But the splendid discipline of the British service was at its best in such a crisis. The boats flew back, their crews clustered aboard, they were swung up at the davits, and the fall-ropes made fast. Hammocks were brought up and stowed, bulkheads sent down, ports and magazines opened, the fires put out in the galley, and the drums beat to quarters. Swarms of men set the head-sails and brought the frigate round, while the gun-crews threw off their jackets and shirts, tightened their belts, and ran out their eighteen-pounders, peering through the open portholes at the stately Frenchman. The wind was very light. Hardly a ripple showed itself upon the clear blue water, but the sails blew gently out as the breeze came over the wooded banks. The Frenchman had gone about also, and both ships were now heading slowly for the sea under fore-and-aft canvas, the "Gloire" a hundred yards in advance. She luffed up to cross the "Leda's" bows, but the British ship came round also, and the two rippled slowly on in such a silence that the ringing of the ramrods, as the French marines drove home their charges, clanged quite loudly upon the ear. "Not much sea room, Mr. Wharton," remarked the captain. "I have fought actions in less, sir." "We must keep our distance, and trust to our gunnery. She is very heavily manned, and if she got alongside we might find ourselves in trouble." "I see the shakoes of soldiers aboard of her--two companies of light infantry from Martinique. Now we have her! Hard a port, and let her have it as we cross her stern!" The keen eye of the little commander had seen the surface ripple which told of a passing breeze. He had used it to dart across behind the big Frenchman and to rake her with every gun as he passed. But, once past her, the "Leda" had to come back into the wind to keep out of shoal water. The manoeuvre brought her on the starboard side of the Frenchman, and the trim little frigate seemed to heel right over under the crashing broadside which burst from the gaping ports. A moment later her topmen were swarming aloft to set her topsails and royals, and she strove to cross the "Gloire's" bows and rake her again. The French captain, however, brought his frigate's head round, and the two rode side by side within easy pistol shot, pouring broadsides into each other in one of those murderous duels which, could they all be recorded, would mottle our charts with blood. [Illustration: ABOARD THE "LEDA."]