As the frightened men came crowding up the hatchways, Dale, who had just fired the only remaining gun on the deck that was left fit for action, took in the situation at once. He stayed the rush in the nick of time by voice and action. He sprang into the midst of them, threatening them, striking them, beating them down, driving them back with his sword. It was a magnificent display of hardihood and courage, presence of mind and resource.
"To the pumps!" he cried with prompt decision. "For your lives, men! The English ship is sinking, and we'll go down with her unless you can keep us afloat!" he shouted in thunder tones with superb audacity. The battle lost was won again in that minute.
"Well done, Richard!" shouted Jones, leaping through the hatchway and seconding the daring ruse of his noble lieutenant by his own mighty voice and herculean efforts, crying masterfully, "Get to the pumps, men! Lively! for God's sake! The ship is sinking under your feet! The English ship is going!"
It was unparalleled assurance, but it won. The two officers actually succeeded in forcing the English prisoners to man the pumps, where they worked with a frantic energy born of their persistent daze of terror. This left the regular crew of the ship free to fight the fires and to do what they could with the remaining guns. As Jones sprang back to the quarter-deck, the surgeon, covered with blood, and appalled at the carnage, came running toward him, crying,--
"The ship is sinking, sir! The cock-pit is under water! I have no place to stow the wounded. We must surrender!"
"Strike! Strike!" cried De Chamillard, who was wounded. "We can do no more!"
"What, gentlemen!" cried Jones, "would you have me strike to a drop of water and a bit of fire? Up, De Chamillard! Here, doctor, help me get this gun over."
The surgeon hesitated, looked around again, and, not liking the appearance of things about him, turned and ran below. Not to his station, for that was under water. His mates had been killed. He wandered up and down the decks, doing what he could--which was but little--for the wounded where they lay. Assisted by two or three of the seamen, with his own hands Jones dragged one of the nine-pounders from the disengaged side of the deck across to the starboard side to take the place of a dismounted one; and, while the heavy battery of the Serapis continued its unavailing fire below, these three small guns under his personal direction concentrated their fire upon the mainmast of the Serapis.
The fortuitous position of the Americans in the enemy's tops enabled them to pour a perfect rain of small-arm fire upon the spar-deck of the Serapis with little possibility of effective return. Man after man was shot down by the side of the intrepid Pearson, who, whatever his other lack of qualifications, showed that he possessed magnificent personal courage, until he remained practically alone upon the deck,--alone, and as yet undaunted.
It is impossible to describe the scene. It is not within the power of words to portray the situation, after over two hours of the most frightful and determined combat. No two ships were ever in such condition; no battle that was ever fought was like it. The decks were covered with dead and dying; bands of men in different directions were fighting the fires; the smoke in lowering clouds hung heavily over the ships, for the wind had died and there was scarcely enough to blow it away. The pale moonlight mingled with the red glare from the flames and threw an added touch of lurid ghastliness trembling over the smoke-wrapt sea. From below came the steady roar of the Serapis' guns, from above the continuous crackling of the Richard's small arms. The noises blended in a hideous diapason of destruction, which rose to an offended Heaven in the horrid discord of an infernal region. The prisoners, still under the influence of their terror, toiled at the clanking pumps. The water gushed redly from the bleeding scuppers. Order, tactics, discipline, had been forgotten. Men glared with blood-shot eyes, set their teeth beneath foam-flaked lips, and fought where they stood,--fought in frenzy against whatever came to hand, whether it was the English ship, or the roaring flames, or the rushing waters. They recked nothing of consequences. In their frantic battle-lust they beat upon the sides of the other ship with their bare hands and bloody knuckles, and knew not what they did. Their breath came quick and short; the red of battle was before their vision; they had but one thought. Slay! Kill! One would have said that the brute instinct was uppermost in every heart. But in scenes of this kind it is not the greatest brute that wins, but the greatest soul; and the one man who still preserved his calmness in this orgy of war was the man to win the battle--Jones.