the six jets of water for a minute or two. Then, saying to himself,
"It is time," he knocked the beams from their ledges, allowed
the square of wood to fall, lifted the hatch, and pushed it off
its combing, and then clambered on to the deck with the corks and
ropes. There were some fifty persons on board, for the most part
women and children, but with two or three men among them. They were
gathered near the stern, and were apparently watching the scene
ashore with astonishment. He hurried aft, having no fear that at
this distance from the shore his figure would be recognized from
the rest, and, if it were, it mattered not. Two or three turned
round as the supposed sailor came aft, exclaiming:

"What does this mean? Why are we put here on board these white
ships? What are they going to do with us?"

"Alas, ladies," he said, "they have put you here to die; they have
bored holes in the ships' bottoms, and in a few minutes they will
sink. It is a wholesale execution.

As he began to speak one of the ladies in the stern pushed her way
through the rest.

"Oh, Harry, is it you!" she exclaimed as he finished. "Is it true,
are we to die together?"

"We are in God's hands, Jeanne, but there is hope yet. Bring Virginie
forward with me."

At Harry's first words a panic had seized all around; one or two
ran to the hatchway and looked down into the hold, and screamed