looking out at the stranger, and those considered themselves fortunate who could command the use of a spyglass. One person—bully Pigeon—was below, and he sat quaking on a chest in the orlop deck, where he had been told that he would be least likely to have his head shot away.
“I am a non-combatant, you know. It would be very wrong in me to expose my life,” he observed with a trembling lip. “If I was one of you, of course I would do my duty as bravely as anybody; but as I am a civilian, and am come aboard for my health, I think it is my duty to take care of myself.”
“Oh! of course,” was the reply; “so precious a person should run no risk of losing his valuable life.”
“Oh, I wish poor Adair were with us,” exclaimed Jack. “He did so wish to see a real fight; and to have to go out of the world without having been in one was very trying.” Jack spoke just as his feelings for the moment prompted him, without much consideration, I suspect.
“Do you know, Rogers, that since we escaped in so wonderful a way from drowning, I have more than once thought that perhaps some of the people of the Onyx may have been saved,” observed Murray. “I do not say that I have any great hopes on the subject, but still I cannot help thinking that it is possible.”
“I’m afraid not, though; we should have heard of them before now,” replied Jack. “But if anybody escaped, I would rather it were Paddy Adair than any one else.”
Their conversation was cut short by that rolling sound of a drum which makes the heart of every true man-of-war’s man leap with joy. It followed the captain’s order to the first lieutenant, “Beat to quarters.” What magic was there in the sound of those words! In an instant every one, from the first lieutenant to the smallest powder-monkey, was in full activity. Bulkheads were knocked away, firescreens were put up, the gallery fire was extinguished, the magazines were opened, powder and shot were handed up, the small-arms were served out, the men buckled on their cutlasses, and stuck their pistols in their belts.
Although Captain Lascelles fully believed that he should gain the victory, he was too good an officer and too wise a man not to take every possible means to secure it. It was soon evident that the Racer was coming up hand-over-hand with the chase, and before long it was clearly made out that she was, at least, a fifty-gun ship. She showed no colours, and as to her nationality opinions were divided. Some thought she was French; but then in opposition to this conjecture, it was asserted that a French fifty-gun ship was not likely to run away from a frigate, whereas a Turk or an Egyptian was very likely indeed to do so. The officers on board them were generally very inefficient, while a total want of discipline prevailed.
“That craft ahead must have a very bad conscience, or she would not be in such a hurry to get out of our way,” observed Jack; “she’s a Turk, or I am a Dutchman.”
“So the captain thinks, which is fortunate, or you might have to turn into a Dutchman, or else break your word,” observed Murray.
“I wish that he were a Frenchman. I should so like to have a tussle with him,” said Jack. “Let people talk as they will about liberty, equality, and fraternity, I agree with my father, that the French never will like the English till they have taught us to eat frogs, and have thrashed us on a second field of Waterloo, and I hope that time may never come.”
“I hope not either,” said Murray. “But I have no wish to go to war with France or Frenchmen. If they are bad friends, they are worse enemies, and not to be despised, depend on that; no people could have fought better than they did during the last war.”
“That is the reason I should like to fight them again,” exclaimed Jack. “What is the use of fighting with people who can’t fight?”
Murray laughed at Jack’s style of reasoning. He had not arrived at the conclusion which an older man might have reached, that fighting under any circumstances is a dreadful business, and that the person who gives the cause for the fight does a very wicked thing, utterly hateful in the sight of God. Never let that truth be forgotten.
Darkness was now rapidly coming on. The stranger could just be seen looming through it. Captain Lascelles felt pretty confident, however, that he should come up with her before she could make her escape. Night at last settled completely down over the ocean; still she could be seen, though very indistinctly. On the two ships flew before the breeze. At length the master, who had been examining the chart in his cabin, came up to the captain.
“We are drawing in very near to the coast, sir,” said he. “It will be safer to keep the lead going.”
“But where the ship ahead can float so can we,” observed Captain Lascelles.
“She may manage to run in between reefs on which we may strike. Never let us trust to the leading of an enemy, sir,” was the answer.
“You are right, master, you are right!” exclaimed Captain Lascelles, in a tone of warm approval. “Send a hand with the lead into each of the chains. We’ll run no risk of casting the ship away.”
Soon the voices of the leadsmen were heard through the still silence of night, as the gallant frigate clove her way through the calm waters.
“By the deep nine,” sang out one on the starboard side.
“By the mark seven,” was soon afterwards heard from the man in the port chains.
“Quarter less six,” was the next shouted out.
“We are shoaling our water rapidly,” observed Captain Lascelles to the first lieutenant. “Stand by to go about.”
All eyes had been fixed on the dark mass ahead. Onward it seemed to glide through the darkness. Every one felt certain that their eyes did not deceive them. There still appeared, they all believed, the sails of the stranger, a huge towering pinnacle reaching to the sky. Yet so near the ground were they that it was dangerous for the frigate, though of course drawing much less water, to stand on.
“Was she a ship of mortal fabric?” some of the more superstitious among the seamen began to ask.
As they looked, the tall pyramid seemed to rock, and then suddenly to dissolve into the air. A sound, at the same time, came from the southward, as if of breakers dashing on a rocky shore.
“Hands about ship,” shouted the captain, with startling energy.
The cry was repeated by the first lieutenant, and quick almost as the answer of an electric message, the boatswain’s whistle uttered the well-known call along the decks. Round came the ship, and when the eyes of those on board were turned to the south, not an indication could be discovered of the ship which had thus far led them in the chase.
“We’ll keep her off and on during the night,” said the captain to the first lieutenant.
“At daylight we will stand in, and see what has become of her. There is little doubt, however, that she has gone on shore. I trust, as there is not much sea on, that the people will contrive to save themselves.”
At this time the Sultan of Turkey was running a great risk of losing the greater part if not the whole of his dominions. Mehemet Ali was one of the most remarkable men who have appeared in the East during this century. Although of the lowest origin and unable to read, having become a soldier, he raised himself by his talents and intrigues to the highest rank in the Turkish army. Being sent to Egypt, he deposed the ruler of that province, and became pacha in his stead. He even showed that he allowed no sentimental scruples to prevent him from accomplishing any object on which he had set his heart. Believing that the Mamelukes might be as troublesome to him as they had often proved to the Sultan, he invited 500 of them to a feast, and then had all of them murdered with the exception of one, who escaped by leaping his horse over a high wall. The idea was simple and very oriental. He might have made them his friends, but he thought that might be too difficult a task, so he chose the other alternative. Now Mehemet Ali thought that it would be much pleasanter to be an independent sovereign than a tributary to the Porte, so he threw off the Turkish yoke. Then he thought that he might as well rule over Syria also, and