Taking a poker from the corner of the fireplace, Black Donald went around among the sleeping robbers and stirred them up, with vigorous punches in the ribs and cries of:
"Wake up!—dolts! brutes! blockheads! Wake up! You rest on a volcano about to break out! You sleep over a mine about to be exploded! Wake up!—sluggards that you are! Your town is taken! Your castle is stormed! The enemy is at your throats with drawn swords! Ah, brutes, will you wake, then, or shall I have to lay it on harder?"
"What the demon?"
"How now?"
"What's this?" were some of the ejaculations of the men as they slowly and sulkily roused themselves from their heavy slumber.
"The house is on fire! The ship's sinking! The cars have run off the track! The boiler's burst, and the devil's to pay!" cried Black Donald, accompanying his words with vigorous punches of the poker into the ribs of the recumbent men.
"What the foul fiend ails you, captain? Have you got the girl and drunk too much liquor on your wedding night?" asked one of the men.
"No, Mac, I have not got the girl! On the contrary, the girl, blame her, has got three of my best men in custody! In one word, Hal, Dick and Steve are safely lodged in the county jail!"
"What?"
"Perdition!"