Cuffe did not quit the deck until the bell struck two, in the middle watch.  This made it one o’clock.  Yelverton and the master kept the watches between them, but the captain was always near with his advice and orders.

“That craft seems faster when she gets her sails wing-and-wing than she is even close-hauled, it seems to me, Yelverton,” observed Cuffe, after taking a long look at the chase with a night-glass; “I begin to be afraid we shall lose her.  Neither of the other ships does anything to help us.  Here we are all three, dead in her wake, following each other like so many old maids going to church of a Sunday morning.”

“It would have been better, Captain Cuffe, had the Ringdove kept more to the westward, and the frigate further east.  Fast as the lugger is with her wings spread, she’s faster with them jammed up on a wind.  I expect every moment to find her sheering off to the westward, and gradually getting us in her wake on a wind.  I fear we should find that worse work than even this, sir.”

“I would not lose her now, for a thousand pounds!  I do not see what the d—­l Dashwood was about, that he did not secure her when he got possession of the rocks.  I shall rattle him down a little, as soon as we meet.”

Cuffe would have been shocked had he known that the body of Sir Frederick Dashwood was, just as that moment, going through the melancholy process of being carried on board a two-decker, up at Naples, the captain of which was his kinsman.  But he did not know it, nor did he learn his death for more than a week; or after the body had been interred.

“Take the glass, Yelverton, and look at her.  To me she grows very dim—­she must be leaving us fast.  Be careful to note if there are any signs of an intention to sheer to the westward.”

“That can hardly be done without jibing her forward lug—­hang me, Captain Cuffe, if I can see her at all.  Ah! here she is, dead ahead as before, but as dim as a ghost.  I can barely make out her canvas—­she is still wing-and-wing, d—­n her, looking more like the spectre of a craft than a real thing.  I lost her in that yaw, sir—­I wish you would try, Captain Cuffe—­do my best, I cannot find her again.”

Cuffe did try, but without success.  Once, indeed, he fancied he saw her, but further examination satisfied him it was a mistake.  So long had he been gazing at the same object, that it was easy for the illusion to pass before his mind’s eye, of imagining a dim outline of the little lugger flying away, like the scud of the heavens, wing-and-wing, ever seeming to elude his observation.  That night he dreamed of her, and there were haply five minutes during which his wandering thoughts actually portrayed the process of taking possession, and of manning the prize.