were now summoned on deck by the call of the
boatswain, and having been addressed by Captain McElvina upon the
absolute necessity of activity and preparation, in a service of such
peculiar risk, they loaded the guns, and secured them for the night.

The crew consisted of about eighty or ninety Englishmen, out of the full
complement of one hundred and thirty men; the remainder was composed of
Frenchmen, and other continental adventurers. Although the respective
countries were at variance, the subjects of each had shaken hands, that
they might assist each other in violating the laws. The quiet and
subordination of a king's ship were not to be expected here,--loud and
obstreperous mirth, occasional quarrelling, as one party, by accident or
intention, wounded the national pride of the other. French, English,
and Irish, spoken alternately, or at the same moment--created a degree
of confusion which proved that the reins of government were held lightly
by the captain in matters of small importance; but, although there was a
general freedom of manner, and independence of address, still his
authority was acknowledged, and his orders implicitly obeyed. It was a
ship's company which _pulled every way_, as the saying is, when there
was nothing to demand union; but, let difficulty or danger appear, and
all their squabbling was forgotten, or reserved for a more seasonable
opportunity: then they all _pulled together_, those of each nation vying
in taking the lead and setting an example to the other.

Such was the crew of the lugger which McElvina commanded, all of whom
were picked men, remarkable for their strength and activity.

As the first mate had predicted, the wind fell light after midnight, and
at dawn of day the lugger was gliding through the smooth water, at the
rate of three or four miles an hour, shrouded in a thick fog. The sun
rose, and had gained about twenty degrees of altitude, when McElvina
beat to quarters, that he might accustom his men to the exercise of the
guns. The rays of the sun had not power to pierce through the fog; and,
shorn of his beams, he had more the appearance of an overgrown moon, or
was, as Phillips quaintly observed, "like a man disguised in woman's
attire."

The exercise of the guns had not long continued, when the breeze
freshened up, and the fog began partially to disperse. Willy, who was
perched on the round-house abaft, observed a dark mass looming through
the mist on the weather b