like himself, were tired of Chilian
ingratitude, and were ready to follow him in whatever service he engaged.

Stephen had taken no part in the later operations of the fleet. After the
capture of the _Esmeralda_ he had been knocked down and very severely
injured by a splinter, caused by a shot from the Spanish batteries passing
through the bulwark close to where he was standing. Lord Cochrane had sent
him, with other wounded, in one of the small war-ships down to Valparaiso,
and there he was tenderly nursed by Lady Cochrane. It was three months
before he fairly recovered his strength, and as soon as he was
convalescent he took a berth in a craft that was sailing with stores and
provisions for the fleet. They had been out four days when she was caught
in a storm on-shore. In vain they tried to beat out; the vessel was a poor
sailer, and drifted to leeward faster than she could work to windward.

"What sort of ground tackle have you?" Stephen asked the captain.

"I have two good anchors, senor lieutenant, but the cables are rather
old."

"I should advise you to have them brought up on deck and overhauled, and
if you find any specially bad places we can cut them out and splice the
ends again."

The cables were brought up, but it needed a very short examination only to
show Stephen that they were old and worn from end to end. "It will go hard
with us if we have to rely upon these," he said. "They would not hold a
bluff-bowed craft like this two minutes; the very first roller that struck
her would snap them like pack-threads. The worst of it is, captain, that
if we escape being drowned we have but the inside of a prison to look to,
for we are off the Peruvian coast now, and any of us who get to shore will
be seized at once."

"With such a sea as this, senor, there is little chance of any of us being
saved if we once strike. We are now somewhere off the mouth of the San
Carlos river. In calm weather there would be water enough on the bar for
us to run in, but not now; we should strike and go to pieces to a
certainty."

"Well, that would depend; we might bump over it. But even if we did break
up on the bar, we should have a much better chance than we should if we
went ashore anywhere else. Instead of being dashed on the beach by the
waves, and then being swept out again, we should be likely to be carried
on into the still water behind the bar, and so of making our way to shore.
There are eight of the crew and ourselves.