The _Scud_ was brought to in a small retired bay, where it would have been difficult to find her by daylight, and where she was perfectly concealed at night, when all but a solitary sentinel on deck sought their rest.Cap had been so harassed during the previous eight-and-forty hours, that his slumbers were long and deep; nor did he awake from his first nap until the day was just beginning to dawn.His eyes were scarcely open, however, when his nautical instinct told him that the cutter was under way.
Springing up, he found the _Scud_ threading the islands again, with no one on deck but Jasper and the pilot, un-less the sentinel be excepted, who had not in the least interfered with movements that he had every reason to believe were as regular as they were necessary.
"How's this, Master Western?" demanded Cap, with sufficient fierceness for the occasion; "are you running us into Frontenac at last, and we all asleep below, like so many mariners waiting for the 'sentry go'?""This is according to orders, Master Cap, Major Duncan having commanded me never to approach the station un-less at a moment when the people were below; for he does not wish there should be more pilots in those waters than the king has need of.""Whe-e-e-w! a pretty job I should have made of running down among these bushes and rocks with no one on deck! Why, a regular York branch could make noth-ing of such a channel."
"I always thought, sir," said Jasper, smiling, "you would have done better had you left the cutter in my hands until she had safely reached her place of destination.""We should have done it, Jasper, we should have done it, had it not been for a circumstance; these circumstances are serious matters, and no prudent man will overlook them.""Well, sir, I hope there is now an end of them.We shall arrive in less than an hour if the wind holds, and then you'll be safe from any circumstances that I can contrive.""Humph!"
Cap was obliged to acquiesce; and, as everything around him had the appearance of Jasper's being sincere, there was not much difficulty in making up his mind to submit.
It would not have been easy indeed for a person the most sensitive on the subject of circumstances to fancy that the _Scud_ was anywhere in the vicinity of a port so long es-tablished and so well known on the frontiers as Fronte-nac.The islands might not have been literally a thousand in number, but they were so numerous and small as to baffle calculation, though occasionally one of larger size than common was passed.Jasper had quitted what might have been termed the main channel, and was winding his way, with a good stiff breeze and a favorable current, through passes that were sometimes so narrow that there appeared to be barely room sufficient for the _Scud's_ spars to clear the trees, while at other moments he shot across little bays, and buried the cutter again amid rocks, forests, and bushes.The water was so transparent that there was no occasion for the lead, and being of very equal depth, little risk was actually run, though Cap, with his maritime habits, was in a constant fever lest they should strike.
"I give it up, I give it up, Pathfinder!" the old seaman at length exclaimed, when the little vessel emerged in safety from the twentieth of these narrow inlets through which she had been so boldly carried; "this is defying the very nature of seamanship, and sending all its laws and rules to the d---l!""Nay, nay, Saltwater, 'tis the perfection of the art.You perceive that Jasper never falters, but, like a hound with a true nose, he runs with his head high as if he had a strong scent.My life on it, the lad brings us out right in the ind, as he would have done in the beginning had we given him leave.""No pilot, no lead, no beacons, buoys, or lighthouses, no -- ""Trail," interrupted Pathfinder; "for that to me is the most mysterious part of the business.Water leaves no trail, as every one knows; and yet here is Jasper moving ahead as boldly as if he had before his eyes the prints of the moccassins on leaves as plainly as we can see the sun in the heaven.""D--- me, if I believe there is even any compass!""Stand by to haul down the jib," called out Jasper, who merely smiled at the remarks of his companion.
"Haul down -- starboard your helm -- starboard hard -- so - meet her -- gently there with the helm -- touch her lightly - now jump ashore with the fast, lad -- no, heave; there are some of our people ready to take it."All this passed so quickly as barely to allow the spectator time to note the different evolutions, ere the _Scud_ had been thrown into the wind until her mainsail shivered, next cast a little by the use of the rudder only, and then she set bodily alongside of a natural rocky quay, where she was immediately secured by good fasts run to the shore.In a word, the station was reached, and the men of the 55th were greeted by their expecting comrades, with the satis-faction which a relief usually brings.
Mabel sprang up on the shore with a delight which she did not care to express; and her father led his men after her with an alacrity which proved how wearied he had be-come of the cutter.The station, as the place was fami-liarly termed by the soldiers of the 55th, was indeed a spot to raise expectations of enjoyment among those who had been cooped up so long in a vessel of the dimensions of the _Scud_.None of the islands were high, though all lay at a sufficient elevation above the water to render them perfectly healthy and secure.Each had more or less of wood; and the greater number at that distant day were clothed with the virgin forest.The one selected by the troops for their purpose was small, containing about twenty acres of land, and by some of the accidents of the wilder-ness it had been partly stripped of its trees, probably cen-turies before the period of which we are writing, and a little grassy glade covered nearly half its surface.
