‘Now, my mates,’ quoth Captain Jem—‘we shall find out whether Jack Spaniard’s eyes mark well in the dark. Let all lights be extinguished in the ship, except the binnacle lantern.’ This order was speedily obeyed, and soon afterwards the binnacle lamp was carefully screened, and at the same instant we lit a bright lantern, and placed it conspicuously on our lee quarter. By this manœuvre it is evident that the Spaniard, if he saw aught, saw but one light, as though we carried no more. After this we tacked several times, shifting the lantern so as to allow our pursuer a good view of it, and make him believe that we were showing the light in bravado. By this time it was nine o’clock and the wind was sensibly abating. We could see naught of the Spaniard, although many a pair of eyes were strained until they ached and throbbed with vain efforts to make out the secret of his whereabouts. About ten o’clock, we were upon the starboard tack, the schooner then laying a course which would have brought her back to Jamaica. A good-sized cask was then prepared, by eight twelve-pound balls being cast into it as it stood on one end on deck. Then a sort of pole or spar, made out of an oar, was fitted into the cask, being stepped as it were amongst the cannon balls, and coming up through the opposite head of the cask, like a mast through the deck of a ship. This apparatus being well secured by stout ropes, was hove overboard, and slackening the lines, we saw that it floated perfectly upright. The machine was then hauled in again; the lantern which I have already mentioned, was made fast to the top of the pole, and then the cask and all were carefully lifted over the bulwark, and cast adrift upon the sea; while, at the same moment, the tiller was put down, the schooner tilted gaily round and filled upon the other tack, and in five minutes we were half a mile away from the decoy beacon, which glimmered with an uncertain light, as it rose rocking upon the ridges of the seas. In silence and in darkness we kept our new course. Happily this was the gloomiest period of the night. Lowering banks of cloud lay heavily upon the eastern horizon, and the stars only glimmered occasionally through the scud. The schooner was kept a little from the wind, so as to make her sail her very best, and went careering, as though she bore a light heart, across the waves. We saw or heard nothing of our enemy, and by midnight we trusted that many a league of ocean rolled between our gay schooner and the great Spanish man-of-war. CHAPTER XIV. THE STRANGE ADVENTURE OF THE UNKNOWN SHOALS AND THE DWARF PILOT.