n."

"It is more than likely that it will," returned Dick, dryly; "for I
cannot for the life of me see how we are to enter the town without
exposing ourselves to very grave risk of discovery."

"Oh, it may be done," asserted Marshall, with far more confidence than
Dick thought was justified by the occasion. "Cartagena has a population
of several thousands, you know; and I do not suppose it is at all likely
that everybody will know everybody else, even by sight; it will be very
difficult for anybody to point to anybody else and say, with assured
certainty, that he is a stranger who has no right to be there. But, of
course, we shall not all enter the town; at least I do not at present
contemplate anything so foolhardy. I shall attempt to get into the town
alone, leaving the longboat snugly concealed but within easy reach, in
case of the necessity for a rapid retreat arising; and you must keep
your eyes open to guard against detection, and at the same time maintain
a bright lookout for me, and be ready to come to my help, should I be
hard pressed. Ah! there is the reef that I spoke of a little while ago;
see there, broad off the weather bow; you can see the surf breaking upon
it--and there is a small island right ahead of us. Keep her away, lad;
up helm and let her go off a point. So! steady as you go; that ought to
carry us clear of everything. And, thank God, there is the dawn coming;
we shall just get nicely in before it grows light enough for anybody to
see us."

The longboat had by this time drawn close in with the land, the island
of Baru looming up black and clear-cut to windward, with the islets and
their adjacent reef, now known as Rosario Islands, a short quarter of a
mile broad on the weather bow, and a clump of hills on the main beyond,
just beginning to outline themselves sharply against the lightening sky
behind them. Daylight and darkness come with a rush in those latitudes,
and by the time that the Rosario Islands were abeam the eastern sky had
paled from indigo to white that, even as one looked, became flushed with
a most delicate and ethereal tint of blush rose, which in its turn
warmed as rapidly to a tone of rich amber, against which a cluster of
mangrove-bordered islands, occupying what looked like the embouchure of
a river, suddenly revealed themselves a point or two on the weather bow.
Like magic the amber tint spread itself right and left along the
horizon and upward toward the zenith, to