“Royal-yard there! can you make out how the strangers are steering, Mr Boyne? We are heading north-east and by north.”
“Ay, ay, sir; if that is the case the vessels ahead are steering about west-south-west.”
“That will do, Mr Boyne; you may come down, sir! Clear for action, Mr Pottle, if you please, and then let the crew go to quarters.”
“Ay, ay, sir. Clear for action, Mr Fidd!”
“Twee, twee, twee-e-e, tweetle, weetle, tee, tee, tee-e!” piped the boatswain, following up his shrill music with the hoarse bellow of:
“All hands clear for action. Now then, old stew-pan,”—to the cook—“dowse your galley-fire, my hearty, and stow away all your best chiney down in the run. Tumble up there, you bull-dogs, tumble up!”
It was no very long job to prepare the schooner for action, and in twenty minutes everything was ready—the magazine opened, powder and shot passed up on deck, the guns cast loose and loaded, the pikes cut adrift from the main-boom, arms served out to the crew, and every man at his appointed station. By this time the lower yards of the brig had risen level with the horizon, whilst the upper half of the frigate’s topsails could be seen from the deck. The firing, meanwhile, had gone on pretty deliberately, and it was now possible to see from our deck, with the aid of a telescope, that the sails of both pursuer and pursued were suffering pretty extensively from the effects of the cannonade. It was evident that each was firing high, the frigate trying to wing the brig and so arrest her flight, whilst the brig was equally anxious to maim her big antagonist’s spars, by which means only could she hope to effect her escape. So far the brig appeared to be getting rather the best of it, for though her canvas showed the daylight through it in several places, her spars and running gear still remained uninjured, and every sail was drawing to the utmost advantage, whilst the frigate had lost her fore royal-mast, which, with its sail, was hanging down over the topgallant-sail and topsail, and the main-topmast studding-sail tack was cut and the sail streaming out loose and flapping furiously in the wind; these little casualties being sufficient to enable the brig to hold her own, for the time being at least, in the unequal race. To encourage the plucky little vessel, by showing her that help was at hand, we now fired a gun and hoisted our colours, allowing the ensign to stream as far out to leeward as possible, in the act of running it up to the gaff-end, in order that those on board her might catch a glimpse of it before it was hidden by our canvas. Approaching each other as we were, nearly end on, we rose each other very rapidly; and at length we in the Dolphin had the satisfaction of seeing the frigate, the vessel most distant from us, fairly hull-up. She had by this time cleared away the wreck of her fore royal-mast, had spliced her studding-sail tack, and was in the very act of setting the sail again when the brig’s two stern-chasers spoke out simultaneously, and next moment down toppled the frigate’s fore and main-topgallant-masts with all attached, the topgallant studding-sail booms snapping off like carrots at the same time, and there the noble craft was in a pretty mess. A ringing cheer, which those on board the brig might almost have heard, went up from our lads at this sight, followed by a hoarse murmur of:
“Lookout! now Johnny Crapeau has lost his temper, and the brig is going to get loco in ’arnest!” as the frigate put her helm down and fired her whole broadside at the flying craft. There was not so very much damage done, after all, so far as the brig was concerned. Her peak-halliards were cut and she temporarily lost the use of her main trysail, and we could see a rope’s-end or two streaming out here and there in the wind; but that was all, excepting that her canvas showed a few extra eyelet-holes. With the frigate, however, it was different; by yielding to his feeling of exasperation, as he had, her skipper had been betrayed into a very unseamanlike act, in luffing his ship with all her studding-sails upon her, and the result was that he lost the remainder of his booms in an instant, and found himself in a worse pickle than ever.
By this time the brig had passed far enough to leeward of us to be able to clearly distinguish the colour of our bunting; and seeing also that we were indisputably holding our luff so as to close with the frigate, she accepted us as a friend, notwithstanding our decidedly rakish appearance, and at once coolly began to shorten sail, evidently now determined, with our aid, to try conclusions with her big antagonist. It was about time for us to do the same; we accordingly clewed up and furled our royal and topgallant-sail, hauled down and stowed the gaff-topsail and main-topmast staysail, brailed in the foresail, and triced up the tack of the mainsail; which left the schooner in condition to be worked by less than a dozen hands. By the time that this had been accomplished, the running gear hauled taut, rope’s-ends coiled down, and everything made ship-shape on board us, we had arrived within a distance of something like two miles of the frigate, at which juncture she fired a shot at us from her bow gun, possibly as a hint to us not to interfere with her. The shot fell short several yards.
“Umph!” remarked Woodford from his post at the helm, “nothing very terrific about that! A twelve-pounder, apparently, and a shockingly poor aim. Our thirty-two will make the Johnnies open their eyes with astonishment, I expect.”