Then began a hot chase round the deck of the galleon, the which might have continued until the pursuer, being the elder, became exhausted, had not I espied, in my running, a half-pike lying over against the bulwarks. This I snatched up, and put myself in a posture of defence. "Voleur! voleur!" cried the red man, glaring at me; and now I had certainty he was no Spaniard. We fought, and doubtless I had fared ill but for my youth and the exercise I had had in this very opposition of pike against sword upon the voyage in the _Elizabeth_. I was but sixteen; the Frenchman wore the grave aspect of a man of fifty; and though he fought as one well practised in the handling of his weapon, ’twas with a stiffness and want of sureness that bespoke disuse. Yet ’twas a desperate fight. Once and again I came very near to lose my life, and escaped the Frenchman’s point solely by my nimbleness. Twice, indeed, the weapon found my flesh; there was blood upon my sleeve. And then came my opportunity. The Frenchman in lunging at me over-reached himself, and I brought my pike down with all my strength upon his arm. His rapier fell to the deck, and before he could recover himself I sprang upon him, and, by a trick of wrestling I had learnt in bouts at our country fairs, threw him upon his back. And there were we two, he stretched on the deck, I pinning him down, and both of us breathing hard, and gazing each into the other’s eyes. Then I spoke in French: what I said I know not; but he smiled, a vacant smile that made me sorry I had hurt him. "Thou art one of my children," he said. "How didst thou escape?" By this, and the strangeness of his smile, I knew that his wits were wandering, and deemed it best to humour him. "Yes, one of your children," I made answer, understanding the word _enfants_ as doubtless he intended, as meaning his company, or crew. "You were mistaken, sir; and I hope I have not broken your arm." "It is bruised, not broken," said the man, lifting it and smiling upon me again. "I do not remember thy name, but thou shalt be my corporal." "Wherein I am mightily favoured," said I. "Marvellously, too, I have forgotten your name, mon Capitaine." "My name!" he said, in manifest puzzlement. "My name!" And then, smiling once more, he said, "I cannot tell. It is so long, so long since I heard it. My children called me Captain, but that was before the storm. I forget many things; my children left me; they were reft from me by the storm; they died—all but you; and I cannot remember your name! They called me Captain; and in truth I am Captain, by the choice and election of the great Condé. Yes, the great Condé made me Captain, a stripling from Quimperlé." "Captain Q," said I, on the spur of the moment. He looked puzzled; then the same smile, like the empty smile of a babe, beamed upon his face, and he said— "Captain Q; and thou shalt be Corporal R. Is it not so?" "And so it is," I said. "My name is Rudd; I am an Englishman."