CHAPTER XX.
THE LAST FIGHT OF THE "REVENGE".
Once, indeed, in the course of the fight, an English ship appeared,brave and willing to offer her small help.
Towards sunset, during a momentary lull in the storm of battle, whileone of the broken and battered Spanish ships was being cleared away fromthe ceaseless fury of the English guns, Jacob Hartop left the littlebrass falcon gun on the forecastle, at which he had stood for fourterrible hours, and went down for a drink of water. A musket-shot hadstruck him in the thigh, and he was somewhat faint. He limped within thedoorway of the seamen's quarters. A dozen men were in this shelter, somebinding up their wounds, some resting and gathering breath before goingout again upon the decks, others patiently waiting for their turn withthe water-dipper.
Jacob's eyes surveyed them, passing slowly from one face to another. Henodded to one, gave a cheering smile to another, and helped a third totie a knot in the kerchief which he was binding over his arm.
"What say you, my masters?" said he. "This be life, eh? This be tastingglory!"
"Ah--h!" breathed Jeff Dimsdale, the man who was taking the dipper fromyoung Robin Redfern. "'Tis such glory as might fill many of our friendsat home with envy. May I taste more on't ere I be like Tom Wilson that'sdown below on the ballast with a bullet in his honest heart!" He raisedthe water to his pale lips. "Tom would ha' given a deal for this drop o'water, I reckon," he said. Then, still hesitating to drink, he added:"Here's to Queen Bess, God bless her!"
Drinking the water at one long draught, he silently handed the dipperback to Robin and passed out into the open.
"'Tis men such as Jeff that have won England her glory on the main,"declared Hartop, as he watched the man striding along the deck. Even ashis eyes rested upon him, he saw Dimsdale stagger and fall, with anarrow, fired from the tops of one of the Spaniards, piercing his temple.A youth, hastening forward, stumbled over the fallen man, rose to hisfeet, looked into Dimsdale's face and passed on. The youth was GilbertOglander, who with grimy, powder-stained countenance, had come up ondeck, utterly tired out by his hard work below. He entered theforecastle and waited his turn for a drink of water.
"What, art stationed below decks, Master Oglander?" questioned JacobHartop. "Methinks your better place were up here where there be boardersto repel. There be many who can carry powder on board, but few who havethe skill to wield a sword or shoot an arrow as thou hast, my master."
"In truth, 'twas that very thought that brought me hither," saidGilbert. "And with the more reason, in that the powder is not now soplentiful or the gunners so many that those I have left below cannot bequickly enough served by the ship's boys. Hast seen aught of TimothyTrollope, Master Hartop?"
Jacob shook his head, but Robin Redfern, hearing the question, answered,as he pointed outward along the upper deck to where, under the larboardbulwarks, a half-dozen of Sir Richard Grenville's men were fighting amida clash of arms with some score of Spaniards who had made an entranceupon the _Revenge_:
"So please you, sir, he is yonder, where, as I have seen with my owneyes, he hath slain a full dozen Spaniards."
Without waiting for his much-needed drink of water, Gilbert snatched upa morion that lay at his feet, clapped it upon his bare head, unsheathedhis sword, and ran out to join in the fray. Jacob Hartop, smiling at thelad's impetuous eagerness, turned to the water-butt and took theproffered dipper from Robin Redfern's hand.
Robin's face was very pale, and there was a strange light in his grave,gray eyes. He glanced quickly round the cabin, and presently darted intothe further corner, went down upon his knees in the dark, and after amoment emerged gripping a little sword in his right hand, and strode tothe door. Jacob Hartop stretched out his hand to stop the boy, guessinghis purpose, but Robin escaped him and ran out, mingling with thefighting crowd.
Very soon afterwards Hartop was again at his gun on the starboard sideof the forecastle deck. At the moment there was a slight lull in thebattle. A galleon that had been grappled to this side of the _Revenge_for an hour or more, and was now almost a total wreck, was being drawnoff to give place to a mighty ship which had stood by from the time ofthe opening of the battle, and whose decks were crowded with soldiers.Glancing out through the gap thus made, Hartop saw at some distance awaya little ship flying the flag of St. George. She seemed to be hoveringnear, either to see the success of the fight, or else, which was moreprobable, to do what she might to rescue the _Revenge_ from the grip ofher overpowering enemies. Hartop knew the little ship. He had seen hermany times during the voyage out from England and also at the anchorageat Flores. It was Jacob Whiddon's _Pilgrim_.
