“Ah!” remarked the skipper; “they have made us out, and evidently don’t quite like our looks. I suppose her captain thinks that, having hauled his wind, we shall now make sail in chase of him if we happen to be an enemy. But I know a trick worth two of that. You did quite right, Mr Bowen, not to shift your helm. Let him stand on another three miles as he is going, and then we will show him who and what we are. Just so; there goes his bunting—Dutch, as you thought. He is beginning to feel a little anxious. Perhaps it would ease his mind a bit if you were to run the tricolour up to our gaff-end, Mr Bowen.”
I did so, and we kept it flying for the next half-hour, by which time the Dutchman had been brought well out on our weather beam, about six miles distant, and his retreat cut off. We then hauled down the French flag and made sail, still, however, holding on upon the same tack. By the time that we had got our topsail, topgallant-sail, flying-jib, and small gaff-topsail set the stranger was about two points abaft our weather beam, and we at once tacked in chase. This was the signal for an immediate display of confusion on board the Dutchman; which ship immediately set her royals and flying-jib, and, when she found that that would not do, bearing away sufficiently to permit of her setting all her larboard studding-sails again. Of course, as soon as she bore away we bore away too, steering such a course as would enable us to gradually converge upon her.
But we had hardly been in chase half an hour when another large ship appeared in sight ahead, steering toward us; and, approaching each other rapidly, as we were, another quarter of an hour sufficed us to discover that she was a frigate, and undoubtedly French. We stood on, however, a few minutes longer, trying to devise some scheme for slipping past her without being brought to, but it evidently would not do; her people suspected us, and clearly intended to have a nearer look at us if they could; so, as she was altogether too big a craft for us to tackle, we were reluctantly compelled to abandon the chase, and heave about to ensure our own escape. And now it became our turn to play the part of the pursued; for as we went in stays the frigate fired a gun, to ascertain whether we were within range, most probably, hoisted her ensign, and made all sail in chase. The shot—a twelve-pounder, we judged it to be by the sound of the gun—fell short; yet at the same time it came near enough to satisfy us that we had not turned tail a moment too soon.
Captain Winter at once jammed the schooner close upon a wind, the vessel heading up about west-north-west for the chops of the Channel, in the hope of both out-weathering and out-sailing the frigate. But the wind had shown a disposition to freshen all day, and was by this time piping up so spitefully that we had been obliged to furl our topgallant-sail and haul down our flying-jib as soon as we hauled our wind; moreover there was a nasty, short jump of a sea on, into which the Dolphin plunged to her knight-heads every time. The weather was, therefore, all in the frigate’s favour, and very soon, to our extreme annoyance, we discovered that the Frenchman was slowly but surely gaining upon us; for when the frigate had been in chase about half an hour, she fired another gun, the shot from which reached within twenty fathoms of us, and it was capitally aimed, too.
“We must get the topgallant-sail and flying-jib on her again, Mr Bowen, and shift our small gaff-topsail for the big one. This will never do; we shall be within range in another half-hour; and then, if that fellow happens to wing us, we shall be done for!”
“The sticks will never bear it, sir,” answered I. “Look at our topmasts now; they are bending like fishing-rods as it is; and unless we rig the preventers pretty quickly we shall lose them, in my opinion.”
“Then get up your preventers at once, my dear fellow,” answered the skipper; “and be as smart as you please about the job. One thing is quite certain, and that is that unless we can drive the schooner a little faster we shall be nabbed!”
“Perhaps, sir,” said I, “if we were to keep the schooner away about half a point she would go along more freely. We are looking a good point higher than the frigate at present, but we are hugging the wind so closely that we have no life in us, and are losing as much as we gain.”
The skipper looked at the frigate astern, then up at the weather leech of our own topsail, which was lifting at every plunge of the schooner.
“Perhaps you are right, George,” said he. “At all events your suggestion is worth trying. So, my man,” to the helmsman, at the same time peering into the binnacle, “keep her away to west-by-north; nothing higher.”