l travelling when you
last saw him?"

"He goin' eastward, sir."--Neb was never half as much "nigger" at sea, as
when he was on shore,--there being something in his manly calling that
raised him nearer to the dignity of white men.--"But, sir, he was gettin'
his people ready to make sail."

"How do you know that?--No such thing, sir; all hands were asleep, taking
their second naps."

"Well, you see, Misser Marble; den you _know_, sir."

Neb grinned as he said this; and I felt persuaded he had seen something
that he understood, but which very possibly he could not explain; though
it clearly indicated that John Bull was not asleep. We were not left long
in doubt on this head. The mist opened again, and, distant from us about
three-quarters of a mile, bearing on our lee quarter, we got another look
at the frigate, and a look that satisfied everybody what she was about.
The Englishman was in stays, in the very act of hauling his head-yards, a
certain sign he was a quick and sure-working fellow, since this manoeuvre
had been performed against a smart sea, and under double-reefed top-sails.
He must have made us, just as we lost sight of him, and was about to shake
out his reefs.

On this occasion, the frigate may have been visible from our decks three
minutes. I watched all her movements, as the cat watches the mouse. In the
first place her reefs were shaken out, as the ship's bows fell off far
enough to get the sea on the right side of them, and her top-sails appeared
to me to be mast-headed by instinct, or as the bird extends its wings. The
fore and main-top-gallant sails were fluttering in the breeze at this very
moment,--it blew rather too fresh for the mizen,--and then their bosoms
were distended, and their bow-lines hauled. How the fore and main-tacks got
aboard I could not tell, though it was done while my eyes were on the
upper sails. I caught a glimpse of the fore-sheet, however, as the clew
was first flapping violently, and then was brought under the restraint of
its own proper, powerful purchase. The spanker had been hauled out
previously, to help the ship in tacking.

There was no mistaking all this. We were seen, and chased; everything on
board the frigate being instantly and accurately trimmed, "full and by."
She looked up into our wake, and I knew must soon overtake a heavily-laden
ship like the Dawn, in the style in which she was worked and handled.
Under the circumstances, therefore, I motioned Marble to