he sheets of her jibs and stay-sails
trimmed to a hair, and every thread drawing perfectly, while around us
the atmosphere remained absolutely stagnant.

I looked for her to open fire upon us as soon as she drew up within
range; but although her guns were run out--and were doubtless loaded--
she came foaming along in grim silence; doubtless her skipper saw, as
clearly as we did, that he had us now, and did not think it necessary to
waste powder and shot to secure what was already within his power. His
aim was, apparently, to range up alongside us on our port quarter, and
when at length he had arrived within a short half-mile of us, with no
sign of the smallest puff of wind coming to help us, I gave orders to
trice up and secure the nettings, and then for all hands to range
themselves along the port bulwarks in readiness to repel the boarders.
It was now too late for us to dream of escape, for even should the
breeze, that the brig was bringing down with her, reach us, we were by
this time so completely under her guns that she could have unrigged us
with a single well-directed broadside.

Anxious though I was as to the issue of the coming tussle, I could not
help admiring that brig. She was a truly beautiful craft; distinctly a
bigger vessel than the _Shark_, longer, more beamy, with sides as round
as an apple, and with the most perfectly moulded bows that it was
possible to conceive. She was coming very nearly stem-on to us, and I
could not therefore see her run, but I had no doubt that it was as
perfectly shaped as were her bows, for I estimated her speed at fully
eight knots, and for a vessel to travel at that rate in such a breeze
she must of necessity have possessed absolute perfection of form. She
was as heavily rigged as a man-o'-war, and her canvas--which was so
white that it must have been woven of cotton--had evidently been cut by
a master hand, for the set of it was perfect and flatter than any I had
ever seen before. She was coppered to the bends, was painted black to
her rails, with the exception of a broad red ribbon round her, and was
pierced for eighteen guns.

When she had arrived within about half a cable's-length of us she
suddenly ran out of the breeze that had helped her so well, and
instantly floated upright, with all her square canvas aback in the
draught caused by her own speed through the stagnant atmosphere; and now
we were afforded a fresh opportunity to gauge the strength of her crew,
f