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'A twelve-pounder! said Ken sharply, as he turned. 'Ah! as a blaze of light sprang out about half a mile aft, 'that's why they stopped firing. There's a destroyer after us. Ken was right. That was why the firing had stopped. A destroyer, which must have been lying in some cove up the Straits, had been summoned by wireless to take revenge on the bold intruder.
Luckily the water was smooth as yet. The main staysail shot out of the boltropes with a report like a twelve-pounder, and this eased her so that if the fore staysail would only hold she would go off.
Feeling that actual work could only be done well by men of actual experience, he had a twelve-pounder gun placed on the after part of the Queen Charlotte's quarter-deck, and hung a small target, with a very small bull's-eye, at the end of the fore-topmast studding-sail boom, at which all the captains of guns practised every day, so that they acquired not only the habit of laying and working their guns according to rule, but also the art of laying them to good purpose, and many of them became crack shots before they came within sight of the enemy.
Those twelve-pounder carronades are of comparatively little use except at close quarters, and Merlani is not fool enough to give you the chance to use them to advantage; he will simply heave to out of range and blaze away with his long gun until more than half your crew are killed, when he will dash alongside and carry the ship without an effort.
I stepped back, picked up a stone of about twelve pounds weight, and stood ready. With a bound the beast landed on the cope-stone of the wall; and, almost in the same instant, my missile caught him fair in the face. He gave a stifled cry, went tumbling back where he had come from, and I could hear the twelve-pounder accompany him in his fall.
The twenty-four-pounders-the largest guns in use at the time-the eighteen-pounders, and the twelve-pounder guns were all in good order. The bags of iron balls called grape-shot-the worst of all varying in size from sixteen to nine balls in a bag, were prepared.
The commander of the troops brought reinforcements up to the firing line, and the twelve-pounder came into action. But the assailants made very little impression on the defence. Although the engagement lasted for more than five hours, the troops succeeded in capturing nothing more than one of the flanking houses.
Luc has brought a field piece, a twelve-pounder, I think, and they've opened fire with grape-shot. They'll sweep the whole forest. Who'd have thought it?" The battle sank for a moment, and then a tremendous yell of triumph came from the Indians. Presently, the cannon crashed again, and its deadly charge of grape took heavy toll of the rangers.
"Yes; we tow a rowboat and a store boat up, behind this craft, as far as she can go; that is, as long as she has wind enough to make against the sluggish stream. When she can go no further, I take to the rowboat. It has eight rowers, carries a gun it is a twelve-pounder howitzer that I have had cut short, so that it is only about a foot long.
"But we heard heavy guns this morning," continued the commander, putting on his sober face, for he could be as serious as a judge, though his adipose structure compelled him to be a great joker at suitable times. "You had no boat guns." "No, sir; but we picked up four twelve-pounder field pieces, which you see, two of them on carriages, on the forecastle of that steamer.
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