The few minutes that intervened between the order to advance, and the moment when the boats got within a quarter of a mile of the rock, were passed in a profound quiet, neither side making any noise, though Raoul had no small difficulty in restraining the constitutional impatience of his own men to begin.  A boat presents so small an object, however, to artillerists as little skilled as seamen generally are, who depend more on general calculations than on the direct or scientific aim, the latter being usually defeated by the motion of their vessels, that he was unwilling to throw away even his canister.  A Frenchman himself, however, he could refrain no longer, and he pointed a carronade, firing it with his own hand.  This was the commencement of the strife.  All the other guns in the ruin followed, and the lugger kept time as it might be by note.  The English rose, gave three cheers, and each launch discharged her gun.  At the same instant, the two men who held the matches in the felucca applied them briskly to the vents of their respective pieces.  To their surprise, neither exploded, and, on examination, it was discovered that the priming had vanished.  To own the truth, he of the Granite State had slyly brushed his hand over the guns, and robbed them of this great essential of their force.  He held the priming-horns in his own hands, and resolutely refused to allow them to pass into those of any other person.

It was fortunate Ithuel was known to be such a determined hater of the English, else might his life have been the forfeit of this seeming act of treachery.  But he meditated no such dereliction of duty.  Perfectly aware of the impossiblity of preventing his men from firing, did they possess the means, this deliberate and calculating personage had resorted to this expedient to reserve his own effort, until, in his judgment, it might prove the most available.  His men murmured, but, too much excited to deliberate, they poured in a discharge of musketry, as the only means of annoying the enemy then left them.  Even Raoul glanced aside, a little wondering at not hearing the felucca’s carronades, but perceiving her people busy with their fire-arms, he believed all right.

The first discharge, in such an affair, is usually the most destructive.  On the present occasion, the firing was not without serious effects.  The English, much the most exposed, suffered in proportion.  Four men were hurt in Winchester’s boat, two in Griffin’s, six or eight men in the other launches and cutters:  and one of Sir Frederick’s gig-men was shot through the heart—­a circumstance which induced that officer to drop alongside of a cutter, and exchange the dead body for a living man.

On the rocks, but one man was injured.  A round-shot had hit a stone, shivered it in fragments, and struck down a valuable seaman, just as he was advancing, with a gallant mien, to sponge one of the guns.

“Poor Josef!” said Raoul, as he witnessed the man’s fall; “carry him to the surgeon, mes braves.”