“Every West Indiaman in those days carried a small arsenal of weapons—blunderbusses and cutlasses—for attacks by roving bands of sea-robbers were not infrequent. The men took the news well enough, although one or two of them went white. But there were enough old veterans among them to keep them steady and prevent a panic.
“I guess the resolute bearing of Captain Munson and Mr. Sterling had a good deal to do with putting heart into them. As for myself, I was horribly scared inside, but I trust that my alarm did not appear too conspicuously on my countenance.
“The men gave a cheer as Captain Munson concluded his little speech and I summoned three of them below to assist in the distribution of the arms. In the meantime Mr. Sterling gave orders to the men to rig up as many dummies as possible and station them along the bulwarks so that we might seem to be more in number than we actually were. This was a common enough trick in those days.
“I have to smile even now when I think of it, but one good fellow in his zeal even clapped a cap on top of the galley chimney, although what a man would have been doing poking his head out of ‘Charley Noble’—as the cook-house stack is called by seamen—is hard to say. By the time all our preparations were completed the craft that was overhauling us was not more than half a mile astern.
“She was a handsome craft and a witch at sailing. The Cambrian Hills was accounted a fast vessel; but we weren’t in it with our pursuer. If we had had any doubt as to her intentions toward us till then she soon dispelled it. From her bow came a flash and a puff of smoke and a ball screamed through our rigging. It did no harm—wasn’t meant to, probably—but it showed us that they ‘meant business.’
“The Cambrian Hills carried an old brass cannon, more for saluting purposes than anything else. But we had slugs on board and the piece of artillery was loaded up. But the enemy, as we now rightfully regarded her, was too far off for our carronade to be effective as yet. She, on the other hand, appeared to have a serviceable heavy gun. All this was not encouraging, but the prospect grew worse as we swept their decks with the glass. Fully forty men lined her bulwarks and we numbered only twenty, including the cook, who was not accounted a first class fighting man. Of him, however, more anon.
“I was a young fellow then and had always thought of pirates as being chaps all covered with finery, gold lace and jewels and such. I was stricken with astonishment to see that no such men appeared on the brigantine. They were all filthy, wretched looking things, many of them being coal-black negroes. Among them were even one or two Chinese. Such a mixture of races I never saw before or since.
“Suddenly Captain Munson, to my astonishment, snatched up his speaking trumpet and hailed the pirate, who was now almost alongside and to windward.
“‘Ship ahoy!’
“His voice was as bold as if he had been skipper of a man-o’-war hailing a sea criminal. It was a bold move, but it was successful in producing some confusion among the pirates. All at once a giant of a man with a black beard stepped up on the pirate’s rail, holding on by the lee forestays.