The other two Go Ahead boys were speedily aroused and twenty minutes later they departed from the hotel.
"It looks worse in the morning than it does at night and we thought that wasn't possible when we came here last evening," said George when the Go Ahead boys looked behind them after their departure.
"I think I will send that landlady a Christmas present of a cake of soap," said Grant soberly.
"She wouldn't know what it was for," laughed John, "if you did."
"My, I would like to hear what my mother would say if she could see the inside of that old tavern."
"The worst thing of all," said Fred, "was the riot in the bar-room. I didn't sleep a wink last night."
"You didn't sound that way, Freddie," said George.
"What time did the noise downstairs stop, Peewee?" inquired John.
"It didn't stop, I guess," laughed Fred. "The landlady said the storm drove all the canal-men into the house, but it didn't seem to me there was anything that drove them out. I shouldn't like to meet one of those men in a dark alley."
"You don't have to meet them," suggested George. "We have lived through the night somehow and are all safe. Now if the Black Growler is ready we are. We'll get our breakfast at Rome, I suppose."