ir liquor, retired, and the
captain, looking keenly at Harry, said, "Methinks, young sir, that you
are not precisely what you seem!"

"That is so," Harry replied; "I am on business here, It matters not on
which side, and it may be that we may strike a bargain together."

"Do you want to cross the channel?" the captain asked, laughing. "You
seem young to have put your head in a noose already."

"No," Harry said, "I do not want to cross myself; but I want to send
some others across. I suppose that if a passenger or two were placed on
board your ship, to be landed in Holland, you would not deem it
necessary to question them closely, or to ascertain whether they also
were anxious to arrive at that destination?"

"By no means," the captain replied. "Goods consigned to me will be
delivered at the port to which they are addressed, and I should consider
that with passengers as with goods, I must carry them to the port for
which their passage is taken."

"Good," Harry said; "if that is the case, methinks that when you
sail--and," he asked, breaking off, "when do you sail?"

"To-morrow morning, if the wind is fair," the captain answered. "But if
it would pay me better to stop for a few hours, I might do so."

"To-morrow night, if you will wait till then," Harry said, "I will place
three passengers on board, and will pay you your own sum to land them at
Flushing, or any other place across the water to which you may be bound.
I will take care that they will make no complaints whatever, or address
any remonstrance to you, until after you have fairly put to sea. And
then, naturally, you will feel yourself unable to alter the course of
your ship."

"But," the captain observed, "I must be assured that these passengers
who are so anxious to cross the water are not men whose absence might
cause any great bother. I am a simple man, earning my living as honestly
as the times will allow me to do, and I wish not to embroil myself with
the great parties of the State."

"There may be an inquiry," Harry replied; "but methinks it will soon
drop. They are three preachers of London, who are on their way to
dispute concerning points of religion with the divines in Scotland. The
result of their disputation may perchance be that an accord may be
arrived at between the divines of London and Edinburgh; and in that
case, I doubt not that the army now lying at Dundee would move south,
and that the civil war would therefore become more extended