Chapter Three.
The “Sans-Culotte.”
The adage that “it is an ill wind that blows nobody good” maintained its reputation for truth, even in the case of the seemingly unmitigated disaster of the previous night—that is to say, at least, as far as I was concerned; inasmuch as the knowledge and experience which I acquired of my profession during the operation of clearing away the wreck, recovering the sails, rigging, and undamaged spars, fitting the new topmasts into their places, and restoring the ship generally to her former condition, gave me an advantage which I could scarcely have hoped to secure in less than six months of the ordinary run of active service. I watched with unflagging interest the progress of every operation as the work went forward, with the result that I learned by actual observation, coupled with the best use of my reasoning faculties, and frequent questions to Mr Sennitt (who, I may say, heard and answered my inquiries with quite astonishing patience), the position and use of every rope that I saw fitted, the mode of working the yards, and much other valuable knowledge.
It is surprising how speedily human curiosity becomes quickened and aroused, if the individual devotes himself earnestly to the study of an art or science. The thirst for knowledge increases with its acquisition—at least, such is my experience—and is not to be satisfied until every mystery connected with such art or science has been mastered, and made the inalienable property of the student. It was so with me in relation to everything connected with my profession. Having gained a certain amount of knowledge concerning the mysteries of seamanship, I craved for more; and throwing all my energies into the discharge of my daily round of duties, made such rapid progress as astonished everybody, myself included.
The “Scourge,” meanwhile, was slowly pursuing her course down channel; the wind, after the recent blow, having fallen light and baffling; it was not, therefore, until the morning of the 13th that she reached her cruising-ground, Scilly bearing at the time about N.E., distant 26 miles.
The day broke clear and cloudless, with a light air of wind from the southward; the water being smooth, save for the long, rolling swell of the Atlantic, which at the spot in question made itself very distinctly felt. The air was mild and springlike, the unclouded sunbeams struck with a perceptible sensation of warmth, and every one on board, forgetting the recent misery of cold and wet, greeted the welcome change with a corresponding flow of exuberant animal spirits.
The hands had just been piped to breakfast, when the lookout aloft reported, “A sail right ahead!”
Recalling to mind the skipper’s request on a previous occasion, I at once ran down into the cabin for his telescope, which I brought on deck and handed to him.
“Thank you, Mr Chester,” said he. “I have remarked with very great pleasure your real in the discharge of your duties. Go on as you have begun, my boy, and you will soon become a valuable and efficient officer.”
Captain Brisac did not, however, himself go aloft this time; Mr Clewline, the second lieutenant, happened to be on deck at the moment, and the skipper handed him the glass, with a polite request that he would “see what he could make of her.”
Mr Clewline, I thought, seemed rather to resent the suggestion as an affront to his dignity; he, however, made no demur, but proceeded aloft with great deliberation, and, seating himself upon the fore-topsail yard, took a very leisurely observation of the stranger.
Having devoted about a quarter of an hour to this occupation, he slowly closed the telescope, and carefully slinging it over his shoulder, descended to the deck with the same deliberation which had characterised his ascent. It was not until he had regained the skipper’s side that he condescended to make his report; when, handing back the glass with a stiff bow, he said, “I make out the stranger to be, sir, a brig, apparently French, of about our own size; she is standing directly toward us, upon the starboard tack, under topgallant-sails.”
“Thank you, sir,” returned the skipper shortly; then turning upon his heel he went below to his cabin, Patterson having come on deck a minute or two before, to announce that breakfast was ready.
The news quickly spread through the ship that the sail in sight was supposed to be a Frenchman; and as the two vessels were approaching each other, and an action, in the event of Mr Clewline’s supposition proving correct, inevitable, a considerable amount of excitement prevailed. The men bolted their breakfast in less than half the time usually devoted to that meal, and returned to the deck the moment they had disposed of their last morsel; while the officers betrayed at least an equal amount of eagerness, two or three of them hastily swallowing a cup of scalding coffee, and munching up a biscuit, without giving themselves time even to sit down.
