“Yes, partly, perhaps,” replied the captain; “but I hear that Commodore Porter has arrived, with the American squadron, in these seas, to break up these pests, and I presume _has_ done it, or frightened them away, so that we sha’n’t be molested. At any rate, I saw no safer course to outlive such a tempest. You are the owner of ship and cargo, to be sure; but you put on me the responsibility of her safety.” “Certainly,” rejoined the other, “for my guidance would be a poor one; and, instead of any disposition to criticise your course, Captain Golding, I feel but too grateful, with the life of a beloved wife at stake, to say nothing of my own, and so much property, that your skill has enabled us to outride the storm--now nearly over, I think--so unexpectedly well. But what is that, a little to the left of the ship’s course, in the distance ahead?” “Ah, that is it!” cheerily exclaimed the captain, casting an eager look in the indicated direction. “Why, how like a race-horse the ship must be driving ahead! I looked not ten minutes ago, and nothing was to be seen; and now there is the headland, in full view, but two or three leagues distant! And stay,--what is that dark object around and a little beyond the point? A ship? Yes, it grows distinct now,--a large, black ship. That, sir, is an American frigate. Hurra to you, Elwood! We will now soon be safe, and in safe company.” It was about sunset. The merchantman, having passed the protecting promontory, and swept around the tall ship of war, had gained an offing, about a half mile beyond, under the lee of a thickly-wooded, long, narrow island; and was now lying snugly at anchor, riding out the heavy ground-swell occasioned by the abated storm; while all on board, unsuspicious of molestation, were making preparations to turn in for the night. “A sail to the leeward!” shouted a sailor, just sent aloft to make some alteration in the rigging. The word was passed below; and the captain, mates, and Elwood, were instantly on deck, and on the lookout. They at once descried a large black schooner, creeping out from behind the farther end of the island against which they were anchored, about a mile distant, and tacking and beating her way towards them. She carried no colors by which her character could be determined; but the very absence of all such insignia, together with the sinister appearance of her long, low sides, which exhibited the aspect of masked port-holes, and also the peculiar stir of her evidently large and strange-looking crew, at once marked her as an object of suspicion. “Elwood, your fears were prophetic,” said the captain, lowering his glass from a long, intent observation. “That craft is a pirate, with scarce a shadow of doubt. But don’t the mad creature see the frigate, and the frigate her?”