"Pull for your lives!" cried Mr. Spencer. "Pull for your lives!"
We gave way together, and the heavy boat was soon hitting up a good pace and burying her nose as she rose and fell on the seas. The Lieutenant took a glance at the small compass, and headed us toward the northwest.
"We're close to Long Island," he said. "I can't make out the Young Eagle at all. That ship's the Britisher."
We had rowed but a few minutes longer when, as if by a miracle, the mist cleared away and the sun shone out. Clear and distinct a big vessel lay off to the eastward. The hated emblem of St. George flew at her peak.
"I thought as much," remarked Mr. Spencer to the cockswain. "She's grounded on the sand bank. That's what Temple counted on."
But hurrah! to the windward of the British vessel was a sight that gave us joy. There was the Young Eagle, eating up into the wind, with her jib-boom hanging, and one of her yards aslant. Somehow Temple had found time to get up his top-gallant masts again, for they were both in place. But now those on board the frigate had espied us; that was plain enough. She was not so large a vessel as she had first seemed, being of the smaller class, carrying probably not over thirty-two guns at the most. She was badly cut up from the effects of her encounter with the brig, however. Her foretopmast was gone, her mainyard was over the side, and all her running-gear in great confusion. If Captain Temple had been an officer of the regular navy he might have deserved cashiering for such a foolhardy bit of business as attacking a powerful vessel when he might have escaped. He was the only one on board the privateer, however, who had reckoned her at less than forty-four guns, and besides this, after his glance at the lead he knew where he was, and could have pricked his position to a certainty on the map. I know that now.
As Mr. Spencer had said, he surely must have counted on the proximity of the sand bar. If the frigate had been taking careful soundings, she would never have got on to it.
The fresh wind that had spoiled the fog was coming from the northward (I can recall no day in my seafaring life when it blew from so many different points as it had in the last ten hours). But I am wandering from the recital of what occurred, and now to pick it up again.
As I have stated, the frigate had seen us, and proof positive was not wanting, for a puff of smoke from one of the guns of her forward division leaped from her side, and the ball came spattering along toward us.
"Oh, shoot the shot!" laughed one of the bowmen. We were missed by fully a cable's length.