This is the bit that makes me suspicious of this pirate fight. This line makes it sound as if the pirate ship was the captured one – that it was under siege and then got away. But wait – the “they” and the “our” become mixed up in this grapple.
Our ship is probably the pirate ship, because of Hamlet’s presence on it. They are probably the Danish ship folk. So – the thing that happens is that the Danish ship got clear of the Pirate ship, which Hamlet is on, by himself. So it’s not, as I previously imagined, that Hamlet gets on the pirate ship and the pirate ship just abandons its quarry, it’s that the Danish ship gets away and Hamlet is left on board the Pirate one.
I mean – maybe. Hamlet is certainly not being as clear as he can be in telling this story. I think there is likely good reason for this confusion.
The Hamlet Project 