The great galleon which now closed in to the attack was the _St. Paul_,the flag-ship of Don Alonzo de Bassan, a brother of the renowned Marquisof Santa Cruz, and King Philip's chosen admiral. Already the_Revenge's_ bowsprit had been shot away, her foremast had fallen by theboard, and her main topmast was lying across her main-deck with twoEnglishmen and seven Spaniards crashed under its weight. Her sails werein ribbons, and her riggings were in a hopeless tangle of broken rope;her bulwarks had great yawning gaps in them, yet still her gallant flagwaved gloriously, albeit with many shot-holes in it, over her poop. Andnow the _St. Paul_ opened fire upon her, first from her chase-guns thatshot out their great stone balls, and then, as she swung round, from herfull broadside. Sir Richard Granville's mizzen-mast, which hadbeforetime been sorely hacked and splintered, fell with a crash. And nowshe lay heaving lazily on the swell of the ocean, with but the raggedstumps of her three masts showing above the level of her shattered hull,and her ship's company in their sadly reduced numbers showing still asturdy and dauntless front, and ever persistently fighting on. The searound about her was so strewn with wreckage that the galleons could notnow come close to her as they had done at the first, but lay round herin a ring, firing into her or sending out their boats crowded withsoldiers to board her, the beams of the setting sun shining on theirmorions and body armour, and glancing on the blades of their drawnswords.
As Don Alonzo's ship hove near, and when the cloud of smoke from herdischarged guns had lifted, the archers in her fighting-tops fired downtheir arrow shafts in the endeavour to pick off such of the Englishofficers as presented themselves on the poop-deck. Sir Richard Grenvillewas struck many times, but his body armour was well forged, and althoughhe indeed had received many slight wounds on hands and neck and face,yet he was practically unhurt, and his hoarse voice could be heard amidthe battle's thunder cheering his men and bidding them fight on.
His son Roland had been wounded by a musket-shot in his right arm, but,like Sir Richard, he cared not so long as he had breath in him to fight;so he took his sword in his left hand, and ever when any Spaniardsattempted to make an entrance upon the decks he was ready to repel them,with Timothy Trollope and Gilbert Oglander shoulder to shoulder withhim, forming a human barrier through which no Don, howsoever bold, mightpass.
Gilbert Oglander became conscious that as Don Alonzo's galleon camenear, there was one archer in her mizzen-top who had, as it seemed,singled him out from among his companions. Arrow after arrow struck witha sharp ring upon his breastplate; and as he moved along the deck toencounter new foes, again and again an arrow would buzz past him, alwaysfrom the same direction.
The Spaniards, secure in the knowledge that the _Revenge_ was helpless,went about the fighting more slowly as evening drew upon them. It was asif they thought to prolong their victim's life, and wished only to seefor how much time the little _Revenge_ would hold out against them.During a lull in the fight Sir Richard Grenville ordered his men toclear the decks of wreckage, and to cast overboard the bodies of theslain. Water was served round, together with bread and onions. AsGilbert Oglander was carrying a flagon of water to one of his woundedcomrades who lay in the scuppers, an arrow struck the flagon and dashedit from his grasp. He picked the empty vessel up and returned to thewater-butt to refill it. Again as he passed aft an arrow struck him,this time maki
ng a deep dent in his morion. And at that moment youngRobin Redfern, with a kerchief bound round his bleeding head, came up tohim and touched him on the arm.
"Master," the lad cried, "I pray you have a care how you expose yourselfto the aim of the archer who hath just fired at you. His arrows havepursued you this long while past. And--and--prithee, Master Gilbert,dost know who 'tis?"
"Nay, how should I know one Spaniard from another?" Gilbert asked,passing on towards the wounded man. But Robin held him.
"Hark you, my master," cried the lad, "I have seen his face. I saw itbut a few moments ago, and, as I live, 'tis the face of your own cousin,Master Philip Oglander!"
