and wrote that down carefully. "And now,"
he continued, "God keep you, my friend. We must win, for we fight with a
rope around our necks."

"But you, Captain Paul," I said, "is--is there no one?"

His face took on the look of melancholy it had worn so often of late,
despite his triumphs. That look was the stamp of fate.

"Richard," replied he, with an ineffable sadness, "I am naught but a
wanderer upon the face of the earth. I have no ties, no kindred,--no
real friends, save you and Dale, and some of these honest fellows whom
I lead to slaughter. My ambition is seamed with a flaw. And all my life
I must be striving, striving, until I am laid in the grave. I know that
now, and it is you yourself who have taught me. For I have violently
broken forth from those bounds which God in His wisdom did set."

I pressed his hand, and with bowed head went back to my station,
profoundly struck by the truth of what he had spoken. Though he fought
under the flag of freedom, the curse of the expatriated was upon his
head.

Shortly afterward he appeared at the poop rail, straight and alert, his
eye piercing each man as it fell on him. He was the commodore once more.

The twilight deepened, until you scarce could see your hands. There was
no sound save the cracking of the cabins and the tumbling of the blocks,
and from time to time a muttered command. An age went by before the
trimmers were sent to the lee braces, and the Richard rounded lazily to.
And a great frigate loomed out of the night beside us, half a pistolshot
away.

"What ship is that?" came the hail, intense out of the silence.

"I don't hear you," replied our commodore, for he had not yet got his
distance.

Again came the hail: "What ship is that?"

John Paul Jones leaned forward over the rail.

"Pass the word below to the first lieutenant to begin the action, sir."

Hardly were the words out of my mouth before the deck gave a mighty leap,
a hot wind that seemed half of flame blew across my face, and the roar
started the pain throbbing in my ears. At the same instant the screech
of shot sounded overhead, we heard the sharp crack-crack of wood rending
and splitting,--as with a great broadaxe,--and a medley of blocks and
ropes rattled to the deck with the 'thud of the falling bodies. Then,
instead of stillness, moans and shrieks from above and below, oaths and
prayers in English and French and Portuguese, and in the heathen
gibberish of the East. As the men were