though several bullets
struck the boat; and the next instant she was alongside the wharf.
Higson, springing on shore, followed by Archie and most of his crew, two
only remaining to take care of the boat, made a dash at the earthwork;
from which the defenders, if so they could be called, rushed out as
their assailants leaped in.

"Don't follow them, lads," cried Higson; "small-arm men, just pepper
them and prevent them coming back. And now we'll fire the storehouses."

The men had been provided with matches and torches, and more quickly
than it can be described they threw their burning brands into the open
windows of the storehouses, which the instant after were in a blaze from
one end to the other. They then with equal rapidity lighting the huge
stacks close to the water's edge, they also were soon blazing away, with
a fury which would have defied all the attempts of the Russians, had any
appeared, to save them. As the wind blew on the shore, the dense
volumes of smoke which were driven in the faces of those on the other
side completely concealed the perpetrators of the deed from their sight.

Green and Tom had, in the meantime, not been idle. A slight opposition
only was made by the crew of the first vessel they boarded; finding it
useless to defend her, they made their escape across the intervening
craft to the shore. The English then set fire in succession to all
those on the outside, the flames from which quickly caught the masts and
rigging of the rest; and before the master's boat rejoined Higson's,
every vessel was blazing away with a fury which secured the destruction
of the whole. Higson, believing that the work was done, ordered Green
to follow him down the river; he, however, had only just got clear of
the line of burning stacks, when he perceived that another storehouse
standing a little farther back than the others had not as yet been set
on fire.

"We must not leave the work unfinished," he exclaimed. "Come, Archie,
you and I and Tim Nolan will soon do the job;" and, springing on shore
with a torch which he had just lighted, followed by Archie and Tim, each
with a musket as well as a torch, he made his way towards the
storehouse. As the party ran on they caught sight of several people in
the distance, and Archie thought he saw some horsemen with long lances;
but they believed that they could reach the building, and get back to
the boat, long before the latter could be down upon them. As they
a