9 On a French Deck

Though I had letters to people of station and consequence in Philadelphia, I did not intend to use more than one or two of them during my stop there on my brief northward journey, saving the majority for the return trip. The two or three days now awaiting me I wished to spend among the people on the streets, in the taverns, the markets, and the drinking shops, discovering their state of mind with regard to war or peace by observation and by actual talk with them. I found Philadelphia to be a much larger and finer city than Baltimore, exceeding anything that I had expected, and I visited all the famous places. I went to Independence Hall, where the immortal Declaration was made, Carpenters’ Hall, where the first Continental Congress met; visited the old Swede Church and the other famous churches, and then strolled down the banks of the Schuylkill and Delaware, among the sailors. These sailors seemed to be mostly a turbulent and not much of a God-fearing set, addicted to strong oaths and stronger liquors. As at Baltimore, there were low groggeries, in which they loved to congregate and spend the money they had earned.

As I went farther down the river I beheld a sloop of war. I could see no flag upon her, but two or three sailors at work upon her deck had the look of Frenchmen. It seemed strange to me that a French war ship should be anchored at Philadelphia, a river port, with British squadrons all along our coast, but walking farther down I read the name upon her—La Rochelle—and beyond a doubt that was certainly French, though she might prove to be a prize which the English had adapted to their own service without changing her name.

But she was still under the French flag. I found a sailor at last who could tell me her tale.

“That’s La Rochelle, a twenty-two-gun sloop, one of Bonaparte’s ships,” he said. “She was cruising off the Capes in search of prizes among the British merchant vessels when she was sighted by two British frigates, which gave chase. Her path out to sea was blocked, but she escaped up the Delaware, and here she is at Philadelphia blockaded. She’ll go down the river the first dark night, and try to slip out again.”

My sympathies were with the Frenchman. I had seen enough of the French at Washington to know that they cared as little as the English about the right, but I could not forget that they had given us great help in the Revolution.

The dusk was coming on, and behind me the lights in the city began to twinkle. One of the French sailors sat on the rail of the ship, and let his feet dangle over. Though the twilight was deepening, I could see his face, and perhaps it was the soft gray of the dusk, and again perhaps it was my own imagination, but it was the face of a young man who mused or dreamed of some one left behind him. I thought I could see the smile or tender light in his eyes as he looked, without seeing, at the blue and white points of light in the city, or the blue and gray and rippling surface of the river. The flowing water, the tide, or the current murmured softly around the side of the ship, and the young sailor began to sing a ballad in the mellow tongue of the south of France:

The words were strange to me then, but the tone told of care and pathos. It made me think of the land from which it came, that fair land of France, with its sunny wheat fields and its vineyards black with the heavy clusters of grapes.

He began a second verse of the song, slow, soft, and wailing. There was a strange silence on the river, merely the distant dip of an oar now and then in the water, and some one far away calling. The hum in the city was dying, the darkness was coming down over both town and river, and the water shone through it with a faint and silvery gleam.

There is nothing like a good song, well sung, to draw one’s sympathy, and my feelings were with that ship, as if she were my own. I took the deepest personal interest in her, and hoped with a great hope that the night would be dark and that she would slip down the river, and afterward between the Capes and past the British fleet into safety.

The night grew darker, and gathering clouds showed that it would be all that I wished. The singer ceased, and his figure vanished from the deck, but the charm of his singing remained. The outlines of La Rochelle became indistinct and shadowy, the silver gleam of the river faded into a misty gray. Where I stood, no light was visible on the ship.

Accustoming my eyes to the dark, I saw that some one else was watching the French ship. He was of ordinary figure and appearance, but he seemed to be more deeply interested even than I. He shifted about, as if he would secure new points of observation, and never took his eyes from the sloop. This absorption enabled me to observe him without being noticed in return. I saw that his face was decidedly English; fat, and ruddy, with reddish side whiskers, and his walk, his entire manner, was that of an Englishman.

