Regarded in this indicatory light, the battle between the Bon Homme Richard and the Serapis—­in itself so curious—­may well enlist our interest.

Never was there a fight so snarled.  The intricacy of those incidents which defy the narrator’s extrication, is not illy figured in that bewildering intertanglement of all the yards and anchors of the two ships, which confounded them for the time in one chaos of devastation.

Elsewhere than here the reader must go who seeks an elaborate version of the fight, or, indeed, much of any regular account of it whatever.  The writer is but brought to mention the battle because he must needs follow, in all events, the fortunes of the humble adventurer whose life lie records.  Yet this necessarily involves some general view of each conspicuous incident in which he shares.

Several circumstances of the place and time served to invest the fight with a certain scenic atmosphere casting a light almost poetic over the wild gloom of its tragic results.  The battle was fought between the hours of seven and ten at night; the height of it was under a full harvest moon, in view of thousands of distant spectators crowning the high cliffs of Yorkshire.

From the Tees to the Humber, the eastern coast of Britain, for the most part, wears a savage, melancholy, and Calabrian aspect.  It is in course of incessant decay.  Every year the isle which repulses nearly all other foes, succumbs to the Attila assaults of the deep.  Here and there the base of the cliffs is strewn with masses of rock, undermined by the waves, and tumbled headlong below, where, sometimes, the water completely surrounds them, showing in shattered confusion detached rocks, pyramids, and obelisks, rising half-revealed from the surf—­the Tadmores of the wasteful desert of the sea.  Nowhere is this desolation more marked than for those fifty miles of coast between Flamborough Head and the Spurm.

Weathering out the gale which had driven them from Leith, Paul’s ships for a few days were employed in giving chase to various merchantmen and colliers; capturing some, sinking others, and putting the rest to flight.  Off the mouth of the Humber they ineffectually manoeuvred with a view of drawing out a king’s frigate, reported to be lying at anchor within.  At another time a large fleet was encountered, under convoy of some ships of force.  But their panic caused the fleet to hug the edge of perilous shoals very nigh the land, where, by reason of his having no competent pilot, Paul durst not approach to molest them.  The same night he saw two strangers further out at sea, and chased them until three in the morning, when, getting pretty nigh, ho surmised that they must needs be vessels of his own squadron, which, previous to his entering the Firth of Forth, had separated from his command.  Daylight proved this supposition correct.  Five vessels of the original squadron were now once more in company.  About noon a fleet