y,' cried the man to whom he spoke; 'and you
are the lad that is like to find it so, unless you bundle off--there are
new brooms bought at Carlisle yesterday to sweep the country of you and
the like of you--so you were better be jogging inland.

'How many rogues are the officers? If not more than ten, I will make
fight.'

'The devil you will!' answered Crackenthorp. 'You were better not, for
they have the bloody-backed dragoons from Carlisle with them.'

'Nay, then,' said Nanty, 'we must make sail. Come, Master Fairlord,
you must mount and ride. He does not hear me--he has fainted, I
believe--What the devil shall I do? Father Crackenthorp, I must leave
this young fellow with you till the gale blows out--hark ye--goes
between the laird and the t'other old one; he can neither ride nor
walk--I must send him up to you.'

'Send him up to the gallows!' said Crackenthorp; 'there is Quartermaster
Thwacker, with twenty men, up yonder; an he had not some kindness for
Doll, I had never got hither for a start--but you must get off, or they
will be here to seek us, for his orders are woundy particular; and these
kegs contain worse than whisky--a hanging matter, I take it.'

'I wish they were at the bottom of Wampool river, with them they belong
to,' said Nanty Ewart. 'But they are part of cargo; and what to do with
the poor young fellow--'

'Why, many a better fellow has roughed it on the grass with a cloak o'er
him,' said Crackenthorp. 'If he hath a fever, nothing is so cooling as
the night air.'

'Yes, he would be cold enough in the morning, no doubt; but it's a kind
heart and shall not cool so soon if I can help it,' answered the captain
of the JUMPING JENNY.

'Well, captain, an ye will risk your own neck for another man's, why not
take him to the old girls at Fairladies?'

'What, the Miss Arthurets! The Papist jades! But never mind; it will
do--I have known them take in a whole sloop's crew that were stranded on
the sands.'

'You may run some risk, though, by turning up to Fairladies; for I tell
you they are all up through the country.'

'Never mind--I may chance to put some of them down again,' said Nanty,
cheerfully. 'Come, lads, bustle to your tackle. Are you all loaded?'

'Aye, aye, captain; we will be ready in a jiffy,' answered the gang.

'D--n your captains! Have you a mind to have me hanged if I am taken?
All's hail-fellow, here.'

'A sup at parting,' said Father Crackenthorp, extending a flask to Nanty