Just outside, at the foot of the steps, he stoop’d, pull’d up a trap in the flooring, and disclos’d another ladder stretching, as it seem’d, down into the bowels of the ship. This we descended carefully; and found ourselves in the hold, pinching our noses ’twixt finger and thumb. For indeed the smell here was searching to a very painful degree: for the room was narrow, and every inch of it contested by two puissant essences, the one of raw wood, the other of bilge water. With wool the place was pil’d: but also I notic’d, not far from the ladder, several casks set on their ends; and to these the captain led us. They were about a dozen in all, stacked close together: and Master Pottery, rolling two apart from the rest, dragg’d them to another trap and tugg’d out the bungs. A stream of fresh water gush’d from each and splash’d down the trap into the bilge below. Then, having drained them, he stay’d in their heads with a few blows of his mallet. His plan for us was clear. And in a very few minutes Delia and I were crouching on the timbers, each with a cask inverted over us, our noses at the bungholes and our ears listening to Master Pottery’s footsteps as they climb’d heavily back to deck. The rest of the casks were stack’d close round us, so that even had the gloom allow’d, we could see nothing at all. “Jack!” “Delia!” “Dost feel heroical at all?” “Not one whit. There’s a trickle of water running down my back, to begin with.” “And my nose it itches; and oh, what a hateful smell! Say something to me, Jack.” “My dear,” said I, “there is one thing I’ve been longing these weeks to say: but this seems an odd place for it.” “What is’t?” I purs’d up my lips to the bunghole, and— “I love you,” said I. There was silence for a moment: and then, within Delia’s cask, the sound of muffled laughter. “Delia,” I urg’d, “I mean it, upon my oath. Wilt marry me, sweetheart?” “Must get out of this cask first. Oh, Jack, what a dear goose thou art!” And the laughter began again. I was going to answer, when I heard a loud shouting overhead. ’Twas the sound of someone hailing the ship, and thought I, “the troopers are on us!” They were, in truth. Soon I heard the noise of feet above and a string of voices speaking one after another, louder and louder. And next Master Pottery began to answer up and drown’d all speech but his own. When he ceas’d, there was silence for some minutes: after which we heard a party descend to the cabin, and the trampling of their feet on the boards above us. They remain’d there some while discussing: and then came footsteps down the second ladder, and a twinkle of light reach’d me through the bunghole of my cask. “Quick!” said a husky voice; “overhaul the cargo here!” I heard some half dozen troopers bustling about the hold and tugging out the bales of wool. “Hi!” call’d Master Pottery: “an’ when you’ve done rummaging my ship, put everything back as you found it.”