“You may be doing right, Kenard, but Heaven
defend us from other dangers than the elements
threaten us with.”

These several orders were executed; and the
yacht lay rocking, with scarcely any progressive
motion, on the sluggish surges, which all at once
began to heave and swell, as if lifted by some vast
and mysterious power beneath. She was nearly
divested of her canvass, yet still beautiful in her
nakedness, showing to advantage the graceful symmetry
of her tapering spars, and the exquisite shape
and proportions of her hull. Like a bird seated on
the water, she yielded to every undulation of the
heaving billows with a grace that seemed the instinct
of life.

The stillness that now reigned was profound and
awful.

“List, my lord,” said the captain, after the lapse
of a few moments, during which all eyes were
turned to watch the storm-cloud walking the skies
in its power, and flinging its broad shadow on the
sea.

The earl bent his ear more acutely, and heard a
deep moaning sound, like winds bowling in caverns
under-sea. Gradually it grew louder, and at the
same time the dark cloud cast itself across the skies
towards the zenith, its edges streaming in advance,
like hair blown out by the wind. In a few seconds
the moon was darkened, the stars became suddenly
extinguished, and an impenetrable gloom fell like a
pall over the deep. Not a breath yet moved the
air. But deeper and more awful grew the moan of
the storm as it swept down the sea. Louder and
louder it came, and now was distinctly heard the
roar of agitated waves, tossed by the shrieking
winds; and between the sky and sea, which seemed
to meet within reach of the hand, glared a line of

[figure description] Page 018.[end figure description]

white foam, seeming, to their imaginations, the glittering
and gnashing teeth of the mad tempest. The
earl hid his head within his cloak, and uttered a
prayer for the safety of the souls on board; the captain
stood upon a gun, with his eyes upon the coming
storm, professionally cool and collected.

“Two steady men go to the aid of the helmsman,”
he said, in a calm, low voice. “She will
bear nothing, Howel; we must make an Eolian
harp of her. So! stand by the topsail halyards.”

“All ready, sir,” replied the lieutenant, in the
same subdued tone.

“Let go all!”

The topsails came down by the run, and in a moment's
time were furled by the active seamen.

“Let go the jib and spanker,” he now shouted,
in an energetic tone.

“All gone, sir!”

The yacht was now under bare poles, and left to
the mercy of the hurricane. The roar of the coming
tempest was now deafening, and the vessel began
to pitch wildly, yet there was no sensible agitation
of the air.

“Every man throw himself on his face to the
deck!” cried the captain, suddenly, in a loud tone.
“My lord, you will be safer below. Our decks
will be swept clean as your hand.”

“I will remain, Kenard.”

“And I will remain with you, uncle,” said Grace,
suddenly appearing before them like a spirit, in her
snowy night-robe, which seemed like a garment of
pale light in the surrounding blackness and gloom;
“I will share the danger by your side,” she added,
with decision.

There was no time to refuse her entreaty or
conduct her to the cabin—the tempest burst upon
them, as if a cloud, swelling with wind and rain,
had broken over the vessel. Instantly all who

[figure description] Page 019.[end figure description]

were on their feet were prostrated. Howling and
shricking through the rigging, accompanied by a
crashing and splintering that appalled every soul on
board with the present sense of danger, it swept
over them with terrific fury. Borne down by its
weight, the vessel careened till she lay almost on
her beam's end, while the mad surges leaped over
her bulwarks and deluged the nearly perpendicular
decks. The darkness became illumined by a
wild, strange light from the foaming sea, and every
object was distinctly seen by its supernatural glare.
The captain got upon his feet, and, climbing to
windward, lashed himself to the main rigging, and
gave such orders as the crisis demanded. But his
voice could not be heard, and his presence and example
were alike useless at a moment like this.
The vessel was driving in the van of the tempest
with inconceivable velocity. The waves seemed
to lift her hull, and hurl her onward like a feather.
The brave seaman beheld many of his crew
swept off, and saw them, without the power to help
them, struggling amid the boiling sea; but their
shrieks were lost in the louder shrieks of the wind,
and the flying vessel soon left them far astern.
Others were lashing themselves to the rigging;
others clinging to the guns; and all were exerting
themselves to preserve their lives. Casting his eyes
aloft, he saw, with a pang of grief, that his maintopgallant-mast
was gone, and that his fore-top-mast
was wounded and tottering fearfully at every
pitch of the vessel. The first fury of the tempest
was spent, and there being a momentary lull, it occurred
to him that it might yet be saved.

“Ho, there, forward!” he shouted.

His words seemed to have an electrical effect
upon the crew, as if the sound of a cheerful human
voice, in that fearful moment, inspired them with

[figure description] Page 020.[end figure description]

hope. Half the danger was lessened to their
minds, and twenty voices replied,

“Ay, ay.”

At the instant, there came a second blast of the
tempest, and a huge sea breaking over the vessel,
swept the captain into the waste, and bore three
more of the men into the sea, who the next moment
were lost in the darkness astern. The first
glance of the captain, on recovering his feet and
sustaining himself by clasping round a gun, was to
the fore-topmast.

“She yet stands it!” he exclaimed, “but another
such a blast will pitch it end foremost through our
decks. Ho, my lads, which of you will take a
couple of fathoms from the topgallant-halyards and
go aloft and fish that stick?”

Many an eye was turned upward, but not a foot
moved.

“A light lad will do it best. The spar must be
saved where it is; for, if it falls inboard, 'twill make
a hole through our decks big enough to let the
ocean in. Be quick, lads!”

“I will do it, sir,” said a young sailor, springing
into the weather rigging, with a coil of rigging on
his arm.

“That's my lad. You shall wear an epaulet for
this.”

With the eyes of the whole crew upon him, the
intrepid young seaman ascended the rigging, though
with much difficulty, as the wind pressed him so
closely against the stays that he could scarcely
climb from one rattling to another. After great
peril he gained the top. Here, breaking from its
latticed guard a couple of oaken slats, he swung
himself into the topmast rigging, and, ascending to
where the stick was splintered, commenced with
great coolness, while the storm howled terrifically

[figure description] Page 021.[end figure description]

about him, to wind the rope about both it and
the pieces of wood he had torn from the top. At
every pitch of the vessel the wounded spar would
gape wide, and threaten to carry him with it into
the sea. But to the eyes of those below, who could
plainly see him by the white light shed from the
phosphorescent waves, he appeared to be as cool
as if engaged in an ordinary duty on an ordinary
occasion. After taking numerous turns about the
mast till his rope was exhausted, he skilfully fastened
the ends, and then, by a stay, descended like
an arrow to the deck.

“What lad is that?” asked the captain, who had
silently watched his labour.

“The fisher's lad,” replied one.

“Gallantly done, my lad,” said the captain.
“This night has made thy fortune for thee, young
man.”

“I believe there is a vessel in sight, sir.”

“What is that you say? Come aft, for this wind
will let nobody hear anything but its own howl.”

“I discovered aloft what appeared to be a vessel
to windward, scudding under bare poles,” repeated
Mark.

“Ha, say you? Then we are like to have company
in the gale.”

As he attempted to ascend to the weatherside to
look for the stranger, a fresh gust of the tornado
burst upon the vessel and threw her upon her beam's
end, the sea breaking over her bulwarks from stem
to stern with the force and volume of a cataract.

“My niece, my niece!” cried the Earl of Bellamont,
suddenly; “save her—oh, God! she is lost!”

The first shock of the tempest had thrown the
nobleman and Grace to the deck; but he had contrived
to shelter her in his cloak, under the lee
of the companion-way, during its continuance, and,

[figure description] Page 022.[end figure description]

save the apprehension attendant on the danger she
was in, she had suffered comparatively little. Her
attention had been drawn, in the mean while,
to the bold enterprise of the young sailor. She
would have shrieked as he volunteered, but her
voice failed her. She had watched his ascent and
the progress of his perilous duty with trembling and
with prayer; and, when he descended to the deck,
she released her hold upon her uncle, and clasped
her hands together in gratitude for his preservation.
It was at this moment the vessel was thrown upon
her beam's end, when, caught up by a wave, she
was borne far from the reach of the earl, whose cries
now drew all eyes towards him.

“My niece! Grace! Where is she?” he cried,
in tones of despair.

“Here, uncle!” she faintly answered from the
sea.

Guided by her voice, they discerned her at some
distance from the vessel, her body immersed in the
water, clinging by one hand to a stay which lay level
with it. Every heave of the sea lifted her nearly
out of the water to let her descend again far beneath
its surface. Yet she held firmly to the stay with
that tenacity which is taught by the love of life.

The earl no sooner beheld her than he was about
to jump overboard to her rescue, when Mark, with
a rope fastened around his waist, run along the level
bulwarks and arrested him before he could take the
leap.

“Stay, my lord! Hold firmly by the end of this
rope, and I will save her or perish in the attempt.”

As he spoke he cast himself into the sea; and
partly by swimming and partly by the aid of the
stay, he had nearly reached her, when a wave lifted
her high on its crest, and forced her to release her
grasp.

[figure description] Page 023.[end figure description]

“Save me, Mark!” she cried, and sunk in the hollow
it left, and almost within reach of his arm.

