“I say, friend Bungo, how shall we manage?  You don’t mean to swamp us in a shove through that surf, do you?” said Mr. Treenail.

“No fear, massa, if you and toder leetle man-of-war buccra only keep dem seat when we rise on de crest of de swell dere.”

We sat quiet enough.  Treenail was coolness itself, and I aped him as well as I could.  The loud murmur, increasing to a roar, of the sea, was trying enough as we approached, buoyed on the last long undulation.

“Now sit still, massa, bote.”

We sank down into the trough, and presently were hove forwards with a smooth sliding motion up on the beach—­until grit, grit, we stranded on the cream-coloured sand, high and dry.

“Now, jomp, massa, jomp.”

We leapt with all our strength, and thereby toppled down on our noses; the sea receded, and before the next billow approached we had run the canoe twenty yards beyond high-water mark.

It was the work of a very few minutes to haul the canoe across the sand-bank, and to launch it once more in the placid waters of the harbour of Kingston.  We pulled across towards the town, until we landed at the bottom of Hanover Street; the lights from the cabin windows of the merchantmen glimmering as we passed, and the town only discernible from a solitary sparkle here and there.  But the contrast when we landed was very striking.  We had come through the darkness of the night in comparative quietness; and in two hours from the time we had left the old Torch, we were transferred from her orderly deck to the bustle of a crowded town.

One of our crew undertook to be the guide to the agent’s house.  We arrived before it.  It was a large mansion, and we could see lights glimmering in the ground-floor; but it was gaily lit up aloft.  The house itself stood back about twenty feet from the street, from which it was separated by an iron railing.

We knocked at the outer gate, but no one answered.  At length our black guide found out a bell-pull, and presently the clang of a bell resounded throughout the mansion.  Still no one answered.  I pushed against the door, and found it was open, and Mr. Treenail and myself immediately ascended a flight of six marble steps, and stood in the lower piazza, with the hall, or vestibule, before us.  We entered.  A very well-dressed brown woman, who was sitting at her work at a small table, along with two young girls of the same complexion, instantly rose to receive us.

“Beg pardon,” said Mr. Treenail, “pray, is this Mr. ------’s house?”

“Yes, sir, it is.”

“Will you have the goodness to say if he be at home?”

“Oh yes, sir, he is dere upon dinner wid company,” said the lady.

“Well,” continued the lieutenant, “say to him, that an officer of his Majesty’s sloop Torch is below, with despatches for the admiral.”

“Surely, sir,—­surely,” the dark lady continued; “Follow me, sir; and dat small gentleman [Thomas Cringle, Esquire, no less!]—­him will better follow me too.”