D’ri was on his feet in a jiffy, and we were both clambering to the deck as another scud of junk went over us.  Perry was trying, with block and tackle, to mount a carronade.  A handful of men were helping him, D’ri rushed to the ropes, I following, and we both pulled with a will.  A sailor who had been hit in the legs hobbled up, asking for room on the rope.  I told him he could be of no use, but he spat an oath, and pointing at my leg, which was now bleeding, swore he was sounder than I, and put up his fists to prove it.  I have seen no better show of pluck in all my fighting, nor any that ever gave me a greater pride of my own people and my country.  War is a great evil, I begin to think, but there is nothing finer than the sight of a man who, forgetting himself, rushes into the shadow of death for the sake of something that is better.  At every heave on the rope our blood came out of us, until a ball shattered a pulley, and the gun fell.  Perry had then a fierce look, but his words were cool, his manner dauntless.  He peered through lifting clouds of smoke at our line.  He stood near me, and his head was bare.  He crossed the littered deck, his battle-flag and broad pennant that an orderly had brought him trailing from his shoulder.  He halted by a boat swung at the davits on the port side—­the only one that had not gone to splinters.  There he called a crew about him, and all got quickly aboard the boat—­seven besides the younger brother of Captain Perry —­and lowered it.  Word flew that he was leaving to take command of the sister brig, the Niagara, which lay off a quarter of a mile or so from where we stood.  We all wished to go, but he would have only sound men; there were not a dozen on the ship who had all their blood in them.  As they pulled away, Perry standing in the stern, D’ri lifted a bloody, tattered flag, and leaning from the bulwarks, shook it over them, cheering loudly.

“Give ’em hell!” he shouted.  “We ‘ll tek care o’ the ol’ brig.”

[Illustration:  “D’ri, shaking a bloody, tattered flag, shouted, ’We ‘ll tek care o’ the ol’ brig.’”]

We were all crying, we poor devils that were left behind.  One, a mere boy, stood near me swinging his hat above his head, cheering.  Hat and hand fell to the deck as I turned to him.  He was reeling, when D’ri caught him quickly with his good arm and bore him to the cockpit.

The little boat was barely a length off when heavy shot fell splashing in her wake.  Soon they were dropping all around her.  One crossed her bow, ripping a long furrow in the sea.  A chip flew off her stern; a lift of splinters from an oar scattered behind her.  Plunging missiles marked her course with a plait of foam, but she rode on bravely.  We saw her groping under the smoke clouds; we saw her nearing the other brig, and were all on tiptoe.  The air cleared a little, and we could see them ship oars and go up the side.  Then we set our blood