He dove, and brought her to the surface scarce
ere she had gone beneath it. She instantly clasped
her arms firmly around him with the instinct of self-preservation;
her cheek lying against his, and her
rich tresses blinding him.

“She is safe; draw us inboard,” he shouted,
buffeting the waves with one arm, the other encircling
her with a firm grasp.

The earl, assisted by the captain and sailors, the
next moment drew his half-drowned niece from
the sea, dripping like a naiad, while the captain did
the same office for the brave youth.

“Two epaulets, by the rood!” he exclaimed.
“'Twas a lucky day Dick Kenard shipped a lad of
your mettle. Ho, there, men! We must now
look to the craft. Save the ship first, and think of
ourselves afterward, is my maxim, my lord. Bear
a hand with an axe! Cut away the masts!”

“Cast the lee guns overboard, and she may
right, captain,” said Mark, shaking the salt spray
from his locks.

“We can but try it, my boy. Overboard with
the barkers!”

Forthwith the men set to work and pitched the
starboard guns into the sea, and, after cutting loose
the fore and main yards, and giving every man's
weight to the weather side, the yacht righted with
a tremendous roll to windward and a lurch that
threw every man flat upon the deck.

“There she is on her legs again,” cried the captain,
exultingly. “The storm seems to have shown
its roughest paw, and we'll ride it out yet. We
are less a topgallant-sail and a brace of yards, my
lord; but an hour's calm will make all shipshape
again. But the poor fellows that are washed

[figure description] Page 024.[end figure description]

over-board! there's no getting them back. They are
gone to their last muster,” he added, with manly
sympathy.

The fury of the tempest had been spent on the
yacht; and though it now blew a stiff gale, it was
no longer attended with any of those tremendous
gusts which had characterized it at the first. The
sea no longer boiled and tossed confusedly, but on
every side rolled its waves in one direction to leeward;
and though they broke in snowy heads, and
lifted themselves in mountainous billows, the regularity
of their motion indicated that the tornado
had settled into a steady though violent hurricane.
The clouds, although still dark and laden with
wind, flew higher above the sea than before, and in
the east they broke into masses, showing between
white places in the sky.

“She will bear her spanker close reefed, and a
hand's breadth of the jib, Mr. Howel. Pass the
word forward to set the jib, sir!”

There was no reply.

“Where is Mr. Howel?” he demanded, with a
foreboding of the fatal result.

“He was washed overboard by the last sea we
shipped,” replied one of the men.

“A noble seaman gone! a lovely woman widowed!
It has been a fatal night! Marston, ho!
Where is my second lieutenant?”

“Mr. Marston was struck by a spar, and knocked
into the water as we went over on our beam,” answered
another.

“This has been a dear night indeed, my lord,”
said the captain, addressing Lord Bellamont, who
was supporting Grace in his arms by the companion-way;
“I have lost my two oldest officers, and
how many of my best men I know not. Edwards!
Thank God, I have one lieutenant left. You must

[figure description] Page 025.[end figure description]

be my second now, and act as my first! Muster all
hands aft. Let us see who are missing, and then
let us set to work and put the crippled craft under
an inch or two of canvass, if only to ease the foretopmast,
which, with this pitching, in spite of its
support, will soon take leave of the ship.”

The men were mustered aft, and thirteen less
than the yacht's complement answered to their
names.

“Ah, poor fellows!” sighed the captain, “they
have got a seaman's end! but they would have had
the same fifty years hence; or else have been
thrown into a hole on shore, which is worse than
they now have got. A short life and a gallant one,
is my maxim, my lord,” he said, turning round and
speaking to the earl. “Poor brave boys, Heaven
give them a snug berth aloft! Well, lads, let us
get a bit of sail on the craft, and cry afterward.
My lad,” he continued, addressing Meredith, “I
see you are a sailor! You must take poor Marston's
place, and wait till you get on shore for your commission.
Go forward and set the jib at once.
Here! a dozen of you close reef this spanker, and
let us see how long it will take for the wind to cut
it up into ribands. Lively, men, lively! Stand by
there, at the helm, to bring her smartly up to the
wind as soon as she begins to feel her canvass.
Hoist away briskly!”

In a few minutes the yacht was lying to under
a reefed jib and close-reefed spanker, with her
helm lashed to the starboard bulwarks; the steersman,
with the two men who had been detailed to
assist him at the beginning of the storm, having
been carried forward into the waste on the first
billow that broke over the stern.

The force of the wind gradually lessened, and, in
half an hour after the jib was set, an order was

[figure description] Page 026.[end figure description]

given to set the foresail, and shake the reefs out of
the spanker.

“Put her away a point or two, and give her
headway,” said the captain to the lieutenant, as the
above orders were executed. “So, steady! there
she walks bravely! See, my lord, how like a duck
she rides on the top of the waves. She's a tight
boat for so gayly painted a craft, or we should, ere
this, have been helping the mermaids string coral
in their sea-caves below. Never judge a ship by
the colour of her bends, is my maxim, my lord.”

The yacht was now under steerage way, and
rose regularly on the billows, which before had
broken against her sides flinging the spray in
showers upon her decks. The wind blew steadily,
but no longer with violence; the storm-cloud,
broken into a myriad of fragments, was scudding
across the heavens towards the southeast; the
waves momently diminished in size; and at intervals
the moon shone down through an opening
upon the sea, like the smile of hope beaming on the
tempest tossed mariners: all things indicated the
termination of the hurricane, to the fury of which
they had so nearly been sacrificed. The pumps
were now tried, and it was ascertained that less
than three inches of water had been made.

“A capital craft, my lord. The Roebuck would
scarcely have ridden out a tornado like this, especially
after having been laid on her ribs. I congratulate
both your lordship and your niece on your escape
from a grave in the sea, for which landsmen,
I am told, have a strange antipathy. But bury me,
my lord, in the deep sea; let the green waves, which
have borne me living, wrap about me dead. Let
me lie where the ripple of driving keels and the
song of the sailor shall be my requiem.”

“You are eloquent, Kenard; and perhaps you
are right.”

[figure description] Page 027.[end figure description]

“It matters little where a man's bones are laid,
my lord; and the sea is as safe a repository, and
will yield them up as readily at the judgment day
as the earth. Ay, more readily, it may be,” said
the captain.

“It may be so,” replied the nobleman, smiling
at the literal way in which the seaman viewed the
subject. “If it is now safe to unclose the companion-way,
I will convey my niece to the cabin for
a change of wardrobe.”

“We shall have no more washing decks to-night,”
replied the captain, giving the necessary orders to
remove the companion-way and hatches, which had
been firmly closed as the storm came on.

They were now opened, and the earl awoke
Grace, who, after her submersion, had dropped into
a gentle sleep in his arms, and assisted her to her
stateroom, where, arousing her terrified and almost
insensible maid from the floor, he left her with a
kiss of paternal affection, mingled with gratitude for
her preservation.

“Shall I come to the deck again after I have
changed my dripping dress?” she asked, with playful
entreaty, as he was leaving her.

“No, my child, you need rest after your bath.
Your cheek is pale as marble,” he replied, tapping
upon it.

“I shall be sick here; I miss the pure air; there
is a suffocating sensation of closeness; and I think
I feel the motion of the vessel more below. I must
go on deck again, uncle,” she said, earnestly. “Besides,
the moon is coming out, and it will be pleasant
to watch the caps of the waves sparkling in her
light.”

“There is no resisting you, Grace; I will come
down for you when you are ready. Let us be thankful,
my child, for our preservation,” he added, devoutly.

[figure description] Page 028.[end figure description]

“I am, uncle, indeed,” she said, with touching
sincerity.

And, as the earl closed the door of her stateroom,
she kneeled by her couch in her wet garments, and
offered up a short, heartfelt prayer of thanksgiving
and gratitude for her safety; nor in it did she
forget the youth who had been the instrument of it.
How much nearer did the gallant service he had
performed for her bring the handsome but humble
young sailor to her heart! How much closer did
the union of his name with her own in prayer bind
him to her young and warm affections! And when
she rose from her knees, her thoughts, it is to be
feared, ran much more upon the instrument of her
preservation than upon the Being who directed it.

When the earl returned to the deck, the moon
was riding in a broad field of blue, unobscured by
a single cloud, and on all sides the waves leaped towards
it to fall back into the shining sea in showers
of silver. The clouds were drifting far to leeward,
and the darkness and terror that had hitherto
reigned had given place to brightness and serenity.
The yacht was gallantly riding over the crested
waves, parting them with her prow and dashing to
either side their glittering drops in snowy jets of
spray. The fore-topgallant-sail was set, and drawing
freely; and, notwithstanding the loss of her
topsails and main-topgallant-mast with its yard, she
held her course and was making good headway
through the water. Two of her larboard guns had
been shifted to the starboard, and other means had
been taken to put her in suitable sailing trim. The
men were engaged in clearing the decks; serving
the rigging where it had been chafed; fishing the
foremast, which Mark had before temporarily secured
and thereby saved; and otherwise repairing
the disasters of the storm. Some of them, the earl

[figure description] Page 029.[end figure description]

observed, were filling the beds around the guns with
shot, disposing cutlasses and muskets in stands and
beckets about the masts, and making altogether very
plain preparations for fight.

