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The Superb anchored two hundred and fifty yards astern of the flag-ship; the Minden anchored about her own length from the Superb, and passing her stream-cable out of the larboard gun-room port to the Albion, brought the two ships together. Next came the Impregnable. These sufficiently engaged the batteries on the island or mole.
After the deck was cleared of these sanguinary savages, several guns were fired at the village, the sails were loosened, stream-cable cut, and the ship put to sea. The same night they got under weigh, seven large war-canoes hove in sight, with about thirty Indians in each.
Our young mate, and his sole assistant, Bob Betts, had set about their work on the stream-cable and anchor, the lightest and most manageable of all the ground-tackle in the vessel.
He was very very quiet, but off his balance evidently. Would you believe it? He wanted to take a length of old stream-cable and a kedge-anchor with him in the long-boat. We said, 'Ay, ay, sir, deferentially, and on the quiet let the thing slip overboard. The heavy medicine-chest went that way, two bags of green coffee, tins of paint fancy, paint! a whole lot of things.
In the meantime the strain put upon the Hecla’s hawsers being too great for them, they snapped one after another, and a bower-anchor was let go as a last resource. It was one of Hawkins’s, with the double fluke, and immediately brought up, not merely the ship, but a large floe of young ice, which had just broken our stream-cable.
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