Now Gilbert, despite the excitement of the battle had not forgottenDrusilla's letter that was nestling within his doublet under theprotection of his breastplate. His thoughts had gone more than once tohis home and to the remembrance of his uncle's trickery, and this hadincreased by an hundredfold his hatred of all friends of Spain, and hehad fought with a spirit of personal vengeance as well as with thedesire to help his fellow-countrymen and his Queen in this battleagainst their dread enemy. For an instant he doubted the truth of whatRobin had told him, and when he had served the wounded man with hisdrink of water, and helped him down to the crowded cockpit, he lookedout through one of the portholes in search of his cousin in thegalleon's tops. But the place where his enemy had stood was now clearedof men, and Philip Oglander was nowhere to be seen.
As he was mounting the ladder-stairs to regain the deck, he came upon aman climbing painfully upward with a sword between his teeth. Puttinghis arm about the man's body to assist him, he said:
"Art wounded, my master?"
The man looked round at him. It was Red Bob.
"Not I," he answered. "But I can no longer lie and listen to the groansof my friends down there, nor to the booming of the guns, and thinkthat, ill though I am, I have not yet fired a shot or drawn a weapon indefence of this good ship. A score of the sick men have already gone upto fight, Master Oglander, and 'tis my intention to join them, and dowhat little I can."
"May the good God put strength into your arm, then!" returned Gilbert,and, stepping upon the deck, he drew the man with him, and gave him aloaded pistol and a bag of powder and shot. Jacob Hartop encounteredthem as they moved aft.
"My good gun hath been dismounted at last," said he. "Yet 'tis of littleaccount, methinks, for I do hear that the powder hath well-nigh givenout." A cheer from the after-deck broke in upon his words. "Ah, here bework for us!" he added, snatching his sword from his side and limpingtowards the quarter-deck, followed by Gilbert and Red Bob.
A boat-load of Spanish soldiers had put out from the admiral's galleon,and had come alongside the _Revenge_. Fresh and eager they clambered upfrom her chains and over her broken bulwarks--two score of them at theleast. Sir Richard Grenville and Captain Robinson rallied their men totheir sides. They quickly drew together in a line, a gallant littlecompany of twelve, not one of whom was without a wound, saving three whohad come up from their hard beds on the ballast, and these were so weakthat it was a labour even to raise their swords.
They met their foes with a rattle of pistol-shots and then with a clashof steel. Sir Richard Grenville closed with a tall Don, whose gayclothing and sparkling rings proclaimed him a man of consequence.Whatever Grenville may have been as a seamen, he was certainly no meanswordsman. He parried the Spaniard's fierce thrust, and with a quickmovement of his strong wrist and an alert lunge forward sent the pointof his weapon deep into the other's bare throat. The Spaniard fell, andSir Richard stepped over his inert body to encounter the man who hadtaken his leader's place. Four Spaniards did he vanquish with his ownhand within the few minutes during which this engagement on hisquarter-deck lasted. And by his side--the least with thegreatest--fought little Robin Redfern.
Robin, indeed, seemed to have abandoned all sense of fear or thought ofdanger, and he fought valiantly in his own boyish fashion. At one momenthe rushed forward into the very midst of the Spaniards, and engaged handto hand with one whom he seemed to have singled out. Gilbert, seeing himthus expose himself, pressed in to his rescue, caught him by theshoulder and dragged him back, parrying on his own blade thesword-thrust that must else have ended the boy's life. Gilbert nowcrossed swords with Robin's antagonist, and in the fading evening lightcaught sight of his face, recognizing it as the face of his own cousin,Philip. For a moment Gilbert drew back, appalled at the thought offighting with one of his own flesh and blood. But Philip, with ascornful laugh on his lips, pressed him to the duel. It was thrust andcut and parry, parry and cut and thrust, for many moments. The two wereequally matched in skill, albeit Gilbert had already been fighting forfive hours without a rest, while his cousin was full fresh and active.Back and ever back, foot by foot, Gilbert was forced, and at last afierce thrust delivered with all the strength in Philip's right arm,backed by all the weight in his body, brought Gilbert to his knees. Thesword's point struck against his breast-plate, doing no real injury, butby its sheer force it disturbed his balance. He rolled over on the deck,and his own weapon fell from his hand.
