The two ships tried to get close enough to board each other, but the sea was too rough to permit their doing so. Hull, having put out the fire on his ship, sent a cannon ball which broke the mainmast of the Guerrière and left it quite helpless. He then sent one of his officers to the British frigate to ask if it was ready to surrender.

The American officer, addressing Captain Dacres, said: "Commodore Hull's compliments, and he wishes to know if you have struck your flag." The British officer, who hated to confess he was beaten, would not at first give a direct answer; but when the officer threatened to resume the battle, he slowly said: "Well, I don't know; our mizzenmast is gone, our mainmast is gone, so, upon the whole, you may say we have struck our flag.'

Not only was his ship helpless and riddled with cannon balls, but about seventy of his men were killed or wounded. The Americans took possession of the ship, and finding it was too much damaged to be of any use, they removed all their prisoners to the Constitution. Then the Guerrière was set afire and blown up.

Captain Hull, who had won such a brilliant victory, was a very stout man. As was the fashion of the time, he wore a tight pair of breeches. We are told that in the excitement of the battle he made a quick motion, which split them from top to bottom. But, in spite of that uncomfortable accident, he staid on deck until the Guerrière surrendered, before going below to change his garments.

The naval victory won by Hull made his name known throughout our whole country. It is because he was such a hero in the War of 1812 that his tomb in Laurel Hill Cemetery, in Philadelphia, is still often visited.

This same Captain Hull was a very generous man; he proved it by giving up the Constitution, so that his brother officers could have a chance to win honors with it too. Captain Bainbridge, who next commanded it, soon after won a great victory over the Java, another British frigate, which was also destroyed.

It

The Constitution was in many a fight all through the War of 1812, and afterwards in the Mediterranean. won so many victories that all Americans felt proud of it. Many poems have been written about it, and the most famous of all is by Oliver Wendell Holmes. He wrote it when our government first talked of taking the old and almost useless war ship to pieces. When the Americans read this poem, they all felt that it would be a shame to lay a finger upon the vessel, and made such an outcry that it was kept as a schoolship.

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XV. "DON'T GIVE UP THE SHIP."

EVERAL other naval battles took place during the

War of 1812. One of the most famous of these was a duel between Captain James Lawrence's ship, the Chesapeake, and the British frigate Shannon. The Chesapeake had just come back from the Cape Verde Islands, and had lost a mast in a storm. The crew, numbering many foreign sailors, was therefore sure the ship was "unlucky;" but when the British captain sent Lawrence a challenge to come out and fight, he sailed out of Boston harbor without delay.

Lawrence was very brave, and had taken part in many a fight since he had helped Decatur destroy the Philadelphia in the harbor of Tripoli; besides, he had sunk the British vessel, the Peacock, only a short time before. His ship soon met the English frigate, and the battle began shortly before nightfall. Twelve minutes later the Chesapeake was unmanageable, but Lawrence called his

men to board the enemy. They did not obey very quickly, and before the order could be repeated, Lawrence was mortally wounded by a musket ball. As his men carried him below, he cried: "Tell the men to fire faster, and not to give up the ship; fight her till she sinks."

In spite of these brave words, Lawrence's ship had to surrender, but his heroic cry has never been forgotten; and whenever people seem discouraged or ready to give up trying, we still urge them on by Lawrence's cry: Don't give up the ship.”

The captive Chesapeake was taken to Hal'i-fax, where Lawrence and his brave officer Ludlow both breathed their last. But their remains were finally brought to New York, where they rest under the same monument in Trinity churchyard.

Although the British navy was so much larger than ours, it had suffered so much in encounters with our vessels that this first victory caused extravagant joy in England. Captain Broke of the Shannon was loaded with honors, and the people of his native county, Suffolk, gave him a beautiful silver plate, in the center of which the two vessels are shown.

Not long after the death of Lawrence, Oliver H. Perry, a young naval officer on Lake E'rie, sailed out to meet a British squadron with his nine small and roughly built vessels. Perry, who had never been in a real naval battle before, finding himself face to face with one of Nelson's officers, determined to do his best. As the enemy began fighting, he boldly unfurled a blue flag, upon which was written, in big white letters, Lawrence's famous words, "Don't give up the ship."

This was the signal for the Americans to begin. With a wild cheer they joined in the fight, serving their guns with great energy, until their principal vessel, the Lawrence, was completely disabled. But although the Lawrence could not go on fighting, Perry was not yet ready to stop. He

left the shattered vessel, with four seamen and his young brother, and in spite of a rain of cannon balls, carried his

Lake Erie with such energy that eight minutes later the enemy's flagship struck her colors, and Perry was master of the inland sea.

Hoping to cheer his countrymen, he quickly wrote this message on the back of an old letter, the only paper at hand: "We have met the enemy, and they are ours-two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop." At nine o'clock that same evening he came back in triumph to the harbor he had left that morning, and ever since then his name has been famous. It is because he won such a great victory that all Americans honor him, and that two monuments have been erected for him, one in Cleveland, Ohio, and the other in Newport, Rhode Island.

Thanks to the victory of Lake Erie, Perry could take Harrison's soldiers over into Canada. Here they fought