_, Copenhafen.

So the officer in charge of the boarding party commenced his report with
the name of the ship and the port from which she hailed, adding thereto
the evident fact that she had been heavily shelled--just a brief
statement which left to the imagination all the incidents and, alas!
tragedies of an unequal fight.

A high-explosive shell had struck the little raised poop, demolishing
the hatchway leading to the cabins beneath, and some heavy work with axe
and saw would have been necessary to obtain an entry had an easier way
not been available through the shattered skylight. In the low-roofed
cabin all was disorder. Tables and lockers were smashed, and the shell
which had burst overhead had filled the place with heavy broken timbers
from the deck above.

So low was the cabin roof of this small three-masted barque, and so dark
the interior, that it was difficult to see about. A lantern was procured
and a careful search commenced. The yellow light fell on drawers pulled
out and their contents--when worthless--flung on the floor; glasses and
bottles smashed and a quaint old China figure lying intact on the broken
timbers. But of the ship's papers there was no trace, with the single
exception of an old Bill of Health, issued six years previously in
Baltimore. Then the area of search moved from the cupboards and drawers
to the floor--broken by a shell which had evidently penetrated the
ship's stern and passed longitudinally through the cabin, exploding near
the base of the companion-hatch.

Presently a startled exclamation, followed by a call for the light, came
from the gloom around the stairway. Two of the boarding party searching
among the debris had stumbled across something which, instinctively,
sent a cold shiver through them. The light, when moved in that
direction, dimly revealed the body of a man lying face downwards on the
floor. Only the lower half of the figure was, however, visible, a mass
of shattered timbers having collapsed on the head and shoulders. That
life had been extinct for some considerable time was evidenced by the
sickly odour which hung heavily in the less ventilated parts of the
cabin, and the work of extricating the body was not commenced before the
whole ship had been searched for possible survivors.

This work occupied a considerable time, but nothing of importance was
discovered until a slight noise, not unlike the feeble, inarticulate cry
of a child in pain, came through the ti