him."

With ocean alacrity some round shot were got up, a gun was fired
point-blank at Labour's Retreat, and down came a chimney-stack, amidst
the cheers of the crew of the _Tom Bowling_.

"Now, then," roared old Joe, "over with our boat, lads, and board 'em!
Tommy, stay you here and let go the anchor"; and in a very few minutes
Plum and Robins were pulling Joe Westlake ashore.

Sloper and his party saw them coming and manfully stood their ground.
The three seamen, securing their boat, forced their way on to the lawn
and marched up to the tailor and his friends.

"What do you mean by firing at my cutter?" roared old Joe.

"What do you mean by knocking down my chimneys?" cried the tailor, who
was exceedingly pale.

"Who began it?" bawled Joe. "Who fired first? Who's bin and made holes
in that there flag of mine? Why, that's the flag of a British sailor,
you little withered thimble you; and durn ye, if you don't make me
instantly an humble apology and stump up with the cost of what ye've
injured, I'll skin ye!" and he threw himself into a very menacing
posture.

At this point one of the tailor's friends slunk off.

"My chimney-stack is worth more than your twopenny flag," shrieked
Sloper, maddened even into some temporary emotion of courage by the
insults of the old man-of-warsman.

"Say that again, will 'ee," said Joe. "Just sneer at that there flag
again, will 'ee."

The tailor was idiotic enough to repeat the affront, on which, and as
though a perfect understanding as to what was to be done subsisted
among the three sailors, old Joe, Plum, and Robins fell upon Sloper,
and, lifting him up in their arms, ran with him to the boat, into
which they flung him, paying not the least heed whatever to his cries
for help and for mercy, and instantly headed for the cutter, leaving
the tailor's friends white as milk and speechless with alarm near the
cannon upon the lawn.

When the boat reached the cutter, Plum jumped aboard and received
little Sloper from the hands of old Joe, making no more of the burthen
than had the tailor been a parcel, say, of a coat and waistcoat, or a
pair of trousers. Old Joe then actively got over the rail. He lifted
the little main-hatch, and Mr. Sloper was dropped into the space
below, where the darkness was so great that he could not see, and
where there was nothing to sit upon but Thames ballast.

"In boat, up anchor, and away with us!" said Joe Westlake.

The breeze was fresh, the cu