ut the
side of the gunboat.

"'They're only fourteen-pounders,' I says.

"'Is that all?' says Archie. 'Only fourteen pounds o' nitroglycerine, or
cordite, or dynamite, or guncotton, or whatever 'tis they packs into
'em! Only fourteen pounds!--and fourteen ounces is enough to send the
_Hattie_ to the clouds and eternal glory if ever it comes aboard,' and
just then one came right under her forefoot and another under her
counter. And I looks back to the gunboat. She's less than a mile away
now, and I takes the glasses and has a peek, and I imagines I sees a
tall, rangy lad standing beside a long, slim, steel-shiny,
needle-lookin' gun, and I says to myself: 'Eddie boy, you miss us about
twice more and Alec Corning'll be buying you more than one drink next
time we meet,' for I knew the end was near. Ahead of me I see a passage
making an island of the last half mile o' that point o' land, and it
looked like water enough in the passage to let the _Hattie_ through.

"I calls out to Archie and tells him to heave the tins of opium into the
quarter-boat, and he did, and 'Now get into her,' I says, 'and pull for
the beach.' And they did, me staying aboard the _Hattie_ to luff her for
them to get away. And then I cut the stays'l free and gave the _Hattie_
her wheel again, and when she was going full-tilt I jibed her over, and
she had everything on, and it was blowing blue devils, and only one
thing you'd think could happen after that long main-boom went swinging
across her deck--over the side had to go her spars. But they didn't. A
twenty-two-inch forem'st she carried, a great stick, and when she was
away again and going straight for the passage I says to myself: 'You'll
have to hurry, Ed Gurney, or I'll be beating you to it!' For after all,
when you're put to it, Durks or no Durks, there's only one thing to
do--try and save your vessel.

[Illustration: "Just then one came right under her forefoot and another
under her counter. And I looks back to the gunboat."]

"The _Hattie_ rushes straight for the passage, and I thought maybe she'd
make it, when whing! whing! whing! you'd think somebody was trying
to cut his initials in the water around her. One after the other, like
somebody having fun with her, and then wr-r-t! I felt her shiver, and
then she seemed to shake herself, and then straight into the air her
bowsprit seemed to rise and point to the morning sky, and from out of
her waist came flame and smoke. Straight on and up th