Swallows and Amazons

Titty decides to write in a log, as Robinson Crusoe did. She describes Mother’s visit. After sunset, she lights the first lantern and hauls it up the tree. Then, she waits for the signal from the others that will tell her to light the second lantern. She falls asleep and is awakened by the signal, an owl call. After lighting the second lantern, she sees a real owl and hears the Blackett girls talking from their boat in the harbor. Titty hides as the girls beach the boat and proceed to the Walkers’ tents.

When Titty hears the girls shouting at the other end of the island, she realizes that the Swallows can still take the Amazon. She jumps into the Amazons’ boat, rows it to the other side of the island, and anchors it. One of the leading lights is out, and she realizes that John and the others won’t be able to enter the harbor without the lights. She decides that everyone will have to stay in their respective boats until morning and that nothing more can happen until then. The author interjects a comment saying that Titty is wrong: “It is never safe to say that nothing more can happen” (211).

Settling down to sleep, Titty hears the sound of oars and realizes that the boat belongs to the “natives,” not the Swallows or Amazons. Two men beach the boat on Cormorant Island and discuss where to hide a box before burying it under stones. They row away, and Titty falls asleep.

The crew of the Swallow rows their boat into the Amazon River at dusk. It grows too dark to see what they are doing, and they turn back. Once they are in the open water again, they hoist the sail. John uses the stars and a compass to direct Susan at the tiller but is not sure where they are. All the lights in Rio have gone out.

Susan begins to feel badly about leaving Titty alone on the island for so long. They reach a landing on one of the other islands and decide to sleep until dawn. When John wakes up, he sees where they are, and with Susan’s help, they put the sail up and get moving again while Roger sleeps. Both children feel guilty as they pass Holly Howe Farm.

They see smoke coming from Wild Cat Island and then come upon the Amazon anchored in the water. They decide to capture the boat and tow it into the harbor just as Titty’s head emerges. Titty says, “I’ve got her” (227).

John cheers so loudly that he wakes up Roger. Titty quickly explains what has happened as John congratulates her, saying, “Swallow is flagship after all” (228). On the island, the Blacketts raise a white flag of surrender. Titty sails the Amazon into the harbor, steering for the first time, as Susan takes the Swallow.

They come close enough to the island to see the Blackett girls, and Nancy shouts that they surrender and that the Walker children must hurry up. The Walkers bring both boats into the harbor, where the Blacketts are waiting. Nancy readily admits that the Swallow is now the flagship. Nancy claps Titty on the back and says that she did exactly what the Blacketts had planned to do with the Swallow.

The Blacketts stay for tea and explain that they have permission to camp on the island for a few days, beginning the next day. Since they can’t live together and be at war with the Walkers, they had to have the war the previous night. They were hiding in the reeds when the Swallow crew looked for the Amazon in the boathouse.

The Blacketts prepare to go home, where they are supposed to be in bed, with the plan to return early the next day to make a raid on their uncle. Susan remembers to give them the charcoal burners’ message for Jim about locking the houseboat. Nancy points out that her uncle must have returned from his trip, as they saw the houseboat’s windows lit up the previous night. As the Blacketts sail home, they lower the flag to half-mast, raise it again, and shout, “Hurrah for the Swallows” (239). The Walkers reply with a hurrah for the Amazons.

The Walkers all sleep until early afternoon, and then John and Roger fetch the milk and eggs from the Dixons. They are relieved to hear that even though the Dixons wondered why the children didn’t come earlier, they haven’t said anything to Mother. Back on the island, Susan is in a “native” mood as she serves their dinner, being bossy about washing up and sewing buttons that Roger has lost.

The children fill each other in on the details of the previous night’s adventures. Titty remembers to tell John about Mother’s offer to write to Mrs. Blackett on his behalf, and John decides to visit her and tell her not to. It will be a “native talk,” so the others can’t come. Titty decides that she and Roger will secretly look for the treasure that was left behind by the mysterious men, which she has not mentioned to anyone yet.

Mother asks what time the children returned to the island the previous night, and John confesses that they were out all night. John admits that sailing at night was, as Mother says, “very nearly like being duffers” (246). He swears Mother to secrecy to protect the Blacketts and promises not to sail at night again. Mother points out that they only have three days left on the island.

Titty and Roger swim, and she tells him how she heard the men burying their treasure, which she imagines are gold pieces and jewels. At tea, Susan is still unhappy about letting the younger children stay up all night. John returns and explains that he has confessed to Mother about their adventure, cheering Susan up.

The children make a chart with all their special names for the places on and around the island. Titty mentions the men—“pirates”—she heard burying their treasure the previous night. Susan remarks, “How you do romance” (252), and John says that she must have been dreaming. Susan says that it is too late in the day to look for the treasure.

Titty and Roger return from fetching the milk and tell the others that Mrs. Dixon accused them of disturbing Jim Turner’s houseboat again. John watches the houseboat through a telescope and sees several motorboats approaching it.

After breakfast, the children are cleaning up the camp and the sailboat when a policeman arrives in a rowboat. He demands to know when the children boarded the houseboat, and John says that they have never been near it. The Blacketts arrive, and Nancy tells the policeman, whom she calls “Sammy,” that she is ashamed of him and is going to tell his mother if he doesn’t leave immediately. The officer apologizes, calling Nancy “Miss Ruth” and begging the girls not to say anything to his mother.

Nancy explains that Sammy’s mother was a nurse to both their own mother and Nancy and Peggy. He isn’t afraid of anyone except “his mother…and [the girls], of course” (261). She tells the others that Jim’s houseboat has been burgled and that the lights they saw on the night of their sailing adventure belonged to the burglars, or “other pirates.” They took his cabin trunk with his typewriter and the book he has been writing all summer. Titty speculates that those were the “pirates” she heard.

John confesses that the reason Jim suspects him is because he has not tattled on the girls for setting the firecracker on the houseboat roof. Nancy immediately makes a Black Spot, or threatening note, for her uncle.