le pirate sailed boldly toward the big Spaniard, and the
latter vessel, utterly astonished at the audacity of this attack,--for
the pirates' flag was flying,--lay to, head to the wind, and waited, the
gunners standing by their cannon. When the pirates had come near enough
to see and understand the size and power of the vessel they had thought
of attacking, they did not, as might have been expected, put about and
sail away at the best of their vessel's speed, but they kept straight on
their course as if they had been about to fall upon a great, unwieldy
merchantman, manned by common sailors.

Perceiving the foolhardiness of the little vessel, the Spanish commander
determined to give it a lesson which would teach its captain to
understand better the relative power of great vessels and little ones,
so, as soon as the pirates' vessel was near enough, he ordered a
broadside fired upon it. The Spanish ship had a great many people on
board. It had a crew of seventy men, and besides these there were some
passengers, and regular marines, and knowing that the captain had
determined to fire upon the approaching vessel, everybody had gathered
on deck to see the little pirate ship go down.

But the ten great cannon-balls which were shot out at Bartholemy's
little craft all missed their aim, and before the guns could be reloaded
or the great ship be got around so as to deliver her other broadside,
the pirate vessel was alongside of her. Bartholemy had fired none of his
cannon. Such guns were useless against so huge a foe. What he was after
was a hand-to-hand combat on the deck of the Spanish ship.

The pirates were all ready for hot work. They had thrown aside their
coats and shirts as if each of them were going into a prize fight, and,
with their cutlasses in their hands, and their pistols and knives in
their belts, they scrambled like monkeys up the sides of the great ship.
But Spaniards are brave men and good fighters, and there were more than
twice as many of them as there were of the pirates, and it was not long
before the latter found out that they could not capture that vessel by
boarding it. So over the side they tumbled as fast as they could go,
leaving some of their number dead and wounded behind them. They jumped
into their own vessel, and then they put off to a short distance to take
breath and get ready for a different kind of a fight. The triumphant
Spaniards now prepared to get rid of this boat load of half-naked wild