"Don't you see that you are crushing my two boats and the men in them?"
"I did not order the boats or the men there," replied Christy calmly,
and in a gentle tone, for the captain of the blockade-runner was not ten
feet from him.
"I did," added the captain of the prize, for such she really was by this
time.
"Then you are responsible for them," said the commander of the St.
Regis.
"Do you mean to murder them?" gasped the other captain furiously.
"If they are killed you have sent them to their death!"
But the commander had no time to argue the matter with the irate
captain. He had rung three bells, and the ship was backing at full
speed. The momentum had not been sufficiently checked to stop her, and
the two boats were crushed to splinters. The seamen who were in them saw
what was coming, and they seized the ropes which had been dropped to
them by the boarders on the rail at the command of the captain, who did
not wish them to be sacrificed to the madness of their commander, and
they climbed to the chains of the Federal ship with the aid of the
boarders.
"Lay her aboard!" shouted Christy as soon as the headway of the ship had
been checked, and the grappling irons had been made fast.
The willing and active seamen poured from the rails to the deck of the
prize, their officers leading the way. The main hatch had been removed
and a light smoke was coming up through the opening.
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