ht out to sea. "They won't be inclined
to follow us far away from the land," he observed; "and if we make for
Lyme, they will guess where we come from."

We saw the men reach the boat, and presently they began to launch her.
By this time we had got well beyond the range of their firearms.

"Hurrah!" cried Dick, who had been looking to the eastward. "I see a
sail coming up from Portland. She's more likely to be a friend than an
enemy, and if we can get on board her we may defy our pursuers."

This announcement encouraged us. We had need, however, to exert
ourselves, for the soldiers had almost launched the boat, which showed
us that they had found oars, or they would not have taken the trouble of
putting her into the water. We could only just see what they were
about, but we made out that four or five fellows had got into her.

Directly afterwards, her head being turned towards us, they gave way.
Though the boat was heavy, four stout hands were more than a match for
us, for though Tom pulled a strong oar, Lancelot and I were scarcely
equal in strength to one man.

Dick kept looking eastward. Again he cried out, "There's another sail,
and another; a whole fleet of them!"

"If they are Parliament ships, they'll soon make the fellows in the boat
astern put about," exclaimed Tom; but we were pulling too hard to turn
our heads even for a moment. Our pursuers still kept on, but they were
not near enough to allow them to fire with any chance of hitting us.

They had undoubtedly seen the ships, and thought we were going out to
carry them information. This probably made them more anxious to catch
us. At length the breeze, as we expected it would, freshened.

"I'll step the mast; you, Master Lancelot, go to the helm. Stand by to
hoist the sail, Master Ben," cried Tom; and in half a minute we had the
mast stepped, the sail hoisted, and the sheet hauled aft, when, again
getting out the oars, we glided rapidly through the water. We saw that
our pursuers had no sail, or they would have hoisted it. This was
satisfactory, though they were pulling harder than ever.

Should the wind hold, we had good hope that they would soon be left
behind, still it would be folly to relax our efforts.

"Hurrah! we are distancing them," cried Tom.

As he spoke, our pursuers fired two shots at us, but the bullets fell
into the water astern.

"Blaze away as fast as you like!" cried Lancelot; "every shot you fire
will help us to get