and, my
lor', how my arm do hurt!"

"So do I. Poor fellows!" I said, "how well they all fought!"

"Ay, they did. But the captain, Master Sep, he was like a lion all the
time. Why, lad, what's the matter?"

"I--I don't want to make too much fuss," I panted; "but I'm broken
somewhere, and it hurts horribly."

"Sit you down, lad, and wait till we come back," said the foreman
kindly.

"No," I said, grinding my teeth, "I won't give up;" and I trudged on,
knowing as well as could be that one or two of my ribs were broken when
I was crushed against the wall, just before it gave way.

And all the time below us to the left wound the line of Frenchmen. It
was so dark that we could not have told that they were there, but for
the low babel of sounds that arose of voices and trampling feet, while
now and then a sound more painful to us still came up in the form of a
groan or a faint cry of pain, and after one of these outbursts the
foreman said:

"I wonder whether that be one of our lads."

"Nay, not it," said our companion roughly; "it be a Frenchy. One of our
lads wouldn't make a noise like that if you cut his head off."

I felt sure he was right, and I could not help smiling, but I was in too
much pain to speak.

And so we trudged on, our paths diverging in a way that took us higher
and higher towards where the track curved round the cliff at the east
side of the Gap, while theirs, of course, kept down by the stream to the
beach.

It was a weary painful walk, for the excitement was now gone, and my
companions' wounds were stiffening, and giving them as much pain as my
chest did me; but no one murmured, and we kept on till we were at the
mouth of the Gap, high up above where four boats were lying, while half
a mile away we could see the lights and dimly make out the hull of a
large vessel.

In spite of our pain we had made most progress, and were waiting some
minutes before the head of the column came up, and there, as we seated
ourselves hundreds of feet above, we could watch the embarkation of the
little force, and see in a dim way the boats run in, hear the plashing
of feet in the shallow water, and then the sound of the boxes as they
were laid in the bottom of one of the boats, this boat being then rowed
out about a dozen yards to wait for the others.

"Only wish it was a storm instead of a calm smooth time," said our
foreman. "Everything seems for 'em. I can't see why the Ripplemouth
people haven't