Left to himself, Jasper Western soon proved how much was really in him.  He weathered upon the islands, passed them, and on coming out to the eastward, kept broad away, with nothing in sight in his wake or to leeward.  By sunset again the cutter was up with the first of the islands that lie in the outlet of the lake; and ere it was dark she was running through the narrow channels on her way to the long-sought station.  At nine o’clock, however, Cap insisted that they should anchor; for the maze of islands became so complicated and obscure, that he feared, at every opening, the party would find themselves under the guns of a French fort.  Jasper consented cheerfully, it being a part of his standing instructions to approach the station under such circumstances as would prevent the men from obtaining any very accurate notions of its position, lest a deserter might betray the little garrison to the enemy.

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, unless 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 unless 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 nothing 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!”