“Hide behind the barrels and boxes, ivery mother’s son of ye!” whispered the Irishman.  The officers were concealing themselves, when suddenly the door opened and a portly elderly gentleman in his shirt sleeves, knee breeches and slippers, carrying a lighted candle in one hand and a pistol in the other descended.  He saw Captain Bones and his lieutenant trying to hide behind a barrel.  The captain, in his excitement, had drawn a pistol and was cocking it.  Terrence at this moment escaped.

With a yell, the old gentleman dropped the candle, which lay on the floor, the thin blaze ascending upward and dimly lighting the scene.  At his yell, there suddenly rushed into the cellar half a dozen stout men, armed with guns and pistols, and the supposed burglars were arrested.  Next morning, Captain Bones and his chief officer were snugly reposing in the county jail, while Terrence, Fernando and Job set out across the country for Augusta.  From this point they took passage in a swift coaster for New York.  At New York they separated, Terrence going to Philadelphia, Job to Baltimore, and Fernando to his home in Ohio.

His journey was long and tedious.  At the close of a hot day in autumn, 1811, the old stage coach came in sight of the dear old home.  The past four years seemed like a terrible dream.  The old familiar spot, where every tree and flower was endeared by sacred remembrances, was never half so precious as now.  His gray-haired father and sorrowful mother, who had long given him up for dead, wept over him and thanked God that he had returned to again bless their home.  Friends, relatives and neighbors, hearing of the sudden return of Fernando, all gathered on that evening, and the youth told the sad story of his impressment and slavery.  He told all save his love affair.  That secret was too sacred.  When he had finished, good old Mrs. Winners was weeping bitterly, and there was scarce a dry eye in the house; for all remembered that poor Sukey was still a slave to the rapacity and cruelty of an ambitious monarch.

CHAPTER XII.

WAR.

The story of the impressment, service and sufferings of Fernando Stevens and his friends are no exaggerations.  Well authenticated history shows that there were thousands of cases similar, and even worse than theirs.  The conduct of England was without precedent and unbearable.  Their great need of men might have been some excuse for impressment of Americans; but there was a spice of hatred in their cruel treatment of the unfortunate sailors.

We read much about the rulers moulding the destiny of the people; but in our republic the people mould the destiny of the rulers.  Long before the president had dared express a thought of war, there were staid old western farmers, level-headed old fellows, who declared that war was inevitable.  America is not a country to be ruled by one man.  The people rule it, and every man thinks for himself, so that