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For God's sake, captain, come on! And every face in the blue glare was riveted on the struggling man but, oh! what anguish to the staring lifeboatmen eager to save him! he fell, his life-belt being torn off in his fall, full forty feet on to the wave-washed mizzen boom.

The "Guillaume Tell," necessarily intent only on escape from overpowering numbers, could not turn aside to crush the small antagonist, which one of her broadsides might have swept out of existence; yet even so, the frigate decided the issue, for she shot away the main and mizzen topmasts of the French vessel, permitting the remainder of the British to come up.

She edged down to within speaking distance of us shortly afterwards, and Captain Annesley hailed to say that as we had fully expected he intended to shape a course back to Barbadoes, and wished us to make every effort to keep together. After breakfast we had a little friendly trial of speed, when it was found that the "Astarte" could just spare us her fore and mizzen topgallant sails.

"There's a big hole stove in the bows, sir!" cried a sailor, running to Captain Spark. "The water's coming in fast!" "I'm afraid we're foundering!" added Mr. Carr. "Stand by to lower the lifeboats!" yelled the captain. "Every man to his place!" With a great crash the mizzen mast went over the side, crushing one of the lifeboats that hung on davits there. "What has happened?" yelled Mr.

To be precise, the wind is north-east; the Snark's mizzen is furled, her mainsail is over to starboard, her head-sheets are hauled flat: and the Snark's course is south-south-west. And yet there are men who have sailed the seas for forty years and who hold that no boat can run before it without being steered.

The stay here was longer than was intended, for the Resolution's fore and mizzen masts were found to be very defective, and her rigging had got into a very bad state. The fore-mast was repaired and the mizzen replaced with a new stick, and when a great deal of work had been done this proved faulty, and a second one had to be cut.

Flight, with me, was the swiftness of my legs. The pursuit, with a ghost, was the swiftness of thought. And there were ghosts. I had seen one. And so, stumbling slowly aft, I discovered the explanation of the seeming. I saw the mizzen topmast lurching across a faint radiance of cloud behind which was the moon. The idea leaped in my brain.

But I am aboard and this shall be amended look to it. And your mizzen yard is sprung; down with it and sway up another " "Aye, aye, Jo," said Belvedere, nodding. "It shall be done " "Manana!" quoth she, frowning. "This doth not suit when I am aboard, no! The new yard must be rigged now, at once, for we sail with the flood voila!" "Sail, Jo?" said Belvedere, staring. "Can't be, Jo!"

At the same moment another shot came from the schooner, badly wounding our main- topmast above the cap, and the breeze reaching us almost immediately afterward, the spar went over the side, dragging down the mizzen topmast and the fore-topgallant-mast with it.

The second division of the Marines now rushed forward, and while one party kept down the Americans who were ascending the main hatchway, another party answered a destructive fire which still continued from the main and mizzen tops. The 'Chesapeake's' main top was presently stormed by midshipman William Smith.