became
variable, and dark clouds were seen banking up in the south-western
horizon. The kind old captain became less cheerful than usual. The
brig no longer glided on smoothly and sedately as before, but began to
roll and pitch with the rising sea. The ladies came on deck, but were
unable to read and work as they had previously done, but Edda declared
that she enjoyed the change, and found amusement in looking at the
dancing seas, and in watching a shoal of porpoises which went careering
along, sporting and rolling and keeping way with the brig without
effort.

"Ah, young lady, you are looking at those fellows, are you?" said
Captain Carlton. "Just watch how they go along. Now I have heard
people on shore talk of a porpoise as a fat, heavy creature who hasn't
got any spirit in him, just like a hog, for instance, wallowing in the
mud. I should like to see the race-horse which could keep up with them.
They would beat that gallant frigate which passed us the other day, and
as to this brig you see, they swim round and round her as if she was at
anchor, and we are going a good seven knots through the water. People
fancy when they see their black tails when they dive that they are
rolling along, but the truth is, there isn't a creature darts quicker
through its native element than a porpoise."

The captain's lecture on the much-maligned fish was suddenly brought to
a close by a cry from the masthead of a sail on the larboard-quarter.
In war time merchantmen keep a sharp look-out, or ought to do so, that
they may have timely notice to enable them to avoid an enemy. On the
present occasion all Captain Carlton could do was to make more sail and
to continue the same course he had been steering. As there were
threatenings of a stiff breeze, if not of a gale, the hands were ordered
to stand by to take it in again, should it be necessary.

The stranger gained rapidly on the brig, and as she was pronounced to be
a large ship, then a man-of-war from the squareness of her yards, and at
length a frigate--

"Could she be the `Imperious?'" Edda ventured to ask.

The old captain shook his head.

"No, my dear young lady," he answered gravely; "it goes to my heart to
alarm you, but the truth must be spoken. I am very much afraid that the
stranger is an enemy."

Edda's heart sunk within her. English prisoners, she knew, whether
combatants or not, were detained in France for years, and the Emperor
had shown his intention