Something must be attempted, however, and the spare spars were got out, and all the necessary preparations were commenced, in order that they might be put into their places and rigged, as well as circumstances would allow. As soon as the sea went down, and the steadiness of the ship would permit, Mr. Leach succeeded in getting up an awkward lower studding-sail, and a sort of a stay-sail forward, and with these additions to their canvas, the ship was brought to head south, with the wind light at the westward. The sea was greatly diminished about noon; but a mile an hour, for those who had so long a road before them, and who were so near a coast that was known to be fearfully inhospitable, was a cheerless progress, and the cry of "sail, ho!" early in the afternoon, diffused a general joy in the Montauk. The stranger was made to the southward and eastward, and was standing on a course that must bring her quite near to their own track, as the Montauk then headed. The wind was so light, however, that Captain Truck gave it as his opinion they could not speak until night had set in. "Unless the coast has brought him up, yonder flaunting gentleman, who seems to have had better luck with his light canvas than ourselves, must be the Foam," he said. "Tobacco, or no tobacco, bride or bridegroom, the fellow has us at last, and all the consolation that is left is, that we shall be much obliged to him, now, if he will carry us to Portsmouth, or into any other Christian haven. We have shown him what a kettle-bottom can do before the wind, and now let him give us a tow to windward like a generous antagonist. That is what I call Vattel, my dear young lady." "If he do this, he will indeed prove himself a generous adversary," said Eve, "and we shall be certain to speak well of his humanity, whatever we may think of his obstinacy." "Are you quite sure the ship in sight is the corvette?" asked Paul Blunt. "Who else can it be?--Two vessels are quite sufficient to be jammed down here on the coast of Africa, and we know that the Englishman must be somewhere to leeward of us; though, I will confess, I had believed him much farther, if not plump up among the Mohammedans, beginning to reduce to a feather-weight, like Captain Riley, who came out with just his skin and bones, after a journey across the desert." "I do not think those top-gallant-sails have the symmetry of the canvas of a ship-of-war." Captain Truck looked steadily at the young man an instant, as one regards a sound criticism, and then he turned his eye towards the object of which they were speaking. "You are right, sir," he rejoined, after a moment of examination; "and I have had a lesson in my own trade from one young enough to be my son. The stranger is clearly no cruiser, and as there is no port in-shore of us anywhere near this latitude, he is probably some trader who has been driven down here, like ourselves."