FIGHT BETWEEN THE SERAPIS AND THE BON HOMME RICHARD
From a rare print
The afternoon sun was well down in the heavens by this time. In the far distance, her sails glinting white and rosy in the path of the sun, and constantly growing smaller, was the fleeing Alliance. And not far behind her, in pursuit, sped the little Vengeance, whose captain Paul Jones had told to try to persuade the half-mad Landais to return to his duty.
This turn of affairs left two ships facing each other on each side. Commodore Jones ordered Captain Cottineau, of the Pallas, to look after the Countess of Scarborough, while he himself took care of the Serapis. He never lost his head; with that "cool, determined bravery," of which Benjamin Franklin spoke, and with "that presence of mind which never deserted him," recorded by Fanning, he made up his mind to make the best of a seemingly hopeless situation, and engage an enemy ship which he knew to be the superior of his own in almost every respect.
He now crowded on all possible sail, until the Bon Homme Richard had come within pistol shot of the Serapis. It was then seven o'clock and the moon was just rising in a clear blue sky. Off some distance, the Countess had begun to run away, and the little Pallas was making after her fiercely. Paul Jones was thus left practically alone to meet his big antagonist of the bristling guns and well-trained, perfectly-disciplined crew.
As the Bon Homme Richard approached him, Captain Pearson, of the Serapis, hailed; but there was no reply. "I don't like this fellow's looks, for all he is apparently less powerful than ourselves," observed the British commander to his first officer. Uneasily he used his night-glass again. "I wonder if it can be the blood-thirsty pirate, Paul Jones," he added a moment later. Then he ordered his sailing-master to hail again.
"This is His Majesty's ship Serapis, forty-four guns. What ship is that?"
Still no answer.