"No, sir; her fore-yard is but now clear of the water, but she rises very fast."
"What do you think of her spars, Forster?" said Captain Oughton to Newton, who had just descended to the last rattling of the main-rigging.
"She is very taut, sir, and her canvas appears to be foreign."
"I'll bet you what you please it's that d——d fellow Surcoeuf. This is just his cruising ground, if the report of that neutral vessel was correct."
"Another hour will decide the point, sir," replied Newton; "but I must say I think your surmise likely to prove correct. We may as well be ready for him: a cruiser she certainly is."
"The sooner the better, Mr Forster. He's but a 'rum customer,' and 'a hard hitter' by all accounts. Clear up the decks, and beat to quarters."
The strange vessel came down with such rapidity that, by the time the captain's orders were obeyed, she was not more than two miles distant.
"There's 'instudding-sails;'—and in devilish good style too!" observed
Captain Oughton. "Now we shall see what he's made of."
The vessel rounded to the wind as soon as she had reduced her sails, on the same tack as the Windsor Castle, displaying her broadside, as the French would say, herissée de canons.
"A corvette, sir," said Newton, reconnoitring through his glass; "two-and-twenty guns besides her bridle ports. She is French rigged;—the rake of her stern is French;—in fact, she is French all over."