"I don't know how long it was before they got help from the ship, and the great brute dragged off me; but I know that the next thing I remember is being carried into the ship through the doorway, and hearing some one say, that Bill Barker was frozen stiff and cold. But I soon came to, and excepting the bruises, there was nothing worse the matter than a broken rib, which I soon got the better of. But poor Bill was dead and frozen hard when they got him aboard, with his gun tight fixed in his hand, so that they could not get it away for some time; for though the poor chap knew all the orders well enough about going out without proper preparations, like many more of us, he couldn't believe as the frost would have such power--power enough to cut him down before he'd walked a couple hundred yards, for it was something awful that night, though the little brawny chaps that live in those parts, seem to bear it very well. "Freeze! why this is nothing: them two bears were masses of ice next morning when they hauled 'em on board, while everything we cut, had to be thawed first before the stove-fires. But then we had plenty of provisions, and I don't think I once saw the grog get down so low, as in this here glass of mine--here present." My father took the hint, and replenished the old sailor's glass. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. ASHER'S LAST HOUR. "Now, once for all," said Asher Skurge, "if I don't get my bit o' rent by to-morrow at four o'clock, out you goes, bag and baggage, Christmas-eve or no Christmas-eve. If you can't afford to pay rent, you'd best go in the house, and let them pay as will." And Asher girded up his loins, and left Widow Bond and her children in their bare cottage, to moan over their bitter fate. And then came Christmas-eve and four o'clock, and no money; and, what was better, no Asher Skurge to turn out Widow Bond, "bag and baggage," not a very difficult task, for there was not much of it. The cottage was well-furnished before Frank Bond's ship was lost at sea, and the widow had to live by needlework, which, in her case, meant starving, although she found two or three friends in the village who were very sorry for her, or at all events said they were, which answered the same purpose. However, four o'clock grew near--came--passed--and no Asher. It was not very dark, for there was snow--bright, glittering snow upon the ground; but it gradually grew darker and darker, and with the deepening gloom. Mrs Bond's spirits rose, for she felt that, leaving heart out of the question, old Skurge, the parish clerk, dare not turn her out that night on account of his own character. Five o'clock came, and then six, and still no Asher; and Widow Bond reasonably thought that something must be keeping him.