a pistol, or a blow
given with the hilt or flat of a cutlass.

"This here's lively, Mas' Don," said Jem, as he stood beside his
companion in misfortune.

"I want to speak to the principal officer," said Don, excitedly. "We
must not let them drive us off as if we were sheep."

"Will you take a bit of good advice, my lad?" said a familiar voice at
his ear.

"If it is good advice," said Don, sharply.

"Then hold your tongue, and go quietly. I'll speak to the lieutenant
when we get aboard."

Don glanced sharply at the bluff-looking boatswain who had spoken, and
he seemed to mean well; but in Don's excitement he could not be sure,
and one moment he felt disposed to make a bold dash for liberty, as soon
as the gates were opened, and then to shout for help; the next to appeal
to his fellow-prisoners to make a bold fight for liberty; and while
these thoughts were running one over another in his mind, a sharp order
was given, the gates were thrown open, and they were all marched down a
narrow lane, dimly lit by one miserable oil lamp at the end.

Almost as they reached the end the familiar odour, damp and seaweedy, of
the tide reached Don's nostrils; and directly after he found himself
being hurried down a flight of wet and slippery stone steps to where a
lanthorn showed a large boat, into which he was hurried along with the
rest. Then there was the sensation of movement, as the boat rose and
fell. Fresh orders. The splash of oars. A faint creaking sound where
they rubbed on the tholes, and then the regular measured dip, dip, and
splash, splash.

"Tide runs sharp," said a deep voice. "Give way, my lads, or we shall
be swept by her; that's it."

Don listened to all this as if it were part of a dream, while he gazed
wildly about at the dimly-seen moving lights and the black,
shadowy-looking shapes of the various vessels which kept on looming up,
till after gradually nearing a light away to his left, the boat was
suddenly run up close to a great black mass, which seemed to stand up
out of the water that was lapping her sides.

Ten minutes later the boat in which he had come off was hanging to the
davits, and he, in company with his fellows, was being hurried down into
a long low portion of the 'tween decks, with a couple of lanthorns
swinging their yellow light to and fro, and trying to make haloes, while
an armed marine stood sentry at the foot of the steps leading up on
deck.

Every one appeared too desolat