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Updated: May 14, 2025
This object he handed to the man at the top of the ladder, who passed it to the next man, and so on until it reached the Janequeo, when it was taken aboard and stowed away below with every sign of the utmost precaution.
It looked as if the Janequeo was in for a bad ten minutes; for, after the alarm had been given, it seemed as though every ship in the harbour had lighted her beacon-fire; and Jim could see, by the glare of those which had sprung up aboard the Union and her consorts, that guns, both big and small, had been run out ready to fire into the intruder as she passed; while every vessel's side was literally black with riflemen, all waiting to pour a volley into the daring Janequeo.
After the engines had been stopped, Jim called a hasty council of the crew, consulting with them as to what was best to be done. They could not possibly force the boat over the chain, because, even were the engines powerful enough, the Janequeo would break her back in the process.
The young man had no opportunity, however, for further reflection, for they were now dashing along toward the Union and the other two ships; and after the first shock of terror at the destruction of the monitor, the Peruvians had returned to the guns, and were quite ready to send the Janequeo to the bottom.
The intrepid Janequeo awaited him in her fortified post, which she deemed secure, and repelled for a long time the various assaults of the Spaniards with great presence of mind. At length, her soldiers being dispersed by the fire of the artillery, she had to seek for safety in flight.
At length all preparations were completed, and on the 2nd of April 1880, exactly a week after Jim had returned to Valparaiso in the Angamos, the fleet, consisting of the Blanco, Huascar, Angamos, Pilcomayo, Mathias Cousino, and the two torpedo-boats Guacolda and Janequeo, left that port and, steaming out of the bay, headed to the northward.
Then, silently, he and his men set about the task of discovering what had caused the obstruction, and they were not long in finding that a stout chain had been stretched across the entrance evidently to prevent just such an attack as this, and that the Janequeo had run in upon this chain where it "sagged" in the middle, her momentum carrying her right up on to it, for her fore-foot was nearly out of the water.
Jim's fears were only too well founded, for the sentry saw the Janequeo as quickly as Jim saw the sentry, and in a second the fellow roared a hoarse challenge across the water, discharging his rifle at the boat as she swept past, without waiting for any reply.
But even before the ships had lost their way prior to dropping their anchors, the Janequeo was seen to sheer out of her place in the line; and presently she raced up alongside the Blanco Encalada, where she came to a standstill. The Blanco's side-ladder was then lowered, and Jim went down it on to the small craft's deck.
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