I suppose that pride and eagerness to overtake us prompted its captain to follow in our wake.

At any rate, he continued and was narrowing the distance between us with each stroke of the sweeps.

When I asked Bettina if she thought they would attempt the arch, she replied:-- "I hope not," then laughing softly, "-- for their own sakes.

The royal barges are not built to shoot the bridge." As we approached the bridge, Betty turned her eyes backward toward it every few seconds, taking her bearings and bringing the boat's nose now a little to the right, now to the left, and again holding it straight ahead.
When we were within twenty yards of the middle arch, she told us to cease rowing, and we obeyed, leaving the boat in her hands.
The roar of the falling waters, tumbling in a cataract on the further side of the Bridge, frightened me, but if Betty heard it she did not fear it, for she began to sing the plaintive little French lullaby we had so often heard, and De Grammont, leaning forward, touched me on the back as he whispered:-- "God gives us an angel to steer our boat." The next moment the water caught us in its mighty suck, just under the upper edge of the arch, and almost before we were aware that we had started through, our boat made a plunge on the lower side, the perilous moment was past, and we were floating in comparatively still water two score yards below London Bridge.
Then Captain Bettina resumed her seat on the stern thwart, and we dipped our oars.
We were turning about to get under way again, when De Grammont cried out:-- "Mon Dieu! They are lost! There they go under! Ah, Jesu!" We all turned our eyes toward the Bridge, but were too late to see the barge.

It had sunk in four fathoms of water, and every man aboard had gone down with it.
We backed water, resting on our oars, and presently the overturned barge came to the surface and floated past us, telling its sad story, "Perished in a bad king's bad cause,"-- a story written on almost every page of the world's history.
A short distance below the Tower, we met a large boat belonging to the ship in which George had come from France, which was waiting off Sheerness to take him back.