The men were still aloft when the battery, which had hoisted Spanish colours, opened fire upon us, the first shot severing our larboard main-topgallant back-stay. This damage, slight as it was, sufficed to effectually rouse Captain Pigot’s hasty, irritable temper; and, hurrying the men down from aloft, he ordered the larboard broadside to be manned, and the guns to be directed upon the audacious battery. A couple of well-directed broadsides sufficed to silence its fire, and the boats were then immediately piped away.
“Mark my words, Lascelles,” said Courtenay, as we trundled down the ship’s side together, “we are going to have a tough time of it with those craft in there; three of them have boarding nettings triced up, and are evidently preparing to give us a warm reception. They look like privateers, and if so, I daresay they are full of men, who will have ample opportunity to bowl us over at their leisure whilst we are pulling in upon them. And we shall have no help from the frigate’s guns, for the rascals are beyond their reach.”
“Now then, Courtenay, no croaking, young gentleman, if you please, or I shall be under the painful necessity of sending you back on board, and taking Mr Maxwell in your place,” said Mr Douglas, who was following us down the side, and who happened to overhear Courtenay’s encouraging remarks.
“Oh, no, sir, you can’t be so heartless as to do that; have some consideration for my feelings,” laughed Courtenay; and flinging himself down in the stern-sheets of the boat, he drew his cutlass, and affected to be very cautiously feeling its edge, to the covert amusement of the men who happened to see him.
“It’s a’most sharp enough for you to shave with, ain’t it, sir?” demurely inquired the smart fore-topman, who was stroke-oar in Courtenay’s boat, at which there was another grin; Courtenay’s chin being as guiltless of hair as the back of a lady’s hand, notwithstanding which it was whispered that he assiduously shaved every morning with his penknife.
“Now, are we all ready, Douglas?” asked Mr Reid, as he stood in the stern-sheets of the pinnace, and ran his eye critically over the boats. “Then, shove off; let fall and give way, lads. Lascelles and I will tackle the brig, Mr Douglas, whilst I must leave you and Mr Courtenay to give a good account of those two schooners which have hoisted their colours. We will take matters quietly, so as to spare the men as much as possible, until the shot begins to drop round us, when we must make a dash and get on board as quickly as we can.”
Courtenay’s assumption that the three vessels we had marked out for attack were privateers was speedily strengthened by the circumstance that boats were seen to put off from the smaller craft—doubtless prizes of the others—conveying what were probably the prize-crews back to their own ships, to assist in their defence. As we neared the land we made out that the people in the battery were still standing to their guns, and we momentarily expected them to open fire upon us; but they were wise enough to refrain, evidently having already had a sufficient experience of the frigate’s broadsides, the destructive effects of which became distinctly visible as we pulled past.
Upon our arriving abreast the battery, the brig and the two schooners, for which we were heading, having got springs upon their cables and hoisted French colours, brought their broadsides to bear upon us, and commenced firing, whereupon we separated, taking “open order,” as the marines say, so as to offer as small a mark as possible. It was the first time I had “smelt powder,” and as the shot began to hum past us, I must plead guilty to having at the outset experienced a certain amount of nervous trepidation. I had an idea that every shot would find its mark, that “every bullet has its billet,” and I momentarily expected to feel the crushing blow which would tell me that I had been hit. But on we swept, the shot flying close over our heads, or just past us on either side, occasionally striking the water within such near proximity as to dash a little shower of spray right over the boat, and presently the musketry bullets came whistling about our ears, yet we remained unscathed. This opened my eyes, and gave me a juster appreciation than I had had before of the perils of warfare. I saw that it was by no means the necessarily deadly thing I had hitherto imagined it to be, and my courage came back to me, my spirits rising momentarily higher in response to the increasing excitement of the occasion. For we were now dashing forward upon our several quarries at racing speed, the men straining at the oars until the stout ashen staves bent like willow wands, and the water buzzed and foamed and bubbled, hissing past us in a regular series of miniature whirlpools, whilst the boats seemed every now and then as though they were about to be lifted clear out of the water by the herculean efforts of their panting crews.
