the ships are slowly closing, watchful as wrestlers striving for holds, the richard edging down with the wind, the serapis holding on.
“what ship is that?” hails captain pearson.
there is no reply.
“what ship is that?” comes the second hail.
the response is a storm of solid shot from the richard’s flaming broadside.
as the richard goes into action, commodore paul jones swings his glass along the eastern horizon. the pallas is going down the wind, in hot pursuit of the countess of scarboro, yawing and firing its bow-chaser as it runs; while far out to sea lies the traitor landais, sulking or skulking, it matters little which, his coward topsails just visible against the moonlit sky-line.
with the wind aft, the richard and the serapis head northwest, both on the port tack. the moon makes the scene as light as day; the sea is as evenly smooth as a ballroom floor. the richard goes over on the starboard tack, the serapis holding as she is; the ships approach each other, the richard keeping the weather-gage. for twenty minutes it is broadside and broadside as fast as men may handle sponge and rammer. as in the hour of the drake and ranger, the yankees show smarter with their guns.
when the battle begins, the richard has to its broadside three eighteen-pounders, as against the serapis’ ten. with the first fire, two of the richard’s three explode, killing half the men that serve them, and tearing open the main gun-deck immediately above. lieutenant mayrant, who has command in the gunroom where the three eighteens are mounted, reports the disaster to commodore paul jones. the latter receives the news beamingly, as though it were the enemies’ eighteen-pounders, and not his own, that have been put out of action.
“then we have only the twelve-pounders and the long nines to fight him with,” says commodore paul jones. “it is now a thirty-two-gun ship against a forty-four. we shall beat him; and the honor will be the greater.” then, observing lieutenant mayrant to be severely wounded in the head, he becomes concerned for that young gentleman. “better go below to brooks,” says he, “and have your wounds dressed.”
“i must get square for portsea jail first,” replies lieutenant mayrant, who is of those exchanged ones enlisted at nantes.
lieutenant dale, forward with the twelve-pounders, comes aft to ask about the exploded eight guns.
“they were rotten when the frenchmen sold them to us,” says lieutenant dale bitterly.
“ay!” responds commodore paul jones. “i’d give half the prize money i shall get from yonder ship to have those frenchmen here.” meanwhile the serapis—not yet a prize—is fiercely belching flame and smoke, while her shot tear the vitals out of the richard.
the ships have been fighting half an hour—rough broadside work; the richard with its lighter metal has had the worst of the barter. they have sailed, or rather drifted, a mile and a half, edging closer to one another as they forge slowly to the north and west.
the serapis, being the livelier ship, has fore-reached on the richard, and captain pearson sees the chance to luff across the latter’s bows. having torn the richard open with a raking broadside, captain pearson will then go clear around the yankee, put the serapis upon the starboard tack, and claim in his turn the weather-gage. it is a brilliant thought, and captain pearson pulls down his helm to execute it. already he sees victory in his fingers. he is radiant; it will make him a knight commander of the bath.
while captain pearson is manoeuvring for that title, the hot broadside dispute proceeds with unflagging fury. only the richard is beginning to bleed and gasp; those ten eighteen-pounders of the serapis overmaster its weaker batteries. also, by this time they are doubly weak; for more than half of the richard’s twelve-pounders have been dismounted, and the balance are so jammed with wreckage and splinters as to forbid them being worked. lieutenant dale reports the crippled condition of the richard’s broadside to commodore paul jones, where the latter stands on the after-deck, in personal command of the french marines, whose captain has crept below with a hurt knee.
“we have but three effective twelve-pounders left,” says lieutenant dale.
“three?” retorts commodore paul jones, cheerfully. “now, well-aimed and low, dick, much good damage may be worked with three twelve-pounders.”
lieutenant dale wipes the blood and sweat and powder-stains from his face, salutes, and goes back to his three guns; while commodore paul jones, alive to the enemy’s new manouvre, takes the wheel from the quartermaster.
to check the ambitious pearson in his efforts to luff across his forefoot, commodore paul jones pays off the richard’s head a point. the check is not alone successful, but under the influence of that master hand, the richard all but gets the serapis’ head into chancery.
