rt
in the pursuit. The chase promised to be an exciting one, for Wilton and
Monroe were straining every nerve to reach the shore before they were
overtaken. They were making for the nearest land, and having just the
number of hands required to pull the boat, each of them was obliged to
use an oar himself. They had no coxswains, and Wilton, at the bow oar of
the professors' barge, could not see what was ahead, though he kept the
pursuing boats in full view.

The nearest land, not more than half a mile from the ship, was a point
covered with salt marsh, above which was a cove, whose opening was about
ten rods in width. Wilton was making for the point below the cove, but
his calculations were made without judgment or discretion. If he reached
the land, his party would be obliged to walk a mile in order to get
round the cove, on a narrow strip of marsh, where they might be
intercepted. But the fatal defect in his plan of operations was a
failure to consider the depth of water between the ship and the point.
The flow of the tide from the cove, while it kept a clear channel
through the entrance, had formed a bar off the tongue of land on the
seaward side of it, which was bare at half tide, and was now just
covered. Wilton was pulling for this bar, with all the strength of his
crew.

Shuffles was prompt to observe the mistake of his late crony, and just
as prompt to profit by it. The first cutter was gaining rapidly on the
chase; but Shuffles, as she reached the border of the main channel,
ordered his coxswain to keep the boat's head towards the entrance of the
cove.

"We shall never catch them on this tack," said the coxswain of the
cutter, who knew nothing about the bar.

"I think we shall," replied the third lieutenant, confidently.

"We are not going towards the point."

"That's very true, and the professors' barge will not go much farther in
that direction. Pull steady, my lads; don't hurry yourselves. There is
plenty of time."

The coxswain thought his superior officer was taking the matter very
coolly, and knowing of the intimacy which had formerly subsisted between
Shuffles and Wilton, he was ready to conclude that the third lieutenant
was willing to permit the escape of "our fellows." While he was putting
this construction on the conduct of his superior, the professors' barge
"took the ground," and stuck fast.

"They're aground, Mr. Shuffles," said the coxswain.

"There's just where I expected them to be,"