n of her friends. Satisfied, I imagine,
that she had all but finished her voyage, seeing no cruiser and
unsuspicious of boats, on she came.[1]

We got almost alongside of her before the people on board seemed to see
us. When she did, evidently taken by surprise, she put her helm down,
and throwing all her sails aback, snapped some of her lighter spars,
thus throwing everything into confusion--confusion made worse by the
fact that, with the view of immediate landing, two hundred or three
hundred of the niggers had been freed from their confinement and were
crowded on the deck. Taking advantage of this state of things we made
our capture without a shot being fired.

In fact everything was done, as sailors say, 'before you could look
round you,' the man at the helm replaced by one of my men, the crew
bundled down into the slave-hold to give them a taste of its horrors,
and the sails trimmed for seaward instead of towards the land. The
captain, who seemed a decent fellow, cried like a child. He said: 'If I
had seen you five minutes before you would never have taken me. Now I am
ruined.' I consoled him as well as I could and treated him well, as he
really seemed half a gentleman, if not entirely one. I found about six
hundred slaves, men and women and children, on board this vessel, who as
they had made a very rapid and prosperous voyage, were in a somewhat
better state than those on board the last capture. Still goodness knows
their state was disgusting enough. Ophthalmia had got a terrible hold of
the poor wretches. In many of the cases the patient was stone blind. I
caught this painful disease myself, and for several days couldn't see a
yard.

Shortly after, having despatched our prize into Rio in charge of a
brother midshipman, we were joined by another man-of-war cruiser, which
had been sent to assist us in our work. As the officer in command of
this vessel was of senior rank to my commander, he naturally took upon
himself to organise another boat expedition, placing one of his own
officers in command. With this expedition I was allowed to go, taking
with me my old boats and their crews, with orders to place myself under
the direction of Lieutenant A.C., the officer chosen by the senior in
command.

So we started with five boats provisioned and otherwise prepared for a
cruise of twenty days. The lieutenant in charge did not think it wise to
land, as a bad feeling towards us was known to exist among the
inhabitants,