The sight of them struck Brown with terror, though a little reflection would have shown him that the pirates would have little or no inducement to attack armed ships carrying no valuable merchandise.

He directed his whole squadron to anchor off Gheriah, which must have appeared puzzling to his late antagonists in that place.

Hoping to evade the pirate ships, anchor was weighed in the night, and the squadron sailed northward, no order being preserved, and the fleet getting much scattered.
As it happened, the pirates had mistaken them for Angria's fleet, and were standing to the northward in search of prey, without any thought of attacking them.

Without any hostile intention on either side, the two squadrons became intermingled.

While it was still dark, the party on the _London_ was startled by a cannon shot flying over them, and in the faint morning light they saw a large ship on their quarter.