I saw the Yarmouth on the port quarter. She loomed dimly through the gloom nearly a mile away, and as I looked I saw the intermittent flashes of her bow-chasers and heard the regular firing.
A shot from one of her long twenty-fours tore past me, and killed a man who was just starting aft to join in the affray on the poop. I thought for an instant that they might know on the Yarmouth what was taking place on board the Randolph, but afterwards I found they knew nothing.
In a few moments the men forward began to see what had happened aft, and they just recovered themselves as Robinson and his crew finished off the last man and were running the ship away to the northward without a thought of engaging the enemy.
So far the villains had been successful, and with another turn of good luck would be masters of a large frigate, fully equipped and provisioned for a long cruise.
Robinson could then have become a wealthy pirate in the West Indian and South American waters, and retired from the sea in a year or two without much danger of being caught, for his vessel was larger and faster than any he would be likely to meet. From the capes of Virginia to the river Plate no vessel of this size had cruised for years, and he would have had a good chance to make a clean sweep before anything caught up with him.
But this turn of luck for him did not occur. When he had finished his deadly work aft and started his men forward, our men rallied, and, led on by the under officers left alive, began to make a stand.
Robinson rushed his men on in a style worthy of a better cause. And the way that great bald ruffian went into our poor fellows was astounding.
They charged up the port gangway in a close body and engaged with pike and cutlass, forcing those before them who were not cut down, until they reached the mainmast. Robinson appeared like a fiend. He roared and yelled to his men to press on, and slashed right and left with amazing power.
The great bald ruffian, who now appeared as his right-hand man, kept close to him, and they went along that deck leaving a bloody path to mark their course.
They cut down and killed or wounded every man who had the hardihood to dispute their way. I saw Robinson strike a gunner a blow that stretched him dead with his skull cleft to the ears, and then, instantly recovering his weapon, he drove it clear through the body of the man next to him.