several shells exploded in the air near her,
she was never at any time in the least danger, and Jim Douglas, with his
chum Terry, had a splendid opportunity of witnessing a bombardment at
close quarters without taking any risks. But both of them were so
unappreciative of this immunity that they would have infinitely
preferred their ship to be in the thick of the fighting, instead of
lying safely out of range as she was.

But presently the Chilians found that it was almost impossible to hit
the shipping behind the mole from the position which they had taken up,
and as Admiral Riveros' principal desire was to annihilate the Peruvian
navy, and thus render Peru harmless at sea, he signalled for the
_Huascar_ to move closer in, and to take up a position more to the
north-eastward. The signal was acknowledged, and presently the monitor
lifted her anchor and stood over still closer to the mole, maintaining a
terrific fire as she went, and receiving a 20-inch Dahlgren shell on her
water-line as some slight return for the damage that she was inflicting.
But luckily she was well provided with water-tight bulkheads, or
nothing could have saved her, for the sea poured into her in tons
through the huge hole which the shell had made in her side.

Nothing daunted, however, her captain, Carlos Condell--the man who had
fought the _Covadonga_ so splendidly, and been promoted through several
ships to the _Huascar_--continued to stand on until he had approached to
within a mile of the mole, when he dropped his anchor and opened a still
more furious and destructive fire upon the Peruvian ships. One well-
aimed shell set the _Union_ on fire, and for a few minutes Jim and his
chum--together with every other man in the Chilian navy, for that
matter--thought and hoped that the famous ship had run her course. But
Villavicencio was, as has already been seen, a man of resource and
energy, and in half an hour he had the fire under control.

Not so fortunate was the school-ship _Maranon_. Although old, she was
armed with the newest weapons for the instruction of naval men in
gunnery, and though these guns were of small calibre, and therefore of
little use against the thick armour of the ironclad, she steamed out
from behind the mole and replied heroically to the _Huascar's_ fire,
killing twelve men who were working the monitor's machine-guns, jamming
one of the turret-tracks, cutting one of the anchor cables, and nearly
wrecking the _Huascar