so muddy that it had to be filtered through cloth or sacking, before it could be drunk.
During fishing expeditions, previous to the commencement of the siege, John had more than once had a drink of water from the well of a peasant, living in a little hut near the river bank. This hut lay between the outposts of the two parties, and had, at the commencement of the siege, been deserted by its owner. After the water became bad, John set out every evening with a bucket, leaving the town just before the gates were shut, and making straight down to the river. When it became dark, he crawled along under the shelter of the banks, unperceived by the outposts of either party, until close to the hut. Then he filled his bucket at the well, and returned as he had come, lying down to sleep on the bank, well in the rear of the Protestant outposts, until morning; when, as soon as the gates were opened, he carried home the precious supply.
It was this, as much as the light and air, which kept the children in comparative health; but, on the further diminution of rations which took place after Kirk's fleet retired, they began to fade rapidly.
The horses had now been killed for food. The sufferings of the besieged inhabitants became greater daily, and numbers died from sheer starvation. The little inhabitants of John Whitefoot's castle were mere skeletons. Most of their parents were dead, and a mournful silence pervaded the town, save when the bells of the chapels called to prayer, or the yells of the mob announced that the lower orders were breaking into houses in search of food.
John could stand the sight of the faces of the suffering children no longer. He was himself faint and ill from hunger, for he had, each day, given a portion of his own scanty rations to the weakest of the children, and he determined to try and get them some food, or to die in the attempt.
He set out at his usual hour in the evening. The tide was high, but just running out, and, entering the river, he floated down with the stream. Keeping close under the bank, he passed the batteries which the besiegers had erected there without notice, dived under the great boom which they had constructed across the river, directly Kirk's expedition had retired, and continued to float down to the mouth of the river, where he landed and boldly struck across the country, for he was now beyond the lines of the besiegers. He knew that his friend Walter was in the Royalist army, for one of the last mails which entered the city had told him that he was to accompany his father, and that Captain Davenant's troop would most likely form part of any army that might march for the north.
By the morning, his clothes had dried upon him, and he then boldly entered the Royalist camp, mingling with the peasants who were bringing in provisions for sale. He soon learned where Captain Davenant's troop was stationed, and made his way thither. He stood watching for some time until he saw Walter come out of a tent, and he then approached him. Walter looked up, but did not recognize, in the thin and pallid lad before him, his former companion.
"Do you want anything?" he asked.
"Don't you know me, Walter?" John said.
Walter started, and gazed at him earnestly.
"Good heavens!" he exclaimed at last. "Why, it can't be John!"
"It is what remains of me," John replied, with a faint smile.
"Why, what on earth have you been doing to yourself, John?"
"I have been starving, in there," John said, pointing to the city.
"Come into the tent, John," Walter said, grasping his friend's arm, and then letting it fall again, with an exclamation of horror at its thinness. "You needn't be afraid. My father is out–not that that would make any difference."
John entered the tent, and sat exhausted upon a box. Walter hastened to get some food, which he set before him, and poured out a large cup of wine and water, and then stood, looking on in awed silence, while John devoured his meal.
"I have wondered, a thousand times," he said at last, when John had finished, "what you were doing in there, or whether you left before the siege began. How did you get out?"
"I floated down the river to the mouth, beyond your lines, last night; and then worked round here. I thought I might find you."
"Well, I am glad indeed that you are out," Walter said. "Every time the mortar sent a shell into the town, I was thinking of you, and wishing that I could share meals with you, for, of course, we know that you are suffering horribly in the town."
"Horribly!" John repeated. "You can have no idea what it is, Walter, to see children suffer. As for men, if it is the will of God, they must bear it, but it is awful for children. I have had eighteen of them under my charge through the siege, and to see them getting thinner and weaker, every day, till the bones look as if they would come through the skin, and their eyes get bigger and bigger, and their voices weaker, is awful. At last I could stand it no longer, and I have come out to fetch some food for them."
"To fetch food!" Walter repeated. "Do you mean to say you are thinking of going back again?"
"That I am," John said. "I am going to take some food in to them. You will help me, won't you, Walter? It isn't for the men that fight, but for little children, who know nothing about King James, or King William, or the Protestants, or the Catholics, but who are just God's creatures, and are dying of hunger. No one could grudge food to infants like these."
"I will help you, of course, John," Walter said, "if I can; but now, tell me all about it."
John then gave an account of all he had been doing throughout the siege.
"And now what have you been doing, Walter? Fighting?"
"No. I have not been doing any fighting, except that, once or twice, I was out with the troop, when they had a skirmish with your horsemen, but I kept in the rear. I hope, ere long, my father will let me enter, but he is waiting to see what comes of it. No. I have been idle enough. Well, of course, I know all the officers in the cavalry now, and pretty nearly all the officers in the camp, and then, with these constant skirmishes and attacks by your people and ours, there is always plenty to interest one. General Hamilton has been conducting the siege lately, but General Rosen returned yesterday and took the command; but there's really not much to do. We know you cannot hold out much longer."
"I don't know," John said quietly. "I think that, as long as a man has strength enough to hold his arms, Derry will not surrender. When you march in, it will be to a city of dead people. We had such hopes when the fleet came. If the people could have caught Kirk, they would have torn him in pieces. He had five thousand soldiers on board, and, if he had landed them, we could have sallied out and fought, instead of dying of hunger."
"Yes," Walter agreed, "we should have retired at once. We have only seven or eight thousand men here now, and if five thousand English soldiers had landed, we must have raised the siege at once. I can tell you that, though he is on the other side, I was almost as angry at Kirk's cowardice as you must have been. I shall be glad when this awful business is over. I knew it was bad enough before, but after what you have told me about the women and children, I shall never think of anything else, and I will gladly help you in any way I can. There can't be any treason in trying to prevent children from starving to death. What do you want me to do?"
"What would do the children more good than anything, the women say, would be milk. If I could get a keg that would hold two or three gallons–and a watertight box with about twenty pounds of bread, I could swim back with them just as I came. I would show you the exact spot where I landed, and would come out again in four days. If you could put a supply ready for me, every fourth night, among the bushes at the mouth of the river, with a little lantern to show me the exact spot, I could come down with the tide, get the things, and float back again when the tide turns."
"I could do that, easily enough," Walter said. "The mouth of the river is quite beyond our lines. But it is very risky for you, John. You might get shot, if a sentry were to see you."
"I do not think that there is much fear of that," John said. "Just floating along as I do, without swimming at all, there is only just my face above water, and it would be hardly possible for a sentry to see me; but if I were shot, I could not die in a better cause."
"I think, John, if you don't mind, I should like to tell my father. I am quite sure he would not object, and, in case you should happen to get caught, you could