ours!" cried Jean Bart, smiling.

Instantly he spun over the wheel, luffed, and brought his boat upon
the starboard quarter of the Dutchman, who was now part helpless. It
took but a moment to run alongside, and, in a moment more, the
_Palme_ was lashed to the _Neptune_ in a deadly embrace. Smoke rolled
from the sides of both contestants and the roar of the guns drowned
the shrill cries of the wounded. The Dutchmen were now desperate and
their guns were spitting fire in rapid, successive volleys; but many
of them were silenced, as the great, brown side of the _Palme_ rubbed
its planking against the splintered railing of the shattered
_Neptune_.

As the vessels were securely bound together, Jean Bart seized a
boarding-pike, a brace of pistols, and, giving the helm to a sailor,
leaped into the waist of his ship.

"Board! Board!" he shouted.

A wild yelp greeted these welcome sounds. As he vaulted over the rail
of his own ship to the deck of the stranger, a motley crew of
half-wild sea-savages swarmed behind him. They had cutlasses and
boarding-pikes, and their faces were blackened with powder. Their eyes
were reddened with sulphurous fumes and their clothes torn with
splintered planking. They rolled over the gunwales like a huge wave of
irresistible fire: pistols spitting, pikes gleaming, cutlasses
glistening in the rays of the sun.

The captain of the _Neptune_ lay near his own wheel, grievously
wounded.

"Lay on, men!" he shouted. "Don't let this French privateer beat us.
We will be disgraced."

But his sailors were no match for the onrush of these fiends from
Dunkirk. They fell back like foam before a sea squall.

"Then down with our flag," cried the captain of the Dutchman. "But,
ye gods, how it hurts me to give the order."

A sailor seized the halyards and pulled the ensign to the deck, and,
as it fell upon the reddened planking, a wild, frenzied cheer came
from the French privateers.

"Jean Bart, forever! France forever! Jean Bart forever!" they cried.

"Up with the French flag!" yelled Jean Bart, laughing like a boy. "Up
with the white lilies of France."

And, as a spare ensign ran aloft, the little fishing luggers scudded
for the shore.

"After them, men!" cried Captain Bart. "Our work is not yet over. We
must have the lambs as well as the old wolf."

So, sail was soon clapped on the _Palme_, she headed for the fleeing
boats, and, with a few well directed shots, hove them to. Then they
were told