All this time we were shooting swiftly down the river, the broad surface of which, gleaming in the starlight, now began to heave and undulate, as the swells of the sea, rolling over the bar, affected it. As we pulled, Peralta, taking advantage of a great shout faintly heard from the shore, hailed, ‘Disco! Disco, ahoy!’ A long shrill whistle was the reply, and, looking round, we saw the low dusky form of the piragua, with her two high raking masts, and, pausing on our oars, we heard the rush of the tide against her sharp bows. ‘Disco is all awake,’ said Peralta, and in a moment more we were alongside and tumbling into the piragua, which, notwithstanding her very considerable size, was so light as to rock violently as, one by one, we leaped over her gunwale. Disco himself, a Mosquito Indian, as I judged him, appeared to have been just aroused by the clamour on shore, and he asked eagerly what the matter was. ‘The matter,’ said Peralta, ‘is, that we must get to sea as soon as we can. Thank God the breeze comes fresher—that puff quite ruffled the water. Jenipa,’ this was to the mulatto, ‘jump forward and cut the cable—no time for weighing. Disco, get a sweep or an oar out on the larboard bows to cant her head round. Lindsay, bear a hand, my man, and get the canvas upon her, or some of our friends ashore will be swimming down upon us with their knives in their teeth.’ The coolness of Peralta was capital to see. Just as Jenipa’s knife went with a cheep through the strands of the hemp, Disco’s oar dashed into the water, and the stream catching the larboard bows of the piragua, she swung round with her head towards the shore we had just left, while Peralta, who worked as though he had been afloat all his life, flung loose the foresail from the long supple bamboo yard, and then both of us clapping on to the haulyards with all our might, the light canvas, all dripping with the night dew, rose steadily to the top of the mast, and then catching the faint puff of the sea breeze, which has but little power when it blows in the night-time, the sail swelled gracefully out, while Peralta, with the sheet in his hand, leaped aft, catching hold of the tiller, and calling to us all to get the mainsail upon the piragua. We were, as the reader may guess, in no humour for trifling, and accordingly the big lugsail was very soon hoisted by rapid jerks, up the mast, and when, after having made fast the haulyards, and trimmed the sheet aft, I paused a moment and looked round, I was quite bewildered. The breeze was hardly sufficient to keep the wide sails sleeping. I heard no loud rushing gurgle, such as a vessel makes travelling fast through the water; yet the lights upon shore were flying by us as though we were borne on horseback towards the sea—the great white flakes and stripes of froth which had floated into the river from the bar, glanced past, showing like light veins and streaks in dark marble—while the skiffs which