safer,
Signed "King of Britain, King of France," and sealed
it with a wafer.

Then proud was Captain Farmer in a frigate of his
own,
And grander on his quarter-deck than George upon
his throne.
He'd two guns in his cabin, and on the spar-deck ten,
And twenty on the gun-deck, and more than ten score
men.

And as a huntsman scours the brakes with sixteen
brace of dogs,
With two-and-thirty cannon the ship explored the fogs.
From Cape la Hogue to Ushant, from Rochefort to
Belleisle,
She hunted game till reef and mud were rubbing on
her keel.

The fogs are dried, the frigate's side is bright with
melting tar,
The lad up in the foretop sees square white sails afar;
The east wind drives three square-sailed masts from
out the Breton bay,
And "Clear for action!" Farmer shouts, and reefers
yell "Hooray!"

The Frenchmen's captain had a name I wish I could
pronounce;
A Breton gentleman was he, and wholly free from
bounce,
One like those famous fellows who died by guillotine
For honour and the fleurs-de-lys, and Antoinette the
Queen.

The Catholic for Louis, the Protestant for George,
Each captain drew as bright a sword as saintly smiths
could forge;
And both were simple seamen, but both could under-
stand
How each was bound to win or die for flag and native
land.

The French ship was _La Surveillante_, which means
the watchful maid;
She folded up her head-dress and began to cannonade.
Her hull was clean, and ours was foul; we had to
spread more sail.
On canvas, stays, and topsail yards her bullets came
like hail.

Sore smitten were both captains, and many lads beside,
And still to cut our rigging the foreign gunners tried.
A sail-clad spar came flapping down athwart a blazing
gun;
We could not quench the rushing flames, and so the
Frenchman won.

Our quarter-deck was crowded, the waist was all
aglow;
Men clung upon the taffrail half scorched, but loth
to go;
Our captain sat where once he stood, and would not
quit his chair.
He bade his comrades leap for life, and leave him
bleeding there.

The guns were hushed on either side, the Frenchmen
lowered boats,
They flung us planks and hencoops, and ev