a tender to the British ship-sloop
_Lapwing_--had also disappeared with all hands, some three months
previously, after having been seen in pursuit of a large brig that had
come out of the river; these circumstances leading to the inference that
the Congo was the haunt of a strong gang of daring slavers whose capture
must be effected at any cost.

It was for this service that the _Barracouta_ had been selected, she
being a brand-new ship especially built for work on the West African
coast, and modelled to sail at a high speed upon a light draught of
water. She was immensely beamy for her length, and very shallow,
drawing only ten feet of water with all her stores and ammunition on
board, very heavily sparred--_too_ heavily, some of us thought--and, as
for canvas, her topsails had the hoist of those of a frigate of twice
her tonnage. She was certainly a beautiful model of a ship--far and
away the prettiest that I had ever seen when I first stepped on board
her--while her speed, especially in light winds and tolerably smooth
water, was such as to fill us all, fore and aft, with the most
extravagant hopes of success against the light-heeled slave clippers
whose business it was ours to suppress. She was a flush-decked vessel,
with high, substantial bulwarks pierced for nine guns of a side, and she
mounted fourteen 18-pounder carronades and four long nine-pounders, two
forward and two aft, which could be used as bow and stern-chasers
respectively, if need were, although we certainly did not anticipate the
necessity to employ any of our guns in the latter capacity. Our crew,
all told, numbered one hundred and sixty-five.

I was in the first lieutenant's watch, and happened to be on deck when
the look-out reported land upon the morning upon which this story opens.
I remember the circumstance as well as though it had occurred but
yesterday, and I have only to close my eyes to bring the whole scene up
before my mental vision as distinctly as a picture. The brig was, as I
have already said, heading to the eastward, close-hauled, on the port
tack, under everything that we could set, to her royals; but the wind
was so scant that even the light upper sails flapped and rustled
monotonously to the sleepy heave and roll of the ship, and it was only
by glancing through a port at the small, iridescent air-bubbles that
drifted astern at the rate of about a knot and a half in the hour that
we were able to detect the fact of our own fo