“A fine craft that is, Charles,” said he to his son.
“Yes, sir,” replied the latter, “a very beautiful model.”
“Look at her run, what a beautiful stern, and how sharp at the bows!” continued the old gentleman, with enthusiasm.
“And how remarkably fast she sails, too,” rejoined Charles.
“Hum!” remarked the old gentlemen, “she seems very light to be a trader.”
“It strikes me so, too,” replied Charles.
“The merchant who could have built that vessel to carry cocoa and coffee, must have been a very great fool, Charles,” continued the commander, still looking at the tidy brig that was sailing away magnificently before him.
“Yes, sir.”
“I begin to have my suspicions, Charles,” resumed the commander, after a pause, “that Mexican flag protects many a rascal: I shall make the fellow heave to.”
So saying, he ordered a gun to be fired, as a signal to the brig to lie to. The report of the huge machine of destruction rang over the waters, and the shot skipped the waves and sank. The suspicious brig paid no attention to it, but held her course, and, in four hours’ time, went out of sight, leaving the commander in now stronger suspicion with regard to her nature and character, and, in a furious rage into which he was thrown by the cool contempt with which his command was treated. He looked at the brig that was leaving his vessel behind, as if the latter was at anchor, and fretted, when he considered that his large ship was unable to enforce his order on account of its comparative slowness. With greater impatience than reason he looked only at what was, for the moment, a defect in the large man-of-war, and forgot, at the time, that if the two small vessels which had so mortified him, those two consecutive days, had over his ship the accident of speed, she, in her turn, possessed the infinitely more serviceable advantage of greater strength and more heavy metal.