“The party drew up upon the beach, all eager to search for the body, and gratified to think that it would not be left as a prey for the gulls, but be hove overboard, sewed up in a hammock and all ship-shape. Sir Sidney Smith walked a-head in advance of the men, full of grief for the loss of his old shipmate; when all at once we heard a voice roaring most piteously, and the next moment a loud shout. We pushed forward, and in another minute a trio of Frenchmen showed themselves at the brow of the hill. Several muskets were presented at them; the sodgers dropped on their knees, when another figure, close behind them, was brought into view, holding a pistol in each hand. And who do you think it was? Why old Soundings himself, with a face full of choler like a heated furnace, his corporation heaving and setting like a mountain billow, and puffing and blowing like a grampus in a storm. Sir Sidney sprung forward and caught the master’s hand, while the rest gathered round and gave three hearty cheers for joy. “‘Ay, ay,’ said the old gemman, laughing, ‘you’re a pack of cowards, to leave a ship in distress. Safety lays in the length of the legs now-a-days. Run, eh! fine clean-going craft like you, run! and suffer a crazy, weather-beaten, old hulk to battle the watch with a whole fleet! But there, d’ye mind, I have taken three prisoners, and now lend me a hand down to the boat.’ “The fact was, the old boy had tumbled into a hollow, the troops had passed over him, and sometime after their retreat, finding all quiet, he crawled out; when meeting suddenly with three Frenchmen dismounted, he presented his pistols and compelled them to go a-head just as we hove in sight. “With light hearts the boats were once more shoved off from the beach; and, notwithstanding the old gemman boasted highly of his prowess, he swore it should be a long day before he’d trust his precious limbs out of the ship again, to go bush-fighting like a land privateer.”