A few minutes after 3 P.M., a white flag at end of a boarding-pike was lifted above the bulwarks of the _Hunter_. At the sight of this the _Chippeway_ and _Little Belt_ crowded all sail and tried to escape, but in less than a quarter of an hour they were captured and brought back by the _Trippe_ and the _Scorpion_, under the commands of Lieutenant Thomas Holdup and Sailing-master Stephen Champlin. With a ringing cheer the word went through the line that the British had surrendered. The sovereignty of Lake Erie belonged to America. The question of supremacy was settled. The events of the day had been most dramatic. This fight amid the wooded shores and extending arms of the bay was viewed from shore by hundreds of anxious Americans. The bright sunlight and calm surface of the lake, the enshrouding fog of smoke that from shore hid all but the spurts of flame and the topmasts and occasionally the flags of the vessels engaged, all had combined to make a drama of the most exciting and awe-inspiring interest. Nor was the last act to be a letting down. Perry determined to receive the surrender of the defeated enemy nowhere else but on the deck of his old flagship that was slowly drifting up into the now intermingled fleets. Once more he lowered his broad pennant, and rowed out for the crippled _Lawrence_. He was received on board with three feeble cheers, the wounded joining in, and a number of men crawling up from the slaughter-pen of a cockpit, begrimed and bloody. On board the _Lawrence_ there had been left but one surgeon, Usher Parsons. He came on deck red to the elbows from his work below, and the terrible execution done by the concentrated English fire was evident to the English officers as they stepped on board the flagship. Dead men lay everywhere. A whole gun’s crew were littered about alongside of their wrecked piece. From below came the mournful howling of a dog. The cockpit had been above the water’s surface, owing to the _Lawrence’s_ shallow draught, and here was a frightful sight. The wounded had been killed outright or wounded again as they lay on the surgeon’s table. Twice had Perry called away the surgeon’s aids to help work ship, and once his hail of “Can any wounded men below there pull a rope?” was answered by three or four brave, mangled fellows crawling up on deck to try to do their duty. All this was apparent to the English officers as they stepped over the bodies of the dead and went aft to where Perry stood with his arms folded, no vainglorious expression on his face, but one of sadness for the deeds that had been done that day. Each of the English officers in turn presented his sword, and in reply Perry bowed and requested that the side-arms should be retained. As soon as the formalities had been gone through with, Perry tore off the back of an old letter he took from his pocket, and, using his stiff hat for a writing-desk, scribbled the historic message which a detractor has