On the _Belvidera_ the English sailors were busily engaged in shifting long eighteens and carronades to the stern, making a battery of stern-chasers mounting four guns. The _Lively Bee_ watched the preparations, and occasionally sent a shot tearing across the _Belvidera's_ deck, throwing the crew into confusion. CHAPTER V. THE CHASE. A fresh breeze was blowing when the American fleet began the chase after the _Belvidera_. In a few hours the _President_ had drawn away from the fleet, and was forging ahead. Then the little _Wasp_, as lively as the insect after which it was named, came closely after. The big _United States_ followed next, with the _Essex_ in good position. Then commenced a contest of speed between the representative vessels of the two greatest nations on earth. The English ship was trying to get away, the American endeavoring to catch her. The _Belvidera_ was a swift vessel, but it had to maneuver considerably, for the _Wasp_ was trying to get into the offing to prevent escape, and the _Lively Bee_ was keeping up the excitement by sending a shot at intervals, whenever the Britisher got within safe distance. It was four o'clock in the afternoon when Commodore Rodgers leaped into the rigging to take another view of his adversary. He was well satisfied. His heart beat with enthusiasm. War had been declared, and he was to be the one to fire the first shot at the British power on the seas. For although the privateer had done effectual work, the navy did not give it credit. Rodgers went to the bow of the _President_ and sighted the gun himself. His shot was a good one, hulling the enemy. Captain Vernon saw it through his glass and he cried out loudly: "Bravo, Rodgers! Give him another!" A second shot followed before the _Belvidera_ could reply. The American was superior in gunning, and every shot told. A third shot from the _President_ broke off the muzzle of one of the _Belvidera's_ stern-chasers, while another shot crashed into the stern of the chase, killing two men and wounding several others. The men on the _Belvidera_ were now all excitement. Captain Byron bit his lips in anger. He had sighted the guns himself, but had done no damage to the American. He ordered two long eighteen-pounders on the main deck to the stern, and two thirty-two-pound carronades on the quarter deck. With these he kept up an incessant fire, many shots being effective. The rigging of the _President_ was cut in many places, and one midshipman was killed. While the excitement was at its height a young midshipman on the _President_, a boy whose years could not have exceeded ten, performed a most daring feat. A gun was sighted at the _Belvidera_, but the gunner was stricken down as he was in the act of firing. The boy saw it and with patriotic fervor, shouted: "I'll have one shot at the rascals anyway." But he could find no match with which to fire the gun.