I guessed the man at once. He was an English spy come there to note the sailing of the French sloop, and to tell the ships of his own nation to meet and take her. I knew not what system of communication, what messengers or signals he might have, or whether they would prove effective, but I resolved at once to set my own efforts against his. If La Rochelle were about to sail, he should not send the warning of it to any one.

I stepped farther back from the waterside, so that he might not observe me, and I followed him, though at a distance, in all his twists and turns, as he tried to see whatsoever might pass on board the French ship. A light suddenly blazed up there, and some sailors appeared on her deck. From the way they set to work, I judged that La Rochelle was preparing for her dangerous return. I intended to warn the Frenchmen of the strict watch kept upon them, and it was now time for me to set about it.

I slipped back in the darkness, and travelling a parallel course went down the stream until I thought I had gone far enough to escape the observation of the English spy. Then I returned to the banks of the river, and there found a waterman who was willing, for good hire, to row me to the French sloop.

“Do you know the captain’s name?” I asked as he pulled us along.

“Dubosc,” he replied; “a good man to handle his ship.”

We were already halfway to La Rochelle. Following my instructions, the boatman had rowed first to the far side of the river, and we were now approaching from such a course that the ship was between us and the spy, thus hiding us from him. In addition, we had the darkness, which was now very heavy on land and river, to help us. Behind our boat the water, as it closed back after our passage, made but a dim gray wake. The farther shore was lost in the obscurity, and due ahead of us the bulk of La Rochelle showed, dim and misshapen. But there came from her a creaking noise—the shuffle and the rasping slide of sail against sail.

“She’s going down the river, and mighty soon, too; there’s no doubt of it,” said the boatman.

A minute later and we were at the side of La Rochelle. My boatman hailed, and a head—black crinkly hair surmounting a thin dark face—was thrust over the rail.

“Who’s there?” called the man in good English, though with a decided French accent.

“Is that you, Captain Dubosc?” I replied, as if I had known him for years.

“Yes, I am Captain Dubosc; who are you, and what do you want?”

“I am a friend,” I said; “I will tell you more when you take me on board; but my message is of the utmost importance to you and to France.”

I could see his keen black eyes shining like a cat’s through the darkness, and he gave the word that I be taken on board. I paid my waterman, and dismissed him, trusting to the Frenchmen to put me ashore when I had done them my service. I saw him rowing away until he and his little boat were enveloped by the shadows, while I stood on the deck with the Frenchmen.

A ship’s lantern threw a sombre, distorting light over our group. Captain Dubosc was a black fellow—that is, extremely dark—as if from the sunburnt shore of the Mediterranean; not very tall, but enormously broad in the shoulders, his face thin and keen. His officers, like their captain, seemed to be mostly from the south of France.

“What is it? Who are you?” he asked shortly.

“My name does not matter just now,” I said, “but I want to tell you, Captain Dubosc, that your ship is watched at this very moment by an English spy. No movement that you can make will escape him, and he will send information that will lead to your capture. Come to the other side of the ship, and you can see the spy for yourself.”

All the officers started forward eagerly to take a look, but Dubosc motioned them back.

“No,” he said, “not too many; he would see us watching and take alarm.”

He and I only slipped to the side nearest the shore, and crouching behind a gun sought the spy with our eyes. He was easily found, for the ship was not far from the wharf. There he was, walking back and forth, examining the ship, her yards, her masts, her sails, and then bending forward and turning his ear toward us in the attitude of one who would listen intently. It was evident that here was a man who did not intend to neglect the business upon which he had been sent. Even in that obscuring dusk his English traits showed. The little whiskers stood out like red fins from each side of his face, his nose was thrust well forward, and his whole attitude was aggressive.

“How will you get rid of him? How will you keep him from telling his knowledge?” I asked of Dubosc.

“Come with me and you shall see,” he said. “We owe you thanks anyway, and now, having been warned, I trust that we French are not deficient in resources for our own protection.”

