A Pirate of the Caribbees

by Harry Collingwood

But we were reckoning without our host—or rather, without the second stranger, whom we had been altogether too busy to give a thought to. As the smoke of our guns blew away to leeward, and we prepared to tack again preparatory to passing once more athwart the brig’s stern, I got a full and clear view of the stranger, who—approaching us from to windward—had hitherto been hidden from us by the brig and by the smoke of our combined cannonade. She was less than half a mile distant from us, and was at the moment in the very act of taking in her studding-sails. She was a brigantine, and a single glance at her sufficed to assure me that she was the Guerrilla, and that at last the feud between Morillo and myself was to be fought out to the bitter end. I had long ago prepared a red swallow-tailed burgee, such as the pirate had dared me to exhibit, and I immediately gave orders to hoist it at our fore royal masthead. The flag had scarcely reached the truck when I saw a black flag flutter out over the other brigantine’s rail and go soaring aloft to her gaff-end. Morillo had evidently recognised my challenge, and was prompt to answer it.

Sweeping under the brig’s stern again, at a distance of only a few fathoms, I hailed, asking whether they surrendered; but a pistol-shot, which flew close past my ear, was their only reply, so we gave them our starboard broadside, and then wore round to meet our new antagonist, leaving the brig meanwhile to her own devices.

I am of opinion that Morillo must have had a very shrewd suspicion as to our identity long before the exhibition of our burgee, because of the eager haste with which he bore down upon us. So eager, indeed, was he, that he carried his studding-sails just a minute or two too long; a mistake on his part, which enabled us to make a couple of short stretches to windward and secure the weather-gage before he was ready to round-to, although as soon as his people detected our purpose they worked with frantic haste to shorten sail.

The pirates opened the ball by giving us their whole larboard broadside while we were in stays, tacking toward them; but the guns were fired hurriedly, and did us no harm, the shot flying high over us and between our masts, without touching so much as a ropeyarn. Five minutes later we passed close across the Guerrilla’s stern, making a half-board to clear her, and delivered our larboard broadside, with the eighteen-pounder thrown in, every shot taking effect and raking her from end to end. Morillo was standing aft by the taffrail, and as we passed near enough to hear the wash of the water about the pirate vessel’s rudder, he suddenly snatched up a blunderbuss, and, singling me out, fired point-blank at me, one bullet knocking my cap off, while another lodged in my left shoulder, a third killing the man at our wheel, close behind me. The Guerrilla immediately ported her helm, while I, springing to our wheel, put it hard a-starboard, thus passing a second time athwart our antagonist’s stern; and again we raked her mercilessly, this time with our starboard broadside. Keeping our wheel hard over, we swept round until we were once more in stays, the Guerrilla having tacked toward us a minute earlier, with the evident intention of raking us in her turn. We were just a little too quick for her, however, gathering way so smartly that, as we neared each other, it became evident that, unless one or the other of us tacked again, we must inevitably run foul of each other. I had no mind for this sort of thing, however, as we should probably hurt ourselves quite as much as our antagonist; so, holding on until we had only just room to clear the Guerrilla, and singing out for a second shot to be rammed home in the larboard guns, I eased our helm down just at the right moment, ranging up so close to the other brigantine that we almost grazed her side, when we exchanged broadsides at precisely the same instant, with terrible effect on both sides. At the same moment our topsail was thrown aback to deaden our way, and as the Guerrilla passed ahead our helm was put hard up and we paid square off across her stern, firing our starboard broadside into her as we did so. The result this time was absolutely disastrous to the pirates, for the guns were fired at the precise moment when the Guerrilla’s stern was lifted up on the crest of a sea, while we were in the trough beyond; in consequence of which, our shot all struck her a trifle below her normal water-line, producing a very serious leak, which, even under the most favourable circumstances, it would have been exceedingly difficult to stop. But this was not the worst of it; the shot, by a lucky accident, so far as we were concerned, had somehow become concentrated, all of them taking effect upon the pirate’s rudder and stern-post, with the result that the former was shot away, and the latter, as well as two or three hood-ends, so badly started that ere ten minutes had elapsed it became apparent that the Guerrilla was rapidly filling.

