“Something very important, indeed, General,” answered the officer, touching his undress cap, and speaking huskily from exertion; “there is a large bark, sir, filled with men, stealing along shore in the American channel, and I can see nothing of the gun boat that should be stationed there.  A shot was fired from the eastern battery, in the hope of bringing her to, but, as the guns mounted there are only carronades, the ball fell short, and the suspicious looking boat crept still closer to the shore—­ I ordered a shot from my battery to be tried, but without success, for, although within range, the boat hugs the land so closely that it is impossible to distinguish her hull with the naked eye.”

“The gun boat not to be seen, Mr. Raymond?” exclaimed the General; “how is this, and who is the officer in command of her?”

“One,” quickly rejoined the Commodore, to whom the last query was addressed; “whom I had selected for that duty for the very vigilance and desire for service attributed to him by my predecessor—­of course I have not been long enough here, to have much personal knowledge of him myself.”

“His name?” asked the General.

“Lieutenant Grantham.”

“Grantham?” repeated the General, with a movement of surprise; “It is indeed strange that he should forego such an opportunity.”

“Still more strange,” remarked the Commodore, “that the boat he commands should have disappeared altogether.  Can there be any question of his fidelity? the Granthams are Canadians, I understand.”

The General smiled, while the young officer who had been noticed so particularly by Tecumseh on his landing, colored deeply.

“If,” said the former, “the mere circumstance of their having received existence amid these wilds can make them Canadians, they certainly are Canadians; but if the blood of a proud race can make them Britons, such they are.  Be they which they may however, I would stake my life on the fidelity of the Granthams—­still, the cause of this young officer’s absence must be inquired into, and no doubt it will be satisfactorily explained.  Meanwhile, let a second gunboat be detached in pursuit.”

The Commodore having given the necessary instructions to a young midshipman, who attended him in the capacity of an aid-de-camp, and the general having dismissed Lieutenant Raymond back to his post on the island, these officers detached themselves from the, crowd, and, while awaiting the execution of the order, engaged in earnest conversation.

“By Jove, the Commodore is quite right in his observation,” remarked the young and affected looking officer, who had been to profuse in his witticisms on the corpulency of Lieutenant Raymond; “the General may say what he will in their favour, but this is the result of entrusting so important a command to a Canadian.”

“What do you mean, sir?” hastily demanded one even younger than himself—­it was the youth already named, whose uniform attested him to be a brother officer of the speaker.  He had been absent for a few minutes, and only now rejoined his companions, in time to hear the remark which had just been uttered.