er. The failure of the final attack was as severe upon him as
the loss of his vessel had been upon Captain Folkner.

"Who are you?" demanded Lonley, when he had in some measure recovered
from the shock which the failure gave him.

"I am Levick, the boatswain; and this is Lieutenant Folkner, who was
wounded in the shoulder in the first of it," replied the man. "He was
knocked from the rail into the water when we boarded, and he held on to
an oar. When the fight was over, and we had lost it, I slipped into the
water, and helped the lieutenant along on his oar, till I was about used
up, and then I called for help."

"Are you much hurt, Mr. Folkner?" asked Lonley of the injured officer.

"I don't know; my shoulder feels numb, and I can't use my arm," replied
Folkner. "But I can use my legs, and I think that is what we had better
be doing."

"I don't understand it," protested Lonley, very much dissatisfied with
the result of the action, as may well be supposed. "I was sure you would
carry her deck at once."

"I was as sure as you were, Lonley; but I believe they had fifty men
all ready for us. They let us leap on deck without much opposition, and
then they surrounded us, and took us by surprise, for I did not suppose,
after what you said, that they had a dozen men," replied the wounded
lieutenant.

"I did not suppose they had even a dozen men left on board," Lonley
explained, with humiliation in his tones.

"I staid in the boat till I had seen all my men on deck," continued Mr.
Folkner. "They surrounded our force, and tumbled them into the hold as
though they had been pigs, slashing them with their cutlasses if they
tried to get out. I saw the fat officer in command of the enemy; he was
very active, and I leaped on deck, determined to cross weapons with him.
But he hit me in the shoulder with his cutlass, and I lost my hold on
the rail."

"You ought to have led your men, not followed them," said Lonley
bitterly.

"That is easy enough for you to say; but I wanted to be where I could
see my men," retorted the first lieutenant, of whom the second had a
very mean opinion, perhaps because he got his position on account of
being the captain's brother.

"Whether I did right or not, I can tell you all one thing; and that is,
that we shall be prisoners if we stay here any longer. They have got our
men under the hatches, and they have ordered out a boat to look for an
officer they sent ashore."

"We can do nothing here