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Men stood on the bulwarks, and waved their caps frantically to the schooner. Others could be seen, by the aid of a glass, casting spars, hen coops, and other articles overboard, and jumping into the water after them; and soon the sea around the wreck was dotted with heads and floating fragments, while the wreckage of the mainmast was clustered with men.
The mainmast was consecrated to the left half, and the mizzen to the fullback. "In one game our lack of proper uniform worked to our advantage. I was on the sick list and had turned my suit over to a substitute. I braved the doctor's disapproval and went into the game in a pair of long working trousers and a blue flannel shirt.
I thought, your honour, seeing as how I have got the command of the schooner, of tying him up to the mainmast, and giving him two or three round dozen or so, and then sending him to swim among the mascannungy with a twenty-four pound shot in his neckcloth; but, seeing as how your honour is going among them savages agin, I thought as how some good might be done with him, if your honour could contrive to keep him in tow, and close under your lee quarter, to prevent his escape."
Her rig was that of a brigantine the foremast having the top and spars of a brig, the mainmast carrying fore-and-aft sails like a schooner. When she had stood in within a quarter of a mile of the shore she tacked, either fearing to get becalmed should she approach nearer, or being, uncertain of the depth of water.
I had had an uneasy feeling from the first that there was something rather mean in my desertion of them. Pride, and I hope some less selfish impulse, made me feel that I could never be quite happy even on the mainmast top if I knew that I had behaved ill to them. I could not very well speak, but I turned round and began to walk in the direction of the dock gates. Mr.
A similar device caught a similar loop at the other end. One strong pull and the dory rose out of the nest of four others that lay just aft of the mainmast. A hand swung her outboard and she was lowered away until she danced on the water.
"Now we've got you, we'll keep you until we have given you more than you bargained for!" cried True Blue, lashing the stranger's bowsprit to their own mainmast, where she was kept in such a position that three of their guns could be continually firing into her, while her crew could not reach the prize's deck without taking a dangerous leap from their bowsprit.
It was necessary to tack, to enter the channel of the river; and, at that fatal moment, the wind struck the mainmast with a force which instantly threw it over-board; and the ship, cast on her beam-ends by the violence of the shock, lay exposed to a heavy sea, which broke over her deck and stern.
A lantern was lighted at the foot of the mainmast, round which was hung a gun-rack, furnished with weapons of all sorts. Ayrton took a revolver from the rack, and assured himself that it was loaded and primed. Nothing more was needed to accomplish the work of destruction. He then glided towards the stern, so as to arrive under the brig's poop at the powder-magazine.
When the weather permitted, the flags of the ship were hung up as an awning or screen, forming the quarter-deck into a distinct compartment; the pendant was also hoisted at the mainmast, and a large ensign flag was displayed over the stern; and lastly, the ship's companion, or top of the staircase, was covered with the flag proper of the Lighthouse Service, on which the Bible was laid.
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