“You see, my lord, we are hard at work,” said
the captain, approaching the earl as he saw him
come to the deck. “In half an hour, save bending
a new set of topsails, we shall be as sound as we
were before this squall. See that those guns are
as dry as a boatswain's whistle,” he shouted to the
men.

“What is the meaning of these hostile preparations,
Kenard?”

“I have reason to believe the pirate is lurking
in this quarter. He was seen from aloft during
the blackest of the storm, scudding through it, like
the flying Dutchman, under bare poles. If he
should discover us as we are, we should have a
hard matter to escape him.”

“He is likely to be as crippled as ourselves.”

“Not he, my lord; the masts of these craft are
stout single sticks, and their sails are fashioned so
as to come down by the run at an instant's warning.
There is no way of sinking one of those fellows
without knocking his bottom out. Lively, men,
lively. Ha! that's my lad! make them fly!”

It was Meredith he addressed. In the absence
of the usual number of superior officers, prompted
by an active spirit and the impulsiveness of his
nature, and inspirited by the scenes in which he
was placed and to which he readily adapted himself,
he had involuntarily echoed the encouraging
cry of the commander. The seamen, with that instinct
which teaches men the presence of a master
spirit, without questioning his authority, moved with
more alacrity, and obeyed his orders without hesitation.
They had borne witness to his courage

[figure description] Page 030.[end figure description]

and fearlessness, his contempt of death and promptness
of action in danger: these were virtues
which, in their eyes, were above all others, and in
his case they atoned for want of years, experience,
and seamanship. The charm by which he governed
them, as if by common consent, was simply the
exercise of the same mysterious power which, since
the world was made, has governed the mass of mankind.
Decision, bravery, and high moral energy
of character! in one word, courage; the attribute
through which one man leads a nation—speaks, and
it is so! the dragon of human adoration! an attribute
pre-eminently possessed also by spirits as well
as men, and through the influence of which Lucifer
was enabled to lead whole armies out of Heaven
into hell!

“Is not that the bold youth who saved my niece?”
asked the earl. “I think I should know the voice.”

“The same, my lord; and, saving your lordship's
presence, he is worthy the hand of any niece, humble
or high, whom he so promptly perilled his life
to save; for none but a brave man and a gentleman
at heart would do so noble an act; that's my maxim,
my lord.”

“Doubtless a true one, Kenard. I shall bear
this youth in mind.”

“Do so, my lord; and I will, with your leave, set
you the example. Though I am glad of the opportunity,
I regret the necessity. My lad!”

“Sir,” said the youth, coming forward with his
cap in his hand.

“As I am without a third lieutenant, I have promoted
you to this rank, and his lordship will see that
your appointment is confirmed in the right quarter.
You were bred upon the sea, and though, perhaps,
have never sailed in a ship, are, I perceive a natural
sailor. Now you may go to your duty, sir.”

[figure description] Page 031.[end figure description]

“Thank you, sir!” said Mark, with manly emotion.
He could say no more, but turned away to
hide his tearful gratitude.

“Hear there, forward. Obey this youth, who
fills the place of poor Marston.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” cried the men, simultaneously;
and, as their new officer walked forward, many a
cap was respectfully touched to him, and many a
gray head uncovered before the stripling—such is
the tribute true bravery everywhere receives! so
universal is the homage it irresistibly challenges!

“Do you see, my lord! That lad will make his
way, mark me. Observe how readily he assumes
the duties of his station. He is already in the rigging!
going aloft to see that the men are properly
fishing the fore-topmast.”

“Your protege shall not want advancement
through my forgetfulness, be assured, Kenard. But
why are you so anxiously looking through your
glass to the windward?”

“For the three-masted frigatoon.”

“You are doubtless mistaken in her character!”

“I cannot be, my lord. No honest trader in
these waters ever had such a rig. She is a pirate,
and, if she is anywhere near us, will be sure to give
us a taste of her quality ere long.”

“And we are far less prepared to meet him than
before.”

“Four guns, and a dozen men and two good officers
less, my lord; nevertheless, we must do what
we can to fight him off. That he is in our neighbourhood
somewhere, I am confident. These gentry
are like sleuth hounds; once on your track, double
and turn as you will, they never lose it till they
run you down. I believe I see an object in the
wake of the moon, under that cloud to the windward,”
he suddenly added, looking steadily through

[figure description] Page 032.[end figure description]

his spyglass. “It is gone. It may have been the
cap of a wave! There, I think I see it again.
By—”

“Sail, ho!” shouted Mark, from the fore rigging.

“Where away?” demanded the captain, without
removing the glass from his eye.

“Just in the moon's wake, three points off the
weather quarter.”

“I see it. 'Tis the same, my lord. I was sure
he would not take his eye off of us. Edwards, see
all clear for action. Station all the men you can
spare from working ship at the guns, and select
twenty of the best for boarders. Be prompt.
Keep away a point, helmsman. Aloft there! Get
through with your duty and come down. I give
you command of the lee battery, sir,” he said to
Mark. “Cheerily, men, all! Prepare for battle
with merry hearts, that's my maxim, my lord,” he
added, turning round to the nobleman.

“How do you make her out now, Kenard?”
asked the earl, who had heard the announcement
of the stranger's vicinage with a pang of anxious
solicitude for the safety of Grace; “I am unable to
hold my glass steadily with this pitching of the
ship.”

“She is walking this way with a nimble foot,”
replied the captain, who, after giving his brief and
rapid orders, once more turned to observe the motions
of the strange sail. “She is a three-masted
lugger—with her three huge topsails spread without
a reef, ploughing her way towards us, and
sending a cloud of spray to her masthead.”

“Is she heavily armed?”

“I cannot see; but above her bulwarks is something
like a mass of human heads.”

“How far off is she?”

“Not more than two miles.”

[figure description] Page 033.[end figure description]

“In what time will she overtake us?”

“She must be going seven or eight knots; we do
not make more than five,” he said, glancing over
the side. “Probably in two hours' time.”

“In two hours! We can increase our sail; you
have studding-sails, captain?”

“But not a stun'sail boom—every deck-spar is
washed overboard. Crippled as I am, I cannot
carry one stitch more sail, my lord. We must let
him come an he will, and trust the issue to Providence.
That's my maxim, my lord.”

“Providence give us the victory!” said the earl,
devoutly.

“Amen!” responded the captain, taking the
glass from his eye, and reverently touching his
cap.

The earl immediately went below, and met
Grace coming from her stateroom wrapped in
comfortable garments, and enveloped in a hood and
cloak.

“My dear niece,” he said, taking her hand and
leading her to a sofa, “I have come to prepare you
for a scene of trial and danger infinitely greater
than that we have just passed through. Hitherto
we have had to contend with the terrible display of
the power of the Almighty, when he moves upon
the deep in his anger—but it was tempered with
mercy. We have now to meet the fiercer passions
of men, to whom the word mercy is unknown.”

“Speak, dear uncle!” she said, with a calmness
that surprised him. “I fear not for myself—I have
a trust, thanks to my sainted mother, that places
me above all fear of death.”

This was spoken with that serene confidence
which innocence and purity alone can wear.

The earl pressed her hand in silence, touched
by the sweet simplicity of her manner, and

[figure description] Page 034.[end figure description]

admiring the sublime hope which elevated her above the
fear that gives bitterness to the cup of life.

“There is a strange vessel bearing down upon
us, which the captain has reason to think is a pirate,”
he said, with more composure.

Grace turned pale, but betrayed no emotion beyond
an upward glance of her eyes and a movement
of her lips, as if in silent prayer.

“It is our intention to fight him, and only surrender
with our lives. In case we should be overcome,
and the pirates board us—and I should not
survive to protect you any longer—” Here the
earl stopped from emotion, pressed his niece to his
heart, and then hastily added, “you are my brother's
daughter! you have his spirit and decision! I will
trust to you.”

“Uncle, speak! explain, my lord!” gasped the
young creature, terrified at his manner rather than
his words, which her innocence could not comprehend.

He drew from his breast a dagger, and silently
placed it in her hands.

“For what is this, my lord?” she gasped, half
guessing its fearful meaning.

“You must sacrifice yourself before you suffer
these ruffians to lay hands upon you,” he said,
with emotion that nearly rendered his words inaudible.

She clasped her hands over her forehead and
stared in his face with a wild glare—her colourless
lips parted with horror—and her whole frame
shivering. Like a thunderbolt, the horrible reality
of her situation had flashed upon her.

“Ha! what? ha! what? ha—wh—” and with
a piercing and most heart-rending shriek she fell
upon the cabin floor. He raised her, and spoke to
her in tender accents of sympathy.

[figure description] Page 035.[end figure description]

“Enough,” she gasped—“enough, uncle—say
no more.”

“Dear niece, be calm!”

“Nay—do not think Grace Fitzgerald is not herself,”
she said, with forced calmness. “Uncle!”

“My dear child!” he answered, folding her to
his heart.

“Give it me!”

“Oh God!” groaned the earl, overcome with
the full realization of the evil that threatened her.
“Must it be, my child?”

“It must. Give me the dagger,” she added, with
energy. “I will not now shrink from it—it may
yet be, next to Heaven, my best friend.”

