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Then, without knowing whether or not I had been successful, I proceeded to signal the following message: "La Mouette, slaver, armed with fourteen 28-pound carronades and four 6-pounders. Carries one hundred and seventy men. Attack with your long thirty-two; boats too risky!" Then, donning my jacket again, I returned inboard just in time to see Marcel's head appear above the level of the poop.
Still the effect was by no means as great as he desired, the oil not exuding in sufficient quantity to render the sea safe for a boat, so we hauled our bag inboard again, punctured it well with a sailmaker's needle, and then tried it again.
Seizing the boat-knife, he critically reached within through and then, without the rays of steel; dragged in the line beyond, passed it inboard, to the bowsman, and then, twice sundering the rope near the chocks dropped the intercepted fagot of steel into the sea; and was all fast again.
Looking back on it, now, Simon, I mind how the bravest sight I thought I ever saw was our string of dories racing afore the tide in the sea of that sunny winter's morning, and the vessel, like a mother to her little boats, standing off and on to see that nothing happened the while we hauled and coiled and gaffed inboard the broad-backed halibut.
It was hard and awkward work, for I had to pass the blocks and ropes which hoisted it up, and it swung inboard and out as the wind pressed upon the great bellying canvas, curving down below me to the great boom which ran out and over the steersman's head some feet above the stern-rail.
At noon on Christmas day we awaited on the quarter deck the arrival of our guests, who, as soon as they came inboard were ushered below and placed in the posts of honor at the tables. After the admiral, captain, and officers had made the round of the decks, preceded by the band playing the immortal strains of "The roast beef of Old England," the shrill whistles piped "fall-to."
He was our leader, and we neither of us thought of saying a word, but sat and listened to the low plash and roll of the oars of some big boat that seemed to be very close in; and so it proved, for at the end of a few minutes we could distinctly see something large and black looming up out of the darkness, and before long make out that it was quite a large vessel that was being worked with sweeps or large oars till it was close in; and then there was the noise of the oars being laid inboard, and the sound of orders being given in a low firm voice.
The stout raw-hide line twanged like a harp-string as the terrified Arima relaxed his convulsive grip on it and was hauled back inboard to safety by his master, and the yacht's forward progress was checked with an abruptness that threatened to drag the bitts out of her as the strain of the line, with the plunging, struggling monster at the end of it, was suddenly thrown upon them, while the shock sent every individual, fore and aft, sprawling upon the deck, to the uproarious and most undignified amusement of the young Inca, and the mortal terror of his faithful subjects.
By midnight the ships, with all sails set and oars inboard, were abreast of the Mull of Kintyre, and at sunrise the next morning, beating due north the voyagers sighted the little isle of Cara, with the higher land of the larger isle of Gigha rising boldly behind it.
Pretty soon he had torpedo-tubes swinging inboard and outboard, and between every pair of tubes a man sitting up in an iron seat that looked like the kind that goes with a McCormick reaper, which all helped the gunner's mate to feel better.
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