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CHAPTER X. WHAT
BECAME OF THE
MUTINEERS OF
THE ‘OSPREY”
t the bottom of the long luxuriant garden-ground was
Aa rustic seat abutting upon the low wall that topped the
lane. The branches of the English trees (planted long ago)
hung above it, and between their rustling boughs one could
see the reach of the silver river. Sitting with her face to the
bay and her back to the house, Sylvia opened the manu-
script she had carried off from Meekin, and began to read.
It was written in a firm, large hand, and headed—
‘A NARRATIVE ‘OF THE SUFFERINGS AND AD-
VENTURES OF CERTAIN OF THE TEN CONVICTS
WHO SEIZED THE BRIG OSPREY, AT MACQUARIE
HARBOUR, IN VAN DIEMEN’S LAND, RELATED BY
ONE OF THE SAID CONVICTS WHILE LYING UNDER
SENTENCE FOR THIS OFFENCE IN THE GAOL AT HO-
BART TOWN.’
Sylvia, having read this grandiloquent sentence, paused
for a moment. The story of the mutiny, which had been the
chief event of her childhood, lay before her, and it seemed to
