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They crept up so close before they showed, that we had no time to tumble into the boats before they were upon us. We made the best sort of fight we could, but that wasn't much. We had brought ashore muskets and cutlasses, but they had been left in the boats, and only a few of us had time to get hold of them before they were upon us.
They carried their revenge so far, that they not only inflicted blows upon Mr. Bingham, but attacked the house of a chief. The natives, some with cutlasses, and others with guns, repelled the unjustifiable attack; and during the affray, several of our men were slightly injured, and one badly wounded, whose life was despaired of for some time.
After leaving the cruiser that afternoon, I was so miserable that I could have jumped into the East River. It was the sight of the big, brown guns did it, and the cutlasses in their racks, and the clean- limbed, bare-throated Jackies, and the watch-officer stamping the deck just as though he were at sea, with his glass and side-arms.
The man's fantastic headgear, the fringe of his curling oily locks, the hawk outline of his face momentarily silhouetted against the phosphorescence astern as he glanced to windward, all lent him an appearance of another day. I could almost imagine I caught the gleam of silver-butted horse pistols and cutlasses at his waist. I brooded in wonder at what I had seen and how little I had explained.
They came at us hotly, and we fought them off with pikes and cutlasses; but we were breathing hard now and our arms ached and our feet slipped. The circle of steel blades was steadily drawing closer. That the end of our voyage had come, I was convinced, but I truly was not afraid to die. It was no credit to me; simply in the heat of action I found no time for fear. Parry and slash!
Be that as it may, I was near as quarrelsome, and would as soon have worshipped the golden calf as saluted that rag. I flung back some reply, and he lugged out and came at me with a spring like a wild beast; and his men below, seeing us fall out, made a rush for the poop with knives and cutlasses drawn.
This order not being fully complied with, at about nine o'clock the gratings were removed, and the guards descended among us, with lanterns and drawn cutlasses in their hands.
It was as scaring as the rising of a corpse out of the depths as scaring as if that corpse turned to and spoke when his head showed, to see those two vessels lying in the daylight after eighty, aye, and perhaps a hundred years of the green silence hundreds of fathoms deep, locked in the same posture in which they had gone down, making you almost fancy that you could hear the thunder of their guns, witness the flashing of cutlasses, and the rush of the boarders to the bulwarks amidst a hurricane note of huzzaing and shrieks of the wounded.
Whereupon Mistress Prue must needs turn, and taking his bead between her hands, kissed him not once, or twice, but three times, and upon "the place God made for it the mouth." O gleaming Cutlasses! O great Brass Jack and glittering Pots and Pans! can ye any longer gleam and glitter and twinkle in doubt? Alas! I trow not.
I found on inspection that there were at least thirty days' provisions on board, so on this score and that of water I felt easy. I lived on deck, seldom using the cabin, which was a veritable arsenal, with racks of muskets and cutlasses on two sides, many more than the captain needed to arm his crew, evidently intended for barter.
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