to "talk bunting," or
show colors; but she had nothing of the kind on board but some old
ragged signals that formerly belonged to the ill-fated brig Swan; and
one of these was accordingly run up to the end of the main gaff. Captain
Burton, for it was indeed he and the brig Avon, after attentively
examining the stranger, gave it as his opinion that she was a pirate,
and directed his men to stand to their guns.

In a few minutes the schooner, having closed with the Avon, fired a shot
across her bows, which being unnoticed, another was fired that passed
through her foresail, to which the brig replied with three guns loaded
with grape, that took fatal effect upon the exposed and crowded deck of
the Vincedor. The pirates then kept up a heavy and well-directed fire of
small arms upon the Avon, and Captain Burton, seeing several of his best
men killed and wounded, reluctantly gave orders to haul up the courses
and back the main yard, still keeping his colors flying.

Longford and about twenty ruffians like himself immediately came on
board; and their first question to Captain Burton was, how he had dared
to fire upon their schooner?

"Because," said the sturdy old seaman, "I knew you to be pirates, and I
was determined not to surrender this vessel without some resistance."

During this speech, Longford raised his pistol, and at its conclusion
fired; and the brave old sailor, shot through the body, and mortally
wounded, fell at his feet. This was the signal for a general massacre of
the crew; and while the bloody act was perpetrating, Longford ran down
into the cabin, to secure certain articles of plunder that he did not
choose to share with his partners in crime and blood.

Before the pirate came alongside the Avon, Captain Burton, suspecting
her real character, had requested Julia to go below for a while, on
pretence that he was going to tack ship, and she would be in the way, as
women always are at sea, of the head-braces and main-boom. As the blunt
old veteran never used much ceremony upon such occasions, she thought no
more about it, but went below as she was bid. The firing, however, had
terrified her exceedingly; and Miss Dorothy Hastings, who was sent out
as a vidette as far as the upper step of the companion-ladder, came
scampering back to the main body with intelligence that the stranger was
a pirate, and immediately proceeded to enumerate the outrages that they
might certainly calculate upon being subjected to. A