Then as a shot fell short, he laughed: "Look at that drop, will you? Do you think I'm going to dive for it?"
A moment later a shell flew past so close that the windage almost staggered him, but the daring lad only cried banteringly: "That's more like it. One more a little closer and I'll show you a home run worth seeing."
And so it went until he was espied from the bridge and peremptorily ordered down.
In the meantime, while this little episode was in progress, we on the gun deck were laboring without cessation. A dozen shots had been fired from Number Eight alone, when suddenly another fort secured the range, and began a deadly fusillade.
The situation was becoming extremely serious!
CHAPTER XV.
COALING IN THE TROPICS.
The well-directed fire of the forts at the entrance to Cienfuegos was rapidly making the "Yankee's" position untenable, and it soon became apparent that we would have to give way before overwhelming odds. Fifteen minutes after the battle began between the Spanish gunboat and the "Yankee," the former beat a hasty retreat, steaming back into the harbor.