He spoke with calm dignity, and seemed to be grateful, as he said he was, for my friendly word in time. I accepted his offer in like spirit. He ordered a boat to be launched on the other side of the ship, and he, another officer, four men, and myself made up its crew. We pulled in the darkness toward the farther shore, and then, dropping down the river a little, returned and landed, leaving only one sailor to mind the boat. On the way I told him who I was.

Dubosc led the way, and having curved in toward the city we approached from the rear the spot where the spy most likely would be. Presently we saw his back. He was standing quite still, attentively regarding the ship, and evidently not suspecting our movements. Dubosc and two of his men slipped upon him, and at the same instant all three seized him and threw him down.

The Englishman uttered one brief cry, which was smothered in the beginning, and threw up his hands in a convulsive struggle, but all the French were upon him then, and in an incredibly brief space he was bound hand and foot and a handkerchief was stuffed so tightly into his mouth that he could make only a noise that sounded like a low moaning.

They turned him over on his face, and the man looked up at us with startled eyes. But in a moment or two this expression passed away and his face settled into a stolid calm which expressed nothing.

“Take him to the ship!” said Dubosc.

The sailors lifted him up, Dubosc whistled to his boatman, and in a minute the boat was brought to the bank nearest us. Nothing seemed to be stirring in the city behind us. The lights twinkled in white and blue points, and the river, with the shapeless ships upon it, was dark and silent, save for its soft murmur.

The sailors put the bound and gagged spy in the boat, and I, ignoring in my deep interest that my part of the affair was over, stepped in with them. Dubosc must have forgotten, too, for he said nothing, and all of us went on board La Rochelle together, first heaving the spy up to those waiting on the deck, as if he had been a bundle of goods. They dropped him heavily upon the hard wood, and he lay there staring up with wide open eyes. Until then I had thought little of him as a man, looking at him merely as the agent of the British Government, but now that he was defeated I felt a sudden pity for him. Before he had seemed altogether commonplace, but now, in the light of the ship’s lantern, his face looked clear cut and strong.

“What are you going to do with him?” I asked of Captain Dubosc. “I suppose you can’t let him go tonight, can you?”

“No,” he replied.

“That’s true,” I said; “he might give the warning. Suppose you take him down the river and turn him loose at the last land.”

“No,” he said again.

“What!” I exclaimed, “you don’t mean to keep him a prisoner on your whole cruise, or carry him as such to France? Remember that you have taken him in an American port—a neutral port.”

“No,” he said a third time.

I looked at him more attentively. His lips parted in a slight smile. Slight as it was, it was enough to reveal the soulless character of the man.

“You don’t mean that?” I cried.

“The far side of my ship is in complete darkness,” he said .quite coolly. “No one save ourselves can see what is passing there. This spy is bound hand and foot and gagged, we quietly drop him overboard, a plunk, and he is gone; there is no warning to the British fleet; there is no complication with the American Government or with anybody; La Rochelle passes out to sea and the whole affair is despatched neatly and cleanly, without fuss and without trouble; our great emperor himself would approve.”

Horror seized me. It was true that the English and French were at war, but Philadelphia was a neutral port; this would be an atrocious murder, and I, however good my intent, would be the chief cause of it.

One of the sailors had dragged the spy up into a sitting position with his back against a gun carriage, and there he sat doubled up with his eyes upon us. He could not fail to hear every word that was said, and I glanced at him. A little of the natural red was gone from his face, but otherwise his expression was unchanged, though he gazed at Dubosc and then at me, and then back at Dubosc with the most penetrating eyes that I ever saw in a man’s head.

“You shall not commit such a murder, Captain Dubosc!” I exclaimed. “I am going ashore and this man is going with me. He shall be my prisoner to-night, and I will see that he says nothing about La Rochelle.”

He shook his head. The spy’s eyes were turned upon me now; they seemed to gleam through the darkness.

