the glass play
me false--as I live, the rogue has her counterpart for a
figure-head!--Will you look at the ladies, Sir?"

Ludlow took the glass, and it was not without curiosity that he turned it
toward the colors the hardy smuggler dared to exhibit, in presence of a
cruiser. The vessels were, by this time, sufficiently near each other, to
enable him to distinguish the swarthy features and malign smile of the
sea-green lady, whose form was wrought in the field of the ensign, with
the same art as that which he had seen so often displayed in other parts
of the brigantine. Amazed at the daring of the free-trader, he returned
the glass, and continued to pace the deck, in silence. There stood near
the two speakers an officer whose head and form began to show the
influence of time, and who, from his position, had unavoidably been an
auditor of what passed. Though the eye of this person, who was the
sailing-master of the sloop, was rarely off the threatening cloud, except
to glance along the wide show of canvas that was spread, he found a
moment to take a look at the stranger.

"A half-rigged brig, with her fore-top-gallant-mast fidded abaft, a double
martingale, and a standing gaft;" observed the methodical and technical
mariner, as another would have recounted the peculiarities of complexion,
or of feature, in some individual who was the subject of a personal
description. "The rogue has no need of showing his brazen-faced trull to
be known! I chased him, for six-and-thirty hours, in the chops of St.
George's, no later than the last season; and the fellow ran about us, like
a dolphin playing under a ship's fore-foot. We had him, now on our weather
bow, and now crossing our course, and, once in a while, in our wake, as if
he had been a Mother Carey's chicken looking for our crumbs. He seems snug
enough in that cove, to be sure, and yet I'll wager the pay of any month
in the twelve, that he gives us the slip. Captain Ludlow, the brigantine
under our lee, here, in Spermaceti, is the well-known Skimmer of the
Seas!"

"The Skimmer of the Seas!" echoed twenty voices, in a manner to show the
interest created by the unexpected information.

"I'll swear to his character before any Admiralty Judge in England, or
even in France, should there be occasion to go into an outlandish
court--but no need of an oath, when here is a written account I took, with
my own hands, having the chase in plain view, at noon-day." While
speaking, the s