Up-na-tan considered himself the surgeon of the _Noank_, and he was a good one, so far as cuts and bruises were concerned. He and Coco held consultations over Guert, and there was no danger but what he would be well attended to. He was a general favorite with the sailors, and their opinion of him had been lifted tremendously by his conduct at the taking of the _Lynx_. They all declared that he had in him the making of a good sea-captain,--as good, it might possibly be, as Lyme Avery himself, although that was a great deal to say. That day went by, and the next, and the next, and all in vain did either Captain Ellis or his captors scan the horizon for any speck that looked like war. There were distant sails, truly, but this pair of privateers was inclined to let well enough alone. The fourth day found them well away upon the Atlantic before a ten-knot breeze, slipping along finely, with all the wounded doing well. Guert's pike-thrust in the leg was his worst hurt. It caused him much pain at intervals, and a great deal of fever. The cutlass blow at his shoulder had been broken of its force by the handle of his pike. The wooden shaft had been cut in two as he parried with it, while drawing it back from his successful thrust at Captain Avery's antagonist. The English swordsman had been a strong one, for his blade went on down to make a gash which might be slow in healing. It would probably have been a death stroke but for the tough pikestaff. "You'll be out on deck, my boy, in a week or two," he had been told by Captain Morgan, "and you're lucky it's no worse." There was no use in fretting over it. He could lie there and dream of old times in New York, and of ships and fleets and armies. There was no book on board for him to read, however, unless he should wish to take up his study of navigation. There he was lying in the afternoon of the fourth day, not tossing around much, for fear of hurting his wounded leg or shoulder. He was feeling lonely, sick, impatient, discontented. "Hullo!" he suddenly exclaimed. "What's that? Are we in a fight? I want to go on deck!--There! I guess that was pretty nearly a spent shot!" It was too bad, altogether. Right through the port-hole window of the cabin had passed a round shot from so far away, apparently, that it hardly shattered the door-post upon which it then struck. It had been well aimed, it had hit the schooner, but it had not done any harm. "There goes Up-na-tan's gun," said Guert, the next instant. "I don't hear the broadside guns. I guess that other firing is from the _Lynx_. She was close by us, they said. This is awful!" He could now hear the distant, dull roar of other guns, and he said:-- "That's the British! It sounds as if we were fighting a man-of-war. Can it be we are going to be captured by 'em this time?"