“Your suggestion is quite out of the question, Mr. Ten Broeck,” said Captain Dubosc. “The man is ours to do with as we please. You can have him to-morrow, if you care to drag the river and find him. But we shall be far out at sea, and the American Government has far too much on hand to bother about so trifling a thing as the disappearance of an English spy.”

This man was fit to be a buccaneer, not the captain of a great nation’s war ship.

“I will not go ashore without him,” I said.

“Then I fear you will not go at all,” he replied. “It is a little late even now to leave us. Look!”

He pointed toward the shore. It was receding; the white and blue points of light twinkling in the city twinkled more dimly; I could hear more distinctly the swash of water along the sides of the ship, and above me the sails creaked. La Rochelle had started on her adventurous journey.

My body turned cold to the backbone for a moment, and then I recovered myself. I saw that it was no time to become confused or excited.

“You dare not kidnap me, Captain Dubosc!” I said.

“Oh, no, we will not kidnap you,” he said; “we do not impress you Americans as, your friends the English do, but we will give you a pleasant voyage to France.”

One of the officers, a young man of about my own age, grinned as if he thought it a good joke. I could have struck him in the face with pleasure, but I restrained myself. I appreciated my situation fully. I knew that they could carry me off to France, unless I was taken on the way by the English, which would be no improvement, and with nearly the whole world at war, my fate would be a small matter to distressed nations. I could rely only upon my own courage and dexterity.

“One must accept the decrees of fate like a philosopher,” I said in a resigned tone, “and perhaps I shall enjoy a free trip to France. But let me take the gag out of that man’s mouth, and ask him a question or two; it can’t possibly do any harm.”

Captain Dubosc assented more readily than I had expected.

“Remove the gag and ask him what you wish,” he said.

I stooped over the spy. His eyes were upon me as if he would look through my body into my soul. His arms were tied, not together, but at his side with one wrapping of cord. I gave back his look, and his eyes, meeting mine, flashed. Bending lower I severed the cord that confined his arms with one sweep of the knife that I had taken from my pocket.

“Release yourself,” I said, thrusting the knife into his freed right hand. Then I sprang upon Captain Dubosc.

In times of violence and peril it is a mighty thing to have the strength of a giant, and even in addition to the muscles and power which God had given me I had the impulse of great excitement. The captain, his face showing terror, attempted to escape, but in an instant my arms were around him, and he was compressed in a hug which no five-foot-six Frenchman could resist. A groan came from him, and I swung him under my left arm, a slight bloody froth appearing upon his lips; then with my right hand I drew my pistol and faced the Frenchmen. It had all been done in thirty seconds, and when their hands flew to their swords the Englishman’s wrists were free and their captain swung unconscious under my arm.

“I wish to go ashore, gentlemen,” I said, “and take the English spy with me; if one of you draws his sword or levels his pistol upon me, I’ll blow your captain’s brains out.”

“And if by any chance he should miss, I will do it for him,” said a quiet voice at my shoulder.

The little English spy stood beside me, a pistol in his right hand and the knife with which I had freed him in his left. He said nothing more, but lined up by my side, as if we formed a whole regiment going into battle. Despite his cockney face, his ridiculous red whiskers, and his insignificant figure, he looked the true hero. It showed in his clear eyes, his firm chin, and his whole attitude.

The officers looked at us half in hesitation, half in fear. In the darkness sailors in the rigging, or hidden elsewhere, might have secured shots at us, but they had the double danger of the captain’s death to follow, and of the reports being heard from the shore, with many complications as a sequel. So they stood in a confused group, still looking at us.

The ship was drifting slowly with the current, and the shores were of equal distance now—one side dark, and the points of light on the other growing fewer and fainter. The darkness hid the surface of the stream, save in a narrow circle around the ship, where the water looked gray, almost black, and as we stood in silence on the deck, looking at each other, we could still hear its monotonous wash around the sides of La Rochelle.

