Abraham Dyson was having a new sloop built for trading purposes, and both Jacob and Cuthbert took the keenest interest in the progress of the work.  The sloop was to be called the Cherry Blossom when complete, and it was Abraham Dyson’s plan that the christening of the vessel by Cherry herself should be the occasion of her formal betrothal to his son.

This ceremony, however, would not take place for some while yet, as at present the little vessel was only in the earlier stages of construction.  Neither Jacob nor Cuthbert had heard anything about this secondary plan, but both took the greater interest in the sloop from the fact that she was to be named after Cherry.

Cuthbert visited her daily, and Jacob as often as his duties at his father’s warehouse allowed him.  On this particular bright February afternoon the pair had been a great part of their time on the river, skimming about in the wherry, and examining every part of the little vessel under the auspices of the master builder.  Dusk had fallen upon the river before they landed, and a heavy fog beginning to rise from the water made them glad to leave it behind.  They secured the wherry to the landing stage, leaving the oars in her, as they not unfrequently did when returning late, and were pursuing their way up the dark and unsavoury streets, when the sound of a distant tumult smote upon their ears, and they arrested their steps that they might listen the better.

Cuthbert’s quick ears were the first to gather any sort of meaning from the discordant shouts and cries which arose.

“They are chasing some wretched fugitive!” he said in a low voice.  “That is the sound of pursuit.  Hark! they are coming this way.  Who and what are they thus hounding on?”

Nearer and nearer came the surging sound of many voices and the hurried trampling of feet.

“Stop him—­catch him—­hold him!” shouted a score of hoarse voices, rolling along through the fog-laden air long before anything could be seen.  “Stop him, good folks, stop him! stop the runaway priest—­stop the treacherous Jesuit!  He is an enemy to peace—­a stirrer up of sedition and conspiracy!  Down with him—­to prison with him! it is not fit for such a fellow to live.  Down with him—­stop him!”

“A priest!” exclaimed Cuthbert between his shut teeth, a sudden gleam corning into his eyes.  “Jacob, heard you that?  A priest—­a man of God! one man against a hundred!  Canst thou stand by and see such a one hunted to death? that cannot I.”

Jacob cared little for priests—­indeed, he had no very good opinion of the race, and none of Cuthbert’s traditional reverence; but he had all an Englishman’s love of fair play, and hated the cruelty and cowardice of an angry mob as he hated anything mean and vile, and he doubled back his wrist bands and clinched his horny fists as he answered: 

“I am with thee, good Cuthbert.  We will stand for the weaker side.  Priest or no, he shall not be hounded to death in the streets without one blow struck in his defence.  But how to find him in this fog?”