Brothers of Peril

om Panounia. After a deal of questioning, sign-making, and mental exertion, the Englishman gathered the information that treachery and murder had taken place up the river, and that his young

hour of their companionship, and, by this

t hand on the other's knee. "Your enemies are my enemies," he

f Kingswell's tone and manner, though he had failed to translate his speech. The me

ervants' enemies, sir. Therefore the young un's enemies must be our enemies, holus bolus." The other sailors nodded decidedly. "Therefore

d hand of every man he favoured with it,-and of every maid, too, more than likely. "Bu

in a desperate hurry, and so his men pulled at the oars just enough to hold the boat clear of the rocks. A s

vilment, ye may lay to

square sail was hoisted and sheeted home. Again the Pelican

e mouth of a little river and a fair valley, a fog overtoo

reat angry. Drop irons," he added

replied Kingswell. "He could not follow us aro

uckered brows. They were beyond hi

" he said.

the lad. "All

n partly lowered, and the Pelican had be

g Beothic to the seamen with a

t, with his deep-set eyes fixed on nothing in particular. Ki

" he commanded. The grapplings splashed into the gray waves. The fog crawled over the boat

ian tobacco was an expensive one, confined to the wealthy and the adventurous. The seamen, who, of course, had not yet acquired it, watched their captain with open interest. When a puff was blown through the nostrils, or sent aloft in a series of rings, they nudged one another, like children at a show. By this time the walls of fog had made of the Peli

pered Ouenwa, p

of a village," protes

the lad. "Ouenwa h

re not the nostrils of either hounds or Beothics. They sniffed to no purpose. They shook their heads. Kingswell wagge

red, shrilly. "Villa

. They had great faith in their own noses, had those mariners of Bristol and the

, after a half-hour of silence. "To

ad reflectively. Presently he

nce were," he murmured, "but I'll do me bes

licking, dashing swing of the tune fired his excitable blood. He forgot all about Panounia, and the suspected village on the river so near at hand ceased to trouble him. He beat time to the singing with his moccasined feet, and clapped his hands together in rhythmic appreciation of his comrades' efforts. In time the ballad was finished. The last member of the craven crew of the Teressa Maria had tasted English steel and been tossed to the sharks. Then

motionless, fully occupied with its various thoughts. Ouenwa was the first to break the spel

" he wh

nt. The boatswain nodded and turned to Harding. That sturdy young seaman crawled to the bows and placed his hands on the hawser of the forward anchor. He looked aft. Kingswell, who had returned to his seat at the tiller, leaned over the stern and cut the manilla rope that tethered the boat at that end.

hlocks on the gunwales. Suddenly the prow of a canoe pierced the curtain of fog not four yards from Tom Bent. He touched the match to the short fuse. There was a terrific report, and a chorus of wild yells. In the excitement that followed, the others discharged their pieces. Kingswell grab

which he had been using to Harding, and told the men to lay aside their muskets and r

fog and silence. A few hours before sunset a wind from the west found her o

swell, "and hoist the sail. We are goi

itching for a chance to repay the