Its crew (two simple, harmless peasants) were cowering among the lumber.

Curio had seized one of the paddles and was guiding the craft out into the middle of the current; for the soldiers were already running along the wharves and preparing to fling their darts.

The other men, who had just been plucked out of the jaws of destruction, were all engaged in collecting their more or less scattered wits and trying to discover the next turn of calamity in store.

Antonius--who, despite his fall, had come down upon a coil of rope and so escaped broken bones and serious bruises--was the first to sense the great peril of even their present situation.
"In a few moments," he remarked, casting a glance down the river, "we shall be under the Pons Sublicius, and we shall either be easily stopped and taken, or crushed with darts as we pass by.

You see they are already signalling from the upper bridge to their guard at the lower.