one_ to reach his station,
but a rope, stretched from the _Hermione_ to her anchor-buoy, caught
the rudder of the pinnace and stopped her in full course, the coxswain
reporting the boat "aground." The pinnace had swung round till her
starboard oars touched the bend of the _Hermione_, and Hamilton gave
the word to "board." Hamilton himself led, and swung himself up till
his feet rested on the anchor hanging from the _Hermione's_ cat-head.
It was covered with mud, having been weighed that day, and his feet
slipping off it, Hamilton hung by the lanyard of the _Hermione's_
foreshroud. The crew of the pinnace meanwhile climbing with the
agility of cats and the eagerness of boys, had tumbled over their own
captain's shoulders as well as the bulwarks of the _Hermione_, and were
on that vessel's forecastle, where Hamilton in another moment joined
them. Here were sixteen men on board a vessel with a hostile crew four
hundred strong.

Hamilton ran to the break of the forecastle and looked down, and to his
amazement found the whole crew of the _Hermione_ at quarters on the
main-deck, with battle-lanterns lit, and firing with the utmost energy
at the darkness, in which their excited fancy saw the tall masts of at
least a squadron of frigates bearing down to attack them. Hamilton,
followed by his fifteen men, ran aft to the agreed rendezvous on the
_Hermione's_ quarter-deck. The doctor, with his crew, had meantime
boarded, and forgetting all about the rendezvous, and obeying only the
natural fighting impulse in their own blood, charged upon the Spaniards
in the gangway.

Hamilton sent his men down to assist in the fight, waiting alone on the
quarter-deck till his other boat boarded. Here four Spaniards rushed
suddenly upon him; one struck him over the head with a musket with a
force that broke the weapon itself, and knocked him semi-senseless upon
the combings of the hatchway. Two British sailors, who saw their
commander's peril, rescued him, and, with blood streaming down from his
battered head upon his uniform, Hamilton flung himself into the fight
at the gangway. At this juncture the black cutter, in command of the
first lieutenant, with the _Surprise's_ marines on board, dashed up to
the side of the _Hermione_, and the men came tumbling over the larboard
gangway. They had made previously two unsuccessful attempts to board.
They came up first by the steps of the larboard gangway, the lieutenant
leading. He was incont