we were running off square before the wind I
began to edge the boat gradually in toward the line of the schooner's
course. By this manoeuvre we gave them a little more time to shorten
sail, since we were still about a mile ahead of them and were now
travelling in the same direction as themselves, although the schooner
was fast overhauling us. But by the time that she was abreast of us,
and only about a hundred feet distant, both her starboard studdingsails
were in, and she was ready to round-to. Then a man came to the rail and
hailed us.

"Boat ahoy!" he shouted. "I guess you're shipwrecked, ain't you, and
want to be picked up."

"Ay, ay, sir," I answered; "that is so. May we run alongside?"

"Sure!" he replied heartily. "I'll come to the wind on the starboard
tack, when you can pass under my starn and come alongside at the lee
gangway."

I waved my hand by way of thanks and to show that I understood, and let
run the sheet of the lug to allow him to draw ahead and take room to
round-to; and presently he eased down his helm and brought the schooner
to the wind, keeping his yards square and hauling his jib sheets over to
windward to check the little vessel's way. We were thus afforded an
excellent view of the craft, and a little beauty she was, as clean built
and finely modelled as a yacht--for which, indeed, she might easily have
been mistaken, except for the fact that her sails were not big enough.
She was painted all black from her rail to her copper, with the bust of
a woman, painted white, for a figurehead, and the name _Martha Brown_,
with the word Baltimore--her port of registry--painted in white letters
on her stern. She appeared to be in little more than deep-ballast trim,
and I began to wonder whither she was bound even before we got alongside
her.

The getting alongside required a little management, for there was a fair
amount of swell running, and the schooner was rolling heavily; but we
managed it all right, and were met at the gangway, upon boarding the
little vessel, by the individual who had hailed us. He was a typical
Yankee, tall, thin, and somewhat cadaverous-looking as to features, with
a clean-shaven upper lip, a short goatee beard, and light hair, slightly
touched with grey, worn so long that it came down over the collar of his
coat, which was of faded blue cloth, adorned with brass buttons. His
trousers were braced up high enough to reveal his ankles, and he wore a
pair of ancient re