MacNab wished the _Caroline_ to be brought to Chippewa; Drew wanted her burnt and done for. By half after eleven they had started, sent off with three hearty cheers from those left behind, Thorne, Reed and the others ready to light the fire which was to answer to the blaze they intended to make, and, unnecessary precaution, which would also serve as beacon to guide them back. Once out, the men were told the service they were bent on and offered the chance to return, the danger not being burked. But no one took advantage of the offer. Some, however, nearly had their course altered in spite of themselves: “Robert Sullivan, one of the crew, called out, ‘Stop rowing, boys, for God’s sake--do you see where we are--we are going straight over the Falls!’ ‘Silence!’ responded Lieutenant Graham, ‘or I will blow your brains out. It is for me, not you, to give orders.’ ‘Oh, very well,’ replied Sullivan, drawing his oar into the boat, ‘if I am to go over the Falls, I may as well go without brains as with them.’ Here we all joined in, and after hurriedly representing to Graham the danger of our position we began to pull up stream. A little longer and it would have been too late.” The roar of the mighty cataract, which awed and somewhat terrified them, had been previously described by a patriot writer as the peal of the funeral dirge of royalty in Canada. Shots from Navy Island made the heart beat; and do their best they were forced to cross the river diagonally. “We are going astern, sir; we shall be over the Falls;” but reassured by the light from the doomed steamer, by which they could determine the drop down stream, they at length all got together. The moon was yet too bright, and they rested on their oars, dipping them enough to stem the current. At last it was dark enough, and they were alongside. “Boat, ahoy! boat, ahoy!--give us the countersign!” “Silence!” said Drew, in a confidential tone, “silence! don’t make a noise, and we’ll give you the countersign when we get on board.” Once on deck, he drew his sword, saying to the three men who were lounging on the starboard gangway, “I want this vessel, and you must go ashore at once.” Thinking he was alone they took up their arms and fired at him, not a yard off. A swing and a cut of the sword, and one patriot dropped at the captain’s feet. Another trigger was pulled, the only result a flash in the pan; there was a sabre-cut dealt on the inside of the man’s arm, and the pistol fell. The captain confesses to expediting this man and another over the boat’s side with an inch of the point of his weapon.