But the _Esmeralda_ refused to strike her flag, the standard of the single star, which still waved proudly from her peak. Her second in command swore he would follow the example of his chief, and so it befel. The vessels closed again, the beak of the Peruvian ramming the _Esmeralda_ on the starboard bow, opening a breach. The waters rushed in, the furnace fires were extinguished, the seamen were killed at their posts, but ere they separated, the commanding officer and a sailor leaped upon the _Huascar's_ deck and died fighting, falling as Pratt had fallen. Again the _Huascar_ rammed, simultaneously discharging her guns into the bowels of the doomed corvette. It was the end; the _Esmeralda_ went down, carrying with her to a sailor's grave all but fifty of her crew of two hundred souls. As for the _Covadonga_, she fled into shoal water, and the _Independencia_ following, ran aground on the rocks, a total wreck, and the _Covadonga_ opened fire upon her. Notwithstanding this loss, Grau harassed the enemy for months with his single ironclad, until excitement in Chile caused the dispatch of the Chilean fleet, which, having been overhauled, was sent to hunt down this brave and persistent unit to the death. A misty morning off the coast of Tarapacá. Two Peruvian war vessels, the _Huascar_ and the _Union_, are steaming quietly to the north. The mist lifts, and to the east disclosed the sandy desert shore and the far, faint, grey range of the Andes. To the west, what? Three lines of smoke from as many hostile funnels. The _Union_ was an indefensible vessel, and Grau signalled her to escape. And now on the north-west three other ominous trails of smoke appear--smoke from the Chilean vessels--the _Almirante Cochrane_, so named after Lord Cochrane, the Englishman famous in Chilean history; the _O'Higgins_, named after the Irish President of Chile; and the _Loa_. Escape was impossible, unless it were by fighting a way through the line, and, against these odds, the brave Grau prepared his ship for action. He opened fire, striking the _Cochrane_, whose armour, however, was too strong to pierce, and, at a thousand yards, the Chilean replied. His shot struck the old hand-worked turret of the _Huascar_ so that it ceased to revolve. Grau closed in and strove to ram, but the _Cochrane_ was a twin-screw steamer, and was manipulated well. The _Cochrane's_ armour was thick, her armament heavy, her weight three times that of the old _Huascar_. For two hours the unequal fight raged on; shot and shell rained from both vessels, often doing but little damage. Grau was in the conning-tower when his end came, directing the action of his ship, calm and collected. Suddenly there was a crash, and when the smoke cleared away it was seen that the conning-tower had been struck by a shell. It was blown to pieces, as were the brave Peruvian admiral and his officer, nothing remaining of their bodies but a few ghastly fragments.