Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 22, 2025
The flag-ship then lay just off Osnaburg Point, with her ensign, or, as it used to be called in old books, her Ancient, the "meteor flag of England," dropped, in the calm, so perpendicularly from the gaff-end, that it looked like a rope more than a flag; while its reflection, as well as that of the ship herself, with every mast, yard, and line of the rigging, seemed, as it were, engraved on the surface of the tranquil pool, as distinctly as if another vessel had actually been inverted and placed beneath.
I still felt very anxious to know for certain who and what this brig really was, and at last I determined to hoist the English flag over the French at our gaff-end, hoping that this signal would evoke some response; but as far as the brig was concerned it was entirely without effect.
While I was still speaking there came an answering flash from the brigantine, which at the same moment boldly ran up a black flag at her gaff-end; and ere the report had time to reach us, a nine-pound shot crashed fair into our bows, raking us fore and aft, and carrying off the top of our unfortunate helmsman's head as it flew out over our taffrail.
Her yards were all squared with the nicest precision, and the new cream-white canvas snugly furled upon them and the booms; the red ensign streamed from the gaff-end; and the burgee, or house flag a red star in a white diamond upon a blue field cut with a swallow tail in the present instance to indicate that her skipper was the commodore of the fleet fluttered at the main-royal-masthead.
"From yonder," I answered, pointing to seaward where the lantern at the Berwick Castle's gaff-end shone like a star through the darkness. "Well, you are just in time for dinner," he exclaimed, "so come in. There are others here who will rejoice to once more see you whom we thought dead long ago."
But this might have been due to the fact that his gaff-end was obscured from our view by the spread of his topsails.
"Troubridge," to me "jump aft and run our ensign up to the peak, will ye?" I went aft to the flag locker, drew out the big ensign, bent it on to the halyards, and ran it up to the gaff-end, where there was just wind enough to blow it out and make it distinguishable for what it was.
Well, anyhow, we won't be behindhand with him in the matter of politeness;" and therewith Master Bob dived below, returning in a moment with our ensign and club burgee in his hand, which he bent to their respective halliards and ran them up the one to our gaff-end, and the other to our mast-head.
I looked in the direction he indicated, and there, upon our lower-mast- head, and also upon the trysail gaff-end, was a globe of pale, sickly green light, which wavered to and fro, lengthening out and flattening in again as the cutter tossed wildly over the mountainous seas.
Then, to add still further to that officer's chagrin and disappointment, the yacht, with the Spanish ensign and pennant snapping from gaff-end and masthead in the roaring trade wind, drove slowly but steadily past the mouth of Mulata Bay, and the young man had the mortification of catching, through a powerful pair of binoculars lent him by Jack, a brief glimpse of the James B. Potter at anchor in the bay, surrounded by a whole flotilla of boats, with steam winches hard at work, and great cases swinging over the side from all three hatchways at the same moment.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking