The sails had been loosened and set; and,
as the vessel approached the throat of the passage, the gale, which was
blowing with increasing violence, began to make a very sensible
impression on the light bark. The cockswain, who, in the absence of most
of the inferior officers, had been acting, on the forecastle, the part
of one who felt, from his years and experience, that he had some right
to advise, if not to command, at such a juncture, now walked to the
station which his commander had taken, near the helmsman, as if willing
to place himself in the way of being seen.
"Well, Master Coffin," said Barnstable, who well understood the
propensity his old shipmate had to commune with him on all important
occasions, "what think you of the cruise now? Those gentlemen on the
hill make a great noise, but I have lost even the whistling of their
shot; one would think they could see our sails against the broad band of
light which is opening to seaward."
"Ay, ay, sir, they see us, and mean to hit us too; but we are running
across their fire, and that with a ten-knot breeze; but, when we heave
in stays, and get in a line with their guns, we shall see, and it may be
feel, more of their work than we do now; a thirty-two an't trained as
easily as a fowling-piece or a ducking-gun."
Barnstable was struck with the truth of this observation; but as there
existed an immediate necessity for placing the schooner in the very
situation to which the other alluded, he gave his orders at once, and
the vessel came about, and ran with her head pointing towards the sea,
in as short a time as we have taken to record it.
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