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Each had its nippers fastened to one side of the stern-jacket, near the hinge-like bolts which held it to the vessel, and on which it was raised and lowered. In a moment the Adamant began to steam backward; but the only effect of this motion, which soon became rapid, was to swing the crabs around against her sides, and carry them with her.
It could not be torn away as the stern-jacket had been, for the rounded and smooth sides and ends of the massive cylinder would offer no hold to the forceps of the crabs; and, approaching from any quarter, it would be impossible for these forceps to reach rudder or screw.
Therefore the Adamant did not try to ram the crabs, nor to get away from them. Her commander intended, if possible, to run down one or both of them; but he did not propose to do this in the usual way. As the crabs approached, the stern-jacket of the Adamant was let down, and the engines were slowed.
The Craglevin was a magnificent warship. She was not quite so large as the Adamant, and she was unprovided with a stern-jacket or other defence of the kind.
As the vessels were thus moving the great pincers of the crabs were twisted with tremendous force, the stern-jacket on one side was broken from its bolt, and on the other the bolt itself was drawn out of the side of the vessel. The nippers then opened, and the stern-jacket fell from their grasp into the sea, snapping in its fall the chain by which it had been raised and lowered.
This stern-jacket, when protecting the rudder and propellers, looked very much like the cowcatcher of a locomotive, and was capable of being put to a somewhat similar use. It was the intention of the captain of the Adamant, should the crabs attempt to attach themselves to his stern, to suddenly put on all steam, reverse his engines, and back upon them, the stern-jacket answering as a ram.
The most important object was to provide a defence against the screw-extracting and rudder-breaking crabs; and to this end the Adamant had been fitted with what was termed a "stern-jacket."
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