There was a different scene on deck.  The feeble crew were earnestly occupied in loading the guns, and rammers and spunges were handled, with all the intenseness which men would manifest in a moment so exciting.  The Alderman was never more absorbed in his leger than he now appeared in his duty of a cannoneer; and the youths, to whom the command of the batteries had necessarily been confided, diligently aided him with their greater authority and experience.  Trysail stood near the capstan, coolly giving the orders which have been related, and gazing upward with an interest so absorbed as to render him unconscious of all that passed around his person.  Ludlow saw, with pain, that blood discolored the deck at his feet, and that a seaman lay dead within reach of his arm.  The rent plank and shattered ceiling showed the spot where the destructive missile had entered.

Compressing his lips like a man resolved, the commander of the Coquette bent further forward, and glanced at the wheel.  The quarter-master, who held the spokes, was erect, steady, and kept his eye on the leech of the head-sail, as unerringly as the needle points to the pole.

These were the observations of a single minute.  The different circumstances related had been ascertained with so many rapid glances of the eye, and they had even been noted without losing for a moment the knowledge of the precise situation of la Fontange.  The latter was already in stays.  It be came necessary to meet the evolution by another as prompt.

The order was no sooner given, than the Coquette, as if conscious of the hazard she ran of being raked, whirled away from the wind, and, by the time her adversary was ready to deliver her other broadside she was in a position to receive and to return it.  Again the ships approached each other, and once more they exchanged their streams of fire when abeam.

Ludlow now saw, through the smoke, the ponderous yard of la Fontange swinging heavily against the breeze, and the main-top-sail come flapping against her mast.  Swinging off from the poop by a backstay that had been shot away a moment before, he alighted on the quarter-deck by the side of the master.

“Touch all the braces!” he said, hastily, but still speaking low and clearly; “give a drag upon the bowlines—­luff, Sir, luff; jam the ship up hard against the wind!”

The clear, steady answer of the quarter-master, and the manner in which the Coquette, still vomiting her sheets of flame, inclined towards the breeze, announced the promptitude of the subordinates.  In another minute, the vast volumes of smoke which enveloped the two ships joined, and formed one white and troubled cloud, which was rolling swiftly before the explosions, over the surface of the sea, but which, as it rose higher in the air, sailed gracefully to leeward.

Our young commander passed swiftly through the batteries, spoke encouragingly to his people, and resumed his post on the poop.  The stationary position of la Fontange, and his own efforts to get to windward, were already proving advantageous to Queen Anne’s cruiser.  There was some indecision on the part of the other ship, which instantly caught the eye of one whose readiness in his profession so much resembled instinct.