“Take it, heroic girl—but our danger may not
be so great—we may yet conquer! I feel, when I
look on you, and reflect on your helpless state,
the might of a host in my single arm. Ha! there
is a gun. I must leave you for a while. Remain
in your stateroom, and both you and your maid
be careful to lie on the floor below the line of
shot. God bless you, my child! Your presence
alone should ensure the salvation of the ship.”

He embraced her with almost parental affection,
tenderly forced her to enter her stateroom, and
closed the door. Then arming himself from his
luggage with a brace of pistols, and buckling on
his sword, he hurried to the deck as the report of
a second gun came booming over the sea.

“She has fired, captain?” he said, as he joined
the commander on the quarter-deck, who was looking
to windward with his glass.

“A long shot to bring us to. It is plain he takes
us for an unarmed vessel.”

“This gives us an advantage, then,” said the
earl, turning his telescope in the direction of the
stranger, who was plainly visible less than a mile

[figure description] Page 036.[end figure description]

distant, white with canvass, and fast gaining on the
yacht, as she laboured slowly along under her diminished
sail.

“A great one, if we can keep him in ignorance
till he is close aboard,” replied the captain. “By
the rood! he comes down bravely. This it is,
your lordship, to have sound spars, and plenty of
canvass to hang on them,” he added, looking moodily
up, and surveying the bare poles of his own
ship. “You are armed, I see, my lord. It is time
I should be. Will your lordship be so good as to
watch his motions. I will be on deck again in a
moment.”

He descended to his cabin as he spoke, and soon
afterward returned armed with a cutlass, his head
covered with a steel boarding cap, and with a
couple of braces of pistols stuck in a leathern belt
buckled round his waist. He caused his lieutenant
and Mark to arm themselves in a similar
manner. Every seaman, also, had a serviceable
blade girded to his side, and one or more pistols
in his belt; and harquebusses and cutlasses were
place on the companion and capstan, ready for indiscriminate
use. Throughout the vessel, every
preparation that the time and circumstances would
admit of, or consummate skill on the part of its master
could effect, was made; and every man stood at
his post, silently and sullenly awaiting the approach
of the pirate—for such it was now plain to every
one was the character of the advancing stranger.

“There is a flash!” said the earl, who was intently
watching the bucanier.

“No, it is a battle-lantern passed along the decks.
He will not fire again seeing we do not heave to,
but run us aboard, and carry us, if he can, cutlass in
hand—this is the mode of fighting with these devils.”

“They must not board us, Kenard!” said the

[figure description] Page 037.[end figure description]

earl, with calm determination in the tone of his
voice.

“We will give him a touch of our quality before
he comes to close quarters. An introduction before
an intimate acquaintance, is my maxim, my
lord.”

“If you give him a broadside, I would suggest,
sir, that the battery I command be added to the
guns on the weather side,” said Mark, who, while
waiting the attack, had been pacing athwart ships
near the cabin door, as if the presence of Grace in
the cabin had something to do with the choice of
his walk.

The captain stared at him a moment; but the respectful
tones of the young man's voice, and the
deference of his manner, left no room for reproof
if he had designed to check the boldness of his new
lieutenant.

“Born for a seaman, by the rood!” he exclaimed.
“Shift the starboard guns to the weather side, Mr.
Edwards. We shall only have a chance of one
full broadside, and it is best to let him have all we
can give him. If you want to be generous, give
all you've got, is my maxim, my lord.”

By the time the change in the battery was effected,
the pirate was within three cables' length, or
a third of a mile of the yacht, and, by the light of
the moon, the decks could be discovered with the
naked eye to be full of men, while her dimensions
and rig were distinctly visible. She was one of
that small class of three-masted luggers called frigatoons,
common at the period, with very broad beam
and round bows. She came along with the wind on
her starboard quarter, noisily ploughing the waves
before her with her blunt bows, under three huge
lugger sails, covering each mast from deck to truck,

[figure description] Page 038.[end figure description]

a jib, and triangular mizzen sail not unlike a ship's
spanker. The moon shone white on all, while its
rays were reflected in quick flashes here and there,
as if from steel, from amid the dark mass on her
decks.

“A fine shot in that dense crowd, Edwards,” said
the captain. “Give every man a musket after the
broadside is discharged, and let him pick a red cap
for himself.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” responded the lieutenant, preparing
to obey the order.

Silently and steadily, as if no man was in her, the
dark hull continued to approach.

“She is full near for a shot, Kenard,” said the
nobleman; “I can see the very faces of the men.”

“A man should know the colour of his enemy's
eyes before he fights with him, is my maxim, my
lord,” he said, coolly levelling his glass. “Let me
single out their captain. Ah, there he stands beside
the helmsman, a grisly old dog, and the moonlight
on his weather-beaten features makes them
appear bronzed. There is a youth standing beside
him with a glass at his eye, whom he is speaking
to. Ha! the old bucanier is giving orders to prepare
for boarding, I see, by the wave of his cutlass
and the motion of his lips. Now is our time,”
he added, energetically.

As he spoke he threw down his glass, drew his
cutlass, and sprung upon the companion-way.

“Stand by for a broadside,” he shouted, in a voice
that reached the pirate.

“All ready!” answered the two lieutenants, in
the same breath.

“Helm a starboard!”

“Starboard 'tis!”

“Steady now!”

“Steady.”

[figure description] Page 039.[end figure description]

“Let them have it!” he shouted, in a clear voice
that rung like a trumpet.

Terrible cries of men taken by surprise, of men
wounded and in pain, followed close the deepmouthed
roar of the guns: the volumes of smoke,
that shot half way towards the pirate, then rolled
swiftly back upon the yacht, and were blown to
leeward, leaving a full view of the enemy. His
foremast was hanging over the side; a glaring gash
along the hull showed where a shot had told between
wind and water; and a breach in the forward
bulwarks, near the catheads, and the groans
of the wounded, indicated the passage of a raking
shot through the mass on deck; instead, also, of
presenting her starboard bow to the range of the
broadside as at first, she had yawed wide of her
course, and was shivering helplessly in the wind.

“Neatly done! We have thrown them into
confusion. If we can only keep her at this distance,
we can riddle her like the top of a pepperbox,
and have the pleasure afterward of seeing her
go down to Davy's locker, bodily, before our faces.
See your enemy buried handsomely, after you have
done for him, is my maxim, my lord. There it
comes,” he shouted, suddenly. “Fall to the deck,
all!”

He had hardly spoken, when, amid a loud yell
from the pirates, who had recovered from the surprise
of their rough salutation where, apparently,
they had calculated on slight resistance, a heavy
broadside was discharged: the balls came singing
through the air, knocking against the sides of the
yacht, and splintering and crashing the upper
works, tearing the decks, wounding the spars, and
creating terrible ruin and confusion, while shrieks
of the wounded rose appalling from every part of
the ill-fated vessel. The captain glanced hastily

[figure description] Page 040.[end figure description]

at the poor fellows that lay bleeding on the decks,
then looked up anxiously at his masts, and leaned
over the bulwarks and run his eye along the side
of his vessel to see what injury she had sustained
in the hull—for, in his eye, the wounds of the ship
were of infinitely more importance than the wounds
of the men.

“No damage to her timbers; but two poor fellows
dead as they ever will be,” he said to the earl, who
stood beside him. “Five—six—seven wounded.
Handle that man carefully, you lubbers, or you will
do his business for him before you can get him to
the doctor. See that the wounded are taken at
once, and with care, to the cockpit, Mr. Edwards.
Lively, there, at the battery; charge to the muzzle!
Now watch the weather-roll. Fire!”

Again the sides of the yacht belched forth fire
and smoke, shaking the little vessel through every
oaken joint.

“Fire away as you load,” again shouted the captain.
“Let each gun fight for itself. Take sight
at his poles, and bring his huge mainsails down
without giving him the trouble to let go his halyards.
Give your foe a lift when you can, is my
maxim, my lord. There, he returns it,” he cried,
as a flash illuminated the open decks of the pirate.
“Down all!”

The hurricane of iron passed high above their
heads, cutting the rigging and splintering long,
slender pieces from the spars. The smoke from
the guns, at the same time, rolled sullenly towards
the yacht, hid the pirate from them, and enveloped
the brig in an impenetrable cloud of sulphurous
smoke.

“Stand by, boarders, to repel boarders!” shouted
the captain, in a loud, quick tone. “He will
be down upon us in his smoke before we know it.

[figure description] Page 041.[end figure description]

I thought there was more powder than iron in those
guns, my lord, and suspected there was an object
in it. Boarders, all!”

“Boarders!” answered the lieutenant.

“Keep good look-out through the smoke. There
it lifts. By the rood! see, he is close upon us!
Put a shot into his fore foot. Lame him, or he'll
be thrusting his snub nose between our ribs.”

As the captain spoke, Mark sprang towards the
after gun, and levelled it against the bows of the
pirate, who, having made sail under cover of his
smoke towards the yacht, was now within twenty
fathoms of her. He applied the flaming linstock
and fired the piece. The shot, taking a slightly
ascending course, struck beneath the bowsprit, tore
it from its bed with its jib, and lodged in the mainmast
ten feet from the deck, nearly severing it
in two. Deprived of her jib, the lugger broached
to, and once more presented her broadside to the
yacht.

