as most
opportune; two enemy's brigs, which for some time had been blockading
the harbor, having left only the day before.

In March, 1814, the privateer schooner "Comet," of Baltimore, not
being able to make her home port, put into Wilmington, North Carolina.
She had been cruising in the West Indies, and had there taken twenty
vessels, most of which were destroyed after removing valuables. In the
course of her operations she encountered near St. Thomas the British
ship "Hibernia;" the size of which, and her height above the water, by
preventing boarding, enabled her successfully to repel attack, and the
privateer was obliged to haul off, having lost three men killed and
thirteen wounded. The American account of this affair ascribes
twenty-two guns to the "Hibernia." The British story says that she had
but six, with a crew of twenty-two men; of whom one was killed and
eleven wounded. The importance of the matter in itself scarcely
demands a serious attempt to reconcile this discrepancy; and it is
safer to accept each party's statement of his own force. The two agree
that the action lasted eight or nine hours, and that both were much
cut up. It is evident also from each narrative that they lay alongside
most of the time, which makes it probable that the ship's height
saved her from being overborne by superior numbers.

The "Saucy Jack," of Charleston, passed through several severe
combats, in one of which she was even worse mauled than the "Comet" in
the instance just cited. On April 30, 1814, off St. Nicolas Mole, in
the Windward Passage between Cuba and Santo Domingo, she met the
British ship "Pelham," a vessel of five hundred and forty tons, and
mounting ten guns, bound from London to Port au Prince. The "Pelham"
fought well, and the action lasted two hours, at the end of which she
was carried by boarding. Her forty men were overpowered by numbers,
but nevertheless still resisted with a resolution which commanded the
admiration of the victors. She lost four killed and eleven wounded;
among the latter her captain, dangerously. The privateer had two
killed and nine wounded. Both vessels reached Charleston safely, and
the "Saucy Jack" at once fitted out again. It is told that, between
daylight and dark of the day she began to enlist, one hundred and
thirty able-bodied seamen had shipped; and this at a time when the
navy with difficulty found crews.[234]

The "Saucy Jack" returned to the West Indies for another cruise,