By that time the hue and cry would have ceased, and, further, the time named by Master Udal for my visit would be come.
As luck would have it, I was hailed, as I rowed under London Bridge, by a man from a vessel which had just dropped anchor in the pool.

She was a French craft, full of merchandise, part for London and part for Leith, in Scotland; and being under-manned, the captain, seeing me idle, offered me and a few others plying about three days' work in helping to unload.

The offer suited me well; and if ever a free man worked like a galley slave, I did for that week.

Yet the French fellow was kindly enough, and hearing I was a fugitive from the law, he suffered me to lie on his boat at nights, and even let me feed with his men.

Finding, too, that I could talk a smattering of his tongue he tempted me sorely to take service northward with him, and become a sailor.