So insecure and treacherous was the site of the place now about to be assailed by a desperado, nursed, like the coal, in its vitals.
Now, sailing on the Thames, nigh its mouth, of fair days, when the wind is favorable for inward-bound craft, the stranger will sometimes see processions of vessels, all of similar size and rig, stretching for miles and miles, like a long string of horses tied two and two to a rope and driven to market.

These are colliers going to London with coal.
About three hundred of these vessels now lay, all crowded together, in one dense mob, at Whitehaven.

The tide was out.

They lay completely helpless, clear of water, and grounded.

They were sooty in hue.