the helm. "Haul aft the main and
foresheets!" he sung out in a voice of thunder. "Brace up the yards!
Down with the helm! Keep her as close as she'll go!" The crew flew to
obey these orders. They knew full well that their lives depended on
their promptness. Already the schooner had approached too near the
stranger. That she was a man-of-war, she no longer left us in doubt.
Before the orders issued by Captain Bruno were executed, a line of ports
were thrown open, and eight long guns were run out, threatening to send
us to the bottom if we showed a disposition to quarrel, and aft at her
peak flew the stars and stripes of the United States.

The pirates saw that they were caught through their own folly and
greediness, but the captain showed himself to be a man of undaunted
courage, and full of resources. "Hold on!" he sung out, before a sheet
was hauled in. "We may lose our sticks if we attempt to run. I'll try
if I cannot deceive these clever fellows, and put them on a wrong
scent." The pirates seemed mightily pleased at the thought of playing
their enemy a trick, and highly applauded the proposal of their captain.
The schooner, therefore, stood steadily on, till she ran close down to
the corvette. Then she hove-to, well to windward of the ship, however.
A boat was lowered, and Captain Bruno, with four of the most
quiet-looking of the crew, got into her, and pulled away for the ship.
When we hove-to, the corvette did the same, an eighth of a mile to
leeward of us. We watched the proceedings of the pirate with no little
anxiety.

"If that fellow succeed in deceiving the captain of that ship, I shall
acknowledge that impudence will sometimes carry the day," observed Mr
McRitchie.

"Couldn't we contrive to make a signal to let the people of the
man-of-war know that we are kept here in durance vile?" observed Jerry.

While he was speaking, I looked round, and saw two of the most ruffianly
of the crew standing close to us, with pistols cocked in their hands,
held quietly down by their sides. I hoped that our captors had not
overheard what Jerry had said. I touched him as if by chance on the
shoulder, and after his eye had glanced at the pistols he said nothing
more about making signals to the corvette. Our position was every
instant growing more and more critical. If the pirate captain was
seized on board the man-of-war, it was impossible to say how his
followers might wreak their vengeance on our heads.