“Ay! hand to hand, and foot to foot, will be the struggle, and God defend the right.” No sooner had the chase altered his course, and shown a determination to accept our challenge, than the firing on both sides ceased, and the two ships steadily but silently approached each other. The eve of a battle is a solemn time. However men may talk in their jovial hours, or feel amid the maddening excitement of the contest itself, there is something inexpressibly awe-inspiring in the consciousness that we are soon to be arrayed in deadly hostility against our fellow-creatures; and now as I gazed along the silent decks, and beheld our brave fellows gazing, as if spell-bound, upon the approaching foe, I perceived that their emotions were akin to my own. Yet there was nothing of fear in those hardy bosoms. There was a compression of the lip, an occasional flashing of the eye, and a half-suppressed word now and then among the men, which showed that amid all their other feelings, a deep, unflinching detestation of their tyrants was uppermost in their hearts. At times their eyes would glance proudly along our sanded deck, with all its apparatus of cutlasses, boarding pikes, and cannon balls, and then turn indignantly, and almost triumphantly, toward the enemy, now bearing down upon us. Meantime a death-like silence hung upon them; not a sound was heard except the sighing of the winds through the hamper, and the dash of the waters under our bows. The chase had now approached almost within musket shot, and yet no demonstration of an attack had been made. We could see that the chase was alive with men. From every port, and look-out, and top, a score of faces warned us of a bloody battle. Each man was at his post, determination stamped on his countenance. As I gazed upon this formidable array of numbers, and beheld the comparatively gigantic hull of our adversary, steadily advancing on us, like some portentous monster of the deep, I almost trembled for our victory; but when my eye fell again on the brawny chests, and determined visages of our gallant crew, I felt that nothing but extermination could prevent them from hoisting our own flag above the proud ensign of our foe which now flapped lazily in the breeze. But my reverie—if such it might be called—was cut short by perceiving a sheet of flame rolling along the Englishman’s side, and, while his tall spars reeled backward with the recoil, a shower of shot came hurtling toward us. In an instant the gaff of our mainsail fell; our sails were perforated in various places; and a cannon ball striking us amid-ships, cut through both bulwarks, and laid one poor fellow dead upon the deck. The men started like hounds when they see their prey. “Stand to your guns—my men!” thundered the captain in this emergency, “let not a shot be fired until I give the word. Bear steadily on your helm, and lay us across their bows.”