A cry of "Sail ho!" from the mast-head attracted the attention of everybody, and made a sudden end to the story of the Flying Dutchman.
I forgot to say that when we found in the morning that the man-of-war was quite out of sight we changed our course back to the proper one; that is, the one on which we were running when we sighted that unwelcome stranger. The new sail was reported dead ahead: there was a bare possibility that it might be the one whose acquaintance we made the day before, and I heard the captain say to the mate that we'd better change our course and avoid her; but no orders were given to do so. The captain and mate went out of earshot of the men, and so I can't tell what they talked about. They kept looking every little while, or rather the captain did, at the sail which we were steadily nearing. It was evident that she was not running in the same direction that we were, or we would not have overhauled her so rapidly.
We had the weather-gauge of her, though, just as the Britisher had the weather-gauge of us the day before. Consequently, if we did not like her looks on getting nearer, it was quite easy for us to get out of her way. It was my watch on deck at the time, and when I could do so I took a squint at the ship, and wondered why the captain did not turn away and leave her to herself.
On and on we went; and after a time Haines said to me,——
"I don't believe that's any man-of-war at all!"
"Why so?" I asked.
"Why, don't you see?" said he, "a man-of-war always looks a great deal more trim and neat than a merchantman: they've plenty of men on board to do all the work they want, and more too; and sometimes the officers sits up nights to study up things to keep the men busy. The captain has made out long ago that she ain't no man-of-war; for I can see it with my naked eye. Her sails are all hanging lopsided like, and I'll bet from the looks of her she's mighty short-handed in crew. Our captain's running to speak to her; or, at all events, he's running near enough for it."
The wheel had been put over a point or two and the yards braced around, so that we were headed directly for the stranger. All the sailors on the Washington were studying her, and wondering what she could be, and she was guessed to be anything and everything that ever sailed the seas. One of the men even guessed that she was an Indiaman, bound home from round the Cape of Good Hope. I had seen pictures of Indiamen and she certainly wasn't anything of that kind. Then she was thought to be an English or French trader to the West Indies, and one of our men thought she was a Spanish craft from some Spanish port to Mexico. The suggestion that she was an Indiaman was laughed at, as she was quite out of the course of vessels from the Cape of Good Hope for England, and at that time we had practically no ships sailing between American ports and the East Indies.