, you know.

"The philosophers say it's a well-settled fact,
That a vessel will leak whose bottom is cracked;
And a belly that's drilled with a bullet, I think,
Is a very bad belly to stow away drink.
So heave and ho, and trombelow,
The dead will be dry to-night, I trow."

"There they are, captain," said one of the returning troopers, after the
song, to which he and his companions had stood listening with delighted
countenances, was brought to an end, "there they are. We found Dick
Waters lying in the road, and when we first came to him he gave a sort
of groan, but we didn't lift him until we came back from hunting Roger
Bell; by that time the fellow was as dead as a pickled herring. Where do
you think we found Clapper Claw? Why, half a mile, almost, down the
stream. He was washed along and got jammed up betwixt the roots of a
sycamore. We had a long wade after him, and trouble enough to get
him--more, I'm thinking, than a dead man is worth. So, give us some more
rum; this is ugly work to be done in the dark."

"Scratch a hole for them, lads, under the bushes," said Habershaw; "put
a sod blanket over them before morning. That's the fortune of war, as
Peppercorn calls it. How are the wounded men getting along?"

"Oh bravely, captain," replied Shad Green, or, according to his
nickname, Red Mug: "this here physic is a main thing for a scratch."

"Bravely!" echoed Screech Owl, or Tom Dubbs, the same who had been
reported by the dragoon as "kicked by the blacksmith;" "we are
plastering up sores here with the jolly bottle:--

"Sing heave and ho, and trombelow,
The Jolly Bottle is a feather, I trow."

"What's a cracked crown, so as it holds a man's brains?" continued the
drunken carouser, whilst a laugh deformed his stupid physiognomy.

"How are we off for provisions, quarter-master?" inquired the captain of
one of the gang.

"Eaten out of skin, from nose to tail," replied Black Jack.

"Then the squad must forage to-night," continued Habershaw. "We must
take a buck, my sweet ones; there are plenty along the river. Get your
rifles and prepare lights, and, to keep out of the way of our horses,
don't stop short of a mile. Be about it, lads. Black Jack, this is your
business."

"True, Captain," replied the person addressed: "I shall have all things
ready directly."

It was near midnight when Black Jack, having prepared some faggots of
pitch-pine, and selected three or