It was a
beautiful starlight night in May, and I floated around the rock, for I
knew that in a cove on the eastern side, concealed from all view of
the sea, lay a Finland fishing-boat, a craft that will weather any
storm, and here in the water was a man who knew how to handle it.
Prisoners are landed on the eastern side, and such advantage is taken
of the natural conformation of this precipitous rock, that a man
climbing the steep zigzag stairway which leads to the inhabited
portion is hidden from sight of any craft upon the water even four or
five hundred yards away. Nothing seen from the outside gives any token
of habitation. The fishing-boat, I suppose, is kept for cases of
emergency, that the Governor may communicate with the shore if
necessary. I feared it might be moored so securely that I could not
unfasten it. Security had made them careless, and the boat was tied
merely by lines to rings in the rock, the object being to keep her
from bruising her sides against the stone, rather than to prevent any
one taking her away. I pushed her out into the open, got quietly
inside, and floated with the swift tide, not caring to raise a sail
until I was well out of gunshot distance. Once clear of the rock I
spread canvas, and by daybreak was long out of sight of land. I made
for Stockholm, and there being no mark or name on the boat to denote
that it belonged to the Russian Government, I had little difficulty in
selling it.
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