uerors, they fired
their vessel in several places, in the hopes of destroying them at the
same time with themselves.

The Dutchmen were brave fellows, and in spite of the risk they ran, they
managed to save some of those they found on board, before they cast
loose from the burning prahu. The brig then made sail after us. Long
before she came up to us, the Malay vessel, with her crew of savage
desperadoes, had followed her consort to the bottom of the ocean.
Dreadful as was their fate, they had, from their numerous atrocities, so
richly deserved it, that no one could pity them. We next had to
look-out for ourselves. The same sanguinary scene that we had witnessed
at a distance was now to be enacted on board our vessel. As we kept
right ahead of the brig, her bow chasers only could reach us, and with
those she plied us as rapidly as they could be loaded, the shot flying
over and around us, and one striking us on the counter, and killing two
men who were working the lelahs placed there. The pirates in return
were not idle. The long gun was worked vigorously, though not with much
effect; but the lelahs and matchlocks kept up a galling fire on the
brig, while the bows and arrows were kept ready to come into play as
soon as she could get near enough to feel their effect.

I will not acknowledge exactly to have felt fear; but I experienced a
very disagreeable sensation as the shot of our friends came flying
around us, and some of the equally unfortunate Dyaks, and one or two
Malays were struck down close to us. The feeling would have been still
worse, had we not been so eagerly engaged in watching the brig, with the
expectation of being released, and hoping to escape unhurt. At last a
shot struck the head of our mainmast, and down came the sail, the
foremast very soon followed, the after part being struck, and with the
sail it swung over the bows. As the musketry of the Dutchmen came
rattling among us, they sent forth the most frightful shrieks and yells
in return, gnashing their teeth and clashing their weapons together, as
they waited to meet their assailants hand to hand. The Dutch captain,
knowing that there were prisoners on board, instead of firing away till
the prahus sunk, as from the character of the Malays, he would have been
justified in doing, ran alongside, shouting out that he would afford
quarter to those who sought it. The fierce Malays answered him with
loud cries of derision and shrieks of despai