“What! from under those guns?” said Webster.

There was no time for more.  The Japanese lieutenant, with his men, rejoined us, and motioned us to lead the way below.  We complied, and introduced them to our “cargo,” the barrels lying everywhere three or four deep above the contraband of war.  How consuming was our anxiety as they poked about!  Things went well enough for a while; they never penetrated into the casks which they caused to be opened deep enough to find the cartridges, or hoisted out enough of them to come at what was beneath.  Our spirits were beginning to rise, when an unlucky accident sent them down to zero.  The hoops of one of the barrels handled were insecure, and coming off, the staves fell apart, and along with a defensive covering of slabs of salt, a neat assortment of revolver cartridges came tumbling out.  The Japanese lieutenant smiled till his little oblique optics were scarcely perceptible.

“Very good,” said he, picking up one of the packages; “very nice—­nice to eat.”

We were thunderstruck, and had not a word to say.  All was up now, of course; the Japs prosecuted the search with renewed keenness, and the nature of our lading soon stood revealed.

“I shall be obliged to detain this ship, gentlemen,” said the lieutenant politely, to Webster and myself.  “Where has your captain gone?”

I looked round for Chubb; he was not visible.

“I suppose he must have gone on deck,” said I.

The lieutenant and his men hurried up, Webster and I following.  Chubb was conferring with a group of the sailors.  The search-light was still flaring away, and I was horrified to see that our formidable neighbour had crept up to within two or three hundred yards.  The lieutenant walked sharply to the side, and shouted some directions to the boat’s crew.  The words were scarcely out of his mouth when I heard Chubb say, “Now.”  The men with whom he had been speaking rushed upon the Japanese, seized them, and in the twinkling of an eye hove them overboard into their boat, or as near it as they could be aimed in the hurry of the moment.  Simultaneously “Full speed ahead” was rung from the bridge, and the steamer sprang forward as the hare springs from the jaws of the hound.  For a moment there was no sound except the rush of the water foaming at the bows.  Then the warship opened fire on us.  Gun after gun resounded, and we held our breath as the ponderous shot hurtled past us.  The first few were wide of the mark, but we were not long to go scatheless.  One of the terrible projectiles struck the water by the starboard quarter, rose over the side with a tremendous ricochet, bowled over one of the men, and smashed the top of the opposite bulwark.  Immediately after another tore transversely across the decks, playing, as Chubb afterwards said, “all-fired smash” with everything it encountered, and killing another of the men, who was cut literally in two, the upper portion of his body being carried overboard, the lower half remaining on the deck.