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On the following morning, shortly after daybreak, Rebolledo Williams began his preparations for a further bombardment of Iquique; but, just as he was on the point of opening fire, the Blanco Encalada's yeoman of signals presented himself with a report that the Chilian gunboat Magellanes a vessel of 772 tons displacement and of eleven knots speed had just made her appearance in the bay, coming up from the southward, and flying the signal, "Have important news to communicate."
Some of the other craft had, however, come off still worse than the Blanco Encalada's launch; for the casualties were even heavier in the Almirante Cochrane's boats, while a shot had pierced the boiler of the launch belonging to the O'Higgins, which immediately blew up with disastrous results, killing and wounding nearly the whole of her crew.
She rushed past the Blanco Encalada's bows, missing them by no more than a few feet, and a few minutes later a deafening report from the shore told those on board the flagship that the torpedo-launch had rushed at full speed upon the rocks, thus exploding her torpedo and blowing herself to pieces.
In a few minutes she would be beyond the circle of light thrown by the flagship's brazier of fire, and would be in safety; but she was not to escape so easily. The Blanco Encalada's gunners carefully laid their machine- guns on the craft, and opened a furious fire upon her.
He had also seen fit to express approval of the manner in which Jim Douglas had carried out the task assigned to him in Arica Bay, and he therefore sent for him to his cabin and informed the young man that he was to take command, in the Blanco Encalada's launch, of the flotilla which was to do patrol-duty during the night a circumstance which afforded Jim the utmost satisfaction, and emboldened him to ask as a favour that Terry O'Meara should again be allowed to accompany him; to which request Riveros immediately acceded.
On this particular night Douglas was, as it happened, the officer of the watch, and Terry, who was off duty, was sharing the vigil with his friend, walking to and fro upon the Blanco Encalada's quarter-deck and listening to the sounds which were wafted across the water both from the town of Caldera and from the neighbouring ships, all of which were brilliantly lighted up.
He immediately guessed the cause and, putting his engines at full speed, raced along toward the spot where he could see the rifles flashing, and before he had gone very far he had the Blanco Encalada's beacon-fire to help him.
The fleet had been lying at Valparaiso for nearly a month undergoing the repairs and refit of which they so sorely stood in need, when one morning Jim, from his station on the Blanco Encalada's bridge, where he was on duty, observed a signal flying from the official residence of the Secretary for War.
Jim, as being second lieutenant of the flagship, was given the command of the little squadron; and, after half an hour's interview with the commodore, during which he received the most minute instructions as to how he was to proceed, he went over the Blanco Encalada's side into her steam-launch, and gave the signal to start.
A rending sound of ripping and tearing timber and another awful crash came immediately afterward, and every man in the Blanco Encalada's launch was hurled off his feet, and thrown either into the bottom of the boat or overboard, while the little steamer's bows rose bodily out of the water until her keel reached an angle of almost forty-five degrees, and there she stuck, still quivering in every timber from the shock.
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