warship. She was not quite so large as
the Adamant, and she was unprovided with a stern-jacket or other
defence of the kind. In sending her out the Admiralty had designed her
to defend the transport against the regular vessels of the United
States navy; for although the nature of the contract with the Syndicate
was well understood in England, it was not supposed that the American
Government would long consent to allow their war vessels to remain
entirely idle.

When the captain of the Craglevin perceived the approach of the
repeller he was much surprised, but he did not hesitate for a moment as
to his course. He signalled to the transport, then about a mile to the
north, to keep on her way while he steered to meet the enemy. It had
been decided in British naval circles that the proper thing to do in
regard to a repeller was to ram her as quickly as possible. These
vessels were necessarily slow and unwieldy, and if a heavy ironclad
could keep clear of crabs long enough to rush down upon one, there was
every reason to believe that the "ball-bouncer," as the repellers were
called by British sailors, could be crushed in below the water-line and
sunk. So, full of courage and determination, the captain of the
Craglevin bore down upon the repeller.

It is not necessary to enter into details of the ensuing action.
Before the Craglevin was within half a mile of her enemy she was seized
by two crabs, all of which had cast loose from the repeller, and in
less than twenty minutes both of her screws were extracted and her
rudder shattered. In the mean time two of the swiftest crabs had
pursued the transport, and, coming up with her, one of them had
fastened to her rudder, without, however, making any attempt to injure
it. When the captain of the steamer saw that one of the sea-devils had
him by the stern, while another was near by ready to attack him, he
prudently stopped his engines and lay to, the crab keeping his ship's
head to the sea.

The captain of the Craglevin was a very different man from the captain
of the Adamant. He was quite as brave, but he was wiser and more
prudent. He saw that the transport had been captured and forced to lay
to; he saw that the repeller mounted two heavy guns at her bow, and
whatever might be the character of those guns, there could be no
reasonable doubt that they were sufficient to sink an ordinary mail
steamer. His own vessel was entirely out of his control, and even if
he chose