As for me, that which I felt reminded me very much, if I may be excused this childish comparison, of the uneasy emotion that I felt in my childhood when I was waiting minute by minute the shot from a gun fired in the scene of a play. Then, must I acknowledge another weakness in my character? I had never faced any danger without imagining immediately all its fatal risks for myself. As in the duel of which I have spoken, a maddening duel, I thought not of death, but of the hideous mutilation which might result from a wound. At the moment of the boarding of this vessel, I had the same preoccupation. I saw myself with horror deprived of an arm or a leg, and thus made a repulsive object of pity to every one. A light touch on the shoulder aroused me from my reflections. I turned around; Falmouth, without interrupting the "Rule Britannia" which he whistled between his teeth, showed me with the end of his gun something white on the horizon which was gradually approaching us. I began to distinguish perfectly the mystic. Suddenly, I was dazzled by a sheet of light which for a moment illuminated the horizon, the sea, and all that I saw of the yacht. At the same time I heard the successive detonation of many firearms and the whistling of bullets passing near me. From the sharp noise, from the crackling which followed the detonation, from some splinters of wood which fell at my feet, I knew that the balls had lodged either in the masts or in the hull of the ship. My first motion was to turn back, my second to prepare and to fire in the direction of the mystic, but reflection restrained me. My impatience, my curiosity, then became intense. I say curiosity, because this word alone seems to me to well express the eager impatience which agitated me. I felt my veins throb violently, the blood rush to my heart, and my forehead flush. Hardly had the echo of the detonation died away than the pirate came out of a thick cloud of smoke, having one of its sails half-brailed. It was a strange spectacle. By the uncertain light of the moon, the body of this ship and its rigging was outlined in black upon the whitish cloud that the wind blew towards us. An instant afterwards the ship lay alongside the yacht from stern to bow, almost touching her. By the light of the ship's lantern we could see the man with the black cowl still at the helm; with one hand he worked the tiller, with the other he pointed to the yacht, and I heard him call in Italian to the pirates who were pressing tumultuously to his side: "Fire no more; board her! Board her!" According to the manœuvres of the pirates, the boarding would take place on the right, and all the crew of the yacht precipitated themselves from this side. The gunners seized the cords which operated the pan-covers of the carronades. I covered the man with the black cowl perfectly with the muzzle of my carbine. At the moment when I pressed the trigger, Williams shouted, "Fire all!"