mouth, and never before, since ship-building began, were a couple of
man-ropes thrown off with greater violence! The pirate captain fell
back into his boat, and the captain of the steamer stepped promptly back
to avoid the storm of bullets that were let fly at his devoted head. At
the starboard gangway the chief mate performed the same ceremony to
another boat with a like result.

The pirates were amazed and enraged, but not cowed. With a wild cheer
they made a simultaneous dash at the ship's sides all round. With a
wilder yell they fell back into their boats,--shocked beyond expression!
A few of them, however, chanced to lay hold of ropes or parts of the
vessel that were not electrified. These gained the bulwarks.

"Shove in some more acid," said the chief electrician in suppressed
excitement to Sam Shipton, who stood beside the batteries below.

"Stir up the fires, lads," cried the chief engineer to his men at the
boilers beneath, as he stood holding a fire-nozzle ready.

Intensified yells all round told that chemical action had not been
applied in vain, while the pirates who had gained the bulwarks were met
with streams of boiling water in their faces. Heroes may and do face
shot and shell coolly without flinching, but no hero ever faced boiling
water coolly. The pirates turned simultaneously and received the
streams in rear. Light cotton is but a poor defence in such
circumstances. They sloped over the sides like eels, and sought refuge
in the sea. Blazing with discomfiture and amazement, but not yet
dismayed, these ferocious creatures tried the assault a second time.
Their fury became greater, so did the numbers that gained a footing on
the bulwarks, but not one reached the deck! The battery and the boiler
played a part that day which it had never before entered into the brain
of the wildest scientist to conceive. The hissing of the hot shower and
the vigour of the cold shock were only equalled by the unearthly yelling
of the foe, whose miraculous bounds and plunges formed a scene that is
altogether indescribable.

The crew of the steamer stood spell-bound, unable to fight even if there
had been occasion for so doing. The dark-skinned captain became
Indian-red in the face from suppressed laughter.

Suddenly a tremor ran through the steamer, as if she too were unable to
restrain her feelings. During the fight--if we may so call it--the
engineers had been toiling might and main in the buried depth