noon
Also , the mercury was dropping quite rapidly . My chief anxiety now was to overhaul the pirate schooner and bring her to action before nightfall ; for , with bad weather threatening , unless we could succeed in doing this , there was every likelihood of her giving us the slip during the hours of darkness . A stern-chase is proverbially a long chase , and a chase to windward is apt to be even longer , while a start of some ten miles , under such circumstances , must necessarily prove a heavy handicap to the pursuing vessel ; nevertheless I was not without hope that , difficult as our task threatened to be , we might yet accomplish it . For it still wanted nearly an hour to noon , the _ Wasp _ was slipping along through the water like a racer , and was looking up a full point nearer the wind than our antagonist , and , early as it yet was to form such a conclusion , I felt almost certain that we were head-reaching as well as weathering upon the chase . As soon as it became apparent that some hours would probably elapse before we could go into action , I gave orders for the guns to be secured and the galley fire to be lighted again , in order that the men might not be deprived of their usual dinner ; and this meal was just nicely over when , to our utter amazement , the chase suddenly hoisted the black flag , bore up , and with squared yards came running down with the obvious intention of coming to close quarters with us ; whereupon we once more made ready for battle , at the same time shortening sail to our ordinary working canvas . At first I was distinctly puzzled to account for or understand this sudden change of tactics upon the part of the pirates ; but a remark of Henderson 's seemed to offer a tolerably plausible explanation of it . `` Depend upon it , sir , '' he suggested , `` they only hauled off to give themselves time to stow away the plunder that cumbered their decks when they shoved off from the Spaniard .