omplish.
Have I not already heard you vow to eat two carp in one day, and now you
would venture upon a third?"

"I pray you that you will order the Company to lie down," cried
Hawtayne, who had taken the tiller and was gazing ahead with a fixed
eye. "In three minutes we shall either be lost or in safety."

Archers and seamen lay flat upon the deck, waiting in stolid silence for
whatever fate might come. Hawtayne bent his weight upon the tiller, and
crouched to see under the bellying sail. Sir Oliver and Sir Nigel stood
erect with hands crossed in front of the poop. Down swooped the great
cog into the narrow channel which was the portal to safety. On either
bow roared the shallow bar. Right ahead one small lane of black swirling
water marked the pilot's course. But true was the eye and firm the hand
which guided. A dull scraping came from beneath, the vessel quivered
and shook, at the waist, at the quarter, and behind sounded that grim
roaring of the waters, and with a plunge the yellow cog was over the bar
and speeding swiftly up the broad and tranquil estuary of the Gironde.

CHAPTER XVIII. HOW SIR NIGEL LORING PUT A PATCH UPON HIS EYE.

It was on the morning of Friday, the eight-and-twentieth day of
November, two days before the feast of St. Andrew, that the cog and her
two prisoners, after a weary tacking up the Gironde and the Garonne,
dropped anchor at last in front of the noble city of Bordeaux. With
wonder and admiration, Alleyne, leaning over the bulwarks, gazed at the
forest of masts, the swarm of boats darting hither and thither on the
bosom of the broad curving stream, and the gray crescent-shaped city
which stretched with many a tower and minaret along the western shore.
Never had he in his quiet life seen so great a town, nor was there in
the whole of England, save London alone, one which might match it in
size or in wealth. Here came the merchandise of all the fair countries
which are watered by the Garonne and the Dordogne--the cloths of the
south, the skins of Guienne, the wines of the Medoc--to be borne away to
Hull, Exeter, Dartmouth, Bristol or Chester, in exchange for the wools
and woolfels of England. Here too dwelt those famous smelters and
welders who had made the Bordeaux steel the most trusty upon earth, and
could give a temper to lance or to sword which might mean dear life to
its owner. Alleyne could see the smoke of their forges reeking up in the
clear morning air. The storm had died