Once within musket-shot of the vessels, a very few minutes at this pace sufficed us to cover the remaining distance, when we dashed alongside—the first lieutenant ranging up on the brig’s starboard quarter, whilst we in the gig took her in the larboard fore-chains—and a stubborn hand-to-hand fight immediately commenced. The craft we had attacked proved to be full of people; and upon our attempting to board, we found that they had been divided into two distinct parties, one of which was successfully opposing Mr Reid, whilst the other seemed determined at all costs to prevent my own little party from gaining a footing upon the deck. Twice were we forced back into the boat, and I saw that two or three of the men were bleeding from pike or bullet wounds. A third time we made the attempt, and as I was scrambling up into the brig’s channels a Frenchman thrust his pike through a port at me. I grasped the weapon, and partly through my antagonist’s efforts to wrench it away again, and partly with the aid of a friendly push behind from one of our own lads, I suddenly found myself shot in through the port, and safely landed on the brig’s deck. Springing to my feet in an instant, I laid fiercely about me with my cutlass, and thus cleared a way for the gig’s crew to follow me. In less than a minute the gigs were in possession of the fore part of the deck, and so quickly was the thing done, and with such good-will did our lads lay about them, that the party opposed to us recoiled in a sudden panic. Taking instant advantage of this, we charged them with a wild hurrah, whereupon they fairly turned tail and fled before us, rushing helter-skelter in among the other party. The whole body of defenders being thus thrown into disorder, the first lieutenant’s party managed to make good their footing on deck; and then, after one desperate but ineffectual charge on the part of the Frenchmen, we had no further trouble, the defenders throwing down their weapons and calling for quarter. This was, of course, at once accorded them, and they were ordered below, the hatches being clapped over them, whilst the ship was subjected to an overhaul. She proved to be both empty and old, besides being apparently a particularly leaky tub; she was consequently valueless, and except for the purpose of destroying her, and thus putting a stop to her depredations, not worth the trouble of taking. This fact definitely ascertained, Mr Reid ordered the crew on deck again; and, giving them five minutes in which to collect their personal belongings, directed them to take the brig’s boats and make the best of their way ashore. The crew thus got rid of, the vessel herself was effectually set on fire in three places, and as soon as the flames had taken such a hold as to prevent all possibility of their extinction we left her.
Meanwhile, the second lieutenant and Courtenay had been equally successful with ourselves, each having captured one of the schooners without very much difficulty. They proved, however, to be, like the brig, very old and weak, having evidently been strained all to pieces in the effort to make them perform services for which they were never built. They, therefore, were also set on fire. And as for their prizes, they consisted of half a dozen wretched little dirty coasters, the largest of which could not have measured over sixty tons. Their crews, we were informed, had been landed on various parts of the coast, so, their lawful owners not being there to take possession of them, these craft were likewise devoted to the flames. By the time that the Frenchmen had all been got rid of, and the little fleet effectually set on fire, it had fallen dark, and all hands being pretty well tired out, we made the best of our way back to the frigate. We h
ad eight hands wounded in this skirmish, all the wounds proving fortunately of a very trifling character, so much so indeed that not one of the wounded was put on the sick list for even a single day.
The Hermione remained at anchor all night; and on the following morning Mr Douglas, with a boat’s crew, went on shore, drove the small garrison out of the fort, and spiked and dismounted the guns.
Thus, harmlessly, so far at least as I was concerned, ended my first brush with the enemy; and though I never heard anything further of the affair, I received the gratifying information that the first lieutenant had spoken very highly of my conduct on the occasion when making his report to Captain Pigot.
CHAPTER FOUR
An Unsuccessful Chase
A fortnight later we fell in with and were ordered to join the squadron of Vice-admiral Parker.
This arrangement was, to the Hermione’s officers at least, a source of intense gratification. For whereas, whilst we were cruising alone, our opportunities for social intercourse were limited to an occasional invitation to dine with the captain—and that, Heaven knows, was poor entertainment enough!—we now had frequent invitations to dine with the officers of the other ships, or entertained them in return in our own ward-room. But, though matters were thus made more pleasant for the officers of the Hermione, I cannot say that the change wrought any improvement in the condition of the ship’s company—quite the reverse, indeed. For, so anxious was Captain Pigot that his ship should be the smartest in the fleet, that when reefing topsails at night, if any other ship happened to finish before us, the last man of the yard of the dilatory topsail was infallibly booked for a flogging next day. And so with all other evolutions. The result of which was, that while our crew became noted for their smartness, they daily grew more sullen, sulky, and discontented in their dispositions, shirking their work whenever there was a possibility of doing so undetected, and performing their duties with an ill-will which they took little pains to conceal. This, of course, only tended to make matters still worse. The skipper could not fail to notice his increasing unpopularity, and this wounded his self-love; added to which he soon got the idea into his head—and certainly not altogether without reason—that the men were combining together to thwart and annoy him. And this only made him still more irritable and severe. It seemed at length as though matters were steadily approaching the point when it would become an open and recognised struggle between the captain and the crew for supremacy in respect of dogged obstinacy and determination. What made it all the worse was that the officers, in the maintenance of proper order and discipline in the ship, were compelled—very much against their will—to support and countenance the skipper in his arbitrary mode of dealing with the crew; thus dividing the inmates of the frigate into two well-defined parties—namely, those on the quarter-deck and those on the forecastle. We were all unpopular in varying degrees, from the captain down to the midshipmen. I have good reason to believe that the first lieutenant on more than one occasion remonstrated with Captain Pigot upon his excessive harshness to the men, and strongly urged him to try the effect of more lenient measures with them; but, if such was the case, the remonstrances proved wholly unavailing. Added to all this there was, especially after we joined the squadron, incessant sail, gun, musketry, and cutlass drill, in addition to the daily combined evolutions of the ships; all of which made our poor lads pray for a change of some sort—they cared not what—it could scarcely be for the worse, and might very reasonably be hoped to be somewhat for the better.
Under such circumstances the joy of the men may be imagined when, one morning at daylight, the signal was made by the admiral to chase to the eastward. Nevertheless, our unfortunate lookout aloft was promptly booked for two dozen at the gangway that day because he had failed to be the first to discover the stranger.
