ons sliding
upon a long, iron bar). But he jumped overboard--despising the chance
of being gobbled up by a shark--and started to swim to his own ship.
He was brought back, flogged, and put in irons; and he evidently
found a week of this kind of thing sufficient; for he submitted
himself humbly to future orders.

Thus Woodes Rogers had already learned that the life of a privateer
commander was not a happy one.

Steering southwest, a large French ship was seen and chased, but she
got away from the two consorts with surprising ease. On March 6th,
when off the coast of Peru, a sail was sighted.

"Let the _Duchess_ bear down on her port and the _Duke_ to starboard,"
cried Captain Rogers. "Heave a solid shot across her bow, and, if she
refuses to capitulate, let her have your broadsides."

Dipping, tossing, rolling; the two privateers swooped down upon their
prey, like hawks. She flew the yellow flag of Spain--and--as the first
ball of lead cut across her bowsprit, it fluttered to the deck. Up
went a white shirt, tied to a rat-line, and the crew from the _Duke_
was soon in charge, and steering her for Lobas: a harbor on the coast.

"She's a tight little barque," said Rogers, when he had landed. "I'll
make her into a privateer."

So she was hauled up, cleaned, launched, and christened the
_Beginning_; with a spare topmast from the _Duke_ as a mast, and an
odd mizzen-topsail altered for a sail. Four swivel-guns were mounted
upon her deck, and, as she pounded out of the bay, loud cheers greeted
her from the decks of the _Duchess_, which was loafing outside,
watching for a merchantman to capture and pillage.

Next morn two sails were sighted, and both _Duke_ and _Duchess_
hastened to make another haul. As they neared them, one was seen to be
a stout cruiser from Lima; the other a French-built barque from
Panama; richly laden, it was thought.

"Broadsides for both," ordered Woodes Rogers. "Broadsides and good
treatment when the white flag flutters aloft."

As the _Duchess_ chased the Lima boat, the _Duke_ neared the Frenchman
and spanked a shot at her from a bow-gun. The sea ran high and she did
not wish to get too close and board, because it would be easier to
send her men in pinnaces.

"They're afraid!" cried the Captain of the _Duke_. "We can take 'em
with no exertion." But he was like many an Englishman: despised his
foe only to find him a valiant one.

Piling into four boats, the men from the _Duke_, fully armed