“Give it to him, my lads, before he brings his
guns to bear!” shouted the captain. “Pour in your
iron! That's my hearties! You knocked her a
foot out of the water that shot, boys! Quit your
guns now; there is no time to reload! Take to your
cutlasses and pistols. We have the rest of it, lads,
at close quarters. We'll show them what it is to
board a king's ship. If your muskets are in the way
in the fight, throw 'em aside and use your English
fists! We'll whip them yet! If we believe we
can do a thing, we can do it; that's my maxim, my
lord. Your lordship will now have the pleasure of
cutting a score or two of these murderer's throats,
with the advantage of exercise to the muscles.
Pleasure with business is my maxim. Stand ready
all! When I give the word, each of you bring

[figure description] Page 042.[end figure description]

down one of those red devils that are crowding about
her bows.”

The men replied with loud cheers, and prepared
resolutely to receive the attack.

The pirate, after the loss of his jib, being no
longer able to hold a direct course, drifted towards
the yacht, which, being at leeward and disabled
both by the storm and action, was in no situation
to choose her own position, and had, therefore, no
other alternative than to lie passive as she was, and
repel as she best could the expected attack.

The bucanier had now ceased firing, not being
able to bring any of his side guns to bear, and converted
all his crew into boarders, who crowded
about the forepart of the lugger, ready to leap cutlass
in hand on the deck of the yacht when they
should have drifted near enough. The brig had
also ceased her fire, her opponent having skilfully
worked out of the range of her guns, by coming
down, as well as his crippled condition would let
him, upon her quarter.

The deck of the pirate was crowded with men,
numbering eighty or ninety, apparently, in all, while
the crew of the yacht, exclusive of the wounded,
consisted of less than forty-five. But cool courage
and confidence in the right, opposed to fierce and
sanguinary passions in an evil cause, count to the
righteous side in a battle for twice the number of
opponents. The earl trembled for the issue. But
the brave Kenard, with his knowledge of the spirit
of his men, and his confidence in their English courage
and in their contempt for pirates, whom he gave
them the credit of despising as cordially as he himself
did, gave not an anxious thought about the result,
assured that, if each man did his duty, victory
would side with the honest and brave. During the
exchange of broadsides, he had kept his place on

[figure description] Page 043.[end figure description]

the quarter-deck, encouraging his men by his cheering
voice: the earl was also beside him, scarcely
less energetic in inspiring the crew with his own
spirit. The first lieutenant was actively engaged,
sword in hand, in directing the fire of the battery;
while Mark, who was in a new element, flamed
with the fierce fire of war, and seemed, amid the
smoke and roar of battle, to have been suddenly endued
with a new and sublime character. He was
everywhere where his presence was most needed,
encouraging and cheering on the men both by his
voice and example; but, notwithstanding his animation
and fire, was as cool and collected in the
sagacious orders he gave as the oldest veteran.

But, with all his devotion to the fight, he forgot
not that the cabin contained a lovely creature, helpless
as she was beautiful, whose life depended on
the issue of that night's conflict. Though his heart
may have been proof against her charms, being
shielded with the proof-plate of another's love, yet
he felt an interest akin to love in her fate. She
was the cousin of Kate! She had expressed an interest
in him that he could never forget! He had
saved her life! It was a second time endangered!
These were all motives to sympathy; and, properly
nurtured, the germes were there from which might
spring a tenderer and deeper feeling. But he had
no room in his breast for a second love. There
was but one polar star to the eye of his affections;
and steadily he steered the bark of his hopes towards
it, although, like the north star of the mariner,
the farther and nearer he sailed in its direction,
it would higher and higher ascend the skies,
mocking his aspiring ambition. Nevertheless, he
resolved to steer steadily onward, even if he should
perish at last amid the icebergs of her cold and
wintry affections. But whatever a lover, in the

[figure description] Page 044.[end figure description]

warmth of his affections, may sincerely feel and
solemnly vow—love unrequited, like the Persian
flower, that withers when the sun is hidden by a
passing cloud, without the warmth of its sun will
speedily die. Time, in the present instance, will
test the truth of this proposition.

The vessels were now within twenty feet of each
other, the pirate rising heavily on each wave, and
surging nearer and nearer at every heave of the sea.
Silence was broken only at intervals by a groan
from a wounded bucanier, and terrible expectation
hung over the two vessels. The moon at length
broke from a cloud and lighted up the scene.
There were beauty and peace floating on her silvery
beams; but the passions of men reigned, and
their souls were closed to everything bright and
lovely. Yet they hailed her light with a shout, for
by it foe was able to see foe nearly with the distinctness
of noonday.

“Now pour in your fire!” shouted the cool Kenard
to his crew; “aim wherever you can see the
glitter of an eye!”

The bows of the pirate vessel were within an
oar's length of he yacht's larboard and weather
quarter as this order was given, and a dozen halfnaked,
savage-looking men were just in the act of
leaping into the main rigging. The simultaneous
discharge of pistols, muskets, and blunderbusses
was like the explosion of a volcano, and but one
third of the bucaniers succeeded in springing alive
into the chains: the remainder plunged, dead ere
they struck the surface, into the sea. The fire was
answered by a loud yell from the pirates, and a few
straggling shots only from pistols; for these demons
seemed to trust more to their dangerous cutlasses
in their wild conflicts than to firearms. They
now pressed forward over the bows in dark swarms.

[figure description] Page 045.[end figure description]

From every part of her that offered any prospect of
reaching the yacht, they leaped without waiting for
the vessels to come together, with cries and execrations
most appalling, into the main chains, or
sprang for the bulwarks, catching recklessly by
their hands at whatever offered. Many fell short
into the sea, or were hurled into it by those who
met them; some leaped overboard, swam to the
side, and drew themselves up by the rigging that
hung over the water, but fell back with curses and
cries of pain, leaving their hands, severed at the
wrists and dripping with gore, clinging to the rope.
Grappling-irons were thrown on deck, but were cast
overboard by the crew before they could be entangled;
and wherever a pirate struck the side of the
yacht with his foot, he was opposed by one of its
defenders.

Three times the Earl of Bellamont sheathed his
sword in the breasts of as many of these ferocious
beings and cast them backward dead into the sea,
and as a fourth, who had thrown himself bodily upon
the quarter-deck, made a tremendous stroke at him
with his yataghan, he blew out his brains with a
pistol. Everywhere, in their first daring attempt to
board them, were they encountered with equal resolution
and success, and of the twenty pirates that
by some means or other succeeded in reaching the
brig, not one retained a foothold on her decks—
every individual of them being either slain outright,
or hurled maimed into the water, where several
swam about amid dark spots of blood, lifting their
handless limbs, and in vain calling to their comrades
to take them on board. The fate of these
checked for a moment the ardour of the remainder,
and they waited till the vessels should come together
before making a second attempt.

The pirate, who had some time before dropped

[figure description] Page 046.[end figure description]

his lugsails, to prevent his shooting past the yacht,
towards which the waves were slowly urging him,
was now lifted and dashed with great violence
against it, striking her on her quarter, carrying
away her bulwarks, and opening her planks in several
places.

“Throw yourselves into her now,” shouted the
pirate chief, leaping forward and waving his cutlass.
“Flesh your blades in their carcasses! Give no
quarter to beards—but spare bright eyes! Board!
board! clamber over each other's backs—press on,
press on! Follow your young leader. He will
shame the best of ye!”

Like a crew of demons, yelling and shouting menaces
of death, mingled with horrible execrations and
oaths of vengeance for their slaughtered comrades,
they obeyed the energetic and sanguinary orders
of their chief. They were headed by the pirate's
first lieutenant and a youth with long fair hair,
which, in the light of the moon, shone like silver,
who, with strange recklessness of life, cast himself
from the bows as they approached the side of the
yacht, and fell feet foremost into the midst of a grove
of sharp steel, amid a shower of balls, that, while
they told in the bodies of his followers, seemed to
pass him as if he carried a charmed life. The old
pirate captain himself headed another party near
the stern of his vessel, which was slowly swinging
round towards the yacht's bows, apparently for the
purpose, when it should come in contact, of boarding
on the forecastle. Here stood Edwards the
lieutenant, with a force of fifteen men to oppose
him; while midships, and near the companion-way,
Mark was stationed at the head of a third of the
yacht's crew, and, acting as a reserve, was prepared
to throw in the weight of his numbers as should be
required, either on the forecastle or the quarter-deck,

[figure description] Page 047.[end figure description]

at which latter point, at the head of an equal number,
stood the captain, supported by the earl's good blade,
ready to repel the attempt to board from the bows
of the pirate.

More like devils incarnate than human beings,
the pirates followed their young leader, and cast
themselves from the bows, some running over the
heads of their comrades and leaping on board; some,
more active, flinging somersets through the air into
the mêlée; and all rushing, crowding, and falling
upon the deck in every possible attitude, seemingly
indifferent, so that the yacht's decks received them,
whether they landed head foremost or upright on
their feet. Such a torrent of desperate men was
irresistible. The defenders of the quarter-deck
were borne down by the mere weight of the assailants'
bodies, or their cutlasses were turned aside
like feathers as they were levelled to meet this
novel and terrible human storm. Immediately in
advance of himself and the earl, the captain had
placed half a dozen men with pikes, the bristly
points of which served to protect, in some measure,
their position by turning to one side the current of
boarders.

