inwards,
and that they would be crushed to atoms, he rummaged the garret and
fortunately found a bit of board and a few nails; and standing on the
stairs, he placed one end of it against the door and the other on the
hatch, forming the entrance to the garret, and so nailed it firmly down.
At last the roof of the second house began to crack over their heads, and
Kerr forced a way for himself and his companions through the thatch as
has been already told."

Poor Funns and his family were not yet rescued from their little island;
and the boat was declared to be too small and weak for so desperate a
voyage. It was therefore determined to row to a spot where a larger boat
was moored. To effect this, they were compelled to act precisely as they
had done in proceeding to rescue the Kerrs. But unfortunately, on
entering the third stream, they permitted the boat to glide down with it,
in the hope that it would carry them in safety through the gate of the
field, and across the road into that beyond it. In this, however, they
were mistaken, and the boat was swamped. Fortunately for them, they were
carried into smooth water, and by wading shoulder deep they reached the
large boat.

Having secured the small boat, they attempted to drag the large one
through the gateway against the stream; but it soon filled with water and
swamped, and, in spite of all their exertions, they found it impossible
to get it up. The small boat was now all they had to trust to, and this
was next caught by the strong stream and overwhelmed in a moment; and had
not the men, most providentially, caught and clung to a haycock that
happened to be floating past, they must have been lost. They were
carried along till it stuck on some young alder trees, when each of them
grasped a bough, and the haycock sailed away, leaving them among the weak
and brittle branches. They had been here about two hours, when one of
the men being unable to hold on longer by the boughs, let himself gently
down into the water with the hope of finding bottom; when, to his
surprise, he found that the small boat had actually drifted to the root
of the very tree to which they had been carried. Some salmon nets and
ropes had also, by the strangest accident, been lodged there. The man
contrived to pull up one of these with his foot, and making a noose, and
slipping it on his great toe, he descended once more, and managed to fix
the rope round the stern of the boat, which was then