“Doctor,” returns Commodore Paul Jones, and his tones are grave with meaning, “I shall not disappoint you. Nor do I care to conceal from you my resolution. When I sail, I sail looking for battle; and I shall not hesitate to engage an enemy superior to my force. The condition of our cause is such that, to sustain it, we need a striking, ay! a startling naval success, and I shall do all I know, fight all I know, to bring it to pass. More; my mind is made up: If I fail, I fall; I shall return victorious or I shall not return.” It is daybreak on a day in middle August when Commodore Paul Jones, with the _Richard_ as flagship of the little squadron of four, puts the Isle of Groaix astern, and points for the open ocean. His course is west by north, so as to weather Cape Clear, and fetch the Irish coast close aboard. With winds light and baffling, the squadron’s pace is slow; it is nine days out of France before Cape Clear is sighted. Then it creeps northward along the Irish coast, Commodore Paul Jones vigilant and alert. He takes a prize or two, and one after the other sends into French ports the British ships _Mayflower_ and _Fortune_. The young commodore’s brow begins to clear; those prizes comfort him vastly. At least the cruise shall not be registered as altogether fruitless. It is the last day of August; the Hebrides lie off the _Richard_‘s starboard beam. A stiff gale from the northwest sets in, and the squadron is driven east by north under storm staysails. This dovetails with the desires of Commodore Paul Jones; wherefore he welcomes the gale as friendly weather. Also, it gives him a chance to try out the _Richard_, which shows lively with the wind abaft the beam, but dull to the confines of despair when sailing on a wind. Close-hauled, the _Richard_ makes more lee than headway. “Which means, Dick,” says Commodore Paul Jones judgmatically, to Lieutenant Richard Dale--“which means, Dick, that we must have the weather-gage before we lock horns with an enemy.” Off Cape Wraith, Commodore Paul Jones is so fortunate as to take two further prizes. He turns them over to Captain Landais, with orders to send them into Brest. The Frenchman, who only receives an order for the purpose of breaking it, sends them into the port of Bergen, where the Norwegians promptly turn them over to the English, on an argument that they do not officially know of any government called the United States.