Some of the sailors climbed over the front wall and with their jackknives cut away the boughs in front of the guns.

There was silence on board the prahus, where the Malays had dropped off to sleep a couple of hours before daylight.

Mr.Ferguson himself superintended the laying of the guns, seeing that each was most carefully trained upon the waterline of a prahu.

As the distance was some seventy or eighty yards, he had little doubt that the two vessels aimed at would be sunk at once.

When he was thoroughly satisfied, he drew back and gave the order to fire.
The two reports sounded as if one, and were mingled with the explosion of shells as they struck the prahus exactly on the waterline.