ay
not send a boat on board to examine us, and we shall pass for a
privateer, or we may get the breeze in time to slip out of her way to
the northward, or to keep ahead of her and give her the go-by during the
night. If she's French, we must put the Frenchman in command, show our
French papers, and bamboozle the mounseers, or if the worst comes to the
worst, tumble the crew of their boat overboard and try to get away."

"But suppose they fire into us?" said Dick, who though often thoughtless
was alive to the true state of the case.

"We must run the chance of that, my lad," answered Ben, "though my idea
is that yonder craft is an English corvette, and although she may be a
pretty fast sailer, when once the _Nancy_ gets the breeze, we shall show
her a clean pair of heels."

Dick sincerely hoped that such would be the case. He had not reckoned
on the chance of being captured as a smuggler, or made prisoner by the
enemy, or shot by either the one or the other. The crew were at their
stations, ready to trim sails the moment the slightest breath of air
should reach them. The topsails had before been set. The squaresail
and studding-sails were got up ready to hoist at an instant's notice.
Still the lugger lay motionless, and the corvette, for such she was
pronounced to be, came rapidly on, under every stitch of canvas she
could carry. She was soon within a mile of the lugger, when some cat's
paws were seen playing over the water; the dog-vanes blew out and then
dropped, the canvas flapped lightly against the masts. The skipper
swore, and the crew swore, until once more they saw the sails bulging
out slightly.

"Hurrah! here it comes at last! We'll keep out of that fellow's way,"
cried Captain Dore, eyeing the stranger. The lugger began gathering
way. "Port the helm, Tom. We'll stand to the northward, and shall soon
see whether he wishes to speak us. If he does, we'll take leave to
disappoint him."

The yards were braced up on the starboard tack, and the lugger stood on
the course proposed, so that the corvette, should she continue on as she
was now steering, would pass astern. Dore kept his eye fixed on her.

"She's a fancy to know more about us," he remarked, as he observed the
stranger also keeping up to the northward. "Her shot can't reach us
yet, and we shall soon see, now we have got the breeze, which is the
faster craft of the two."

As Dick looked over the starboard quarter, he saw the sails and d