work our guns at very infrequent intervals and
with the utmost difficulty, while, if we were to hit her, we would do so
only by the merest accident. And even if we could contrive by any means
to compel her to surrender to us, we could not take possession of her.
Our interest in her was therefore no greater than that with which a
sailor, caught in a heavy gale, watches the movements of another ship in
the same predicament as his own.

Meanwhile, by imperceptible degrees she was steadily driving down toward
us, until at length she was so close, and so directly to windward of us,
that I almost succeeded in persuading myself that there were moments
when I could catch, through the strong salt smell of the gale, a whiff
of the characteristic odour of a slaver with a living cargo on board.
Nor was I alone in this respect, for both Simpson and the man who was
tending the schooner's helm asserted that they also perceived it. But
now a question arose which, for the moment at least, was even more
important than whether she had or had not slaves aboard, and that was
whether she would pass clear of us or not. She had settled away to
leeward until she had approached us to within a couple of hundred yards,
and as the two craft alternately came to or fell off it alternately
appeared as though the stranger would pass clear of us ahead, or fall
off and run foul of us. The moment had arrived when it became necessary
for one or the other of us to do something to avert a catastrophe; and
as those aboard the brigantine gave no indication of a disposition to
bestir themselves I ordered Simpson to have the fore-staysail loosed and
set, intending to forge ahead and leave room for the other craft to pass
athwart our stern. The fore-staysail sheet was accordingly hauled aft,
and four men laid out on the bowsprit to loose the sail. This was soon
done, and then, when we next settled into the trough of the sea, and
were consequently becalmed for the moment, the halyards were manned and
the sail hoisted. The brigantine was by this time so dangerously near
to us that, even when we were both sunk in the trough of the sea, it was
possible for us to see her mast-heads over the crest of the intervening
wave, and I now kept my eye on these with momentarily increasing
anxiety, for it appeared to me that we were in perilous proximity to a
hideous disaster. And then, as the schooner swept upward on the breast
of the oncoming wave, I saw the spars of t