his competitor, and had made his preparations accordingly.  Keeping his head-yards aback, he knocked his ship round off, until her broadside bore on the lugger, when he let fly every gun of his starboard batteries, the utmost care having been taken to make the shot tell.  Twenty-two heavy round-shot coming in at once upon a little craft like le Feu-Follet was a fearful visitation, and the “boldest held their breath for a time” as the iron whirlwind whistled past them.  Fortunately the lugger was not hulled; but a grave amount of mischief was done aloft.  The jigger-mast was cut in two and flew upward like a pipe-stem.  A serious wound was given to the mainmast below the hounds, and the yard itself was shivered in the slings.  No less than six shot plunged through both lugs, leaving holes in the canvas that made it resemble a beggar’s shirt, and the jib-stay was cut in two half-way between the mast-head and the end of the bowsprit.  No one was hurt, and yet for a moment every one looked as if destruction had suddenly lighted on the lugger.  Then it was that Raoul came out in his true colors.  He knew he could not spare a stitch of canvas just at that moment, but that on the next ten minutes depended everything.  Nothing was taken in, therefore, to secure spars and sails, but all was left to stand, trusting to the lightness of the breeze, which usually commenced very moderately.  Hands were immediately set to work to get up a new stay; a new main-yard and sail were got along, and everything was prepared for hoisting both as soon as it could be ascertained that the mast would bear them.  Nearly similar preparations were made forward as the shortest way of getting rid of the torn foresail; for that it was the intention to unbend and bend, the yard being sound.

Luckily, Captain Cuffe determined to lose no more time with his guns, but swinging his head-yards, the frigate came sweeping up to the wind, and in three minutes everything was trimmed for the utmost.  All this time le Feu-Follet had not stood still.  Her canvas fluttered, but it held on, and even the spars kept their places, though so much injured.  In a word, the wind was not yet strong enough to tear the one or to carry away the other.  It was an advantage, too, that these casualties, particularly the loss of her jigger, rendered le Feu-Follet less weatherly than she would otherwise have been, since, by keeping the frigate directly in her wake, she was less exposed to the chase-guns than she would have been a little on either bow.  Of this truth Raoul was soon persuaded, the Proserpine beginning to work both her bow-guns, as soon as she came to the wind, though neither exactly bore; the shot of one ranging a little to windward and the other about as much on the other side.  By these shot, too, the young Frenchman soon had the satisfaction of seeing that, notwithstanding her injuries, the lugger was drawing ahead—­a fact of which the English became so sensible themselves that they soon ceased firing.