about the middle of the watch and told Curley, the Jamaican second mate, he might go below. He set Job to take soundings and, himself taking the tiller, swung her over to port with the wind abeam. Jeremy went to the bows where he could see the white line of shore ahead. They drew in, steering by Job's soundings, and by the time the watch changed were ready to cast anchor in a small sandy bay. Herriot came forward, scowling darkly under his bushy eyebrows, and rumbling an occasional oath to himself. The sloop, her anchor down and sails furled, swung idly on the tide. The men were clearly mystified as the sailing-master started to give orders. "George Dunkin," he said, "take ten men of the starboard watch, and go ashore to forage. There be farms near here and any pigs or fowls you may come across will be welcome. You, Bill Livers," addressing the ship's painter, "take a lantern and your paint-pot and come aft with me. All the rest stay on deck and keep a double lookout, alow an' aloft!" The forage party slipped quietly off toward the beach in one of the boats. The remainder of the crew looked blankly after the retreating Bill Livers.

"Hm," murmured Job, "has Stede Bonnet gone clean crazy?"—and as Herriot let the painter down over the bulwark at the stern—"Ay, he's goin' to change her name, by the great Bull Whale!"

An hour before dawn the crew of the long-boat returned, grumbling and empty-handed. Herriot appeared preoccupied with some weightier matter and scarcely deigned to notice their failure by swearing. There was no singing as the anchor was raised. A sort of gloom hung over the whole ship. As she stole out to sea again, the men, one by one, went aft and leaned outboard, peering down at the broad, squat stern. Jeremy did likewise and beheld in new white letters on the black of the hull, the words Royal James. Next day in the fo'c's'le council he learned why the renaming of the Revenge had cast a pall of apprehension over the crew. There were low-muttered tales of disaster—of storm, shipwreck, and fire, and that dread of all sailors—the unknown fate of ships that never come back to port. Apparently the rule was unfailing. Sooner or later the ship that had been given a new name would come to grief and her crew with her. Pharaoh Daggs cast an eye of hatred at Jeremy and growled that "one Jonah was enough to have abroad, without clean drownin' all the luck this way," while the crew looked black and shifted uneasily in their places.

The bay where they had anchored overnight must have been somewhere on the eastern end of Long Island, a favorite landing place for pirates at that time. All day they cruised along the hilly southern shore. The men seemed unable to cast off the gloom that had settled upon them. Stede Bonnet sat in his cabin, never once coming on deck, and drinking hard, a thing unusual for him. Jeremy, who saw more of him than any of the foremast hands, realized from his gray, set face that the man was under a terrible strain of some sort. He told Job what he had seen and the tall New Englander looked very thoughtful. He took the boy aside. "There'll be mutiny in this crew before another night," he whispered. "They'll never stand for what he's done. If it comes to handspikes, you and I'd best watch our chance to clear out. Pharaoh Daggs don't love us a mite."

But the mutiny was destined not to occur. An hour before noon next day the lookout, constantly stationed in the bows, gave a loud "Sail ho!" and as Dave Herriot re-echoed the shout, all hands tumbled on deck with a rush.

CHAPTER VIII

As the pirate sloop raced southward under full sail, the form of the other ship became steadily plainer. She was a brig, high-pooped, and tall-masted, and apparently deeply laden. Major Bonnet, who had come up at the first warning, seemed his old cool self as he conned the enemy through a spyglass. Jeremy had been detailed as a sort of errand boy, and as he stood at the Captain's side he heard him speaking to Herriot.

"She's British, right enough," he was saying. "I can make out her flag; but how many guns, 'tis harder to tell. She sees us now, I think, for they seem to be shaking out a topsail.... Ah, now I can see the sun shine on her broadside—two
... three ... five in the lower port tier, and
three more above—sixteen in all. 'Twill be a fight, it seems!"

Aboard the Royal James the men were slaving like ants, preparing for the battle. Every man knew his duties. The gunners and swabbers were putting their cannon in fettle below decks. Others were rolling out round-shot from the hold and storing powder in iron-cased lockers behind the guns. Great tubs of sea water were placed conveniently in the 'tween-decks and blankets were put to soak for use in case of fire. Buckets of vinegar water for swabbing the guns were laid handy. In the galley the cook made hot grog. Cutlasses were looked after, pistols cleaned and loaded and muskets set out for close firing. Jeremy was sent hither and thither on every imaginable mission, a tremendous excitement running in his veins.

The sloop gained rapidly on her prey, hauling over to windward as she sailed, and when the two ships were almost within cannon range, Stede Bonnet with his own hand bent the "Jolly Roger" to the lanyard and sent the great black flag with its skull and crossbones to fly from the masthead. The grog was served out. No man would have believed that the roaring, rollicking gang of cutthroats who tossed off their liquor in cheers and ribald laughter was identical with the grumbling, sour-faced crew of twenty hours before. As they finished, something came skipping over the water astern and the first echoing report followed close. The cannonade was on.

A loud yell of defiance swept the length of the Royal James as the men went to their posts. The gun decks ran along both sides of the sloop a few feet above the water line. They were like alleyways beneath the main deck, barely wide enough to admit the passage of a man or a keg of powder behind the gun-carriages. These latter were not fixed to the planking as afterward became the fashion, but ran on trucks and were kept in their places by rope tackles. In action, the recoil had to be taken up by men who held the ends of these ropes, rove through pulleys in the vessel's side. Despite their efforts the gun would sometimes leap back against the bulkhead hard enough to shatter it. As the charge for each reloading had to be carried sometimes half the length of the ship by hand, it is easy to see that the men who served the guns needed some strength and agility in getting past the jumping carriages.

Jeremy was sent below to help the gunners, as the shot from the merchantman continued to scream by. Job Howland was a gunner on the port side and the boy naturally lent his services to the one man aboard that he could call his friend. There was much bustle in the alley behind the closed ports but surprisingly little confusion was apparent. The discipline seemed better than at any time since the boy had been brought aboard the black sloop.

Job was ramming the wad home on the charge of powder in his bow gun. The other four guns in the port deck were being loaded at the same time, three men tending each one.

"Here, lad," sang out Job, as he put the single iron shot in at the muzzle, "take one o' the wet blankets out o' yon tub an' stand by to fight sparks." Jeremy did as he was bid, then got out of the way as the ports were flung open and the guns run forward, with their evil bronze noses thrust out into the sunlight.

The sloop, running swiftly with the wind abeam, had now drawn abreast of her unwieldy adversary. The merchant captain, apparently, finding himself out-speeded and being unable to spare his gun crews to trim sails, had put the head of his ship into the wind, where she stood, with canvas flapping, her bows offering a steady mark to the pirate.

"Ready a port broadside!" came Bonnet's ringing order, and