About the same time that the gunner set up his cry for quarter, the master-at-arms, who had been in consultation with the gunner and the carpenter in regard to the sinking condition of the ship, hearing the cry for quarter, proceeded, without orders from Jones, and either from treachery or the prompting of humane feelings, to release all the prisoners, amounting to more than a hundred. One of these, being the commander of the letter-of-marque Union, taken on August 31st, passed, with generous self-devotion, through the lower ports of the Richard and the Serapis, and, having reached the quarter-deck of the latter, informed Captain Pearson that if he would hold out a little longer the Richard must either strike or sink; he moreover informed him of the large number of prisoners who had been released with himself, in order to save their lives. Thus encouraged, the battle was renewed from the Serapis with fresh ardor. The situation of Jones at this moment was indeed hopeless beyond anything that is recorded in the annals of naval warfare. In a sinking ship, with a battery silenced everywhere, except where he himself fought, more than a hundred prisoners at large in his ship, his consort, the Alliance, sailing round and raking him deliberately, his superior officers counselling surrender, while the inferior ones were setting up disheartening cries of fire and sinking and calling loudly for quarter--the chieftain still stood undismayed. He immediately ordered the prisoners to the pumps, and took advantage of the panic they were in, with regard to the reported sinking of the ship, to keep them from conspiring to overcome the few efficient hands that remained of his crew. Meanwhile the action was continued with the three light quarter-deck guns, under Jones' immediate inspection. In the moonlight, blended with the flames that ascended the rigging of the Serapis, the yellow main-mast presented a palpable mark, against which the guns were directed with double-headed shot. Soon after ten o'clock the fire of the Serapis began to slacken, and at half-past ten she struck. Mr. Dale, the first lieutenant of the Richard, was now ordered on board the Serapis to take charge of her. He was accompanied by Midshipman Mayrant and a party of boarders. Mr. Mayrant was run through the thigh with a boarding-pike as he touched the deck of the Serapis, and three of the Richard's crew were killed, after the Serapis had struck, by some of the crew of the latter who were ignorant of the surrender of their ship.