was perhaps a little higher, but
it, too, was hardly better adapted for fighting. Indeed, the lieutenant
depended more upon the moral force of official authority to overawe
the pirates than upon any real force of arms or men. He never believed,
until the very last moment, that the pirates would show any real fight.
It is very possible that they might not have done so had they not
thought that the lieutenant had actually no legal right supporting him
in his attack upon them in North Carolina waters.

It was about noon when anchor was hoisted, and, with the schooner
leading, both vessels ran slowly in before a light wind that had begun
to blow toward midday. In each vessel a man stood in the bows, sounding
continually with lead and line. As they slowly opened up the harbor
within the inlet, they could see the pirate sloop lying about three
miles away. There was a boat just putting off from it to the shore.

The lieutenant and his sailing master stood together on the roof of
the cabin deckhouse. The sailing master held a glass to his eye. "She
carries a long gun, sir," he said, "and four carronades. She'll be hard
to beat, sir, I do suppose, armed as we are with only light arms for
close fighting."

The lieutenant laughed. "Why, Brookes," he said, "you seem to think
forever of these men showing fight. You don't know them as I know them.
They have a deal of bluster and make a deal of noise, but when you seize
them and hold them with a strong hand, there's naught of fight left in
them. 'Tis like enough there'll not be so much as a musket fired to-day.
I've had to do with 'em often enough before to know my gentlemen well
by this time." Nor, as was said, was it until the very last that the
lieutenant could be brought to believe that the pirates had any stomach
for a fight.

The two vessels had reached perhaps within a mile of the pirate sloop
before they found the water too shoal to venture any farther with
the sail. It was then that the boat was lowered as the lieutenant had
planned, and the boatswain went ahead to sound, the two vessels, with
their sails still hoisted but empty of wind, pulling in after with
sweeps.

The pirate had also hoisted sail, but lay as though waiting for the
approach of the schooner and the sloop.

The boat in which the boatswain was sounding had run in a considerable
distance ahead of the two vessels, which were gradually creeping up with
the sweeps until they had reached to within less than