The huge loom of the Frenchman was seen bursting through the smoke. Thick clusters of boarders hung upon her sides and shrouds. A final broad-side leapt from her ports, and the main-mast of the _Leda_, snapping short off a few feet above the deck, spun into the air and crashed down upon the port guns, killing ten men and putting the whole battery out of action. An instant later the two ships scraped together, and the starboard bower anchor of the _Gloire_ caught the mizzen-chains of the _Leda_ upon the port side. With a yell the black swarm of boarders steadied themselves for a spring. But their feet were never to reach that blood-stained deck. From some where there came a well-aimed whiff of grape, and another, and another. The English marines and seamen, waiting with cutlass and musket behind the silent guns, saw with amazement the dark masses thinning and shredding away. At the same time the port broadside of the Frenchman burst into a roar. "Clear away the wreck!" roared the captain. "What the devil are they firing at?" "Get the guns clear!" panted the lieutenant. "We'll do them yet, boys!" The wreckage was torn and hacked and splintered until first one gun and then another roared into action again. The Frenchman's anchor had been cut away, and the _Leda_ had worked herself free from that fatal hug. But now, suddenly, there was a scurry up the shrouds of the _Gloire_, and a hundred Englishmen were shouting themselves hoarse: "They're running! They're running! They're running!" And it was true. The Frenchman had ceased to fire, and was intent only upon clapping on every sail that he could carry. But that shouting hundred could not claim it all as their own. As the smoke cleared it was not difficult to see the reason. The ships had gained the mouth of the estuary during the fight, and there, about four miles out to sea, was the _Leda's_ consort bearing down under full sail to the sound of the guns. Captain de Milon had done his part for one day, and presently the _Gloire_ was drawing off swiftly to the north, while the _Dido_ was bowling along at her skirts, rattling away with her bow-chasers, until a headland hid them both from view. But the Leda lay sorely stricken, with her mainmast gone, her bulwarks shattered, her mizzen-topmast and gaff shot away, her sails like a beggar's rags, and a hundred of her crew dead and wounded. Close beside her a mass of wreckage floated upon the waves. It was the stern-post of a mangled vessel, and across it, in white letters on a black ground, was printed, "_The Slapping Sal_." "By the Lord! it was the brig that saved us!" cried Mr. Wharton. "Hudson brought her into action with the Frenchman, and was blown out of the water by a broadside!" The little captain turned on his heel and paced up and down the deck.