The piece was soon loaded; and the crew were now eager to know what would be the next move. One of the younger sailors stepped up to the captain of the eighteen, who was also captain of the fore-castle—a grim, weather-beaten old tar, whose face bronzed with the sun, and seamed with several scars, gave evidence of many combats, both with man and the elements—and asked if he thought the skipper was really going to have a set-to with the brig—“for, blast me, she’s big enough to blow us all to Davy Jones.” The old salt, after emptying his mouth of a quantity of tobacco-juice, to enable him to make a reply, hitched up his trowsers with his left hand, slapped his right down on the breech of the gun, and turning his eyes toward the interrogator with huge disdain, said, “Look ye, youngster, if so be as how you’s so mighty uneasy about the captain’s motions, you had better walk aft and ask him; and as you look so uncommon old of your age, perhaps he might give you the trumpet;[5] but as for me, shipmate, it’s now two years and nine months since I joined this craft—and blast my eyes if the chap ever put his foot on a deck that can handle her better, or knows better what he is about, than the one on her quarter-deck; and, curse me, if he was to pass the word to let go the anchor in the middle of the ocean, I would be sure the mud-hook would bring up with twenty fathom, and good sandy bottom; and if it is so we engages that are brig, we will give her h—l, big as she looms.” The brig by this time was within three-quarters of a mile of the Maraposa, astern, and a little to leeward; and with the intention, as it appeared, of ascertaining the distance, fired one of her bow-chasers—but the ball struck and richocheted over the water far in the schooner’s wake. Captain Willis, with a scornful smile on his lip, told the man at the wheel to put his helm up, and let the schooner’s head pay off. “Watch her as she falls off, Davis,” he said to the old captain of the long gun, “and fire when you get a sight.” “Steady, so!” was Davis’s reply—and the loud boom of the cannon resounded over the water. The watchful eye of Willis discerned splinters flying from the fore-mast of the brig, and shortly after the top-mast, top-gallant and royal-masts, with all their sails and gear, were seen to totter for an instant, and then pitch over the lee side. A loud shout from the crew of the slaver attested their gratification at the success of their first shot; and a weather-broadside from the crippled brig, whose head had fallen off from the wind, in consequence of the drift of her wrecked masts, manifested their anger.