and they fought desperately in the darkness that followed.
Suddenly the stranger disappeared in the gloom of night. Some time
afterward Truxton learned that the ship was the very one he was
searching for--the frigate _La Vengeance_; that he had shattered her
terribly; and that she ran away in the darkness to a friendly port to
save her life.

These victories made the navy very popular. Truxton was the hero of this
war with the French on the ocean. It soon ceased, and the little navy
found ample employment in the Mediterranean.

In the year 1800 Bainbridge was sent, in command of the _George
Washington_, to pay tribute to the Algerine ruler. The Dey, as he was
called, commanded the Captain to take an Ambassador to Constantinople.
Bainbridge refused. "You pay me tribute, and are my slave," said the
haughty Dey; "you must do as I bid you;" and he pointed to the guns of
the castle. The Captain was compelled to obey. The Sultan received him
kindly, for the crescent moon on the Turkish banner, and the stars on
the American flag, seemed to prophesy good-will between the two nations.
He gave Bainbridge an order that made the insolent Dey tremble. With it
in his hand, the Captain said to the turbaned ruler, "Release every
Christian captive you have, without ransom." The astonished and humbled
Dey obeyed, and Bainbridge sailed away with threescore liberated
captives under the American flag.

Meanwhile the rulers of Tunis and Tripoli--other North African
robbers--had exacted and received tribute from the United States. The
treatment of Bainbridge made the latter resolve to pay tribute no
longer, but to humble the piratical powers. In the spring of 1801
Commodore Dale was sent with a squadron on that errand. He captured a
Tripolitan pirate ship, and appeared before Tunis, where the flag-staff
before the house of the American Consul had been cut down. Dale
threatened the ruler with chastisement. He was astonished and perplexed.
Dale cruised in the Mediterranean until fall, effectually protecting
American commerce, for the half-barbarian powers were made timid and
cautious.

The following year a relief squadron was sent to the Mediterranean
under Commodore Morris. The _Constellation_ blockaded the harbor of
Tripoli. A flotilla of Tripolitan gun-boats tried to drive her away, but
failed. At one time the _Constellation_ successfully fought seventeen of
them, as well as troops of cavalry on shore. The other vessels of the
squadron