ough the fleet and day had dawned.
All was joy and relaxation when Erskine, the engineer, suddenly
exclaimed: "Mr. Taylor, look astern!" and there, not four miles away,
and coming down under sail and steam, was a large side-wheel steamer,
left unseen by gross carelessness on the part of the look-out.

Erskine rushed below, and soon volumes of smoke were pouring from the
funnels, but it was almost too late, for the chaser was coming up so
fast that the uniformed officers on her bridge could be distinctly seen.

"This will never do," said Steele, and ordered the helm to be altered so
as to bring the ship up to the wind. It took them off the course to
Nassau, but it forced their pursuer to take in her sails, and an
exciting chase under steam right into the wind's eye began. Matters at
length became so critical that no hope remained but to lighten the boat
by throwing overboard her deck-load of cotton--a sore necessity in view
of the fact that the bales which went bobbing about on the waves were
worth to them L50 or L60 apiece.

In clearing out the bales they cleared out something more, a runaway
slave, who had been standing wedged between two bales for at least
forty-eight hours. He received an ovation on landing at Nassau, but they
were obliged to pay four thousand dollars to his owner on their return
to Wilmington.

The loss of the cotton lightened the boat and it began to gain in the
race, both craft plunging into the great seas that had arisen, yet
neither slackening speed. A fresh danger arose when the bearings of the
engine became overheated from the enormous strain put upon them. It was
necessary to stop, despite the imminence of the chase, and to loosen the
bearings and feed them liberally with salad oil mixed with gunpowder
before they were in working order again. Thus, fifteen weary hours
passed away, and nightfall was at hand when the chaser, then only five
miles astern, turned and gave up the pursuit. It was learned afterward
that her stokers were dead beat.

But port was still far away, they having been chased one hundred and
fifty miles out of their course, and fuel was getting perilously low. At
the end of the third day the last coal was used, and then everything
that would burn was shoved into the furnaces,--main-mast, bulwarks, deck
cabin, with cotton and turpentine to aid,--and these only sufficed to
carry them into a Bahama Island, still sixty miles from Nassau. They
were not there two hours before