This was the final straw that caused the proverbial fatal accident to the camel. North Carolina, at the end of patience, now flared up, and, ignoring her own corrupt authorities, appealed to the capable Alexander Spotswood, Governor of Virginia, for the extermination of the pest of Ocracoke Inlet. Virginia heard and responded and despatched Captain Brand and Lieutenant Maynard, each in command of a small ship of war, to the Carolina coast in quest of Blackbeard. Brand and Maynard appreciated the size of their job, so they gathered into their crews picked men who were volunteering for the duty, and who would be likely to keep the same zestful lookout for the oncoming terror as does a whaler in fat and profitable fishing grounds for the dark bulk which shall fill all his barrels with oil. They reached Pamlico Sound, of which Ocracoke Inlet is a part, toward the evening of November 21, and with jumping pulses spotted the masts of the black beast as he lay in wait for prey. Blackbeard was surprised just as Bonnet had been, and like Bonnet spent the night in getting ready for battle. The Virginians had to lie outside the inlet all night and wait for the morning to light them through the risky channels. When next day they sailed in, Blackbeard, knowing the soundings, was able to make the running-fight pirate tactics prescribed for such emergencies, and blasted Brand and Maynard with his broadsides; and though steeped to the eyebrows in rum, he was at all times the adept and finished sailor. But the enemy were getting at him, too, and his decks were cluttered with the slain. He was undermanned, having only some twenty men at the time, so that his losses from the attackers’ fire left him but a sparse crew to work his ship and man eight guns, as well as keep going an effective musketry volleying. There was left but one resource, and that was hand-to-hand conflict. He got within grappling distance of Maynard’s ship, and with his usual ferocity of appearance and manner threw himself and his surviving men into the Virginian’s rigging, and plunged, demoniacally fighting, to the decks. For a second the pirates shook their enemy with the shock of the impact, but not long; with that roaring vigor which gave the English-speaking sailors their dominion of the oceans of the world, Maynard’s men rallied and an indescribable butchering ensued. Blackbeard made for the commander, and Maynard met him with equal courage and the added strength which the moral side of the matter always lends a warrior’s arm. The arch-pirate’s body was open at more than twenty places; but on those heaving, blood-wet decks he fought the lieutenant with the verve of an athlete fresh for the field. A sudden chance and he thrust a cocked pistol straight into his opponent’s chest, but before the finger could pull the trigger back, Maynard laid the cutlass squarely across the pirate’s throat. He sank to the deck like a slaughtered bull.