I felt a kind of wild exhilaration, a sense of triumph over odds which never fails to exalt the spirits. With their captain under my arm, as a kind of pawn, I could defy a whole ship’s crew, a war ship at that, a twenty-two-gunner to boot.

“Well, gentlemen,” I said, “the boat in which we came is still trailing by the ship’s side and waiting. I wish to go ashore with this Englishman.”

Two of them began to whisper together.

“All I ask is personal safety for both of us,” I said. “The Englishman shall be my prisoner until to-morrow, and I shall see that he sends no warning that can interfere with the escape of La Rochelle.”

A lieutenant at last gave the word. A half dozen sailors had gathered and were looking at us. One of them lay hold of the rope and pulled the boat almost to the ship’s side.

“Into her!” I said to the Englishman.

He dropped lightly into the centre of the boat. He could have cut the rope and rowed away with the oars that lay ready for his hand, but he did nothing of the kind. He held his pistol levelled ready for a shot, if it were needed, and with the other hand steadied the boat. Still holding Captain Dubosc under my arm, I dropped over the side and landed in the boat beside the spy.

“Hold, this is a breach of faith!” cried the lieutenant, rushing forward. “We have not tried to hurt you, and you are taking our captain with you.”

“It is no breach of faith,” I said; “we are not yet on shore, and you might even send a cannon ball after us in this boat. We merely carry our hostage as far as the land. Send a sailor with us to bring him and the boat back, or come yourself.”

He signed to a sailor, who leaped into the boat with, us. The Englishman cut the rope, and then he and the Frenchman took up the oars and pulled for the shore. I took Captain Dubosc from under my arm and held him in such a position that his body would protect the spy and me from any but the most skilful shot from the ship. He was beginning to recover from the affectionate hug which I had given him. His eyes opened languidly and he struggled a little, but I held him firm.

La Rochelle was almost stationary, merely drifting a little, and twenty or thirty men, officers and sailors, were clustered at her rail looking at us as we swiftly approached the shore. We had passed the city, and there were no lights in the darkness, save the few aboard the ship. The boat bumped suddenly against the bank. I released Captain Dubosc, and the English spy and I stepped out of the boat and upon the dry and solid earth, which felt very reliable and welcome beneath my feet after my experience with the treachery of ships and water.

“Good night, Captain Dubosc,” I said; “and please remember, until you are out of it, that this is a neutral country, and we do not approve of murder here.”

He was sitting upon one of the slides, all his strength, returned, but he did not reply.

The spy and I stood side by side on the bank, watching the departing boat. The sailor was doing all the rowing, and the captain was sitting on a slide with his face toward us. The ship had swung toward the shore to meet him. I saw Dubosc say something to the sailor, and the boat began to curve around the ship, as if he would board her on the far side.

The little spy suddenly threw himself upon me with all his weight, seizing me by the shoulders and dragging me down. His action was so quick that I had no time to resist, and we fell in a heap. I heard the report of a pistol, and a bullet whistled through the air where my head had been five seconds before. Dubosc was standing up in the boat, his empty pistol, still smoking at the muzzle, in his hand.

I sprang to my feet and snatched out my own pistol, but the boat had passed around the curve of La Rochelle’s prow and Dubosc was hidden from me.

“I think we’d better step back a little,” said the spy; “a treacherous shot from the ship would reach us.”

We walked farther away, but La Rochelle changed her course again, and bore out toward the middle of the stream. I saw a short thick figure appear upon her deck, and I knew it was that of Captain Dubosc.

The spy and I stood where we were and watched La Rochelle fade away into the darkness, until only the gray river and the dim shores were left.

We stood there at least a minute staring at the bank of darkness into which the French sloop had disappeared. Then I turned to the spy.

“What is your name?” I asked.

“Henry Ketcham.”

“Then I want to say, Mr. Henry Ketcham, that you pulled me down just in time.”

