to see
a ship sailing briskly along under one of them, while another ship,
perhaps less than a mile away, is lying helpless in the midst of a
stark, breathless calm. Or two ships, a mile or two apart, may be seen
sailing in diametrically opposite directions, each of them with squared
yards and a fair wind. Under ordinary circumstances the fickle and
evanescent character of these atmospheric eddies is of little moment;
they involve a considerable amount of box-hauling of the yards, and
cause a great deal of annoyance to the exasperated and perspiring
seamen, very inadequately compensated by the paltry mile or so which the
ship has been driven toward her destination; and their aggravating
character begins and ends there.

But when one ship is chasing, or being chased by, another, it is quite a
different matter; for the eccentric behaviour of these same partial
breezes may make all the difference between capturing a prize, and
helplessly watching the chase sail away and make good her escape. Or,
as was the case with ourselves, it may make precisely the difference
between losing a prize and retaining possession of her. Thus we felt
supremely grateful to the erratic little draught of air that swept us
beyond the reach of the pursuing boats; but we piped a very different
tune when, some two hours later, we beheld the brig come bowling along
after us under the influence of a slashing breeze, while we lay becalmed
in the midst of a sea of glass and an atmosphere so stagnant that even
the vane at our mast-head drooped motionless save for the oscillation
imparted to it by the heave of the schooner over the swell. We had, of
course, long ere this, got the boarding-nettings up and stretched along
in stops, with the tricing lines bent on, and everything ready for
tricing up at a moment's notice; but, remembering the number of men that
I had seen in the boats, I felt that, should the brig succeed in getting
alongside, there was a tough fight before us, in which some at least of
our brave fellows would lose the number of their mess; and I could not
help reflecting, rather bitterly, that if the breeze were to favour us
instead of the brig, a considerable loss of life would be avoided. But
that the brig would get alongside us soon became perfectly evident, for
she was already within a mile of us, coming along with a spanking
breeze, on the starboard tack, with her yards braced slightly forward,
all plain sail set, to her royals, t