huge pile of skins had been hoisted on board, and a stiff grog
had been served out to the crew of the captain's gig, I
ordered the schooner's head to be set due south. For icebergs
were played out, for the moment, and it was getting to be time
for something more tropical.

Tropical was a mild expression of what was to come, as was
shortly proved. It was about three bells in the next day's
forenoon watch when the look-out man first sighted the pirate
brigantine. I disliked the looks of her from the first, and,
after piping all hands to quarters, had the brass carronade on
the fore-deck crammed with grape to the muzzle.

This proved a wise precaution. For the flagitious pirate craft,
having crept up to us under the colours of the Swiss Republic, a
state with which we were just then on the best possible terms,
suddenly shook out the skull-and-cross-bones at her masthead, and
let fly with round-shot at close quarters, knocking into pieces
several of my crew, who could ill be spared. The sight of
their disconnected limbs aroused my ire to its utmost height, and
I let them have the contents of the brass carronade, with ghastly
effect. Next moment the hulls of the two ships were grinding
together, the cold steel flashed from its scabbard, and the
death-grapple had begun.

In spite of the deadly work of my grape-gorged carronade, our foe
still outnumbered us, I reckoned, by three to one. Honour
forbade my fixing it at a lower figure--this was the minimum rate
at which one dared to do business with pirates. They were stark
veterans, too, every man seamed with ancient sabre-cuts, whereas