The next morning, as we expected, the orders came down for the Indiaman to go round to the river. The wind was fair, but light; we hove up and made sail, stemming the last of the ebb. When the flood made, the wind died away, so that we made but little progress, much to the annoyance of those on board, who were naturally impatient to land after so tedious a voyage. Towards the evening it fell calm, and a fog-bank rose on the horizon to the eastward. There were still two hours of daylight, when, as I was sweeping the horizon with my glass, I discovered the three masts of a vessel with no sails set on them. As she was a long way off I went half-way up the main rigging to have a better view of her, and made her out to be a large lugger. I went down to the poop, where Bramble stood smoking a cheroot with some of the officers of the ship. "Father," says I, "there's a large lugger on our beam, with her sails lowered down. I caught her masts with the glass just now." "Then she's a French privateer, you may depend upon it," replied Bramble, "and she means to try to take us by surprise to-night." The officers went down and reported it to the captain: the glasses were fixed upon her, and there was little doubt as to what she was. "Lucky you discovered her, boy, for we might have been surprised, that's a fact," said the captain; "however, now she shall catch a Tartar." "She's waiting for the fog, captain," said Bramble, "which will come rolling down with the shift of wind in about an hour or two, I expect; and then we must allow her another hour to get alongside of us. Depend upon it she has plenty of men, and intends to try to board us in the fog." Everybody was now on the _qui vive_; the women were, as usual, frightened; the men passengers looked grave, the Lascars rather unsteady; but we had forty English seamen and a hundred invalid soldiers on board, who could all be depended upon. The guns were loaded and shotted, and the invalid soldiers were mustered; muskets and ammunition handed up; the bayonets fixed, unfixed again; and then they were ordered to remain on the booms with their accoutrements on and their muskets by their sides. The officers still kept their glasses on the lugger, until at last the fog came down and we could see her no more. The officers who commanded the invalids, after a consultation with the captain, at which Bramble assisted, told off their men into two parties, one of them being appointed to assist the seamen with their bayonets in repelling the boarders (should the attempt be made), and the other to fire upon them and into the deck of the vessel when she came alongside. The Lascars were stationed at the guns, in case they might be required; but no great dependence was placed upon their services.