The Nonsuch had tacked twice, working to windward up the narrow channel, when Dyer shouted the news that the Spanish ship had apparently slipped her cable, and was under way, running down toward them; and he followed up the news by descending the fore-rigging and making his way aft, where he stationed himself on the poop beside George, in readiness to supervise the working of the ship while the latter fought her.
The two men had only time to exchange a few hurried words together when the Spanish ship was seen to windward, coming down toward them under full sail. And a gallant sight she looked, with her brightly-painted hull, her big gilded figure-head and head rails flashing in the sun, her mastheads and yard-arms bedizened with banner and pennons streaming in the breeze, and her painted sails bellying and straining at yard and stay with the warm breathing of the trade-wind. She was still some two miles distant, and it would be at least ten minutes before she arrived within gun-shot.
“Pilot,” said George, turning to Dyer, after he had eyed the stranger carefully, “let the mariners clew up and furl our topgallants. I believe we can do without them, by the look of yonder ship, which seems to be not nearly so fast as ourselves, and there will be the less tackle for the men to handle when it comes to manoeuvring, and consequently the more men free to fight.”
The order was given; the men sprang to the topgallant halliards and sheets, cast them off, manned the clewlines and buntlines, and clewed up the topgallants. Then a dozen of them—six forward and six aft—leapt into the rigging, clambered it with the alacrity of squirrels, neatly furled the sails, and were on their way down again from aloft when the first gun from the Spaniard boomed out across the still waters of the channel, to be echoed a little later by the distant hills. The shot flew wide, striking the water nearly a hundred fathoms away on the Nonsuch’s lee bow.
“Now,” cried George, turning to a man who had for some time been standing by the ensign staff, “you may hoist away and let the Dons see with whom they are about to fight.” And in obedience to his command the glorious Red Cross on its white field floated out over the taffrail and went soaring majestically to the head of the staff, to be greeted with cheer after cheer by the crew.
The Nonsuch was now on the starboard tack, heading to the northward, and it looked as though the Spaniard meditated crossing her stern and raking her at close quarters as she crossed. To counter this manoeuvre, therefore, Dyer gave the order “Ready about!” and as the sail-trimmers sprang to their stations, George shouted an order to the gunners of the starboard battery to be ready to fire at the word of command. The men accordingly blew their smouldering matches vigorously, again looked to the priming of their ordnance, and held themselves ready to discharge at the word. Up swept the Nonsuch into the wind, with all her sails ashiver in the brisk breeze, and, watching carefully, George gave the order to fire at the exact moment when the Spanish ship was square abeam. The Spaniard discharged her broadside at the same instant, and immediately succeeding the thunder of the two broadsides those on board the Nonsuch heard the distant thud of their pounding shot and the crackling crash of splintering spars; and, looking eagerly in the direction of the Spanish ship, they saw that they had shot away her foremast and bowsprit, both of which were in the very act of falling. So they raised three joyous cheers and fell to loading their pieces again, while their comrades, who had not yet fired, looked to see where the Spanish shot had gone. But, with the exception of two holes in the Nonsuch’s mainsail, and a severed brace dangling from the fore-topsail yardarm, no damage was discoverable, whereat they cheered again.
The Spanish ship continued to forge ahead on her original course for a distance of a few fathoms, and then the wreck of her foremast and bowsprit, towing alongside and still attached to her hull by the standing and running rigging, dragged her head round to starboard, whereupon she instantly broached to. Meanwhile the Nonsuch, having stayed, was paying off on the larboard tack, the relative positions of the two ships being such that a collision seemed imminent. George saw that the situation was such as to demand instant decision, and he immediately made up his mind what to do.
“Keep her away, Mr Dyer,” he commanded, “and run alongside the enemy to leeward. Keep your head sail aback to deaden our way, or we shall never get the grapnels to hold. Stand by there to larboard to heave your grappling irons. Archers and musketeers, discharge me a volley upon the decks of yonder ship; and, gunners of the larboard battery, be ready to fire a broadside of ordnance, great and small, into her at the moment when you feel us touch. Then, boarders, be ready to follow me.” And he drew his sword.
The next moment a shower of arrows and musket balls swept the decks of the stranger with devastating effect, as might be gathered from the chorus of shrieks and yells of anguish that arose from the deck of the Spaniard. An answering volley was instantly returned by the enemy, but it was wild, straggling, and feeble, bearing eloquent testimony to the state of confusion that already prevailed on board her, and which did little harm; and this state of confusion was further demonstrated by the sight of an officer on her poop waving his sword violently and shouting orders to which nobody seemed to pay the slightest attention. A minute later the hulls of the two ships crashed together, the grappling irons were thrown at the precise instant that the Nonsuch poured a destructive broadside into her antagonist, and before the ships had time to recoil from the impact, George, at the head of some fifty boarders, leapt from the one ship to the other, and the party proceeded to lay about them with sword, pike, and musket butt with such fell determination that after a few seconds’ resistance on the part of the Spaniards the latter flung down their weapons and called for quarter.
George turned to the officer, who had now descended from the poop to the main deck and was valiantly fighting, single-handed, with his back to the front of the poop cabins, and cried to him: