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Updated: May 12, 2025
Mr Smallsole was undecided; the gun fired was not a heavy one, and so Mr Jolliffe remarked; the men, as usual, anxious for the attack, asserted the same, and Mr Smallsole, afraid of retreating from the enemy and being afterwards despised by the ship's company, ordered the boats to weigh their grapnels. "Stop a moment, my lads," said Jack to his men, "I've got a bite."
He was not allowed many minutes more to carry out his policy, whatever it was, for the Ocklockonee came up alongside of the Arran, the grapnels were thrown out, and the whole boarding force of the steamer was hurled upon her decks. But the commander was a plucky man, however he regarded the chances for or against him, and his crew proceeded vigorously to repel boarders.
At once the English knights and their comrades took the offensive, and fell upon their assailants who, at the sight of the reinforcement, for a moment stood irresolute. For a short time there was a fierce struggle; then the pirates sprang back to their two ships, and endeavoured to cast off the grapnels.
For nine days the ship hung around the spot grappling for the cable, in the hope of raising it, and sinking its grapnels for this purpose to a depth of two miles. The cable was caught several times, but the rope which held the grapnel broke each time, and the precious coil fell back again into the deep.
The car was of wicker-work, comprising an inner surface of about 54 square feet divided into three compartments or small rooms, surmounted by an open terrace, to which the balloon was braced. Outside grapnels, wheels, and fowling-pieces, four of each, besides two speaking-trumpets, were lashed to the sides of the car.
Swift as thought itself, was then the action of those sturdy, experienced buccaneers. Unhesitatingly all threw themselves upon the chain of one of those grapnels, neglecting the other, and heaved upon it with all their might to warp the ships together. Blood, watching from his own quarter-deck, sent out his voice in a clarion call: "Musketeers to the prow!"
Nor did he know that the glass blocks under the armour-plates of the crabs, which were placed in rubber frames to protect them from concussion above, were also guarded by steel netting from injury by small balls. Valiantly the boats beset the crabs, keeping up a constant fusillade, and endeavouring to throw grapnels over them.
They covered the prows of their vessels with hides, extending a good way along the upper part of their sides, so that the grapnels might slip and find no hold. When all was ready, Gylippus and the other generals exhorted their men....
The ropes of the grapnels were cut, and slowly the galleon passed away into the night, leaving the galley to replace what slaves had been maimed in the encounter and to head back for Algiers, abandoning the expedition against the argosy of Spain. Under the awning upon the poop Asad now sat like a man who has awakened from an evil dream.
"Seems to me you're inclined to be a little inquisitive, Dab," said Ford, as his friend peered sharply into and around one craft after another; but just then Dabney sang out, "Hullo, Jersey, what are you doing with two grapnels? Is that boat of yours balky?" "Mind yer eye, youngster. They're both mine, I reckon." "You might sell me one cheap," continued Dab, "considering how you got 'em.
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