," said the boatswain.

Thereupon the lieutenant himself walked over to the forecastle hatch,
and, hailing the gunner, ordered him to get up another ladder, so that
the men could be run up on deck if the pirates should undertake to come
aboard. At that moment the boatswain at the wheel called out that the
villains were going to shoot again, and the lieutenant, turning, saw the
gunner aboard of the pirate sloop in the act of touching the iron to the
touchhole. He stooped down. There was another loud and deafening crash
of cannon, one, two, three--four--the last two almost together--and
almost instantly the boatswain called out, "'Tis the sloop, sir! look at
the sloop!"

The sloop had got afloat again, and had been coming up to the aid of the
schooner, when the pirates fired their second broadside now at her. When
the lieutenant looked at her she was quivering with the impact of the
shot, and the next moment she began falling off to the wind, and he
could see the wounded men rising and falling and struggling upon her
decks.

At the same moment the boatswain called out that the enemy was coming
aboard, and even as he spoke the pirate sloop came drifting out from the
cloud of smoke that enveloped her, looming up larger and larger as she
came down upon them. The lieutenant still crouched down under the rail,
looking out at them. Suddenly, a little distance away, she came about,
broadside on, and then drifted. She was close aboard now. Something came
flying through the air--another and another. They were bottles. One of
them broke with a crash upon the deck. The others rolled over to
the farther rail. In each of them a quick-match was smoking. Almost
instantly there was a flash and a terrific report, and the air was full
of the whiz and singing of broken particles of glass and iron. There was
another report, and then the whole air seemed full of gunpowder smoke.
"They're aboard of us!" shouted the boatswain, and even as he spoke the
lieutenant roared out, "All hands to repel boarders!" A second later
there came the heavy, thumping bump of the vessels coming together.

Lieutenant Maynard, as he called out the order, ran forward through the
smoke, snatching one of his pistols out of his pocket and the cutlass
out of its sheath as he did so. Behind him the men were coming, swarming
up from below. There was a sudden stunning report of a pistol, and then
another and another, almost together. There was a groan and the fall of
a