"Now will I do for thee at last!" cried Philip Oglander savagely betweenhis teeth, speaking in English. He held his sword in air for a moment asif in deliberation where to strike. In that moment his weapon hand wasstruck a tremendous blow by a pistol flung at it by Red Bob, and Red Bobhimself sprang forward, crying "Traitorous hound! I know ye!" andclutched him round the body in a wrestling embrace. The two swayed toand fro for an instant, and then Red Bob dropped on the deck with PhilipOglander's dagger in his heart.
When Gilbert rose to his feet to continue the duel with his cousin hesaw Philip climbing back over the bulwark in haste to regain thegalleon's boat. Others of the Spaniards occupied Gilbert now, andAmbrose Pennington and one of the yeomen of the sheets coming up tohelp, they were soon overpowered or driven over the side. Some fell intothe sea; five-and-twenty of them had been slain; and the boat returnedto Don Alonzo's ship with but seven out of the forty men who had setout in her, less than half an hour earlier.
THE GREAT FIGHT ON BOARD THE _REVENGE_]
Darkness had now spread across the sea, the stars peeped out through theoverhanging mist of smoke, and in a wide ring about the _Revenge_ thegalleons stood, ceaselessly firing upon her. Their guns flashed outtheir fire into the black night. Many of the shots flew wide; somepassed over the low-lying wreck and struck the galleons lying beyond,yet many thundered against the sides of the English ship, buryingthemselves in her stout timbers or rebounding with a hiss into the sea.Hour after hour throughout the night the battle continued, and if notmany of Sir Richard Grenville's men were killed or wounded it wasbecause so few remained alive to be wounded or killed. An hour beforemidnight there were but a dozen men and boys at Sir Richard's side uponhis decks, and these were all so weary and bruised and hungry that theyscarce could stand. Yet they hovered about their chief, seldom speaking,but only exchanging strange glances one with another, binding up eachother's hurts, or gazing about them at the flashing of the cannon. Attimes one would take up a musket, and, if he could find powder and shotwherewith to load it, would fire into a crowd of soldiers upon one ofthe Spaniard's decks.
Sir Richard strode to and fro, sword in hand, with a staggering gait,now pausing behind the shelter of some yet unbroken piece of bulwark andwatching the movements of the enemy. And once he caught at GilbertOglander's arm, gripping it tightly as though to support himself.
"I pray thee tell me, Sir Richard," cried the lad. "Art wounded? Wilt gobelow to the cabin?"
"Nay, nay," returned Grenville quickly, breathing hard nevertheless, "Iwould but ask thee to hasten below and discover wherefore our guns besilent. Od's life, boy, must we lie here and not give them shot forshot! Go, bid the gunners maintain their firing!"
And Gilbert obeyed, coming back some minutes afterwards, saying:
"Good my master, the last barrel of powder hath been broached, and thereis scarce enough for another round."
Then Sir
Richard took off the casque from his head and wiped his brow,answering:
"Go below yet again and bid them sweep up the boards of the magazine,and scrape out a handful of powder wheresoever it may be found. And you,boy," he added to young Robin Redfern, who stood trembling near himunder the light of one of the deck lanterns, "hie you to one of thewater-butts and bring me a drink of water."
His voice was weak, and Ambrose Pennington, who had seated himself onthe thick end of a dismounted cannon, heard it and quickly rose to hisfeet.
"Y'are hurt, Sir Richard," said he. "I know it, though you do bear itso bravely. I beg you let me help you to your cabin, where the surgeonwill attend you."
Sir Richard shook his head.
"Wherefore should I leave the deck now," said he,--"now when there be sofew to defend it?"
"Nay, I implore you," urged Pennington, and putting his arm about theadmiral's body he gently drew him towards the stairs. And Grenville wentwith him. The surgeon was brought, and he speedily took off SirRichard's body-armour, and laid bare the many wounds that he hadreceived. These he washed and bound up with bandages. The two stoodunder a little hanging lamp that was near the open porthole. Theirmovements, or their flitting shadows, must have been observed upon oneof the galleons, for even as they were nearly ready to quit the cabin amusket-shot struck Sir Richard on his shoulder. A second bullet struckhim on the head, and at the same moment a third shot killed the surgeonat his side.
Taking up a fragment of linen Sir Richard bound it about his head andstaggered to the door. Severe as his injuries were, it was not in him tostand aside in the hour of peril. He crept up to the deck. At the top ofthe stairs he was met by Robin Redfern, who had patiently stood therewith the flagon of water that he had been sent for.
