topsails
began to bulge out, and the courses moved, and away we glided through
the still smooth water faster than we had done for many a day. For some
hours we ran on till a sail was reported right ahead still becalmed. As
we drew near we discovered her to be a large topsail schooner, with a
very rakish appearance. She was still becalmed, but as we brought the
breeze up with us her sails bulged out, and she began to glide through
the water. There were many discussions as to what she was; some thought
her an honest trader, others a slaver; some said she was American, and
others Spanish or Portuguese. "One thing is in her favour," observed
old Gregson, "she does not attempt to run away." "Good reason, Greggy,"
said Dickey Snookes aside to me, "she can't--just see what she will do
when she gets the wind!" Though I had never seen a slaver, the stranger
came exactly up to my idea of what a slaver was like. We always at sea
call a vessel, whose name and country we don't know, a stranger. Still
she did not run away even when she got the breeze, but hove her topsail
to the mast, and kept bobbing gracefully away at us as we came up, while
the stars and stripes of the United States flew out at her peak. All
doubts as to the honesty of her character were dissipated when an
officer standing at her gangway hailed and asked what frigate we were.
The reply was given, and he was asked what schooner that was. "`The
Wide Awake,' from New Orleans, bound in for Sierra Leone. Shall be
happy to take any letters or packages you have to send for that
settlement, captain," exclaimed the speaker through his trumpet. This
was all very polite. Still more so was it when the American skipper
offered to send his boat aboard us to receive our despatches. As it
happened, the captain had been wishing to send a letter back to Sierra
Leone, and several of the officers wished to write, and as the delay
would not be great, we told the polite American that we would trouble
him. He seemed well pleased, and said that he would get his boat ready,
and drop aboard us. I remained on deck watching the schooner, for there
is something very attractive to my eye in the movements of another
vessel at sea. A boat was after some time lowered from the schooner and
pulled towards us, when she filled her fore-topsail, stood a little way
on, tacked, and then steered so as to get to windward of us. I saw our
first lieutenant watching her very narrowly when s