I thought this was very odd, but of course obeyed. The schooner lay
without moving on the calm ocean. Some time passed. The officers
continued pacing the deck, looking even more anxious, I fancied, than
before. At length, as I swept the horizon with my telescope, I observed
a white sail rising above it. I looked again, and made out the royals
and part of the topgallant-sails of a square-rigged vessel. I shut up
my glass quickly, however, as I saw the captain looking somewhat angrily
towards me.

"You had better go below," said Senhor Silva, coming up to me. "Ask no
questions, and do not say what you have seen. It will be better for you
to do as I advise, and before long I will explain matters to you."

As I had no inclination to go below, I begged to be excused doing so;
indeed, I was anxious to learn the character of the stranger, and to
observe what was going forward.

"Well, do as you like," said Senhor Silva; "but I tell you your presence
on deck may possibly annoy our friends."

The stranger approached rapidly, bringing up the breeze with her.
Presently the captain issued some orders to his crew, and a number of
them went aloft with buckets of water, with which they drenched the
upper sails. In a short time some cat's-paws began to play over the
ocean, our royals swelled out to the breeze, and the helm being put up,
we stood away to the northward. Still the vessel in the south-west,
having far more wind, quickly overhauled us. Our lower sails were now
wetted, and every inch of canvas the schooner could carry was packed on
her. I soon discovered that, instead of pursuing, we were pursued by
the stranger. This, if the schooner we were aboard was a man-of-war,
seemed unaccountable. Portugal was at peace, so I fancied, with all the
world; besides which, the stranger did not appear very much larger than
the schooner--a craft which, if she was of the character Senhor Silva
had asserted, was not likely to run away. In a short time I made out
the stranger to be a brig with taunt masts and square yards--remarkably
like a man-of-war. As she drew nearer I saw, to my astonishment, the
glorious old flag of England waving from her peak. I looked and looked
again. I could not be mistaken. The schooner, now beginning to feel
the wind, made rapid way through the water; which, stirred up into
wavelets, hissed and bubbled under her bows as her stem clove a passage
through it. Faster and faster we went, as the