Exploding the “infernal” at Tripoli.
As the two American boats disappeared like magic, and as if they had vanished from the face of the water, the Tripolitan gunboats closed up, and in another moment the Americans found themselves surrounded on all sides but one by the corsairs, and that one side was next the fire-ship. The Tripolitans, with a yell of triumph, prepared to spring over the side.
“Are you ready to stand to your word, men?” asked Somers, standing up in the boat, with a lighted torch in his hand.
“Ay, ay, sir!” promptly answered every man in both boats, laying down his oars.
“And I!” called out Wadsworth.
“And I!” said Pickle Israel, in his sweet, shrill, boyish voice.
“Then may God bless our country, and have mercy on us!” said Somers solemnly, and throwing the torch upon the Intrepid’s deck.
The next moment came an explosion as if the heavens and the earth were coming together. The castle rocked upon its mighty base like a cradle. The ships in the harbor shivered from keel to main truck, and many of them careened and almost went over. The sky was lighted up with a red glare that was seen for a hundred miles, and the deafening crash reverberated and almost deafened and paralyzed all who heard it.
Those on the American ships heard the frightful roar of the hundred barrels of gunpowder that seemed to explode in an instant of time, and, stunned by the concussion, they could only see a mast and sail of the ketch as they flew, blazing, up to the lurid sky, and then sank in the more lurid water.