thholding her fire. The
_Ponto_ would then "crack on speed," for in spite of her alleged
maximum of eleven knots she was capable of working up to twenty-eight,
or a knot more than the speed of the cruiser under forced draught.
These hopes were nipped in the bud by the _Tompion_ blowing away the
_Ponto's_ stern and putting both propellers out of action.

Of subsequent events immediately following the brief action Wilmshurst
and his brother officers saw little. Their whole attention was
directed towards their men, for the Haussas, on hearing the gun-fire,
impetuously made a rush on deck--not by reason of panic but out of the
deep curiosity that is ever to the fore in the minds of West African
natives to a far greater extent than in the case of Europeans.

Next morning the _Ponto_ was nowhere to be seen. She had foundered
within two hours of the engagement, while two hundred of her officers
and crew were prisoners of war on board the _Tompion_, and a hundred
and twenty British subjects, mostly the crews of vessels taken and sunk
by the raider, found themselves once more under the banner of
liberty--the White Ensign.

During the course of the day Wilmshurst heard the salient facts in
connection with the raider's career. She was the Hamburg-Amerika
intermediate liner _Porfurst_, who, after being armed and camouflaged,
had contrived to escape the cordon of patrol-boats in the North
Atlantic. For three months she had followed her piratical occupation,
re-provisioning and re-coaling from the vessels she captured. Whenever
her prisoners grew in number sufficiently to cause inconvenience the
_Porfurst_ spared one of her prizes for the purpose of landing the
captives in some remote port.

It was by a pure fluke that the raider ran almost blindly under the
guns of the _Tompion_. Under the impression that the convoy consisted
of unescorted merchantmen the _Porfurst_ steamed athwart their track,
and slowing down to eleven or twelve knots, awaited the arrival of a
likely prey.

Finding too late that the convoy was not so impotent as at first
appearance the kapitan of the _Porfurst_ attempted a daring ruse. Upon
being challenged by the cruiser he gave the vessel's name as _Ponto_,
the real craft having been sunk by the raider only two days previously.
The Hun stood a chance of dropping astern and slipping away but for the
furtive and timely warning signalled by a young apprentice, who,
contriving to creep unobserved into