The conflict now became most terrible and sanguinary.
The crew, that had been borne down by
the first shock, had recovered their feet, and nearly
every man was instantly struggling with a bucanier.
Kenard fought like a lion, thrice clearing a space
around him in which he could sweep his cutlass.
The earl, at length, seeing some of the pirates rushing
to the companion-way and attempting to force
it, placed his back against it, and met their fierce
lunges with well-directed thrusts, turning aside
their descending strokes aimed at his head, with
the skill of a swordsman and the coolness of a
soldier. He fought not only on the defensive, but
his eye was quick to see where any of his own

[figure description] Page 048.[end figure description]

party within his reach were being worsted, and his
blade was instant in its service of relieving them
from their mortal peril. Every sweep of his blade
was fatal, for he fought for one dear to his heart
whose life and honour were at stake.

For some time the battle was waged with doubtful
success. At one moment the pirates, who, after
the first wild charge, had formed into a body, would
be driven over the side, and at another they would
press the defending party towards the stern. Their
youthful leader, who was everywhere present,
cheering them on with animating cries as often as
they were beaten back towards their own vessel,
was at length opposed to Kenard face to face.

“I would not slay a youth like thee if I could
help it,” he said, parrying his attack, and endeavouring
to close with him, and wrest the cutlass from
his grasp.

“Thou shalt have no space left for compunction
if thou shouldst,” said the other, avoiding his grasp,
and making a lunge at his neck, which he grazed
with his blade.

“Have at thee, then, if such be thy play! give as
you get, is my maxim, my lord!” he added, looking
round as usual when he gave utterance to a maxim,
to catch the earl's attention.

But his lordship was too busily defending himself
and the companion-way against a gigantic and active
Frenchman to acknowledge the usual appeal.
The turning of his head gave the youthful pirate
an advantage, of which he availed himself. With
great dexterity, he twisted with his cutlass the
weapon out of his grasp, and sent it flying through
the air into the sea. He was about to follow up his
advantage by sheathing his blade in his breast, when
it was struck up by an intervening one, and turning
round, the young pirate found himself confronted
with the Earl of Bellamont, who, having that instant

[figure description] Page 049.[end figure description]

freed himself from his assailants, was looking round
to see where his sword would be of most service,
when he discovered the peril of the captain. His
presence had an electric effect on the youthful bucanier.
He started back with an exclamation of
surprise, and half repeated the name of the nobleman.
But instantly he checked himself, and successfully
parried the pass he made at him, retreating
at the same time, and acting wholly on the defensive.
The earl wondered at his exclamation and at
the sound of his voice, which reminded him of a familiar
one. This sudden change in the tactics of
one who hitherto seemed to know only how to advance
and attack, also surprised him; and, although
he surveyed him closely, as the drifting
clouds across the moon let it shine brightly at intervals,
his features were so shaded by a drooping
bonnet, and so black and begrimed by the blood
and smoke of battle, that his scrutiny was defeated.

“Nevertheless,” thought he to himself, “have I
heard that voice and seen that form before!”

Inspired as much by curiosity to ascertain who it
was that revived such indefinable associations, as by
a desire to put an end to a dangerous foe, he pressed
him hard. With all the youthful bucanier's coolness
and skill, he had been wellnigh worsted, never
returning back a blow for those the earl gave him so
freely, when a loud shout from the forecastle caused
every combatant on the quarter-deck to suspend
his descending stroke, withhold his deadly thrust,
or leave, half-sheathed, his sword in the body of his
antagonist. As the earl paused to look for the
cause of this fresh outcry, he saw that the lugger's
stern had at length came in contact with the bows
of the yacht, and that the pirates, headed by their
old chief, were pouring across the bulwarks and
leaping upon the deck, wild with fury and thirsting

[figure description] Page 050.[end figure description]

for blood. Hitherto chafing with inaction, and
roused to a fearful pitch of excitement by the spectacle
and uproar of the combat from which they were
withheld, like tigers chained in an arena panting to
mingle in the fierce conflict of their species, terrific
and overpowering in proportion to the length and
impatience of their restraint, was their first onset.
The little band under Edwards, who had reserved
their energies for this moment, drew back to the
opposite side of the vessel to escape the tumultuous
fall of their almost flying bodies on the deck,
and poured in upon them a fatal fire of pistols and
harquebusses.

“Now at them, my brave fellows, with your
cutlasses,” he cried; “throw away your pistols,
and grapple while they are crowded together! Set
upon the rascals, and give a good account of them!”

With a shout, they charged in a body, and a terrific
and sanguinary contest ensued. Mark, with
his division, hitherto had not been idle. He saw
that the fate of the yacht would depend on the reception
given to the last boarding-party, headed by
the old pirate chief himself, and wished therefore
to husband the strength of his men until this crisis.
Nevertheless, while he was anxiously watching the
lugger as its stern drifted round, he was present
with two or three of his best men, to turn the
tide of the combat on the quarter-deck, as it went
now against the earl, now against the captain; and
several times he received, in the hottest of the fight,
the warm acknowledgments of both for the promptness
in which he effected diversions in their favour.
It now came to his turn to enter more closely into
the combat.

No sooner did the boarders find themselves in a
mass on the forecastle of the brig, than they separated
into two bodies, one of which received the

[figure description] Page 051.[end figure description]

charge of, and entered into fierce fight with, the division
under Edwards; while the other, consisting
of twenty men, headed by the pirate in person, made
a rush aft to carry the quarter-deck. Here a few
of their comrades were fighting at a disadvantage
under their youthful leader, who, taking the advantage
of the earl's pause at the shout of the fresh
boarders, had again mingled among his few remaining
men, who were defending themselves on the
opposite side of the deck against a much larger
number of their antagonists.

Mark had anticipated the charge, and had formed
his men in a firm phalanx to meet it. The first
line consisted of five men, who just filled up the
passage between the launch and the forward larboard
gun, along which the pirates were advancing.
Besides their cutlasses, they were armed with
boarding-pikes, which protruded three feet in advance.
A second and third line were armed with
cutlasses and pistols. Their young leader himself
sprung upon the gun as the rush was made, and
in a cool, steady tone of voice, said,

“Stand firm, pikemen. Never mind their cutlasses;
your comrades behind will take care of your
heads. Now they come! Give them your pistols!”
he exclaimed, as the bucaniers came upon
them like a wedge, as if they would cleave bodily
through their centre. They were checked by the
advanced pikes, and thrown into confusion by the
discharge of a dozen pistols, which they instantly
returned with scarcely half as many, without material
effect.

“Cut them down. Let not a handful of cowards
put ye back. No quarter! Down with them!
Strike off the poles of their pikes! Close with
them,” shouted the old pirate chief.

A second rush was made with better success.

[figure description] Page 052.[end figure description]

The old bucanier shivered with his cutlass, as if they
had been pipe-stems, two of the pike-staffs, and
the front line of men gave back.

“Drop your pikes and take your blades!” shouted
Mark, at the same time discharging his pistols at
the pirate chief and wounding him in the shoulder.

The combat was now waged with terrible ferocity.

“Fight hard, or we shall be routed!” cried Mark,
with energy. “Stand steady, men! Keep your
ground, or you will be cut to pieces. Stand! fly
not, on your lives! One good blow—All is lost!”
he suddenly cried, as he saw the men give back before
the obstinate attack of the pirates.

Leaping from the gun into the midst, he dealt
blows as if he had the strength of a Hercules, and
essayed to stop, with his single arm and the intervention
of his body, their onward and victorious
course. But the impetus was already given, and
they bore him forward with his men in a dense
mass, so crowded together that no man could use
his weapon. They were driven aft and upon the
quarter deck, where the captain came to his aid
and succeeded in rallying them for the defence of
this important post. At the same instant the youthful
pirate, seeing the success of his party, called his
followers from their unequal contest, and leaped
down with them among his crew, leaving half his
men dead behind him.

On the forecastle Edwards fought for a while
with success, and had nearly beaten the pirates back
to their vessel, when the victorious shouts of the
conquering party gave them renewed spirit, and
filled the minds of the crew with sudden panic.
The bucaniers, taking advantage of their hesitation,
in their turn became the assailants; and the
men, completely routed, fled towards the

[figure description] Page 053.[end figure description]

quarterdeck, cutting their way with the desperation of fear
through the party that besieged it, and, with the
loss of a third of their number, succeeded in reaching
it.

The whole of that portion of the yacht forward
of the quarter-deck was now in possession of the
pirates, a portion of whom began to force open the
hatches; while the majority, under the direction of
the chief and his youthful lieutenant, prepared to
carry this last post, which was elevated four feet
above the main deck, by forming their men into
two divisions, and attacking it on both sides of the
companion-way at the same time.