“Old Sennitt”—as he was irreverently termed in the midshipmen’s berth—was one of the earliest to put in an appearance after breakfast, and his first act was to go straight aloft with his glass. He devoted more time even than Mr Clewline to the examination of the stranger, and it was not until Captain Brisac had returned to the deck and hailed him that he made a move.
As he came aft and joined his superior upon the quarter-deck, exultation was visible in his face, and in every movement of his body.
“It is all right, sir,” he exclaimed; “she is French beyond all possibility of doubt. The cut of her canvas is alone sufficient evidence of her nationality; but in order that there may be no room for question of it, she has furled her royals, and has run up the tricolour to her main-royal-mast-head. She is a brig, as far as I can make out her rig, coming end-on to us as she is, and seems about our size, or perhaps a trifle larger. I suppose we may as well clear for action at once?”
“If you please, Mr Sennitt; and, not to be behindhand with them, let them see the colour of our bunting before you do anything else.”
The order to clear for action was received with enthusiasm; and the little round ball which immediately soared aloft, breaking abroad and displaying the naval ensign as it touched the main truck, was greeted with a rousing cheer. The “green” hands were by this time not quite so verdant as they had been a few days before, Mr Sennitt having drilled them most remorselessly at every available opportunity—and as they had been very judiciously intermingled with the experienced “salts,” in appointing them to their various stations, the work went on with, as Captain Brisac remarked, “very creditable celerity.” In little more than half an hour, the yards had been slung, bulkheads knocked down, the magazine opened, guns cast loose, loaded, and run out, and every other preparation completed.
Meanwhile the two brigs had been slowly drawing together, and by 10 a.m. were within a couple of miles of each other. There had been a little manoeuvring on each side to secure the weather-gage; but our skipper, perceiving that the action was likely to be thereby delayed, speedily yielded the point, and allowed the Frenchman to take the coveted position.
“It will make very little difference, five minutes after we are engaged,” he remarked to the first lieutenant, who, after having gone the rounds and personally seen that everything was ready, had rejoined him aft, just as the order had been given to the helmsman of the “Scourge” to “keep away.”
“There is one thing which we have not yet done,” he continued, “it seems quite unnecessary, but we may as well avoid all possibility of mistake by showing the private signal.”
The private signal was accordingly shown but evoked, as was expected, no response. It was consequently hauled down again, and now everybody made himself finally ready for the impending conflict. My readers will naturally feel curious to know whether on this, the first occasion of my “smelling gunpowder,” I experienced any sensation of fear. I am old enough now, and have seen enough of service, to have no misapprehension of being misunderstood, or rather misjudged; I will therefore confess the truth, and candidly acknowledge that, for a few minutes after the completion of our preparations, I felt most horribly frightened. I knew that I was about to be involved in a scene of death and destruction, of sickening slaughter, and of even more sickening physical suffering; I anticipated seeing my fellow-men struck down right and left, their limbs torn away, and, quite possibly, their bodies cut in two by the cruel chain-shot; I looked round upon the order and cleanliness which everywhere prevailed on board our ship, and contrasted the existent condition of things with the picture which my imagination conjured up of impending blood and carnage; and I admit that for a few minutes my heart almost failed me. That state of feeling, however, soon passed away, and was succeeded by a condition of painful excitement and impatience, which lasted until the first shot was fired, when it abruptly subsided, leaving me as cool and collected as I am at the present moment.
I was not too frightened, however, to notice and admire the perfect sang-froid with which Captain Brisac and Mr Sennitt contemplated the approach of our antagonist. They stood side by side, just abaft the main-rigging, scrutinising every movement on board the French ship, and exchanging critical remarks upon the smartness of her crew in shortening sail and executing the various manoeuvres usual on board a ship going into action; and I gathered, with no very comfortable feelings, that, from what they observed, they quite anticipated a hard fight.
