the Serapis. The rest of the action was fought with the three nine-pounders and the musketry in the tops; not a gun below, nor a gun forward of the quarter-deck, was fired after the ships closed. Jones himself handled the nine-pounders. One of them he charged with round-shot, and pointed it continually at the main-mast of the Serapis; the others, filled with grape and canister, swept the enemy's decks with most destructive effect; while from the tops rained a murderous fire of musketry.

7. The commander of the Serapis relied chiefly upon his lower-deck guns, and poured broadside after broadside into the battered old hulk of the Bon Homme Richard, hoping to sink her. Both ships repeatedly caught fire; and "the scene," as Captain Jones observes, "was dreadful beyond the reach of language." But the terror on board the Bon Homme Richard was water, not fire; for it soon began to be doubtful if she could be kept afloat long enough to fight the action fairly out. Towards nine, one of her pumps being shot away, and the carpenter crying out the ship must go down, a panic arose among the group near the pumps, and the gunner ran aft to strike the flag.

8. "Fortunately for me," says Jones, "a cannon-ball had done that before;" which the gunner perceiving, he shouted, "Quarters! quarters!" in the tone of a man who thinks his ship is sinking. "Do you call for quarter?" shouted Captain Pearson. "No," replied Jones, with savage emphasis. The answer was unheard in the noise of the battle, and Captain Pearson ordered a party to board.

9. On mounting the bulwarks of the Bon Homme Richard, the boarders were met by a vigorous charge of pikemen, who had been stationed along the deck for the purpose, under cover of the bulwarks. The boarders returned to their guns, and the battle was renewed with redoubled fury. At the moment of the panic on board the American ship, a petty officer had set at liberty the four hundred and fifty prisoners confined below, meaning to give them a chance for their lives; and, before they could be again secured, one of them, the captain of a twenty-gun ship taken a day or two before, leaped into a port

hole of the Serapis, and told Captain Pearson that if he could but hold out a few minutes longer, the enemy's ship must sink. This news, equal to a reinforcement of two hundred men, gave new heart to the brave commander of the Serapis.

10. And so the battle raged another hour, Jones being well seconded by the best of his crew, and efficiently aided by some of the volunteers. Even his purser, Mr. Matthew Mease, most nobly fought on the quarter-deck; and when, at last, he was wounded in the head so seriously that it was afterward trepanned in six places, he only remained below long enough to have it bound with a handkerchief, and then returned to his gun.

11. A young Parisian, named Baptiste Travallier (trah-val'ya), a friend of the Chaumonts (sho-mong'), amused the band of fighting men on the quarter-deck. One of the sailors calling for wadding, young Travallier took off his coat and thrust it into the muzzle of the gun. Soon after, the ship catching fire, he took off his shirt, and dipping it into water, used it "with great dexterity" to extinguish the flames; and fought the rest of the action in a cool undress of trousers and shoes.

12. Third Hour.-The sharpshooters in the tops of the Bon Homme Richard, aided by the commodore's grape and canister, had, by the end of the second hour of the battle, killed, wounded, or driven below, most of the men on the deck of the Serapis, and every man above the deck. Emboldened by this, the sailors in the main-top of the American formed a line along the main-yard, the end of which hung directly over the enemy's main hatchway.

13. A cool and daring sailor, seated at the end of the yard, dropped hand-grenades into the hatchway. One of these exploding in a heap of cartridges, they blew up with appalling effect. Twenty men were instantly blown to pieces; forty more were disabled, and, as some report, forty more were slightly wounded. The ship was set on fire in half a dozen places at once, nor was the fire extinguished until the next day. Thus, while one ship was threatened with one element, the other had to contend with another; and the question was,

which was likely to gain the faster, the water in the hold of the Richard, or the fire between the decks of the Serapis.

14. The End of it.-Scottish grit carried the day on this occasion against English pluck. At half-past ten, when the combat had lasted three hours and a half, Captain Pearson ordered his flag to be struck.-Life of Franklin.

Repulse of the Americans at Savannah.—In September, 1779, D'Estaing appeared before Savannah, and prepared to co-operate with General Lincoln, then commanding the American forces in the South, in an effort to regain possession of the city. On the 9th of October, after a siege of about three weeks, an assault was made, but the allied forces were repulsed with the loss of about a thousand men. Among those who fell was the gallant Count Pulaski. General Lincoln, receiving no further aid from D'Estaing, was then obliged to abandon the siege, and he retired with his little army to Charleston.

Pulaski's Banner.-Longfellow.