The earl, Mark, and the captain, though all three
were wounded more or less severely, the latter supporting
his left arm in a sling, assembled their force,
now diminished to twenty men, to meet the escalade.
The pirates, with yells of vengeance for their
slaughtered comrades, began to bring to the assault
loose spars, sails, and whatever they could lay hands
on, which they heaped against the wall the deck
presented. The harness-casks were rolled up,
made firm, and covered with rolls of canvass; and
the hatches, which some of them had torn off for
the purpose of descending to plunder the hold,
were laid against it, to aid them in constructing a
glacis.

“Bring along those carcasses! pile them up
here!” shouted the old chief, ferociously. “We
will yet make a fair run of it.”

The bodies of the dead, both of pirates and the
crew of the yacht, were eagerly dragged forward
and thrown on the pile, and it was soon raised so
that the quarter-deck could be gained erect and
sword in hand without the danger to which they
would be exposed in climbing a barrier so well
guarded.

[figure description] Page 054.[end figure description]

“Now, men, make a run for it and sweep the
deck!” he shouted.

The pirates retreated a few steps in two parties,
headed by the old chief and his young lieutenant,
and, with a yell, rushed forward and up the human
glacis to the quarter-deck. But they were met
with a resolution that matched their own ferocity,
and several of them fell back dead, adding their
own bodies to the pile they had the moment before
assisted in constructing. A few battled for
a few seconds, giving and receiving wounds, but
were finally pressed back to the main deck. In the
assault, Mark and the young pirate leader had once
crossed weapons; but, ere they could exchange
passes, the latter was forced back by the retreat of
his own party.

“Let them maintain the deck if they will,” said
the chief to his young lieutenant; “we have the
command of the cabin and hold. Keep them busy
while I force the companion-way, and see what kind
of a prize she will prove. I little thought we had
engaged with a king's ship, but we must now make
the most of it. I have lost men enough for one
night's work, and don't care to make a capture of
the yacht if I can get anything of value out of her.
So keep them employed on the quarter-deck till I
take a cruise through the cabins.”

As he spoke he gave orders for his men to force
a spar from the doors of the companion-way which
the earl had braced against it.

“Hold there, fiends!” cried the nobleman, as he
saw these demonstrations of the pirate's intentions.

He sprung forward as he spoke, and with a
blow of his cutlass clove the scull of a bucanier,
who was wrenching the lock with a pike-head, so
that it fell in two parts over either shoulder. He
aimed a second blow at the pirate chief so suddenly

[figure description] Page 055.[end figure description]

that the point of the blade laid open his cheek, and
an active movement to one side only saved his
head from flying from his shoulders: at the same
instant, a pistol-ball, fired by the chief, struck the
earl near the knee, and he fell over into the arms of
Mark.

The doors at once were forced open, and the old
leader, accompanied by two or three of his men,
descended to the cabin.

“To the rescue! To the rescue!” shouted Mark,
on seeing them disappear, letting the earl down
gently upon the deck.

“Protect or slay her, young man, and I will bless
thee!” cried the earl, faintly.

He made no reply to the earl's words; and,
heedless whether he was followed or not, leaped,
cutlass in hand, through the top of the companionway,
and lighted on his feet at the bottom of the
stairs.

The doors of the first cabin were open, and a
glance showed him two of the pirates rifling the
baggage of the earl, and the chief in the act of
forcing the inner door leading to the stateroom occupied
by Grace.

Poor maiden! how had she been occupied during
the fearful conflict above and around her?
How had she borne the terrific sounds of battle?
From the first moment of the fight she had been
kneeling in silent prayer—bearing on her heart's
orisons the names of her uncle, and of one, though
of lowly origin, not less dear to her. Of herself
she scarcely thought: but at every report of cannon,
every discharge of musketry, she shuddered
for those who were exposed to the dreadful horrors
of the fight. Her maid had become insensible
through overpowering terror. Terror, too, was
acutely felt by herself, but it was modified and

[figure description] Page 056.[end figure description]

subdued by the bright hopes of religion. She feared
not death. “The sting of death is sin.” She knew
no sin! For her it could have no terrors. Nature,
indeed, shrunk at contemplating its violent dissolution;
but the glorious certainties of a new life
beyond this reconciled her to put this away for that
better one. She expected to die within the hour—
perhaps by her own hand! The dagger her uncle
had given her was hidden in her bosom, and, as she
knelt, her grasp was firmly laid upon its hilt. Long,
long and terrible had been the conflict to her ears—
more terrible, perhaps, than if she had witnessed it.
Its sanguinary horrors were indeed hidden from her
sight; but her imagination, with its hundred eyes,
aided by the horrid sounds that reached her, reflected
the scene upon her dizzy brain in colours, if
it could be possible, more dreadful than the reality.
Who can imagine the effect upon her of the loud
roar of the cannon vibrating through every oaken
nerve of the vessel, and filling its hollow decks
with a noise more awful than the thunder that explodes
at her feet. Who can conceive the fearful
shrinking of the heart at the rush of the balls—the
sound of the crashing decks—the wild and unearthly
shrieks of the wounded—the moans of the dying—
the fierce yells of the combatants—and all the
thousand and terrific sounds that assimilate war
to the hellish pastime of accursed spirits. Who
is there that, not participating in its mad excitement,
calmly witnesses a battle, that will not turn away
in disgust and horror, be ready to deny his humanity,
and to believe men neither more nor less than
demons incarnate?

When the cabin doors burst open, she hurriedly
committed her soul to Heaven, and, rising from her
knees, held the friendly dagger above her virgin
bosom, and stood facing the closed doors of her

[figure description] Page 057.[end figure description]

cabin, feeling that the crisis of her fate was approaching
its consummation.

The entrance of Mark into the forward cabin
was not perceived by the pirates nor their chief.
With a blow of his cutlass he nearly severed the
head of one that was leaning over a chest, and, before
the other could rise, the ball of his pistol had
laid him across the body of his comrade. The
next instant he was opposed to the terrible pirate
leader himself.

“Ha, my young fledging!” cried he, his cutlass
descending with tremendous force, and with a fatal
accuracy of aim, that would have cleft him to the
chine had it taken effect; but, with youthful activity,
he avoided the stroke which he could not
avert, and the point of the pirate's weapon buried
itself so deep in the floor of the cabin that he was
unable to extricate it. Mark instantly availed himself
of this singular advantage, and, quicker than
lightning, sheathed his blade in his heart.

“Oh! villain, you have done for me!” he cried,
pressing his hand on his side, through which the
crimson tide rushed in an irresistible torrent.

He staggered as he spoke, and a lurch of the
vessel at the same moment sent him headlong,
breaking his sword off close to the floor as he fell
with it in his grasp, upon the bodies of his men.

“Courage! my lady!” said Mark, bounding to
the door, and speaking in the triumphant tones of
success. “Their leader is slain! we shall soon
clear the vessel of his base herd! Courage!”

“Bless you for these words of hope! You are
safe! and my uncle! how fares my dear uncle?”

Before he could reply the companion-stairway
was filled with pirates.

“A female voice!” shouted one, as he entered
the cabin.

[figure description] Page 058.[end figure description]

“Love and ransom,” cried another, with a sensual
laugh.

“We will draw lots for her, Hans.”

“The captain has saved us that trouble,” growled
a third. “Ho! who have we here?” he cried, seeing
Mark, with his dripping cutlass in his hand, standing
resolutely with his back against the door of the
stateroom.

“Our captain is slain!” cried another, fiercely,
now for the first time seeing the body of his chief
lying in its gore.

The pirates for a moment forgot Mark, and
gathered around their fallen leader. They raised
him up, and his head fell back helpless upon his
shoulder, and his eyes glared with the fixed stare of
death.

“He is dead! His sword is broken. Let us
avenge the old man!” they cried, with one voice.
“Ha! here is the point of his weapon, that ne'er
failed him before, sticking in the deck, and he hath
been taken at vantage ere he could draw it out.”

“He who hath done this for thee, old man, shall
die by my hand!” said one of them, letting him fall
again.

With one accord, their glances rested on Mark,
and he was fiercely attacked by the one who had
last spoken and another, while the remainder commenced
breaking open chests in search of treasure.
For a few seconds he defended himself with
great skill and courage. But, being hard pressed,
and twice severely wounded by his fierce opponents,
he became faint with loss of blood; his
head swam; his eyes became dim; he grew bewildered,
and struck at random. His assailants saw
their advantage, and one of them made a final lunge
at his breast to transfix him. But, ere the blow
could take effect, he sunk sideways to the floor, and

[figure description] Page 059.[end figure description]

falling behind the hangings, the blade buried itself
within the door of the cabin.

“Curses light on the foul steel! Finish him,
Renard.”

“He is done for,” said the other, sheathing his
blade through the curtain.

“Now for the woman! His mistress, I dare say,
he fought so like a lion. I will try and console her
for his loss,” he added, with a laugh.

The fall of its brave defender left the way undisputed
to the inner cabin. With united efforts,
they forced open the slightly-secured leaves of the
door. Grace stood before them in an attitude of
sublime self-sacrificing, her eyes raised heavenward
full of hope and faith, while the uplifted dagger was
in the act of descending into her bosom. The foremost
pirate instantly comprehended her purpose.
Quick as lightning, he leaped forward, and, with
his cutlass, struck the weapon from her grasp as it
was entering her bosom.