“And I want to say, Mr. What’s-your-name, that you cut the rope that tied my arms just in time.”

“Which makes us even.”

“Which makes us even.”

I looked at him. His red whiskers, notched at the edge like a saw, stood out defiantly, but I liked the little scamp.

“What were you doing prowling around there watching that boat?” I asked.

“Saving my country. What were you doing prowling around there watching me?”

“Saving my country.”

“Again we are even.”

“Again we are even.”

I liked him more and more.

“Remember, Mr. Henry Ketcham, of England,” I said, “that you are my prisoner.”

“All right, Mr. What’s-your-name, I don’t forget.”

“Then pass me that pistol of yours.”

He handed it to me.

“Any other weapon about you?” I asked.

“None.”

“On your honour?”

“On my honour.”

I thrust his pistol in my pocket to keep company with my own.

“I am responsible for your safety until about noon to-morrow,” I said; “come.”

He tramped along obediently by my side. Far away I saw a single dim ray, and I knew that it was one of the many lights of Philadelphia. Toward that light we trudged industriously.

I was in fine spirits.

We passed two or three watchmen, who looked inquiringly at the big man and the little man stalking solemnly side by side, Ketcham almost hid in my shadow, but they said nothing. At last we reached the tavern, and I notified the landlord that my friend, Mr. Ketcham, was to sleep in one of the beds in my room that night, and he said all right. The rooms in our American taverns often contain as many as four, five, or six beds, and the more tenants a landlord can find for them, the better for him.

We went up to my room and I lighted a candle.

“See that bed,” I said to Ketcham, pointing to one in the corner. “You sleep there, and don’t forget that you are my prisoner; don’t go away in the night.”

Then I tumbled into my own bed and slept well, being aided therein by a sound conscience and a satisfied mind.

I awoke late, and found that Ketcham was dressing.

“I was just going to waken you,” he said; “I was afraid you’d sleep all day.”

I thanked him and took him to breakfast. There I inquired about the French sloop of war La Rochelle. The night had been dark, had she taken advantage of it and slipped down the river? Yes, she had, and it was said that the English consul was in a great flurry about it, as he knew nothing of her departure until this morning, and he was afraid she would escape the English fleets on the coast. These were inquiries that I could make without arousing suspicion of anything more than a mere general interest, for naturally everybody was curious about the French sloop and her chances of escape.

Ketcham ate a very hearty breakfast. It is strange what a prodigious appetite little men often have.

As the English consul now knew of La Rochelle’s departure it might seem that I had no further use for Ketcham; but not so. He might have some system of communication far surpassing that of the consul’s, and I was bound to give La Rochelle a good start, Captain Dubosc or no Captain Dubosc. No; I would hold Ketcham for most of the day, thus making sure of him, and I determined, while I was about it, to enlighten him also, in order that there might be no waste of time.

“Are you through, Ketcham?” I asked, when I saw him wiping his lips with his handkerchief.

“Yes,” he said, giving one longing look at the table, upon which nothing was left save the dishes.

“Then come with me.”

We took our hats and walked out into the street. After a night of trouble or peril, the daylight is glorious, whether it comes with sunshine, or rain, or snow. This morning it came with sunshine, bright, shimmering, and pervading. It gilded the red bricks of Philadelphia, and crept into the darkest corners, covering dirt and soot with leaf gold thinner, finer, and more lustrous than ever goldbeater beat.

I looked up at the sparkling heavens, and down at the gleaming city.

“Ketcham,” I said, “it is better to be here than down yonder at the bottom of the river, tied hand and foot.”

“Better, far better,” he said in tones of deep conviction.

“Ketcham,” I continued, “I am now going to take you on a little tour of the city for your own benefit.”

“I shall be pleased to go with you,” he replied.

I led him through the busy streets to Carpenters’ Hall.

“Come in, Ketcham,” I said. “There are some things in here that I want to show to an Englishman.”

