D'Artagnan, the King Maker — page 100: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Messenger. xe) They had flags, but, though these were flat as boards, nothing could be discerned at this distance. “Dutch!” said a graybeard. “Spanish!” said another, as old, but as keen of sigtht. “The galleys are Spanish,” said Pedro, ‘and so the galiot—look at the peculiar. square-sail forward, which makes her a brigantine. I't ‘helps ‘her, too, now! All are Spanish.” | “Strange, then,” said D’Artagnan, straining his eyes; “the bow-chasers of the galleys are firing on their own!” “It does look so—but, no! they are firing past her, over her, too, which means goood marksmen ‘ “See, see—two vessels interlocked % “Oh, ho!” cried Pedro, afiter a pause, “I know what that is—a Frenchman!” “French P” “What does it look like? <A brig and a schooner lashed together, stem and stern. But it is one ship, that !”’ To the murmur of incredulity, he went on confidently: “She was built at Croisic, and they intended ther to cruise in the Mediterranean; but they feared the Spanish would stop her at the Straits. She would have given them a run, though! Look at her—fit for a head wind, as you see her now. And on a side wind, she went a wonder. They called her Le Messier, that is ‘The Watcher’—for she is a spy and a dispatch boat above all! ‘With those four masts, for that jigger is a mast, though they can strike 1t down f “The three others are not firing on her,” interrupted D’Artagnan. “So, they are not! Oh, they have driven another target between them and the shore, and spite of the storm, or rather with its aid, they will wreck her on the rocks! Oh, we are pretty Christians to be so bent on destroying a ship exposed to ruin anyway!” “At all events,” said the Frenchman, seeing nothing in the fog and gloom over the land, “it is not a battle be- tween these!” “Though we cannot see the flying one,” resumed Pedro, “she returns the fire, for there are oars without holders in the hold. But what do they care for the con- CORNICE OOOKS (C(O) im