[A LOYAL TRAITOR.]
A STORY OF THE WAR OF 1812 BETWEEN AMERICA AND ENGLAND.
BY JAMES BARNES.
CHAPTER XI.
THE SWORD-FISH AND THE WHALE.
Now again we had changed our course, and were going before the wind directly to the westward. The breeze was light, and better for a small vessel than for a heavy, deep-laden man-of-war, and we might have run away in safety if we chose. That something was up, however, that meant adventure no one could help seeing.
Orders were given, without any bawling or shouting, to get down the top-gallant masts on deck. The crew worked like ants. (I loved them for the way they went about it.) The yards were lowered to the deck as quickly as if they were clothes-poles in a drying-yard. I had never seen anything done so neatly and with such despatch. Our headway decreased, of course, as we lost the use of our upper sails.
Mr. Spencer, who was aloft, reported to the deck: "We're hidden now, Captain Temple," he said. "She might pass within a quarter of a mile of us and never see us."