"She surely doesn't hope to catch us napping?" said I.
"God knows!" cried the mate. "What would I give now for a bit of moon!"
"If it's to be a fight it'll have to be a shooting match for a spell, or wind must come quickly," said I. "But if she meant mischief wouldn't she head to pass under our stern, where she could rake us, rather than steer to come broadside on?"
Instead of responding, the mate sprang on to the bulwark-rail, and in tones such as only the practised and powerful lungs of a seaman can fling, roared out—
"Ho, the ship, ahoy!"
We listened with so fierce a strain of attention that the very beating of our hearts rung in our ears; but not a sound came across the water. Twice yet did Mr. Hall hail that pallid fabric, shapeless as yet in the dark air, but to no purpose. On this there was much whispering among the men clustered about the guns. Their voices came along in a low, grumbling sound like the growling of dogs, dulled by threats.
"Silence, fore and aft!" cried the mate. "We don't know what she is—but we know what we are! and, as Englishmen, we surely have spirit enough for whatever may come."
There was silence for some minutes after these few words; then the muttering broke out afresh, but scattered, a group talking to larboard, another on the forecastle, and so forth.
Meanwhile the vessels, all insensibly, had continued to draw closer and closer to each other. A small clarification of the atmosphere happening past the stranger, suffered a dim disclosure of her canvas, whence I perceived that she had nothing set above her topgallant-sails, though it was impossible to see whether she carried royal-masts, or indeed whether the yards belonging to those masts were crossed on them. Her hull had now also stolen out into a pitch-black shadow, and after gazing at it with painful intentness for some moments, I was extravagantly astonished to observe a kind of crawling and flickering of light, resembling that which burnt in the sea, stirring like glow-worms along the vessel's side.
I was about to direct Mr. Hall's attention to this thing, when he said in a subdued voice, "Fenton, d'ye notice the faint shining about her hull? What, in God's name, can it be?"