"Ah! there! there!" he muttered; "no!—yes!—that's it!—just a little!—just a frac— Let her go!"
The gun almost parted its breech tackles with the recoil, as the charge burst from the muzzle, tearing our nerves with its noise.
"I haven't hit her!" cried the captain, springing to the side, and gazing almost wildly at the brig—"haven't touched her. Load up again! Where's your powder? Load up, load up!"
"Hold on, sir!" exclaimed Mr. Gale. "Look! look! What's the matter with her foretopmast? It's going, sir—it's going."
As he spoke, the foretopmast of the slaver leaned heavily to leeward; then, like a falling tree by a river's brink, went swashing into the water.
The game was up with the fast-sailing brig. Confounded by the disaster, her crew attempted no revenge upon us, as they might have done, with their pivot cannon; and in less than half an hour the Dom Pedro, as she proved to be, was a prize to the pursuing sloop of war. Both our nine-pound balls had taken effect aloft.
It was found that the Brazilian brig had on board no less than five hundred slaves, among whom, to our great joy, were discovered Black Abe and Yellow Jack. The captain of the British cruiser delivered over to us our two shipmates; while with the rest of the blacks, the prisoners, and the prize, he prepared to bear away for Sierra Leone, where the wretched Africans would once more breathe the air of freedom.
How happy were Abe and Jack! How they laughed and cried, danced and wept! And oh! the tales they told us of the miserable slave brig!
In two months thereafter we arrived home with a full ship; and when the Hector had been hauled in at the pier head, it did us all good to see four little colored children, followed by their mothers, come running down to the water-side to be folded in the arms of the warm-hearted fellows who so short a time before must utterly have despaired of such a meeting.
"Dar's de ole gun dat saved us," said Abe, to his little family, indicating the nine-pounder.