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Having sailed for the Spanish American settlements, the pirates descried two large ships, about half way between Carthagena and Portobello, which proved to be the Mermaid, an English man-of-war, and a Guineaman. They approached in chase until discovering the man-of-war's great range of teeth, when they immediately put about, and made the best of their way off.
As she got off Port Royal, the ship was hailed by a man-of-war's boat, and ordered to shorten sail; and the boat coming alongside, who should appear on deck but Gerald Tracy. "I was sent to ascertain what ship this is, where you are bound to, and all other particulars; but as I happen to know, I needn't waste time in asking," said Gerald.
"To that of le Feu-Follet, or ze Ving-y-Ving," put in Griffin, who, now he had got the two functionaries fairly afloat, spared none of the jokes that come so easy and natural to a man-of-war's man. "She went out, too, in an 'extraordinary disappearance, and perhaps the lady and the lugger went out together."
"I'll stick by the lifeboat," shouted the man-of-war's man, and they parted. Ah! it was grand to see that lifeboat go into action. She could be easily seen, though the night was so dark, for she was painted pure white and bright blue, with a scarlet strip round her a "thing of light," but by no means a light thing!
"Among our crew, made up of some really splendid fellows, but with an odd mixture of 'Mahonese, 'Dagos, 'Rock-Scorpions, and other countrymen, there was an old man-of-war's man named Sadler a little, dried-up old chap of some sixty years, who had fought under Nelson at Trafalgar, so he said, and had been up and down, all around and criss-cross the world so often that he had actually forgotten where he had been, and so had all his geography lessons, learned by cruising experience, sadly mixed up in his head; which, although small, with a little old, weazened frontispiece, was full of odds and ends of yarns, with which he used to delight us young aspirants for naval honors, as he would spin them to us on the booms on moonlight nights, after the hammocks had been piped down.
"Give way, my lads, give way," cried Hemming; not that his crew required the slightest inducement to pull as hard as they could lay their backs to the oars. The felucca had got considerably the start, and was going through the water somewhat faster than the man-of-war's boat; the more also she drew off the land the stronger she got the breeze.
Of these marriages only one, I believe, turned out happily. A daughter of this marriage was Betty Cotton, our landlady. She was the eldest of seven daughters, and had five brothers. Her father, Alexander Cotton, was born at Hull, and was an old man-of-war's man, and for three years had guarded Napoleon at Longwood, St. Helena.
The officer from the man-of-war listened with an uncomfortable sense of having blundered in his manner toward this powder-splashed young man who set American citizens at liberty, and created captains by the half-dozen at a time. "Are you from the States?" he asked as they moved toward the man-of-war's men. "I am, thank God. Why not?" "I thought you were, but you saluted like an Englishman."
"Blest if I know!" said the captain. "We was a peaceable lot enough till you and Mrs. Geen came a-visiting; but you two would play Hamlet's ghost with a Quaker meeting." "It's my Phoby they're after my Phoby!" screamed Mrs. Geen, and then she turned on the fellow behind Captain John; it was Hosking, once a man-of-war's man, and now supposed to be teaching her boy the carpentry trade.
I don't know how many journeys I had made, when all at once there was an alarm given, and as it were right out of the darkness, I could see a man-of-war's boat coming right down upon us, while, before I quite got over the first fright, there was another in sight.
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