"God bless thee, my lad!" said Sir Richard, taking the cup from theboy's hand. "And may you live to serve your Queen and country as I havetried to serve them!"
The words had but left his lips when a cannon-ball whizzed past him. Heturned to look for the boy, and found Robin lying dead at his feet. Thena full broadside of his own ship's guns was fired.
"Fight on! Fight on!" he cried, although indeed none was near him tohear his encouraging words.
That was the last discharge of his heavy guns; for now there was notsufficient powder on board with which to fire them, and even the smallercannons, the falconets and demi-culverins, could be but sparingly used.Yet so long as there was a handful of powder to be found it wascarefully employed. Not only had the ammunition run short, but all thepikes were broken in hand-to-hand fight, and of Grenville's men that hadgone into action forty lay dead, and the most part of the rest severelywounded. The ship herself was almost a wreck, her tackle all cutasunder, her upper works altogether rased. During the fifteen hours,from three o'clock in the afternoon, when the battle had begun, untildaybreak on the next morning, she had been closely assailed by fifteenseveral galleons, in addition to those that had fired upon her from adistance.
Just before dawn, Edward Webbe and the few remaining gunners who hadbeen at work between decks appeared above the hatchway. They had used upthe powder to the last grain, and there was no more fighting to bedone. Webbe was as black as a coalman, his clothing was torn to tatters,and he was covered with wounds. He went up to Captain Robinson and toldhim the condition of the ship. The captain then held colloquy with thesailing-master, and both approached Sir Richard Grenville.
"Our powder hath been spent, even to the last corn," said the captain.
"We have six feet of water in the hold," added the sailing-master, "andthree great shot-holes below the water-line which are so weakly pluggedthat with the first working of the sea we must needs sink."
Sir Richard Grenville took a turn to and fro, meditating. Then he lookedat the master-gunner, whom he knew to be a most resolute man, and saidin a tone of command:
"Blow up the ship, then! Blow her up! Split her and sink her, thatnaught may remain of glory or victory to our enemies. As for ourselves,let us yield ourselves unto God, and to the mercy of none else!"
"Nay," returned the master. "Have we not told ye that there is nogunpowder on board wherewith to fire a gun, much less to blow up theship?"
"Why, then," cried Grenville, "split her up with your hatchets, pull outthe plugs from the shot-holes. But sink her, sink her how you will. Forwhile we have, like valiant men, repulsed so many of our enemies, itwere folly now to shorten the honour of our nation by prolonging ourlives for a few hours or a few days. So let sink her, I say. Sink her,in God's name."
To this Edward Webbe and divers others who were with him readilyassented. But Captain Robinson and Pennington were of another opinion,and they besought Sir Richard to have care of them, declaring that theSpaniards would doubtless be as ready to accept a composition as theythemselves were ready to offer the same. "There be many able and valiantmen in our company yet living," said the captain, "whose wounds are notmortal, and who may yet do their country and Queen acceptable servicehereafter."
But Sir Richard refused to hearken to this pleading, and he moved awayand stood for a while looking over the sea that was now clearer underthe approaching light of dawn. And beyond the galleons he caught sightof Jacob Whiddon's ship, the _Pilgrim_, bearing away to the leeward withtwo great galleons in pursuit of her.
Meanwhile, Captain Robinson held speech with his fellows and won many ofthem to his side, and he besought Ambrose Pennington to leave the shipand go on board the _St. Paul_ and parley with Don Alonzo de Bassan forconditions. So Pennington and Jacob Hartop and some three others, all ofthem sorely wounded and looking strangely ill-conditioned, went downinto an empty boat that was alongside, and holding up a white flag intheir bow they crossed the intervening space of sea to the admiral.
They found Don Alonzo in no great haste to make another entry upon the_Revenge_, for his men had had enough of her, and even still feared her.Pennington told him that Sir Richard Grenville had a mind to blow up hisship with himself and all his ship's company.
"And wherefore should he resort to a measure so extreme?" questioned DonAlonzo. "Since his disposition is so dangerous, return to him, I begyou, and let him know that I am willing to put an end to this battle,and that I have already lost more men and more ships than I had everthought to lose at the hands of one small English man-of-war. Bid himunderstand that I yield to him his life, and that the lives of all hisship's company shall be spared and sent home to England. For the bettersort, such reasonable ransom shall be paid as their estates may bear.But I do aver, and swear by the Holy Mother, that all of you shall befree from the galleys and from imprisonment. I care not to expose myselfand my fleet to further loss and mischief. Also, 'tis my great desire torescue your Sir Richard Grenville, whom for his most notable valour I dogreatly honour and admire."
