The fire below made very rapid headway, and effectually prevented her men from working the lower-deck guns; it thus happened that with one discharge from the English guns one of the two Spanish ships engaged was seriously crippled.
The two craft, however, responded gallantly from their upper decks with what cannon they were still able to serve, and a perfect hail of arrows and arquebus bullets swept the English decks, mowing down men in all directions.
The English had quietly reloaded those of their broadside guns that were on the side of the enemy, the guns of the port broadside being still undischarged.
“Now, lads,” roared Cavendish above the clamour and din of rending timber and falling spars, “give them another broadside; and let the musketeers on the upper decks and the bowmen in the fore and after castles follow it up with a volley, in order to clear their decks. Immediately after the discharges the boarders are to follow me!”
At the commencement of the engagement Roger and Harry, seeing what was likely to happen, had laid aside their light rapiers and armed themselves with a pair of pistols apiece and the more formidable English hanger as used by the ordinary seamen; and shoulder to shoulder they stood by the starboard bulwarks, ready to spring as soon as Cavendish should give his order to board.
Meanwhile the three other Spaniards, seeing the manoeuvre of the English and the danger of their consorts, had made all sail as quickly as possible, and were now running away before the wind in order to go about and stand up on the starboard tack to engage the English vessels and relieve their companions, which were in a somewhat parlous state.
The guns of the English ships’ starboard broadsides now once more opened fire with a simultaneous crash, which was immediately followed by a discharge of musketry and arrows which laid low on the Spaniard’s deck nearly every living soul who had not taken what cover the deck structures afforded.
“Now, boarders,” roared Cavendish, his voice ringing high above the turmoil, “away with you, and do not leave their decks until their flag comes down!”
With a wild cheer the seamen, headed by Cavendish—who was closely supported by Roger and Harry, who were respectively second and third on the enemy’s decks,—dashed at the Spaniards.
One of the two Spanish ships was now blazing fiercely, having been set on fire by the discharges of the English guns, and her crew were beginning to think that the time had arrived for them to leave her. In this opinion they were confirmed by the English, who were gradually driving them from their own decks to those of their consort. They were thus, as it were, between two fires, and were badly hampered by the necessity to climb from the one vessel to the other. Those of them who could not gain the deck of the other ship were driven overboard, and very few of them survived to reach their goal.