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I was near the mate, but sprang past several, threw the downhaul over the windlass, and jumped between the knight-heads out upon the bowsprit.
He made a sign to the mate, who came forward, took his station, deliberately between the knight-heads, cast a glance aloft, and called out, "All hands, lay aloft and loose the sails!" We were half in the rigging before the order came, and never since we left Boston were the gaskets off the yards, and the rigging overhauled, in a shorter time. "All ready forward, sir!" "All ready the main!"
The mate then took his place between the knight-heads to ``twig'' the fore, on the windlass to twig the main, and at the foot of the mainmast for the mizzen; and if anything was wrong, too much bunt on one side, clews too taut or too slack, or any sail abaft the yard, the whole must be dropped again.
Finally all of us went to the break of the poop, where we could get a better view, and just as we arrived, a monstrous form came over the knight-heads and stood forth on deck. The fellow had a beard fully a fathom long, and he stood nearly two fathoms high, his feet being hoof-shaped.
At his appearance, all the "old salts" quitted the heel of the spar, tarpaulins came fairly down to a level with the bag-reefs of the shirts, and even Strand stepped into the nettings, leaving the place between the knight-heads clear. To this spot Cuffe ascended with a light, steady step, for he was but six-and-twenty, just touching his hat in return to the boatswain's bow.
Unnoticed he got out of the ship over the knight-heads, ran along the back rope, and seizing the dolphin-striker firmly with both hands, lowered himself into the sea without a splash. He swam away, noiseless like a fish, and then struck boldly for the land, sustained, embraced, by the tepid water.
She ought to be dead ahead of us, as we tend now but blast me if I can see as much as her mast-heads." At this suggestion, a dozen men sprang upon guns or other objects, to look for the vessel in question. The old salt forward, however, had much the best chance, for he stepped on the heel of the bowsprit, and walked as far out as the knight-heads, to command the whole view ahead of the brig.
They were within a cable's length of each other, and Newton could plainly distinguish the features of the gallant Surcoeuf, who was in advance on the knight-heads, when a puff of wind, which at any other time would not have occasioned the starting of a royal sheet, took the sails of the corvette; and her wounded foremast, laden with men in the lee-rigging, unable to bear the pressure, fell over the side, carrying with it the maintop-mast and most of the crew who had been standing in the rigging, and leaving the corvette an encumbered wreck.
I thought; for we had enough of them, us it was. There she comes! See, here is her flying-jib-boom-end and there hey! Wychecombe? That's the old Roman, shoving through the smoke! Cæsar himself! and there stands Dick and young Geoffrey Cleveland he was of your family, duke there stands Dick Bluewater, between the knight-heads, waving his hat HURRAH! He's true, at last!
Before the boat had touched the side the crew were laboring at the noisy windlass with their shouts of "Yo heave ho! heave and pawl! heave hearty ho!" while the mate was screaming from the knight-heads, "Heave hearty, men heave hearty. Heave and raise the dead. Heave and away." Amid this uproar Coronado continued: "You won't shake hands with me, Lieutenant Thurstane.
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