Indeed it began to look as though the plucky little ship would escape
after all, for she was now beyond range of all but the _Huascar's_
heaviest guns, while the _Union_ had been obliged to slacken speed
considerably in order to enable her to get her wreckage cleared away.
But Condell surmised that the Peruvians must have shrewdly guessed at
his destination, and he knew that they would not give up the chase so
long as there was a chance of getting him again under their guns.
Moreover, he had still nearly three hundred and fifty miles to go before
he could reach safety,--more than a day and a half's steaming!

The _Covadonga_ very soon ran the _Huascar_ hull-down, and had left the
corvette about five miles astern before the latter got the wreckage of
her foremast cleared away and resumed her pursuit at full speed; but
Condell had improved the shining hour by putting his own little ship to
rights, and getting up more powder and shell in readiness for the
renewed attack which he knew must come.

Day had just begun to dawn when the _Union_ again opened fire, and her
first shell unluckily cut the tiller-chains on board the gunboat, so
that the _Covadonga_ very nearly ran up on the beach before the chain
could be repaired and the ship again got under control; indeed, Jim
distinctly felt her keel scrape as she ran over a shoal which stretched
out about half a mile into the sea. By the greatest good fortune,
however, she got clear, and again resumed her attempt at escape. But
the Peruvian ship had by this time lessened her distance to about two
miles, and was firing so accurately that nearly every shot came aboard
Condell's little ship, which, however, still continued to reply
pluckily, and with such precision that she did a considerable amount of
damage to the _Union_.

Then suddenly it seemed as though the end had come, for a particularly
well-aimed shell came hurtling into the _Covadonga_, close to her
rudder-post, almost entirely destroying the rudder, and smashing one of
the blades clean off the propeller. As a consequence, her speed
immediately dropped to about five knots, and Condell ground his teeth
with rage. If they could but have held out a little longer all might
have been well, and he might have escaped into one of the shallow bays
abounding on the coast where there was too little water for his heavily
armed enemy to follow. He felt that it was cruelly hard. But the brave
skipper was not yet beaten; far fr