George Cary Eggleston

“ Presently he went for the fourth or fifth time to the end of the porch, where he could see a part of the street by peering through the great green jalousies or slatted shutters that barred out the fierce sunlight.
“What do you do that for, Dick?” asked Lawrence Rutledge in a languid tone and without lifting his head from the head-rest of the joggling board.
“What do I do what for?” asked Dick in return.
“Why run to the end of the verandah every five minutes? What do you do it for? Don’t you know it’s hot? Don’t you realize that violent exertion like that is unfit for weather like this? ”

“ She can come head-on to a beach, and as she glides up the sloping sand it shuts up her centre board and lifts her rudder out of its sockets without the least danger of injuring either. In the water a dory is as nervous as a schoolgirl in a thunder storm. ”

“ Fortunately there was a breeze, rather light but sufficient, when the sun rose next morning. The Hunkydory was cast off and, with Cal at the tiller, her sails filled, she heeled over and “slid on her side,” as Tom described it, out of the Ashley River and on down the harbor where the wind was so much fresher that all the ship’s company had to brace themselves up against the windward gunwale, making live ballast of themselves. ”

“ Whenever the people of any country are ready to submit to any infringement of their rights as free men, liberty in that country is dead, and tyranny is free to work its evil will. And in a free country it is the most sacred duty of every man to resist the smallest as well as the largest trespass upon his rights as a man. ”

“ Why shouldn’t we make the best of things and be happy? Why should you go brooding around, making the rest of us miserable? I tell you it’s nonsense. Cheer up, and give the rest of us a chance to enjoy ourselves.”
“You are right, Cal,” Larry answered; “and I won’t spoil sport. I didn’t mean to, and my worrying was foolish. By the way, what shall we do to pass the time to-day?”
“Well, for one thing, we ought to put up a shelter. A fog like this is very apt to end in soaking rain, and if it does that to-night, we’ll sleep more comfortably under a roof of palmete leaves than out in the open. ”

“ The boys were in consternation.
“Do you suppose those scoundrels can have caught him?” asked Dick, with horror in his tones.
“I don’t know,” Larry answered through his set teeth. “But there’s only one thing to do.”
“Only one thing,” answered Dick. “We must go to his assistance, and if they have him prisoner we must rescue him or all die trying. I for one will never come back alive unless we bring him with us.”
“That’s of course,” said Cal, who for once spoke crisply, wasting no words. “Wait a second, Larry! How many cartridges have you—each of you?” ”

“ What’s the matter with you, anyhow? Have we lived a life of easy luxury here at Quasi for so long that you’ve forgotten that this is an expedition in search of sport and adventure? Isn’t this earthquake overthrow an adventure of the liveliest sort? Isn’t the loss of our belongings by fire a particularly adventurous happening?”
“After all,” broke in Tom, who had a genuine relish for danger, difficulty and hardship, “after all, we’re not in half as bad a situation as we were when we faced the revenue officers from behind our log breastwork. ”

“ Larry was quick to observe that neither the words nor the tone of the one who had spoken were such as the drunken, degraded, ignorant men he had seen in the smugglers’ camp would have used, and the fact puzzled him. After a moment’s reflection he called out:
“If you have any business with us you may come ahead a few paces into the full light of the fire and say what you have to say. But if one of you raises a gun we’ll give you a volley of buckshot straight at your breasts. Come on out of the bushes and tell us what you want.” ”

“ IN this book is crowded a wealth of sport, adventure, Indian stories, hunting and camping, facts about animals encountered, and all that will please a boy’s heart. A skilful hunter and trapper takes his son, nephew, and two close friends on such a hunting and camping trip as their most vivid imagination could not have improved upon. They are supremely happy in their enjoyment in all that pertains to the woods, and his camp-fire stories of experiences with Indians. Each of the boys has a chance to show his bravery and resourcefulness, and each is equal to the occasion. ”

“ Dick loosed his hold, and as soon as Cal had rinsed his mouth, he redeemed his promise.
“Well, the first thing I discovered was that there’s a promising young deer at present haunting this neck of the woods, and we’re all going out to involve it in controversy with us to-day, and then shoot it as its just due for defying us in such impudent fashion.”
“Venison!” exclaimed Tom enthusiastically; “how my mouth waters for a taste of its juiciness! But how do you know about it, Cal?”
“It isn’t venison yet,” slowly answered the other. “You are much too hasty in jumping at conclusions. ”

“ Unfortunately, just as I had finished doing so, a peculiar moth attracted my attention—a moth not mentioned or described in any of the books, and quite unknown to science, I think. I went at once in chase of it, but it led me a merry dance through the thickets, and it was two hours, I should say—though I carry no timepiece—before I caught the creature. In the meanwhile I had forgotten all about my boat, and when I got back I saw it drifting out to sea with quite a strong breeze to aid the tide in carrying it away. ”