“By the Virgin! that was skilfully done, Renard!”
said the other. “You have won her fairly.”

“And he who would have her must win her from
me,” he continued, with dogged resolution, catching
her as, with a shriek of hopeless despair and wretchedness
unspeakable, she was falling to the deck.

“A sweet voice, but somewhat loud!” said the
other, with a laugh. “Ho! what have we here?
Another prize,” he exclaimed, descrying the helpless
maid. “Smaller game! but not the less welcome.
Dead, for a guilder! No, she breathes! We are
lucky, Renard. It will cost us some hard knocks
to keep possession of our prizes.”

“We have no captain now, and each man is for
himself.”

“Not quite. Our new fighting lieutenant will
command us now; and suppose he should, as he

[figure description] Page 060.[end figure description]

is like to do, take a fancy to your bit of womankind?”

“He will first have to fancy me!” said the other,
menacingly. “Nor shall he command me while
men older than he are in the lugger.”

“He will have a word to say on that score, and
here he comes to speak for himself.”

He had scarcely spoken ere the young pirate
made his appearance in the cabin. The shriek of
Grace had drawn him from the deck, where he had
been defending the entrance to the companion-way
against the whole force of the yacht, under the captain
and the earl—the danger menacing his niece
having suddenly restored the latter to almost supernatural
strength, and a fierceness of spirit that rose
superior to physical suffering. With his wound
hastily bound up, he had once more joined in the
fight, and was foremost in battling with those who
opposed his passage to the cabin. Repeatedly his
life was exposed, but saved by the voice of the
young leader, forbidding his men to harm him; and
even in the heat, and noise, and fury of battle, their
wild spirits involuntarily yielded obedience to a
voice that seemed formed to command and to be
obeyed.

With flashing eyes he entered the stateroom, and
his glance rested on the lifeless form of Grace,
clasped in the arms of the pirate Renard.

“I am right! It is she!” he cried. “Release
your prize, villain!”

“You say well, boy; she is my prize,” he answered,
with a menacing look.

“Ha!” shouted the youth.

Quicker than thought he sprang upon him, got
within his sword arm, seized him by the throat,
closed with him, and buried his sabre to its hilt in
his chest.

“So have I washed out the pollution of thy touch

[figure description] Page 061.[end figure description]

on this fair creature,” he said, attempting to disengage
Grace from his hold as he fell backward.

But his arm so firmly encircled her, that he was
forced to sever the tendons of it with his cutlass
before he could release her from this horrible embrace
of lust and death.

“Oh God!” he said, involuntarily, “that I should
be an actor in such a scene as this. Yet my presence
here has been her preservation. I will save
her and protect her now, even with the life of the
captain!”

“His life is already ended,” said the bucanier,
who, on witnessing the fate of his comrade, had
quietly dropped the lifeless form of the maid where
he had found her.

He pointed as he spoke to his body.

“Dead!” exclaimed the youth. “Then am I
chief here. I will save, for her sake, all that are left
alive. But she shall not know me! She shall
ever be ignorant to whom she is indebted. Yet
methinks I would like to send by her a message to
the haughty daughter of the house of Bellamont.”
This was spoken with bitter irony. “But I must
try to restore her.”

He poured a vase of water over her forehead, and
moistened her lips, and she revived.

“Where am I? What has transpired? Who—
how—where—”

She glanced wildly around, and everything that
had passed flashed upon her mind. She bounded
from him with a deplorable cry, and covered her
face with her hands. “Mercy, oh God! mercy!”

“Grace!” he said, in a gentle tone.

“Who speaks? who?”

Grace!”

“Thou art no enemy! Bless thee for the sound
of thy voice. Tell me what has happened? Where

[figure description] Page 062.[end figure description]

is my uncle? Oh, speak as if life hung on thy
words.”

“The Earl of Bellamont is living.”

“Heaven, I thank thee! And this dead body?”

“I have protected thee from a fate worse than
death, with the life of this man.”

“Who—who art thou? I should know that
voice,” she exclaimed, with returning confidence
and hope, gazing upon his now swarthy and disfigured
features which defeated her scrutiny, deeply
shaded, too, as they were by his bonnet, which
he pulled farther over his brows.

“An outcast, unworthy a thought from innocence
and purity like thee.”

“Yet you are my friend. How came you here?”

“To save thee!”

“I am confused, puzzled, perplexed! your voice,
your air! I know not what to think or say. A
pirate boarded us, and you—you are not a pirate.
Oh, my uncle! my dear uncle! Heaven be thanked,
you are safe!” she cried, darting forward and
flinging herself into his arms as he entered the cabin,
literally covered with blood, while behind him
crowded a dark mass of pirates, through whom he
had cut his way.

“How fares it with thee, my child?” he cried,
with anxiety, pressing her to his breast.

“Safe from all but terror!”

“God bless thee! we will die together; there is
no hope. Come on, ye fiends, now,” he cried, turning
upon his foes with one arm entwined about her,
and brandishing his cutlass in the calm defiance of
despair.

They rushed upon him with a shout.

“Back!” cried the clear, commanding voice of
their young leader, in a tone that arrested every advancing
foot and suspended every cutlass mid-air.

[figure description] Page 063.[end figure description]

“Look! there lies your late captain in his blood!
Your first lieutenant is slain. I am now your leader.
Obey me. Stand back, all of ye!” The men
sullenly dropped their weapons and retreated to the
foot of the stairs. “Earl of Bellamont! you and
your niece are, from this moment, safe. Your
yacht shall be instantly cleared of every man but
its own crew, and you shall be at liberty to sail on
your course. Call upon your captain for a cessation
of hostilities on deck, while I draw off my
men.”

The astonished earl immediately obeyed.

“Who are you, mysterious young man?” he
asked, turning to him after communicating his request
to the captain. “Your voice and air are familiar.”

“It matters not, my lord. I have saved thy niece
from violence, and would, had I the power, earlier
have put an end to this scene of bloodshed. Bid
your captain call his crew to the quarter-deck, while
I pass to my own vessel with my men.”

The order, with the object of it, was repeated to
the captain.

“Ay, ay!” he replied from the deck. “Let
them go, with a left-handed blessing. But what
has changed the devils about so? Have they had
fighting enough?”

“We have mistaken the character of your vessel,”
said the young leader, evasively.

“Ha! you are there, my lion's cub, and can
speak like a Christian, too. A little fighting always
makes a man feel more civilized, is my maxim,
my lord,” he said, looking down upon them through
the skylight.

“To your own vessel, men!” said the youth,
sternly. “Throw down that casket! Take not

[figure description] Page 064.[end figure description]

with you the value of a groat. Go as you came,
with only your arms in your hands.”

The men looked at each other, and surveyed
their athletic young chief, who stood like a youthful
Mars, with the look and bearing of resolute
command. His eye rested for an instant on each
man, as he saw their hesitation, with a searching
and terrible glance, and, as each one encountered
it, he turned his eyes away and silently obeyed.
As the last man left the cabin, he said,

“Some of you return, and bear your captain's
body to the decks of your own vessel. Lay him
decently along the quarter-deck.”

Four of the pirates came back, and raised it
without a word, while he stood quietly by, leaning
on his sabre.

“Michael,” he said, to one who seemed to take
the lead of the rest, “I make you, for the present,
second in command. Have the wounded conveyed
to the lugger, and the dead thrown into the sea.
Be ready to cut clear of the yacht at a moment's
warning; and, with what time you have, repair
damages and get sail on. Work will keep the men
from thinking of mischief. Go! and see that I am
obeyed. I shall instantly follow you.”

The bucanier departed with ready obedience to
the will of the lofty spirit that had at once assumed
such irresistible power over his mind. The
earl and Grace listened with surprise to the stern
authority with which he governed such fierce men,
and witnessed with wonder the entire control he
seemed to possess over their wills. The former
gazed on him for a few seconds as he stood beneath
the swinging lamp, his features thrown into the
deepest shadow by the falling brim of his bonnet
and his drooping plume, and then spoke:

“Mysterious and wonderful young man,

[figure description] Page 065.[end figure description]

whoever you are, we owe you much. This life of crime
and horror is not your sphere. There is humanity
about you. Tell me,” he added, with irresistible
curiosity, “who are you?”

“A bastard!”

It is impossible to convey the manner and emphasis
with which this word was articulated. It
expressed volumes to both uncle and niece. It told
a dark history of shame, scorn, and disgrace; explained
why, being so above them by nature, he
herded with the basest. A painful tale of moral
wrong and suffering it unfolded to their imaginations,
save that they knew not his name or family.
They read from his brief confession all that could
have been told them. The earl sighed, shook his
head, and was silent. Grace looked upon him with
pity.

He contemplated for a moment the effect of this
disclosure, and then, turning haughtily away, said,

“The service I have done you is cancelled by
your discovery of the baseness of the instrument.
There is debt on neither side. Adieu, my lord—
adieu, Lady Grace Fitzgerald.”

“How know you my name and rank?”

“And mine!” simultaneously exclaimed both.

“It matters not. Thou wilt learn full soon
enough to scorn as well as pity me.”

With these words he departed. The yacht was
cleared of its piratical horde, and the two vessels
separated, and soon were steering on opposite
courses.