The men responded to my invocation with a cheer--it is one of the most difficult things in the world to restrain a British sailor's propensity to cheer when there is fighting in prospect--and as they did so the brig yawed suddenly and poured her whole starboard broadside of grape slap into us.  I saw the bright flashes of the guns, and the spouting wreaths of smoke, snow-white in the dazzling sunshine, and the next instant felt a crashing blow upon my right temple that sent me reeling backward into somebody's arms, stunned into complete insensibility.