n, gave her in like fashion the contents of
our starboard broadside. This time the Frenchmen were ready for us, and
returned our fire with their two stern-chasers, both shot passing
through our mainsail without doing any further damage. Again we tacked;
and this time I gave orders to put in a charge of grape on top of each
round shot, which we rattled into the stern of the Frenchman at a
distance of not more than three or four fathoms. Our shot must have
wrought terrible execution; for after each discharge we could hear the
shrieks and groans of the wounded even through the crash of the two
other vessels' broadsides. This time they only gave us one gun in
exchange for our four, the shot passing in through our port bulwarks and
out through the starboard, killing a man on its way. Our shot, however,
had killed the brig's helmsman, and almost immediately afterwards the
vessel broached-to, her foremast going over the bows as she did so.
This was enough for them; they received another broadside from the
_Dolphin_, and then, just as we were in stays, preparatory to passing
athwart their stern and raking them again, a man ran aft and hauled down
their flag, at the same time crying out that they surrendered.

The firing on both sides at once ceased, the smoke drifted away to
leeward, and we were able to see around us once more, as well as to note
the condition of the combatants after our brief but spirited engagement.
The cutter had seized the opportunity to make good her escape, and was
now more than two miles to leeward, running before the wind to the
westward on her original course. The brig--which proved to be the
_Etoile du Nord_, of Dunkirk--had, as already stated, lost her foremast,
her bulwarks were riddled with shot-holes, and her rigging badly cut up.
The _Dolphin_ also had suffered severely from the fire of her
antagonist, her starboard bulwarks being almost destroyed, her rigging
showing a good many loose ropes'-ends floating in the wind, and her
main-boom so severely wounded that it parted in two when her helm was
put down to bring her to the wind and heave her to. As for us, the
damage that we had received from the brig's fire was so trifling as to
be not worth mentioning.

I knew, of course, that after so determined a fight the services of our
surgeon would be in urgent request on board both the principal
combatants; so, as he was aboard the lugger, I ran down close under the
_Dolphin's_ lee and, having h