Of the four they flung, two reached the Frenchman's decks, and
fastened there. Swift as thought itself, was then the action of
those sturdy, experienced buccaneers. Unhesitatingly all threw
themselves upon the chain of one of those grapnels, neglecting
the other, and heaved upon it with all their might to warp the
ships together. Blood, watching from his own quarter-deck, sent
out his voice in a clarion call:
"Musketeers to the prow!"
The musketeers, at their station at the waist, obeyed him with
the speed of men who know that in obedience is the only hope of
life. Fifty of them dashed forward instantly, and from the ruins
of the forecastle they blazed over the heads of Hayton's men,
mowing down the French soldiers who, unable to dislodge the irons,
firmly held where they had deeply bitten into the timbers of the
Victorieuse, were themselves preparing to fire upon the grapnel
crew.
Starboard to starboard the two ships swung against each other with
a jarring thud. By then Blood was down in the waist, judging and
acting with the hurricane speed the occasion demanded.
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