“Les Anglais! mille tonnères!” I heard the Frenchman in the brigantine’s main rigging exclaim, as he waved his clenched fist in the air. Then he retorted, in what he doubtless believed to be the purest English—
“Vat is dat you say, Monsieur Angleeshman? If I do not surrendaire, you vill blow me out of de vattar? Ha, ha! Sacre! It is I, monsieur, who vill blow dat footy leetle schooner of yours into ze sky, if you do not surrendaire yourshelf plus promptement, eh!”
“All right, monsieur; blaze away, then, as soon as you like!” retorted I, in the best attempt at French I could muster. Then, to my own people, who were at quarters—
“Stand by, starboard guns! Wait until she rolls toward us. Now, fire!”
Our imposing broadside of three guns rang out at the precise moment when the brigantine rolled heavily toward us, exposing her deck to our fire; and I heard the shot go crashing through her bulwarks to the accompaniment of sundry yells and screams, that told me they had not been altogether ineffective. Almost at the same instant three of her guns replied; but their muzzles were so deeply depressed, and she was just then rolling so heavily toward us, that the shot struck the water between her and ourselves, and we neither saw nor felt any more of them. Meanwhile, our square canvas being aback, our antagonist swept rapidly ahead of us; seeing which, I filled upon the schooner and bore up under the brigantine’s stern, raking with our port broadside as we crossed her stern, immediately hauling my wind and making a half-board across her stern again to regain my position upon her weather quarter. Our starboard guns were by this time reloaded, and we gave her the three of them, double-shotted, as we recrossed her; and the tremendous clatter, with the howls and shrieks that followed this discharge, showed that we had wrought a considerable amount of execution among the Frenchmen.
“There’s something gone aboard of him, but what it is I can’t make out,” exclaimed Lindsay, who was standing close beside me. “Ah!” he continued, “I see what it is now; it is her mainboom that we have shot away. I can see the outer end of it towing overboard. And see, she is paying off; with the loss of their after-sail they can no longer keep their luff!”
It was even as Lindsay had said; we had shot away the brigantine’s mainboom, and thus rendered her big, powerful mainsail useless; so that, despite the lee helm that they were giving her, she was gradually falling off, until within a minute or two she was nearly dead before the wind. This placed her almost completely at our mercy, for we were now enabled to sail to and fro athwart her stern, raking her alternately with our port and starboard guns, and with our nine-pounder as well, while she could only reply with two guns which her people had run out through her stern ports. Still, although disabled, she was by no means beaten, her plucky crew keeping up a brisk fire upon us from these two guns until by a lucky broadside we dismounted them both. But even then they would not give in; despite the relentless fire that we continued to pour into them, they contrived after a time to get two more guns into position, with which they renewed their fire upon us as briskly as ever. This sort of thing, however, could not continue for very long; our fire was so hot and our guns were so well aimed, that we fairly drove the plucky fellows from the only two guns that they could bring to bear upon us, and within a couple of minutes of the cessation of their fire, a lantern was waved aboard the brigantine, and someone hailed that they surrendered, while at the same moment all sheets and halliards were let go and her canvas came down by the run, as a further intimation that they had had enough of it.
Upon this we of course at once ceased firing, and ranged up alongside the prize, hailing her that we would send a boat aboard. Then, for the first time, we discovered that both our large boats were so severely damaged that neither of them would float; whereupon Lindsay offered to board the prize in the dinghy, with two hands, and take possession. Accordingly, the little cockleshell of a craft was dropped over the side, and in less than two minutes my chum hailed to say that he was safely aboard, and that the execution wrought by our fire had been terrible, the brigantine having lost nearly half her crew, both the captain and the chief mate being among the killed. He added that the brigantine’s long-boat was undamaged, and that he proposed to hoist her out, with the assistance of the prisoners, and send her to us by the two hands who had manned the dinghy, if we would look out to pick her up in the event of their being unable to bring her alongside. To this I of course agreed; and a quarter of an hour later the boat was safely alongside us, with a prize crew of twelve picked men tumbling themselves and their traps into her.
Meanwhile, what had become of the Three Sisters and the big ship? I looked round for them, and behold! there they both were, about half a mile to windward, and bearing down upon us in company!
“Phew!” thought I, “here is a nice business! While we have been playing the game of hammer and tongs down here, the big ship—doubtless manned by a strong prize crew—has run alongside the old brig and taken her! And yet—can it be so? Christie has eight hands with him, and I believe the fellow would make a stout fight for it before giving in. I cannot understand it; but we shall soon see. If they have captured him we shall have to recapture him, that is all!” Then, turning to the men, who were busy securing the guns and repairing such slight damage as had been inflicted upon our rigging, I said—