For the moment one thing only did I desire, and that was to be within arm's reach of the Frenchman, cutlass in hand.
Had he been three times our number I doubt if one of them would have escaped if we had reached him.

My heart felt like to burst with its boiling rage, and all one could do was to wait patiently at one's post, and it was the hardest thing I had ever had to do yet.
John Ozanne made us all lie down, save when a change of course was necessary, while he did his utmost to get the weather gauge of the enemy.
And he managed it at last by a series of tacks which cost us many men and more spars.

Then, throwing prudence to the winds, he drove straight for the Frenchman to board him at any cost.

It was our only chance, for his heavier guns would have let him plug us from a distance, till every man on board was down.
We gave a wild cheer as we recognised the success of John Ozanne's manoeuvring, and every man gripped his steel and ground his teeth for a fight to the death.
But it was not to be.

Death was there, but no fight.