"Your honor may trust me."

"And now good-by--remember, to-morrow evening," said the colonel, as,
wrapping himself closely in his dark cloak, and pulling his hat low over
his eyes, he passed out by the back passage door and left the house.

"Ha, ha, ha! Why does that man think it needful to look so villainous?
If I were to go about in such a bandit-like dress as that, every child I
met would take me for--what I am!" laughed Black Donald, returning to
his comrades.

During the next hour other members of the band dropped in until some
twenty men were collected together in the large kitchen around the long
table, where the remainder of the night was spent in revelry.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE SMUGGLER AND CAPITOLA.

Come buy of me! come buy! come buy!
Buy, lads, or else the lassies cry;
I have lawns as white as snow;
Silk as black as e'er was crow;
Gloves as sweet as damask roses;
Veils for faces; musk for noses;
Pins and needles made of steel;
All you need from head to heel.
--Shakespeare.

"If I am not allowed to walk or ride out alone, I shall 'gang daft!' I
know I shall! Was ever such a dull, lonesome, humdrum place as this same
Hurricane Hall?" complained Cap, as she sat sewing with Mrs. Condiment
in the housekeeper's room.

"You don't like this quiet country life?" inquired Mrs. Condiment.

"No! no better than I do a quiet country graveyard! I don't want to
return to dust before my time, I tell you!" said Cap, yawning dismally
over her work.

"I hear you, vixen!" roared the voice of Old Hurricane, who presently
came storming in and saying:

"If you want a ride go and get ready quickly, and come with me, I am
going down to the water mill, please the Lord, to warn Hopkins off the
premises, worthless villain! Had my grain there since yesterday morning
and hasn't sent it home yet! Shan't stay in my mill another month! Come,
Cap, be off with you and get ready!"

The girl did not need a second bidding but flew to prepare herself,
while the old man ordered the horses.

In ten minutes more Capitola and Major Warfield cantered away.

They had been gone about two hours, and it was almost time to expect
their return, and Mrs. Condiment had just given orders for the tea table
to be set, when Wool came into her room and said there was a sailor at
the hall door with some beautiful foreign goods which he wished to show
to the ladies of t