I expected better things of you both.

Go below immediately, and consider yourselves under arrest.

I shall report your coming on board to the captain." The boys saluted without a word, and went below to the midshipmen's berth where the tale of their adventures was soon related to their comrades, who were at first inclined to believe that the whole story was an invention got up to screen themselves for breaking leave.
However, they soon saw that the boys were in earnest, and the truth of the story as to their being picked up at sea by the "Ripon" could, of course, at once be tested.
Presently they were summoned to the captain's cabin, and there Hawtry again recited the story.
The captain told them that they had erred greatly in going away in such a reckless manner, without taking proper precautions to secure their return before gun-fire.

But he said they had already been punished so severely for their thoughtlessness that he should overlook the offence, and that he complimented them on the courage and coolness they had displayed in extricating themselves from the dangerous position into which they had fallen.
He then invited them to breakfast, at which meal the first lieutenant was also present, and here they gave much fuller details of their escape than Hawtry had done in his first narration of it.
At ten o'clock, when the boys were below, they heard a loud cheering, and found that the "Orinoco," with the Grenadiers, had just come into harbor, and were being cheered by their comrades on board the "Ripon" and by the blue jackets of the men-of-war.
All through the day the harbor was alive with boats.

Before nightfall the Coldstreams were all ashore, and by Monday evening the last of the Grenadiers had also disembarked..