The _Peacock_ having made chase, the wind suddenly shifted to the southward, when the merchantmen made all sail to run away and the _Epervier_ hauled close to the wind on the port tack, and stood toward the _Peacock_ quite willing for the fight. [Illustration: Diagram of the PEACOCK-EPERVIER BATTLE.] The _Peacock_ now had the best of the wind, and when, soon after 10 o’clock, the two ships were approaching each other end on, and had arrived within gunshot, she was headed off wind a bit in order to bring her starboard battery to bear on the _Epervier_ and rake her. But Captain Wales, of the _Epervier_, was not to be caught by any such move as that. Putting up his helm, he eased off to meet the Yankee, and then shoving down his helm, he rounded to on the _Peacock’s_ bow and delivered his starboard broadside, two shots from which struck the foreyard of the _Peacock_, entirely disabling that very important spar. The British captain had clearly outmanœuvred the Yankee up to this time, which was not far from 10.20 A.M. Captain Warrington fired his starboard broadside as he passed the _Epervier_, and then ordered his men to load with bar-shot, bundles of scrap-iron (called langrage), etc., in order to cripple the British brig aloft, and reduce her to a sailing capacity as bad as his own. While the Yankees were doing this the _Epervier_ might have sailed away and left the crippled _Peacock_, but Captain Wales was not that kind of a man. On the contrary, he tacked about as rapidly as possible, in spite of the fact that he had to risk a raking fire from the Americans, and then bore down with his port battery to the _Peacock’s_ starboard. At this the bar-shot and scrap-iron from the Yankee began to tell on the British head-gear. Jib after jib was cut away, while the sails of the foremast were torn to shreds. The pressure on the after-sails threw her stern down away from the wind and her bow up into it. Then her sails caught aback and the _Peacock_ ran across her stern and fired a few guns to rake her, though because of the headway of the _Peacock_ only a few were fired. A moment later the maintopmast of the British ship fell with a crash, and her main-boom was cut in two and fell on the wheel, so that she was for the time helpless. [Illustration: The _Peacock_ and the _Epervier_. _From a wood-cut in the “Naval Monument.”_]