[Count Pulaski, a brave Polish officer, entered the American service in 1777; and, after the battle of the Brandywine, in which he commanded the cavalry, was made a brigadier. This appointment he soon resigned, to command an independent corps, which he raised in Baltimore in 1778. It was on this occasion that he was presented with the celebrated banner of crimson silk, by the Moravian nuns of Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania. This banner he gallantly bore through many a conflict until he fell at Savannah. The following beautiful poem commemorates the presentation of the banner.]

WHEN the dying flame of day
Through the chancel shot its ray,
Far the glimmering taper shed
Faint light on the cowled head,
And the censer burning swung,
Where before the altar hung

That proud banner, which, with prayer,

Had been consecrated there;

And the nuns' sweet hymn was heard the while,

Sung low in the dim, mysterious aisle :

"Take thy banner. May it wave
Proudly o'er the good and brave,
When the battle's distant wail
Breaks the Sabbath of our vale;
When the clarion's music thrills
To the hearts of these lone hills;
When the spear in conflict shakes,
And the strong lance, shivering, breaks.

"Take thy banner; and, beneath
The war-cloud's encircling wreath,
Guard it-till our homes are free;
Guard it-God will prosper thee!
In the dark and trying hour,
In the breaking forth of power,
In the rush of steeds and men,
His right hand will shield thee then.

"Take thy banner. But, when night
Closes round the ghastly fight,
If the vanquish'd warrior bow,
Spare him-by our holy vow;
By our prayers and many tears;
By the mercy that endears;

Spare him—he our love hath shared;
Spare him as thou would'st be spared.

"Take thy banner; and, if e'er
Thou should'st press the soldier's bier,
And the muffled drum should beat
To the tread of mournful feet,

Then this crimson flag shall be

Martial cloak and shroud for thee."

And the warrior took that banner proud,

And it was his martial cloak and shroud.

[The banner was saved by Pulaski's lieutenant, and was taken to Baltimore. It was subsequently deposited in Peale's Museum; and, in 1844, was presented to the Maryland Historical Society, in whose possession it still remains.]

Events of 1780.-Taking of Charleston.-The principal military operations of 1780 were carried on in the Carolinas. Clinton, with a fleet commanded by Ar'buth-not, having sailed from New York to the South, appeared before Charleston in February, and, on the 1st of April, commenced a regular siege. The forces defending the city were commanded by Lincoln. While the siege was in progress, an American corps, stationed at Monk's Corner, to keep open a communication between the city and the interior, was surprised by Col. Tarleton (tarl'ṭun) and put to flight. On the 12th of May, after a heroic defense of about forty days, Lincoln surrendered; and six thousand prisoners fell into the hands of the British.

Partisan Warfare in the South.-Clinton, believing South Carolina to be subdued, sailed for New York, leaving Cornwallis to carry the war into North Carolina and Virginia; but Generals Sumter and Marion, and

* Thomas Sumter was born in South Carolina, about 1731. active and able part as one of the partisan leaders at the South.

During the Revolution he took an
The qualities of bravery, determi-

other patriot leaders, by their partisan warfare, still kept alive the spirit of freedom at the South. Sumter met with a repulse at Rocky Mount, but at Hanging Rock, only a week after, he gained a decided victory.

Marion's Brigade.—Ramsay.

1. GENERAL FRANCIS MARION was born at Winyard, in 1733. His grandfather was a native of Languedoc, and one of the many Protestants who fled from France to Carolina, to avoid persecution on account of religion. On the formation of a regular army in 1775, to defend his native province against Great Britain, he was appointed a captain in the second South Carolina regiment, and had gradually risen to the rank of colonel before Charleston fell.

2. Fortunately for his country, he had fractured his leg and retired from the garrison, which prevented his being made a prisoner of war. After the surrender, he retreated to North Carolina. On the approach of General Gates, he advanced with a small party through the country toward the Santee. On his arrival there, he found a number of his countrymen ready and willing to put themselves under his command, to which he had been appointed by General Gates. This corps afterward acquired the name of Marion's Brigade.

3. In a few days after taking the command, General Marion led his men across the Pedee at Post's Ferry, to disperse a large party of tories, commanded by Major Gainey, collected between Great and Little Pedee. He surprised them in their camp, and killed one of their captains and several privates. Two of his own party were wounded. Major James was detached at the head of a volunteer troop of horse to attack their horse. He came up with them, charged, and drove them into Little Pedee swamp.

4. Marion returned to Post's Ferry, and threw up a redoubt on the east bank of Pedee, to awe the tories, still numerous in that neighborhood. While thus employed, he heard of the

nation, and cheerfulness, which he exhibited, endeared him to his followers, who bestowed upon him the sobriquet of the "Carolina Game-Cock." Fort Sumter, in Charleston Harbor, was so named in honor of him. His death occurred in South Carolina, in 1832.