We were cruising at this time in the Windward Channel, the squadron being at the moment of the discovery about midway between Points Malano and Perle. We were working to windward under double-reefed topsails on the starboard tack, the trade-wind blowing fresh at about east-nor’-east.
The strange sail was about ten miles dead to windward of us; and that she had sharp eyes on board her was manifest from the fact that, before we had time to acknowledge the admiral’s signal, she had shaken the reefs out of her topsails and had set topgallant-sails. Every ship in the squadron of course at once did the same, and forthwith a most animated chase commenced. The Hermione happened to be the weathermost British ship, and, consequently, nearest the chase; and most anxiously did Captain Pigot struggle to maintain this enviable position; albeit we were closely pressed by the frigates Mermaid and Quebec, which were thrashing along, the one on our lee bow and the other on our lee beam, a distance of a bare cable’s length separating the three ships from each other. It was an interesting and exhilarating spectacle to watch these two graceful craft leaping and plunging over the swift-rushing foam-capped emerald surges, spurning them aside with their swelling bows and shivering them into cloud-like showers of snowy spray which they dashed as high as their fore-yards; now rolling heavily to windward as they slid down into a liquid valley, and anon careering to leeward under the influence of wind and wave, as they mounted to the succeeding crest, until their wet gleaming sides and glistening copper flashed in the sun almost down to their garboard strakes. Nor did our own ship present a less gallant spectacle as she careered madly forward through the hissing brine, now burying her bows deep in a fringe of yeasty foam, and next moment soaring aloft as though she meant to forsake the ocean altogether; her steeply-inclined deck knee-deep with the rushing cataracts of water which poured over her to windward, her canvas tugging at the stout spars until they bent and sprang like fishing-rods, and the wind singing through her tautly-strained rigging as through the strings of a gigantic Aeolian harp. The bearings of the chase were promptly taken by Mr Southcott, the master; and a single hour sufficed to show that we were not only fore-reaching, but also weathering upon her. By that time we had brought her a couple of points abaft our weather-beam, and the Hermione was then hove about, this manoeuvre temporarily bringing the chase fair in line with our jib-boom end; whilst the Mermaid lay broad away on our lee quarter fully a mile distant, with the Quebec half a mile astern of her. With the rising of the sun the breeze freshened still more; and it soon became evident, from the first lieutenant’s manner, that he was beginning to feel anxious about his spars. Captain Pigot, however, who was on deck, would not allow the canvas to be reduced by so much as a single thread; so Mr Reid was at length compelled (at considerable risk to the men who executed the duty) to get up preventer back-stays fore and aft; and to this precaution was doubtless due the ultimate success which crowned our efforts. Another hour brought us fairly astern of the chase; and, the moment that her three masts were in line, we again tacked and stood after her, being now directly in her wake and about nine miles astern. Meanwhile the rest of the squadron had also tacked, and were now to be seen tailing out in a long straggling line on our lee quarter—the Mermaid leading, the Quebec next, and the rest—nowhere, as the racing men say.
Breakfast was now served, and by the time that I again went on deck we had so far gained upon the chase that the foot of her courses could be now and then seen as we rose upon the crest of a sea. She was evidently a very smart as well as a very fine ship; yet we were overhauling her, hand over hand, as our ships pretty generally did those of the French. It was freely admitted on all hands that the French were better shipbuilders than ourselves, yet our ships generally proved the faster in a chase like the present; and I had often wondered how it was. Now I saw and could understand the reason. It was because the British ships were better sailed and better steered than those of our enemies. Even at our then distance it was painfully apparent that the yards of the chase were trimmed in the most slovenly manner, and in the matter of steering she was sheering and yawing all over the place; whilst for ourselves, our canvas was trimmed with the utmost nicety; and we had a man at the wheel who never for a single
instant removed his glance from the weather-leach of our main-topgallant—sail, which was kept the merest trifle a-lift—just sufficiently so, and no more, to show that the frigate was looking up as high as it was possible for her to go, whilst the remainder of her canvas was clean full and dragging her along at race-horse speed. The result was that, though our ship was possibly the slower of the two, her wake was as straight as though it had been ruled upon the heaving water; whilst that of the chase was so crooked that she must have travelled over nearly half as much ground again as ourselves, thus losing through faulty steering more than she gained through superiority in speed.
At 10 a.m., by which time we had neared the chase to within a distance of six miles, the stranger hove about for the first time and stood to the southward and eastward, close-hauled on the larboard tack. At 10:30 we followed suit, and half an hour later the high land behind Jean Rabel, Saint Domingo, was sighted from aloft Captain Pigot now came to the conclusion that the stranger was aiming to take refuge in Port au Paix; and, should she succeed in effecting her design, it might prove difficult if not impossible to capture her. His anxiety to speedily get alongside her and force her to action accordingly grew almost momentarily more intense, as also did his acerbity of temper, until at length he became so nearly unbearable that, had he just then happened to have been washed overboard, I believe not a single man in the ship—apart from the officers, that is, of course—would have raised a hand or joined in any effort to save him.
The Pirate Story Megapack: 25 Classic and Modern Tales Page 140