battery, and
as it possesses certain small ordnance, such as falconets and swivels,
which we could not spare the time to destroy, I would recommend that, as
we must pass it close, the men be instructed to lie down behind the
bulwarks as we sail by, lest haply any of them be hit; for I make no
doubt that they will discharge at us every piece they have as we pass."

"Say you so?" returned Bascomb. "Then, by the Lord Harry, we will be
beforehand with them. Ho, there! Load the larboard broadside of
ordnance, great and small, and train your pieces to sweep the top of
yonder battery as we pass. We cannot afford to risk the loss of any of
our number through a mistaken sense of magnanimity."

With swelling sails distended by the ever-freshening sea breeze, the
_Adventure_ now swept boldly in for the mouth of the Boca Chica, and
presently a curl of white water revealed the presence of the shoal of
which Dick Chichester had spoken, right in the middle of the fairway.
Dick directed the helmsman to steer to the north of this, between it and
the island of Tierra Bomba, with its swelling wood-crowned heights.
Dick glanced aloft at the castle which crowned the summit of the
southernmost hill, but although the golden flag of Spain flaunted itself
insolently in the breeze from the flagstaff on its northern turret, not
a man was to be seen upon the parapet. Many of the embrasures, one-half
of which they could now see, had been destroyed by the bursting of the
ordnance, and it soon became clear that none of its garrison intended to
make any effort to dispute the passage of the English ship. Whether the
garrison of the battery down on the beach would be less prudent still
remained to be seen, but one thing was perfectly clear, and that was
that the Spanish soldiery were very busy upon the gun platform, their
movements being directed by a tall man in a full suit of black armour,
the helmet of which was surmounted by a splendid plume of long crimson
feathers. The English, however, were not left long in doubt as to the
intentions of this individual, who was, doubtless, the commander of the
garrison; for as the ship swept along the narrow channel, hugging the
northern shore closely, and every moment shortening the distance between
the battery and herself, he was seen to draw his sword, which flashed
like a white flame in the brilliant sunshine as he waved it above his
head, and the next moment a perfect storm of bullets from falcon and