e day. Perhaps, if I had been like those who know the knack of verses,
I should have worked off my ill-humours in rhyme, and slept better in
consequence, and greeted the dawn with joy. Wonder rather than joy was
in my mind on this morning as the sky took colour and the woods stirred
with the chatter of the birds. For the pirates had disappeared! Their
boats lay against the beach, but there was, as it seemed to us at first,
no visible sign of their masters.

We soon discovered their whereabouts, however. They had groped, under
cover of night, to the woods, and we soon had tokens of their presence.
For by-and-by we could hear them moving in the wood, and could catch the
gleam of their scarlet coats and the shine upon their weapons.

In the wood they were certainly safe from us, if also we were, though in
less measure, safe from them. As I have said, the wooded hill ran at a
sharp incline at some distance from the place where we had set up our
stockade, so we were not commanded from above, and, no matter how high
the pirates climbed, they could not do us a mischief in that way by
firing down on to us.

They did climb high, but with another purpose, for presently we saw,
with rage in our eyes and hearts, one bit of business they were bent on.
Our flag fluttered down like a wounded bird, and it made me mad to think
that it was being hauled down by those rascals, and that we had no art
to prevent them.

Could we do nothing? I asked Lancelot impatiently. Could we not make a
sortie and destroy the boats that lay down there all undefended? But
Lancelot shook his head. The way to the sea was doubtless covered by our
enemies in the wood. We should only volunteer for targets if we
attempted to stir outside our stockade. There was nothing for it but to
wait.

I think that it must have enraged the pirates to find us so well
protected that there was no means of taking us unawares or of creeping
in upon us from the rear. With the daylight they essayed to hurt us by
firing from the hill; but from the lie of the ground their shots did us
no harm, either passing over our heads or striking the wall of our
stronghold and knocking off a shower of splinters, but doing no further
damage. We, on the contrary, were able to retaliate, firing through our
loopholes up the slope at the red jackets in the woods, and with this
much effect, that soon the scarlet rascals ceased to show themselves,
and kept well under cover. We felt very snug where