The afternoon threatened to turn out stormy. Vast masses of clouds were continually driven across the sky: and the increasing agitation and deep furrows of the ocean foretold a night fraught with peril and disaster to the seaman. Drear December seemed about to assume his wildest garb. This day of the week always brought the county paper. A solitary copy of this journal was taken by Mrs. Teague, and it formed the sole channel (alas! for the march of intellect,) by which the smoking club and other worthies of Lanport were enlightened on the sayings and doings of the great world. It must not be inferred from this that the demon of politics was unknown in this retired spot; on the contrary, the arrival of the ---- Journal, was looked for with the utmost impatience from week to week; and as long as its tattered folio hung together, its contents formed a never ending subject of conversation. On the day of its arrival, therefore, the "club" invariably met many hours before their wonted time, to discuss politics and pigtail, revolutions and small beer. This circumstance, and the state of the weather, had drawn a numerous party around the hearth at the Mermaid. The delay which took place in the arrival of the newspaper seemed unusual; the "spokesman" had cleared his throat, the pipes had long been lit, but still it was not forthcoming. Mrs. Teague at last announced that it was engaged by the "jintleman in the parlour." The patience of the party lasted half an hour longer, when the clamorous calls for news dictated the step of sending a message to the stranger. It met with an ungracious reception. At this moment some one came in with the intelligence that a suspicious looking craft was hovering off the coast, and that the lieutenant (whose absence was thus accounted for) was about to put off in his galley to bring her to and overhaul her.