being defeated in his luff, captain pearson next discovers that his brisk antagonist has put him in a dilemma. if he holds on, the richard will run him down; he can already see the great, black cutwater rearing itself on high, as though to crush him and cut him in two. if he pays off the head of the serapis, and avoids being run down, the richard will still foul and grapple with him. lieutenant mayrant’s bandaged head shows above the richard’s hammock nettings, as, with grappling irons ready for throwing, he musters a party of boarders—cutlass and pistol and pike—to have them in hand the moment the ships crash together. that title of knight commander of the bath, and the star and garter that go with it, do not look so near at hand. also, the serapis, at this closer range, begins to feel the musket-fire from the richard’s tops. one after another, three seamen are shot down at the wheel of the serapis.
in this desperate emergency, captain pearson, good sailorman that he is, neither holds on nor pays off, but with everything thrown aback attempts to box-haul his ship. it may take the sticks out by the roots, but he must risk it. the chance is preferable to being either run down or boarded.
the serapis is a new ship, fresh from the yards, and her spars and cordage stand the strain. captain pearson backs himself slowly out of the trap. he grazes fate so closely that the richard, answering some sudden occult movement of the helm, runs its bowsprit over the larboard quarter of the serapis, into its mizzen rigging.
“stand by with those grappling irons!” shouts commodore paul jones.
lieutenant mayrant throws the grapples with a seaman’s accuracy; they catch, as he means they shall, in the mizzen backstays of the englishman. but the ships have too much way on. the richard forges ahead; the serapis, every sail flattened, backs free; the lines part. before lieutenant mayrant can take his jolly boarders over the richard’s bows, the ships have swung apart, and fifty feet of open water yawn between them.
the serapis falls to leeward; at the end of the next five minutes both ships are back in their old positions, with their broadside guns—or what are left of them—at that furious work of hammer and tongs.
at this crashing business of broadsiding, the richard has no chance, and commodore paul jones—a smile on his dauntless lips, eyes bright and glancing like those of a child with a new toy—stands well aware of it. he must board the englishman, or he is lost. as showing what captain pearson’s eighteen-pounders can do, the richard’s starboard battery—being the one in action—shows nine of its twelve-pounders dismounted from their carriages; while, of the one hundred and forty-three officers and men who belong with the main gun-deck battery under lieutenant dale, eighty-seven lie dead and wounded. the gun-deck itself, a-litter with dismounted guns and shot-smashed carriages and tackle, is slippery with blood, and choked by a red clutter of dead and wounded sailors.
commodore paul jones turns to his orderly,
jack downes. “present my compliments to lieutenant dale,” says lie, “and ask him to step aft.”
bloody, powder-grimed, lieutenant dale responds.
“dick,” observes commodore paul jones, “he’s too heavy for us. we must close with him; we must get hold of him. bring what men you have to the spar-deck, and serve out the small arms for boarding.”
the breeze veers to the west, and freshens up a bit. this helps the richard sooner than it does the serapis; commodore paul jones, having advantage of it, wears and makes directly for his enemy. this move, like a stroke of genius, brings him within one hundred feet of the serapis, directly between it and the wind. it is his purpose to blanket the enemy, and steal the breeze from him. he succeeds; the serapis loses way.
it is now the turn of commodore paul jones to go across his enemy’s forefoot, and retort upon the serapis that manouvre which captain pearson attempted against the richard. but with this difference: captain pearson’s purpose was to rake; commodore paul jones’ purpose is to board; for he lias now no guns wherewith to rake.
the serapis is held as though in irons, canvas a-flap, by the blanket of the richard’s broad sails. slowly yet surely, like the coming of a doom, the richard forges across the other’s head. the design of commodore paul jones is to lay the serapis aboard, lash ship to ship, and sweep the englishman’s decks with his boarders. these, armed to the teeth, as ready for the rush as so many hunting dogs, lieutenant mayrant is holding in the waist.
the richard is half its length across the bows of the serapis—still helpless, sails a-droop! suddenly, by a twist of the helm, commodore paul jones broaches the richard to on the opposite tack, and doubles down on his prey. it is the beginning of the end. the jib-boom of the serapis runs in over the poop-deck of the richard; a turn is instantly taken on it with a small hawser by lieutenant dale, who makes all fast to the richard’s mizzen-mast. the ships swing closer and closer together; at last the two rasp broadside against broadside, the richard still holding its way. as they grind along, the outboard fluke of the serapis’ starboard anchor catches in the richard’s mizzen-chains. first one, then another gives way; the third holds, and the ships lie together bow and stern. commodore paul jones is over the side like a cat; the next moment he lashes the serapis to the richard, and the death-hug is at hand.
