d
were well used to hand-to-hand engagements. With a wild cheer they
leaped over the breastworks and rushed upon the enemy.

The British were absolutely astonished at the intrepidity of this
advance. Pistols spat, cutlasses swung, and one after another, the
English officers fell before the snapping blade of the King of
Barrataria, as they bravely cheered on their men. The practiced
boarders struck the red-coated columns with the same fierceness with
which they had often bounded upon the deck of an enemy, and cheer
after cheer welled above the rattle of arms as the advancing guardsmen
were beaten back. All the energies of the British were concentrated
upon scaling the breastworks, which one daring officer had already
mounted. But Lafitte and his followers, seconding a gallant band of
volunteer riflemen, formed a phalanx which it was impossible to
penetrate. They fought desperately.

It was now late in the day. The field was strewn with the dead and
dying. Still spat the unerring rifles of the pioneers and still
crashed the unswerving volleys from their practiced rifles. "We cannot
take the works," cried the British. "We must give up." And--turning
about--they beat a sad and solemn retreat to their vessels. The great
battle of New Orleans was over, and Lafitte had done a Trojan's share.

In a few days peace was declared between the United States and Great
Britain, and General Jackson--in his correspondence with the Secretary
of War--did not fail to speak in the most flattering terms of the
conduct of the "Corsairs of Barrataria." They had fought like tigers,
and they had been sadly misjudged by the English, who wished to enlist
them in their own cause. Their zeal, their courage, and their skill,
were noticed by the whole American Army, who could no longer
stigmatize such desperate fighters as "criminals." Many had been
sabred and wounded in defence of New Orleans, and many had given up
their lives before the sluggish bayous of the Mississippi. And now,
Mr. Lafitte, it is high time that you led a decent life, for are you
not a hero?

But "murder will out," and once a privateer always a privateer, and
sometimes a pirate.

Securing some fast sailing vessels, the King of Barrataria sailed to
Galveston Bay, in 1819, where he received a commission from General
Long as a "privateer." Not content with living an honest and peaceful
life, he proceeded to do a little smuggling and illicit trading upon
his own account, so it w