head
over heels into the sea. I naturally expected that his friends would
stop and endeavour to pick him up, but not a bit of it; they merely
uttered another yell, apparently of encouragement to each other, and
drove their paddles into the water with increased energy.

Both guns being now empty, I signed Simpson to come to the wind and luff
athwart the sterns of the flotilla, while I busied myself upon the
recharging of the pieces. By the time that this was done we were on the
starboard quarter of the most southerly of the canoes, and I immediately
proceeded to test my skill upon her. Making short tacks across her
stern, I fired half a dozen bullets into her, every one of which hit,
five out of the six wounding and disabling one or more of her occupants
as well as drilling a hole in the canoe herself, with the result that
she began to drop astern of the others, the crews of which were exerting
themselves to their very utmost, having apparently come to the
conclusion that the sooner they could reach the island the better it
would be for them. Wherefore I attacked the next canoe in like manner:
but now I was less careful than before in the matter of hurting her
occupants, for it began to dawn upon me that these savages had no notion
of standing by to help a disabled consort, and that, do what I would, I
could not possibly prevent some of them at least from effecting a
landing; therefore my business must be to see that as few of them as
possible should set foot on the island. Incidentally, I found that by
persistently attacking the southernmost canoe I was slowly but surely
effecting one part of my purpose, by causing the whole flotilla to edge
slowly away to the northward, thus diverting them from any purpose that
they might have had of landing in South-west Bay.

Then another plan suggested itself to me. I saw that the savages were
either destitute of means to plug the bullet holes in their canoes or
had not wit enough to make use of them; but each canoe appeared to carry
several large calabash bowls, which were used as balers: my plan,
therefore, was to shoot promptly at any man whom I saw attempting to
bale a leaky canoe, with the result that the particular canoe which I
happened to be attacking gradually filled and ultimately swamped,
leaving her crew to cling helplessly to her as she floated full to her
gunwale, or to strike out for the island, now some three miles distant.
And since the fellows swam like seal