The way was new to Lance, and thoroughly excited now, he allowed the sturdy old woman to half guide, half thrust him along, till the way was so narrow along the steep cliff slope that at her bidding he went on first, with the consequence that more than once he lost his footing, and would have fallen from the narrow track but for the help he received.
At one time they were ascending as if to climb to the cliff top, then down, and up again, till at the end of a few hundred yards a rift was reached, down which the old woman hurried the lad, uttering a peculiar hissing sound the while, which quite changed the aspect of the scene which had unfolded itself to Lance's astonished gaze. For there below him, lit up by a few lanterns, he could make out the hull of a great lugger, lying in the jaws of the rift down which they were hurrying, while men were wading waist-deep to and fro—those going out to the lugger's side empty-handed, these coming bearing bales and kegs, which they carried to a low rocky archway, so low that it must have been covered when the tide was up, while now they stooped and passed in their loads to other hands, which seized them and bore them away.
At the warning hiss uttered by the old fisherwoman the work ceased, and as a man, evidently the captain, swung himself down into the water, Old Poltree, his sons, and another man crept out from beneath the rugged archway.
Few words were spoken. The captain of the lugger gave an order or two, splashed through the water with his men, and climbed on board, where the lanterns were extinguished, hitchers and sweeps thrust forth on either side, and the English fishermen waded out to put their shoulders to the stern of the boat and help to thrust her out into the open water.
Their help did not last, for the water deepened rapidly and the great lugger was well on the move, and unless
