Now the battle was on in earnest. The two ships lay side by side, and for fifteen minutes the roar of cannon and the rattle of musketry filled the air, while cannon balls tore their way through solid timber and human flesh.
Down came the mizzen-mast of the Guerriere, cut through by a big iron shot.
"Hurrah, boys!" cried Hull, swinging his hat like a schoolboy; "we've made a brig of her."
The mast dragged by its ropes and brought the ship round, so that the next broadside from the Constitution raked her from stem to stern.
The bowsprit of the Guerriere caught fast in the rigging of the Constitution, and the sailors on both ships tried to board. But soon the winds pulled the Constitution clear, and as she forged ahead, down with a crash came the other masts of the British ship. They had been cut into splinters by the Yankee guns. A few minutes before she had been a stately three-masted frigate; now she was a helpless hulk. Not half an hour had passed since the Constitution fired her first shot, and already the Guerriere was a wreck, while the Yankee ship rode the waters as proudly as ever.
Off in triumph went the "Old Ironsides," and hasty repairs to her rigging were made. Then she came up with loaded guns. The Guerriere lay rolling like a log in the water, without a flag in sight. Not only her masts were gone, but her hull was like a sieve. It had more than thirty cannon-ball holes below the water-line.
There was no need to fire again. Lieutenant Read went off in a boat.
"Have you surrendered?" he asked Captain Dacres, who was looking, with a very long face, over the rail.
"It would not be prudent to continue the engagement any longer," said Dacres, in gloomy tones.
"Do you mean that you have struck your flag?"