"The tide will be with us for nearly three hours," said Tidkins. "Come—we won't lose a moment." The foreman retraced his steps across the barges to the wharf; while the Resurrection Man and the Buffer, each armed with a pair of pistols, leapt into the boat, that lay alongside the lighter. Two stout fellows, dressed like watermen, and who were already seated in the boat, instantly plied their sculls. The skiff shot rapidly away from the vicinity of the barges, and was soon running down the middle of the river with a strong tide. The morning was beautiful and bright: a gentle breeze swept the bosom of the stream:—and when the sun burst forth in all its effulgent glory, a few fleecy clouds alone appeared on the mighty arch of blue above. Here and there the mariners on board the outward-bound vessels were busy in heaving up their anchors—a task which they performed with the usual cheering and simultaneous cry,—or in loosening the canvass that immediately became swollen with the breeze. At distant intervals some steamer, bound to a native or foreign port, walked, as it were, with gigantic strides along the water, raising with its mighty Briarean arms, a swell on either side, which made the smaller craft toss and pitch as if in a miniature whirlpool. Alas! how many souls have found a resting-place in the depths of those waters; and the spray of the billow seems the tears which old Father Thames sheds as a tribute to their graves! Then, at dark midnight, when the wind moans over the bosom of the river, the plaintive murmurs sound as a lament for those that are gone! Vain are thy tears, O River! But if they must be shed, let them flow for the living, whose crimes or whose miseries may, with Orphic spell, awaken the sympathy of even inanimate things. The boat shot rapidly along, the sun gilding its broad pathway. What evidence of commercial prosperity appears on either side! The clang of mighty hammers denote the progress of new vessels in the various building-yards; and in the numerous docks the shipwright is busy in repairing the effects of past voyages, and rendering the gallant barks fit to dare the perils of the ocean once more! The river-pirates, whose course we are following, pursued their way: the old _Dreadnought_, stripped of the cannon that once bristled on its lofty sides, and now resembling the worn-out lion that has lost its fangs, was passed;—the domes of Greenwich greeted the eye;—and now the boat merged upon the wide expanse which seems to terminate with Blackwall. But, no! the stream sweeps to the right; and onward floats the skiff—skirting the Kentish shore. At length the gloomy and sombre-looking hulks off Woolwich are reached: the boat shoots in between the shipping; and there the pirates landed.