She lay to under the land still, and with only
a few hands on deck, while the _Agra_ edged away from her and entered the
straits between Long Island and Point Leat, leaving the schooner about
two miles and a half distant to the N.W.

Ah! The stranger's deck swarms black with men.

His sham ports fell as if by magic, his guns grinned through the gaps
like black teeth; his huge foresail rose and filled, and out he came in
chase.

The breeze was a kiss from Heaven, the sky a vaulted sapphire, the sea a
million dimples of liquid, lucid, gold. . . .

The way the pirate dropped the mask, showed his black teeth, and bore up
in chase, was terrible: so dilates and bounds the sudden tiger on his
unwary prey. There were stout hearts among the officers of the peaceful
_Agra_; but danger in a new form shakes the brave; and this was their
first pirate: their dismay broke out in ejaculations not loud but
deep. . . .

"Sharpe," said Dodd, in a tone that conveyed no suspicion of the
newcomer, "set the royals, and flying jib.--Port!"

"Port it is," cried the man at the helm.

"Steer due South!" And, with these words in his mouth, Dodd dived to the
gun deck.

By this time elastic Sharpe had recovered the first shock; and the order
to crowd sail on the ship galled his pride and his manhood; he muttered,
indignantly, "The white feather!" This eased his mind, and he obeyed
orders briskly as ever. While he and his hands were setting every rag
the ship could carry on that tack, the other officers, having unluckily
no orders to execute, stood gloomy and helpless, with their eyes glued,
by a sort of sombre fascination, on that coming fate. . . .

Realize the situation, and the strange incongruity between the senses and
the mind in these poor fellows! The day had ripened its beauty; beneath
a purple heaven shone, sparkled, and laughed a blue sea, in whose waves
the tropical sun seemed to have fused his beams; and beneath that fair,
sinless, peaceful sky, wafted by a balmy breeze over those smiling,
transparent, golden waves, a bloodthirsty Pirate bore down on them with a
crew of human tigers; and a lady babble babble babble babble babble
babble babbled in their quivering ears.

But now the captain came bustling on deck, eyed the loftier sails, saw
they were drawing well, appointed four midshipmen in a staff to convey
his orders; gave Bayliss charge of the carronades, Grey of the cutlasses,
and directed Mr. Tickell to brea