strange sail to seaward; or school of porpoises, leaping and blowing,
windward bound; or hungry shark prowling round the ship, lent momentary
interest to the watery solitude. It was a privilege to fall in with
another cruiser, whether of our own or of the English flag. On such
occasions, down would go the boats for the exchange of visits, the
comparison of notes, and sometimes the discussion of a dinner. The
English officers had numerous captures and handsome sums of prize-money
to tell of, while our people, as a rule, could only talk of hopes and
possibilities. Our laws regulating captures were as inflexible as the
Westminster Catechism, and a captain could not detain a vessel without
great risk of civil damages, unless slaves were actually on board.
Suspected ships might have all the fittings and infamous equipage for
the slave traffic on board, but if their masters produced correct papers
the vessels could not be touched; and our officers not infrequently had
the mortification of learning that ships they had overhauled, and
believed to be slavers, but could not seize under their instructions,
got off the coast eventually with large cargoes of ebon humanity on
board.

Not so with the English commanders, whose instructions enabled them to
take and send to their prize-courts all vessels, except those under the
American flag, under the slightest showing of nefarious character; and
their hauls of prize-money were rich and frequent.

The intercourse with the English officers, notes Master Perkins, at
first cordial and agreeable, became, after a few months, cold and
indifferent. Her Majesty's officers no longer cared to show politeness
or friendly feeling. The first premonitions of the Rebellion in the John
Brown raid, the break-up of the democracy at Charleston, and the
violence of the Southern press concerning the probable results of the