bled ship; but, greatly to our disappointment, nothing
was to be seen in any direction, even from the lofty elevation of our
royal-yard. As the day wore on the wind died away altogether, and by
noon the schooner had lost steerage-way, her head boxing the compass as
she floated on the glass-smooth undulations that alone remained to tell
of the elemental fury that had raged over the spot but a few hours
previously.

We remained thus becalmed for fifty-four hours, so utterly devoid of
movement that the ash-dust and galley refuse hove overboard by the cook
during that time collected into an unsightly patch alongside, just abaft
the larboard fore-rigging, in the exact spot where they had been thrown.
The weather was now excessively hot, and those of us who could swim
took advantage of so favourable an opportunity for bathing by spending
most of our time off duty in the water alongside, until the appearance
of a shark's fin or two, at no great distance, warned us of the danger
of such a proceeding, and caused the skipper to issue an order that no
man was to go overboard without especial permission.

A few hours of such weather, after the gale, would have been an
agreeable change, affording us, as it did, an excellent opportunity to
dry our drenched clothing; but it was spun out so long that we were all
heartily glad when, toward sunset on the second day of the calm, a
delicate line of blue, betokening the approach of a breeze, appeared
along the northern horizon; and by the time that the sun had sunk out of
sight, the first faint breathings reached us. We had by this time
arrived at the conclusion that my surmise relative to the movements of
the brigantine of suspicious character was erroneous, and that she had
steered in some other direction. As soon, therefore, as our canvas
filled and the schooner gathered steerage-way, a course was shaped for
the south-west; the skipper and I having made up our minds that the West
Indian waters afforded the most promising field for the operations of
such enterprising privateersmen as ourselves.

The breeze that had come to us proved to be but a very languid zephyr
after all, a scarcely perceptible breathing, just sufficient to give the
schooner steerage-way, and to drift us along at the rate of a bare two
knots, to the south-west, through the soft, mysterious sheen of the
star-lit night. With the dawning of the new day matters improved
somewhat, our speed rising to nearly four knots