el, and soon the rotten old
craft was "leaking like a basket."

It began to look desperate for Jones and his ship. He could not half
reply to the heavy fire of the English guns, and great chasms were made
in the ship's side, where the 18-pound balls tore out the timbers
between the port holes.

Captain Pearson of the "Serapis" looked at his staggering and leaking
enemy, and thought it about time for the battle to end.

"Have you surrendered?" he shouted across the water to Commodore Jones.

"I have not yet begun to fight," was the famous answer of the brave Paul
Jones.

Surrender, indeed! I doubt if that word was in Paul Jones' dictionary.
He would rather have let his vessel sink. The ships now drifted
together, and by Jones' order the jib-boom of the "Serapis" was lashed
to his mizzen-mast. This brought the ships so close side by side that
the English gunners could not open their ports, and had to fire through
them and blow them off. And the gunners on both sides had to thrust the
handles of their rammers through the enemy's port holes, in order to
load their guns.

Affairs were now desperate. The "Bon Homme Richard" was on fire in
several places. Water was pouring into her through a dozen rents. It
seemed as if she must sink or burn. Almost any man except Paul Jones
would have given up the fight. I know I should, and I fancy most of you
would have done the same. But there was no give up in that man's soul.

One would think that nothing could have been worse, but worse still was
to come. In this crisis the "Alliance," one of Jones' small fleet, came
up and fired two broadsides into the wounded flagship, killing a number
of her crew. Whether this was done on purpose or by mistake is not
known. The French captain did not like Commodore Jones, and most men
think he played the traitor.

And another bad thing took place. There were two or three hundred
English prisoners on the "Bon Homme Richard," taken from her prizes. One
of the American officers, thinking that all was over, set these men
free, and they came swarming up. At the same time one of the crew tried
to haul down the flag and he cried to the British for quarter. Paul
Jones knocked him down by flinging a pistol at his head. He might sink
or burn--but give up the ship? never!

The tide of chance now began to turn. Richard Dale, the master's mate,
told the English prisoners that the vessel was sinking, and set them at
work pumping and fighting the fire to