fortunate that we met
with no resistance, from which we afterwards found we had had a narrow
escape, when all our lives would have been sacrificed. As we leaped
down on board over the bulwarks we found only one man on deck, on the
after-part of which he was walking by himself, evidently in a furious
rage, by the manner in which he cursed and gesticulated. As the light
of the lantern fell on his countenance I thought I had never seen one
with a more diabolical expression. He was a little man, slightly built,
with dark weather-beaten, and sharp features, excessively ugly. His
eyes were small, but black as jet, and I fancied that I could see them
twinkling even in the dark. The crew had all been sent below, but we
soon roused them up, twenty in number; fierce, cut-throat-looking
villains most of them were. The between-decks we found crowded with
slaves; and we found, when we came to count them, that there were three
hundred men, women, and children, so closely packed that they could not
lie down even to rest. They had suffered dreadfully during the chase,
with the fright and heat, and from having the hatches battened down.
Our first business was to shorten sail, which we made the Spaniards and
Portuguese who formed the crew go aloft to do; and we then edged the
schooner down to where the brig was, and lay-to close to her.

The master of the slaver, when at length he became convinced that there
was no help for what had occurred, grew more calm, and he then told me
that everything he had in the world was embarked on board that craft,
that he had set his canvas and made every sheet and tack fast, when,
sending all his people below, the hatches being battened down, he
himself had taken the helm, determined to weather us or to run his
vessel under water.

"I should have escaped, too," he continued, "if your cursed shot had not
carried away my topsails while all the hands were below. A quarter of
an hour more and you might have looked for me in vain."

I did not tell him how nearly we were missing him after all; indeed I
had enough to do to watch him and his crew, and to see that they did not
play us any trick. All the men I confined in the fore peak, after
securing all the arms I could find, while I allowed him to turn into his
own berth, where he slept, or pretended to sleep. I never passed a more
anxious night, what with the stench and the groans of the wretched
slaves, and the risk of a crew of desperadoes rising