“ A second later the dory was pushing her way through mud and submerged marsh grass. Tom’s error had driven her, head on, upon one of the grass covered mud banks.
Dick was instantly at work. Without waiting to haul the boom inboard, he let go the throat and peak halyards, and the sails ran down while the outer end of the boom buried itself in the mud. ”

“ When the strain upon his attention seemed at last to relax, Cal ventured to say something—and it was startling to his comrades.
“Of course you’re right about the books on such subjects,” he said. “For example, the most interesting of all facts about fish isn’t so much as mentioned in any book I can find, though I’ve searched through several libraries for it.”
“What is your fact?” asked Dunbar, suspending his work to listen.
“Why that fish do not die natural deaths. Not one of them in a million ever does that.” ”

“ Tom did, but he said nothing. Tom was finding out something that the others knew nothing about.
On the next morning but one after the deer hunt he had climbed to the crotch of the tree to make a further study of the trail he had discovered. After a little while he decided to climb farther up the tree, in order to secure a better view.
From that loftier perch he saw something at a distance that deeply interested him. It was a sort of hovel, so buried in undergrowth that it would have been scarcely visible at all except to one looking from a high place as he was. ”

“ A principle is never small; liberty is always of supreme consequence, and it makes no difference how trifling the trespass upon one’s liberty is in itself, the duty to resist it at all costs and all hazards is just the same. Convenience and comfort do not count in any way. The difficulty is that men are not always ready to take trouble and endure inconvenience in defense of their rights where the matter in question seems to them of small moment. ”

“ We’ve acquitted ourselves nobly as sappers and miners, and are entitled to take plenty of time for supper and a good little rest afterwards—say till the moon, which is just now coming up out of its bath in the sea out there, rises high enough to shine into our hole. ”

“ Dunbar’s talk. You know I’ve always been interested in fish—even when they refuse to take bait. Hush. He’s about to begin again.”
“Oh, it is obvious enough when you think about it,” said Dunbar. “It is a fundamental law of nature that every living thing, animal or vegetable, [292] shall tend to develop whatever organs or functions it has need of, for defense against enemies or for securing the food it needs. You see that everywhere, in the coloring of animals and in a thousand other ways. The upper side of a flounder is exactly the color of the sand on which he lies. ”

“ By advice of the lieutenant, the boys left their shotguns on board the cutter and carried instead the short, hard-shooting repeating rifles that he furnished them. Armed in this way, each could fire many shots in rapid succession, instead of the two which alone their shotguns permitted.
“We can defend ourselves now if the gang discovers and assails us,” said Larry, with a satisfied smile. “With these guns we’re a good deal more than a match for those ten smugglers armed as they are with nothing better than pistols. By the way, Tom, what’s the plan of campaign?” ”

“ As he spoke, a bend of the shore line cut off what little breeze there was, the sail flapped and the dory moved only with the tide.
“Lower away the sail,” he called to Cal and Dick, at the same time hauling the boom inboard. “We must use the oars in making a landing, and I see the place. We’ll camp for the night on the bluff just ahead.”
“Bluff?” asked Tom, scanning the shore. “I don’t see any bluff.”
“Why there—straight ahead, and not five hundred yards away.”
“Do you call that a bluff? Why, it isn’t three feet higher than the low-lying land all around it.” ”

“ Cal answered. “We should get lost in the fog and go butting into mud banks and unexpected shoals. No. Till this fog clears away we can’t think of leaving the altogether agreeable shore upon which a kindly fate has cast us. But we can be happy while we stay, unless we make ourselves unhappy by worrying. I know what is troubling you, Larry, and it’s nonsense to worry about it. I often think I wouldn’t carry your conscience about with me for thirty cents a month.”
“But, Cal, you see it is our duty to notify the revenue officers of our discovery before those smugglers get away.” ”

“ Up to this time the intruder, a huge man of evil countenance, had spoken no word. Now he suddenly took the initiative.
“Who are you fellers, anyhow, and what are you a-doing here?” he asked.
“Curiously enough,” responded Cal, “those are precisely the questions I was going to ask you. Suppose you answer first. Who are you and what are you doing here?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out,” the intruder replied, truculently.
“Perhaps you’d better reconsider that,” said Cal. “You’re a prisoner, you know, caught in the act of stealing our ammunition, and we are armed. ”

“ We are all of us the sons of gentlemen. We have been trained to think—and truly so—that a gentleman must do his duty regardless of consequences to himself. So we are going to start for Beaufort at daylight, no matter what annoyances it may bring upon us.”
“Of course you are right,” said Dick and Tom in a breath. Cal said nothing until one of them asked him why he remained silent.
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“I’m a Rutledge,” he answered, “and what Larry has said is the gospel in which I have been bred. I hadn’t thought it out till Larry spoke, that’s all.” ”