With this answer Pennington returned to the _Revenge_, and since safetyof life was promised, the larger number of the men, feeling themselvesto be now at the end of their peril, stood up against Sir Richard andEdward Webbe, and declared their willingness to surrender.
"What!" cried Edward Webbe with bitter scorn and contempt in his voice."Do you ask me to surrender to a Spaniard? Me who have borne so much ofhorror and torture and cruelty at their hands, and at the hands of theiraccursed Inquisition? God forbid! No, I will not surrender. Rather wouldI die now at this moment where I stand!"
And thus saying he whipped out his sword, and resting its hilt upon thedeck, held its point towards his body with intent to throw himself uponit. But the captain arrested him in the act, kicking the sword away.Webbe struggled to regain his weapon, and, failing, was about to rush tothe ship's side and fling himself into the sea, when Ambrose Penningtonand another caught him and carried him down to his cabin and therelocked him in, making sure that he had no weapon within reach.
Sir Richard Grenville stood alone, not attempting to dissuade his menfrom their resolve, and presently in the silence Jacob Hartop spoke.
"Ned was right," said he, stepping to Sir Richard's side. "An Engl
ishship, even though she be a poor battered hulk, were ever a better homethan a galleon of Spain." He glanced aft to the flag-staff upon which atattered remnant of the honoured flag still fluttered in the morningair, and baring his head he added: "God bless Queen Elizabeth!"
Gilbert Oglander and Timothy Trollops had taken no part in this littlescene. They were at the time both below in the cockpit attending totheir wounds and giving what small help was in their power to their sickand dying companions. Here, too, was Roland Grenville. But in good timethe death-like silence of the abated battle brought the three up ondeck. As they came to the stair-head they glanced upon the water, whichrippled and glanced in the morning light; for there were now nointervening bulwarks to shield it from their sight. And they saw somesix gaily-furnished boats approaching. The boats were brought alongside,and the boys at their bows threw up coils of rope as they touched,which, falling upon the blood-stained deck, were taken by certain of SirRichard's men and secured to such balks of timber as could be found.Then one by one the men stole away into the boats and were taken aboardDon Alonzo's ship and others of the galleons.
Sir Richard Grenville, thus overmatched, agreed after much persuasion toleave the _Revenge_, which was indeed an unsavoury resting-place for anyman, her decks being covered with blood and strewn with the bodies ofdead and wounded men, as if it had been a slaughter-house.
"Well, an you will, let it be so," said Sir Richard as he turned todescend into the boat that the Spanish admiral had sent for him. "He maydo with my body what he listeth, for I esteem it not." And grasping thehand of Gilbert Oglander, who was helping him, he added, "Pray for me,Gilbert, my lad. And bid the others of our company pray for me also."
Then he swooned, reviving only when he was laid upon a couch in thecabin of one of the Spanish officers on board the _St Paul_.
Don Alonzo himself would neither see him nor speak with him. But theother captains and gentlemen received him with gracious courtesy,treated him with humanity and kindness, and left nothing unattemptedthat might contribute to his comfort or tend to his recovery. Theywondered at his courage and his stout heart, for he now showed no signof faintness nor change of colour.
Gilbert Oglander remained at his side throughout that day, and wasrelieved at night by Sir Richard's son Roland. Early in the morning thegalleons anchored in the roadstead of Terceira. Sir Richard Grenvillewas too weak to be removed upon the island, and Gilbert and Roland satwith him until he died on the morning of the third day after the battle.
His last words were worthy of his life. Two of the Spanish captains werepresent as he spoke them in their own tongue.
"Here die I, Richard Grenville," he murmured as he held his son's hand."Here die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyful and quiet mind, for that Ihave ended my life as a true soldier ought to do that hath fought forhis country, Queen, religion, and honour, whereby my soul most joyfuldeparteth out of this body, and shall always leave behind it aneverlasting fame of a valiant and true soldier that hath done his dutyas he was bound to do."
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