He followed me obediently into the building. I took him to the room in which the first Continental Congress had met.

“Ketcham,” I said, “the first American Congress met here to devise plans to protect the thirteen colonies from the arrogance and tyranny of Great Britain and her ruler, George the Third. Take a good look at it, impress it on your memory.”

He looked all around the room.

“You have seen it?” I asked.

“I have seen it.”

“See that chair over there! I’ve no doubt that John Adams sat in it, and John Adams was a great and a wise man.”

“I see it.”

“And that other chair over there, perhaps Patrick Henry sat in it; Patrick Henry was a great and wise man too, and he made some good speeches about the arrogance and tyranny of kings.”

“I see it.”

“And who can say that the immortal George Washington himself has not looked through that window? You have heard of George Washington. He gave a great check to the pride of kings.”

“I see the window. I have heard of him.”

We walked solemnly out of Carpenters’ Hall, and I took him to Independence Hall.

“Be sure to take off your hat when you enter here, Mr. Ketcham,” I said.

“My hat is off,” he replied.

He was holding it in his hand.

I led him to the room in which the Declaration of Independence was written and signed.

“Do you see this room, Mr. Ketcham?” I asked.

“I see it.”

“Then remember it, for here was drawn up an immortal document, called the American Declaration of Independence, which will serve as a warning for all time to all monarchs and tyrants, especially those of Great Britain.”

“I will remember it.”

“See that chair over there; maybe in that very chair sat the great and glorious Thomas Jefferson, still living, thank Heaven; the man who wrote, ‘All men are born free and with equal rights.’”

“I see it.”

“And over there in that chair perhaps sat Benjamin Franklin, who was most potent in stirring the thirteen colonies to rightful rebellion against the tyranny of their English rulers.”

“I see it.”

“And that window over there—perhaps the famous Alexander Hamilton himself, the framer of our blessed Constitution, looked through it.”

“I see it.”

Hamilton wasn’t there, but I didn’t mind that.

We returned to the streets, and on our way to the tavern I said to Ketcham:

“See these streets, Mr. Ketcham; perhaps through this very street the discomfited Howe marched when he and the British army fled forever from Philadelphia.”

“I see them.”

We walked on. I felt pride and satisfaction; I had taught one Englishman a lesson. Little Ketcham trotted meekly by my side. Presently he pulled gently at my arm, and I stopped.

He pointed to a small building, over which floated the British flag.

“Ah, yes, I see,” I said; “it is the home of the British consul.”

“See that flag that the wind blows out from the staff above?” he said; “it is the flag that flew over the English ships in Aboukir Bay when they destroyed the great fleet that had brought Napoleon and his army to Egypt.”

“I see it.”

“Stand nearer the corner here, you can get a better view of it; that is the flag that streamed in the wind over the immortal Nelson and his men when they crushed the naval power of combined France and Spain on the bloody day of Trafalgar.”

“I see it.”

“Come to the edge of the sidewalk here and you can get a better view of the red in it; that’s the flag that Marlborough carried at Blenheim, when the English won against odds one of the decisive battles of the world; it’s the same flag that waved at Ramillies and Malplaquct, and it waved to the same purpose.”

“I see it.”

“Look how the wind sports around it, as if it liked it; that is the flag that Clive carried at Plassey, when England won a new world in Asia. Notice the flag well and remember it.”

“I remember it.”

“Come over here and you can get still another view of it; that’s the flag that waved over the fleet of Effingham when it turned back the Spanish Armada and saved the world from enslavement. Do you see it?”

“I see it.”

We walked side by side, but in silence, to the tavern. There I announced to him that his term of imprisonment was over and he could go.

“But before you leave, Mr. Ketcham,” I said, “I want to tell you that I like you.”

“And I like you, Mr. Ten Broeck.”

“Shake hands.”

We shook, and he left.

I want to say again that he was a brave man, true grit, worthy to be a Kentuckian.

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