."

Poole clapped the pistol behind him as he shook himself free.

"Look here, sir," he cried; "have you gone mad?"

"Do you hear, men?" cried Fitz, seizing him again. "Forward! You,
Poole, in the Queen's name, surrender!"

Not a man stirred, all standing in a group looking on, some wonderingly,
some thoroughly amused, while the carpenter whispered--

"All right, lads; let them fight it out. Of all the cheek!"

"Did you say, You Poole or You fool?" said the skipper's son quietly;
"because one of us seems to be behaving very stupidly. Take your hand
off my collar. This pistol's loaded in five chambers, and was in six
till I blew the lock off the cabin-door.--Quiet, I tell you, before
there's an accident. Why, you must have gone off your head."

"Did you hear what I said, men?" shouted Fitz furiously. "In the
Queen's name, make this boy your prisoner! Here, you, boatswain, take
the lead here and obey my orders." For that individual had just made
his appearance on deck.

"What's the row, young gentlemen? Here, you, Squire Poole, put away
that six-shooter. If you and Mr Fitz here has fell out, none of that
tommy-rot nonsense. Use your fists."

"Boatswain," cried Fitz haughtily, "I, as an officer, seize this
schooner in the Queen's name."

"What, has she telled you to, sir? I never heared her come aboard."

"No trifling, man. For your own sake, obey my orders. Seize this lad,
and then make sail for the nearest British port."

The boatswain took off his cap and scratched his head, looking at the
boys in a puzzled way, while Poole made no further resistance, but
resigned himself to being held, as he kept the pistol well behind his
back.

"Do you hear me, men?" shouted Fitz, his heart sinking with despair the
while, as he noted the smiling looks of every face before him, and felt
what a miserable fiasco he had made.

"Oh yes, I can hear you, sir," said the boatswain. "I'd be precious
deaf if I didn't; but you're giving rather a large order, taking a lot
on yourself now as the skipper's lying in dock. Any one would think as
you had got a gunboat's well-manned cutter lying alongside, and I don't
see as it is. What was that there shot I heard?"

"I blew the lock off the cabin-door by my father's orders," cried Poole.
"We were locked in."

"Ho!" said the boatswain. "Then this 'ere's been what they used to call
aboard a ship I was in, a hen-coop _de main_. I don't quite exactly
know what it me