Going about at 4.20 A.M. on the other tack, Captain Hull headed across the bows of the _Eolus_. He was now steering out to sea, and to the joy of the Americans the sails swelled under a faint improvement in the breeze. An hour later they were crossing ahead of the _Eolus_ within range of long guns, but the Englishman did not open fire and the _Constitution_ passed free. The _Eolus_ when in the wake of the _Constitution_ tacked, and then Captain Hull had the satisfaction of seeing the enemy once more all astern of him. It was not that he was out of danger. There were four frigates--the _Belvidera_, the _Eolus_, the _Guerrière_, and the _Shannon_--all after him, but he had escaped being surrounded. The line-of-battle-ship and the smaller craft had been left so far astern as to be out of the race. For several hours after this the race was without incident, though so far as the eye could judge the _Constitution_ gained slightly in the faint-air race, but at 9 o’clock a strange sail arrived within plain view to the southward. She was evidently bound to New York. To decoy her (for she looked like a Yankee) the _Belvidera_ hoisted American colors, but Captain Hull stopped that game by hoisting the British ensign, whereat the merchantman braced up and escaped, while the _Constitution_ slipped along with every thread drawing and the green water between her and the enemy slowly widening, until at noon the nearest one was estimated to be three and a half miles astern. The wide-beam, shoal-draft ship had the best of the race in a light air, as others have since had in races of less importance near the same ground. [Illustration: Chase of the _Constitution_ off the Jersey Coast. _From the painting by Inch at the Naval Academy, Annapolis._] The crew were now, for the first time, able to get some rest. Officers and men alike stretched out on deck and slept as men may who for thirty-six hours have worked for life, but the brave old sailor who commanded the ship stood to his post. Throughout the afternoon the lead of the _Constitution_ was slightly increased, but at 4 o’clock the wind began to weaken, to the disadvantage of the flying Yankee, for she ran out of the breeze, and the enemy held it for a time after she lost it, and so drew up until within perhaps three miles. There was nothing to do now but get out all the boats to a tow-line, for the water was too deep for kedging. And then came the last and most stirring event of the long race. A heavy cloud appeared away to southward and eastward, the first sign of one of the black squalls with which American coasters are over-familiar. A fearsome spectacle they are to the unaccustomed, nor do they lack weight of wind at any time, but to the men of the _Constitution_ this squall was a Godsend.