Meanwhile, however, we held on across her stern, filling our topsail again, and tacking as soon as we had room; while the pirate brigantine, deprived of her rudder, shot into the wind and got in irons, obstinately refusing to pay off on either tack. This enabled us to sweep across her bows, pouring in our port broadside as we passed, raking her fore and aft, and bringing down her foremast by the run. Holding on for a few minutes, we next wore round—getting her starboard broadside as we passed—and then cut close across her stern again, raking her as before. By this time, however, it had become apparent that she was sinking, so, having once more tacked, we ranged up close athwart her stern, with our topsail aback, when, instead of firing, I hailed to ask if they surrendered.

“No, señor,” replied Morillo himself, who was standing aft close to the now useless wheel, “we will never surrender! I wrote you a letter—which I hope you received—in which I said that I would fight you until my ship sinks under me; and I mean to do so. I also told you that my feud with you is to the death; so, take that!” and therewith the scoundrel quickly levelled a pistol and, for the second time that day, fired point-blank at me! And there is no doubt whatever that this time he would have slain me—for the pistol was pointed so truly that I actually looked for a moment right into the barrel of it—had it not been for the Diane’s helmsman, who

unceremoniously seized me by the arm in the very nick of time and quickly pulled me aside. As it was, the bullet whistled close past my ear. This dastardly act so exasperated our people that forthwith, without waiting for orders, they poured the whole of our port broadside into the devoted craft, completely demolishing her stern, so that for a few seconds, as we drew slowly athwart her wake, we got a full view of her decks, which were cumbered with killed and wounded, and literally streaming with blood. Still, by a miracle, Morillo himself survived this last destructive broadside of ours; for when the smoke blew away I saw him still standing erect and shaking his fist defiantly at us.

It was by this time evident to us all that the Guerrilla was a doomed ship; she was settling fast in the water, and to continue firing upon her would only be a waste of ammunition. We therefore filled our topsail and, a few minutes later, tacked, again getting a broadside from the sinking ship, when we stationed ourselves square athwart her bows—where we were pretty well out of the way of her fire—and, with topsail aback and mainsheet eased off, waited patiently for the final moment, which we saw was rapidly approaching. Yet, even now, Morillo persisted in firing at us with his two bow guns, compelling us to fire upon him in return; and so the useless fight went on, until the Guerrilla had settled so low in the water that the sea welled in over her bows at every plunge of her, rendering it impossible to any longer maintain their fire. Then, with folded hands, we all stood by, watching for the end.

And a very melancholy picture it was upon which we looked. There was the illimitable expanse of ocean all round us, blue as sapphire, heaving in long, regular ridges of swell, and whipped into foam here and there by the scourging of the strong trade wind, with a rich blue sky above, dappled with wisps of trade-cloud, and the sun shining brilliantly down from the midst of them, causing the heaving waters to flash and glitter under his fiery beams, so that the sea that way was too dazzling to look at. And there, right in the centre of the glowing picture, lay the two brigantines—we with our bulwarks torn and splintered to pieces, our sails riddled with shot-holes, our rigging badly cut up, and our decks scored with shot-marks and littered with dead and wounded men; while the Guerrilla was an even more melancholy wreck than ourselves, as she lay heaving and rolling sluggishly, with her covering-boards awash and the sea sweeping her decks from stem to taffrail at every plunge, and the wreck of her foremast towing under her bows. There was not a soul visible on board her. When she first engaged us her decks had appeared to be crowded with men, but now most of them were either killed or wounded, and the few who had escaped seemed to have flung themselves down exhausted, for they had all disappeared. As for the craft herself, it was now only when she rose heavily upon the ridges of the swell that we could see her hull at all; and every plunge that she took into a hollow threatened to be her last. Yet she lingered, as though reluctant to leave the brilliant sunshine and the warm, strong breeze; lingered until I began to wonder whether she would not after all remain afloat, a water-logged wreck; and then, all in a moment, her stern rose high in the air, revealing her shattered rudder and stern-post, and with a long, slow, diving movement, she plunged forward, like a sounding whale, and silently vanished in a little swirl of water. We at once bore up for the spot where she had disappeared,—finding it easily by the torn and splintered fragments of wreckage that came floating up to the surface,—but her crew went down with her, to a man; for although we cruised about the spot for fully half an hour, we never saw even so much as a dead body come to the surface.