ccasional
skirmishing with pikes and pistols took place through the ports, but
there does not appear to have been any concerted effort to board from
the lower decks of the Serapis, which had the advantage below.

The Richard had already received several eighteen-pound shot between
wind and water, causing her to leak badly; the main battery of
twelve-pounders was silenced; as for the gunroom battery of six
eighteen-pounders, we have seen that two out of the three starboard ones
burst at the first fire, killing most of their crews. During the whole
action but eight shots were fired from this heavy battery, the use of
which was so much favored by the smoothness of the water. The bursting
of these guns, and the destruction of the crew, with the partial blowing
up of the deck above, so early in the action, were discouraging
circumstances, which, with a less resolutely determined commander, might
well have been decisive of the fate of the battle.

Colonel Chamillard, who was stationed on the poop, with a party of
twenty marines, had already been driven from his post, with the loss of
a number of his men. The Alliance kept studiously aloof, and, hovering
about the Pallas and the Countess of Scarborough, until the latter
struck, after half an hour's action, Landais endeavored to get
information as to the force of the Serapis. He now ran down, under easy
sail, to where the Richard and Serapis grappled. At about half-past nine
he ranged up on the larboard quarter of the Richard, of course having
the Richard between him and the Serapis, though the brightness of the
moonlight, the greater height of the Richard, especially about the poop,
and the fact of her being painted entirely black, while the Serapis had
a yellow streak, could have left no doubt as to her identity; moreover,
the Richard displayed three lights at the larboard bow, gangway, and
stern, which was an appointed signal of recognition.

Landais now deliberately fired into the Richard's quarter, killing many
of her men. Standing on, he ranged past her larboard bow, where he
renewed his raking fire, with like fatal effect. To remove the chance of
misconception, many voices cried out that the Alliance was firing into
the wrong ship; still the raking fire continued from her. Captain
Pearson also suffered from this fire, as he states in his report to the
Admiralty, but necessarily in a much less degree than the Richard, which
lay between them. There is ample evidence of L