erly rascal!" exclaimed the officer in charge of the gig,
addressing the unfortunate bowman, "you shall get a couple of dozen at
the gangway as soon as we get back to the ship for that. And if you
miss next time I'll make it five dozen. We've lost a good fathom of
distance through your confounded stupidity. _Pull_, men! D'ye mean to
let the hooker slip through your fingers after all?"

Then a thought seemed suddenly to strike this exasperated individual;
his boat was too close under our counter to enable him to use his own
muskets, so he hailed the cutter and inquired if there was "no one in
her clever enough to pick off that rascally Spaniard at the felucca's
tiller?"

"Come," thought I, "this is pleasant! A pretty pass the service is
coming to when a man is coolly fired upon by his own countrymen.
However, let us hope the `cutters' are as bad shots with the musket as
the average of our blue-jackets!"

Just then _crack_! went a musket from the cutter, and I heard the thud
of the bullet in the planking somewhere behind me.

"A miss is as good as a mile," thought I; whilst the lieutenant in the
gig astern relieved his feelings by alternately anathematising the poor
marksmanship of the `cutters,' and urging his own crew to increased
exertions. By this time, however, the breeze had fairly caught us; we
were in smooth water, and slipping so rapidly through it that it was
evident the sweeps were no longer rendering us the slightest effective
service; whilst, from the more subdued sounds issuing from the pursuing
gig, I could tell that we were distinctly drawing away from her; I
therefore took it upon me to order the sweeps to be laid in, an order
which was obeyed with the utmost alacrity. This action of ours seemed
to inspire the gigs with renewed hope and they put on such a determined
spurt that for the next ten minutes it was an even chance whether after
all they would no catch us. They _did_ gain upon us decidedly for the
first five minutes of the spurt; but their desperate and long-continued
exertions were now beginning to tell pretty severely upon the oarsmen,
and by the end of that time it became evident that they were completely
pumped out, for we rapidly ran away from them. The cutter, meanwhile,
had been manfully following her lighter consort all this while, the
midshipman in charge of her amusing himself by blazing away at me as
fast as he could load and fire even after we had run out of range.
Fortuna