The fire of the British ships for fury and precision was overwhelming. The head of the _Guerrier_ was simply shot away; the anchors hanging from her bows were cut in two; her main-deck ports, from the bowsprit to the gangway, were driven into one; her masts, fallen inboard, lay with their tangle of rigging on the unhappy crew; while some of her main-deck beams--all supports being torn away--fell on the guns. Hood, in the _Zealous_, who was pounding the unfortunate _Guerrier_, says, "At last, being tired of killing men in that way, I sent a lieutenant on board, who was allowed, as I had instructed him, to hoist a light, and haul it down as a sign of submission." But all the damage was not on the side of the French. The great French flagship, the _Orient_, by this time had added her mighty voice to the tumult, and the _Bellerophon_, who was engaged with her, had a bad time of it. It was the story of Tom Sayers and Heenan over again--a dwarf fighting a giant. Her mizzen-mast and mainmast were shot away, and after maintaining the dreadful duel for more than an hour, and having 200 of her crew struck down, at 8.20 P.M. the _Bellerophon_ cut her cable and drifted, a disabled wreck, out of the fire. Meanwhile the four ships Nelson had left in the offing were beating furiously up to add themselves to the fight. Night had fallen, by the time Troubridge, in the _Culloden_, came round the island; and then, in full sight of the great battle, the _Culloden_ ran hopelessly ashore! She was, perhaps, the finest ship of the British fleet, and the emotions of its crew and commander as they listened to the tumult, and watched through the darkness the darting fires of the Titanic combat they could not share, may be imagined. "Our army," according to well-known authorities, "swore terribly in Flanders." The expletives discharged that night along the decks and in the forecastle of the Culloden would probably have made even a Flanders veteran open his eyes in astonishment. The _Swiftsure_ and the _Alexander_, taking warning by the _Culloden's_ fate, swept round her and bore safely up to the fight. The _Swiftsure_, bearing down through the darkness to the combat, came across a vessel drifting, dismasted and lightless, a mere wreck. Holliwell, the captain of the _Swiftsure_, was about to fire, thinking it was an enemy, but on second thoughts hailed instead, and got for an answer the words, "_Bellerophon_; going out of action, disabled." The _Swiftsure_ passed on, and five minutes after the _Bellerophon_ had drifted from the bows of the _Orient_ the _Swiftsure_, coming mysteriously up out of the darkness, took her place, and broke into a tempest of fire.