast to windward
and her foreyards braced flat, this that she might sail closer to the
wind.

Entering the narrow passage, she was held to the edge of the low but
steep bank to windward; so close that where the low-lying reeds grew
outward we could hear them swishing against her sides as we passed on.

Miss Cunningham, having seen her father comfortably established with
Ubbo in the cabin, had come on deck, and Captain Blaise, busy though he
was, took time to make her welcome. No need for him to boast of his
seamanship--the whole coast could tell her that; but how often had a
beautiful girl a chance to see the proof of it?

We followed the curve of the river's bank almost as the running stream
itself. When we came to a sharp-jutting point, Captain Blaise himself,
or me to the wheel, would let her fall away until her jib-boom lay over
the opposite bank; and then, her sails well filled, it was shoot her up
into the wind and past the point before us. Twenty times we had to
weather a point of land in that fashion. Fill and shoot, fill and shoot,
never a foot too soon, never a foot too late--it was a beautiful
exhibition, and only a pity it was not light for her to see it better.

We were clear of the river at last; that is, we were in the river's
V-shaped mouth, the delta. The south bank extended westerly, two miles
or so farther to the sea, and the other bank north-westerly toward Momba
Bar. Now we were able to get a view of the coast line, and northward to
beyond the bar it was an almost unbroken line, we could see, of lights
flaring from high points along the shore.

Captain Blaise hove her to until he should see a guiding rocket from the
men-of-war which he knew were waiting. And presently one came, a blue
and gold from due west, and another red and gold from the
west-nor'-west, then a red and blue from north-west by west. Presently
there was another, from abreast of and close in to the bar. And we knew
there were more in waiting than had signalled. It was already a solid
line across the mouth of the river.

If those ships guarding the river's mouth were only anchored, our
problem would have been simplified; but they were constantly shifting,
and as they showed no sailing lights, no telling where, after a signal
flashed, they would fetch next up; and always, showing no