I cannot say. We
seized his musket and bayonet and sword, and without a moment's delay,
which would have been fatal, we rushed on, and sprung like wild beasts
into the room where our guards were sitting. Some were sleeping; others
were playing at cards; two were talking with their heads bent together.
They had not time to look up even before we were upon them. Mr Ronald
ran one of the card-players through with the sword we had taken from the
guard; Peter killed another with the bayonet. I shall not forget his
look of astonishment and dismay when he saw us standing before him. One
of the other men knocked over a third with the leg of the table. Before
the others could seize their arms, we had got hold of them. Mr Ronald
was obliged to kill another man, who fought so desperately that we could
not otherwise master him; and throwing ourselves on the remaining three,
we bound and gagged them, and lashed them to the benches on which they
had been sitting. The whole affair did not take us a minute. It was
very bloody work, but it could not be helped. We then hurried to the
bottom of the tower, and broke open the door. We had been prisoners a
very short time, and could scarcely believe ourselves to be free.

Hastening down to the beach, Mr Ronald stripped off his clothes, and
plunging into the water, with his knife in his mouth, swam off towards
the little boat he had before observed. Had it not been for my wound, I
would gladly have gone instead of him. In spite of his wooden leg, he
swam fast and strongly, and soon reached the boat. Getting into her, he
cut her from her moorings, and then quickly paddled her to the more.
More than once we had turned a glance inland, lest we mould have been
observed; but, without interruption, Mr Ronald dressed, and then all of
us getting into the boat, we pulled out seaward. She was too small to
allow us, with any prospect of safety, to cross the Channel in her, so
that we could not yet consider our enterprise accomplished.

We had armed ourselves with the soldiers' weapons, so that, had there
been a strong breeze off-shore, we should not have been afraid to have
attacked and attempted to cut out any merchant vessel or other
well-armed craft. As it was, Mr Ronald judged that it would be wiser
to endeavour to capture one of the fishing-boats he had seen. Muffling
our oars, therefore, in dead silence we pulled out towards the largest
of the fleet, and which lay the outermost o