When the ships had approached each other within a quarter of a mile, we were able, for the first time, to ascertain the actual armament of our foe. Mr Sennitt was the first to seize the opportunity of counting her ports, and he it was who announced, loud enough for everybody to hear, that she showed six guns of a side, making her entire battery heavier than our own by four guns. “Which makes her a very fair match for us,” he contentedly remarked.
“We will engage her at close quarters, Mr Sennitt,” said the skipper; “be good enough, therefore, to have every gun double-shotted. Let no man fire until I give the word; we will wait until we are fairly abreast of her, and then give her our whole larboard broadside at once. Luff, you may!” to the master, who had taken the wheel. “Luff, and shave her as closely as you can, without actually touching her. Steady—so; that will do very nicely.”
As the French ship came up, she fired every gun along her larboard broadside, commencing from forward, the moment they could be brought to bear; and the shot came tearing in through our bulwarks, making the splinters fly in all directions. In my ignorance I expected to see about half our crew go down before that first discharge, but to my unbounded surprise not a man was hurt.
The Frenchman was by this time so close that we could not only see with the utmost distinctness the crew reloading their guns, but could hear the confused jabber of excited conversation which appeared to be going on unchecked on board. What a contrast to our own ship, where every man stood at his post, steady and silent as a statue!
At last the two ships came up fairly abreast of each other, and were passing so closely that an active man might have jumped from the one to the other, when the skipper uttered the word “Fire!”
The four guns of our larboard broadside rang out simultaneously, the concussion of the air causing the two ships to heel outwards; and through the noise of the explosion I distinctly heard the crashing of timbers, and the piercing shrieks of the wounded.
“That’s one to us; we draw first blood,” chuckled a voice behind me; and I looked round to observe young Harvey, a fellow-mid, rubbing his hands with an air of great satisfaction.
“Hard up with your helm,” exclaimed the skipper; “shiver your main-topsail and let her wear short round; stand by your guns there on the starboard broadside, and fire as you bring each to bear.”
The effect of this manoeuvre was to lay our ship almost directly athwart the stern of the Frenchman, and so smartly was it executed that we had pretty effectually raked him before he was able to bear up, and give us another broadside, the whole of which flew over us harmlessly, except for a hole or two in our sails.
The fight now became a running one, both ships going off before the wind, and the Frenchman rather evincing a disposition to keep us at a distance. He did not seem to like the taste he’d had of our quality, as I heard the Irish captain of the after-gun, on the port side, remark. But we possessed rather the advantage of him in the matter of speed, and slowly edged down upon him until we were once more close alongside, when the ships exchanged broadsides, both firing at the same moment. We could see the white marks in our antagonist’s sides, where our shot had struck, but either from defective aim, or because he wanted to shoot away our spars, all his shot again flew high, with no worse result than the severing of the starboard main-topsail-brace, a casualty which it took but a minute or two to repair.
Two or three more broadsides were exchanged without visible effect, and then an unlucky shot wounded our fore-topmast so badly that, after tottering for a minute or two, it went over the bows, dragging the main-topgallant-mast down with it.
Captain Brisac proved himself quite equal to the occasion. He could not prevent the “Scourge” from broaching-to, so, ordering the helm to be put hard-a-port, he luffed us right athwart the Frenchman’s stern, pouring in the larboard broadside, which had been disengaged since our opening fire, with such good effect that the French ship’s main-yard was shot away, and the mainmast-head badly wounded.
A strong gang was immediately set to work board on each ship to repair damages; but as the Frenchman, by reason of the loss of his after-sail, was unable to bring his ship upon a wind, he had no alternative but to run dead before it, fully exposed, meanwhile, to the raking effects of our larboard guns, which were kept playing upon him until he had passed out of range, not one of his guns during that time being able to reply.
It took us rather over one hour to clear away the wreck, and get another topmast on end, fully rig it, and make sail once more. Mr Sennitt, who personally superintended the work, insisted that it should be thoroughly well done—as well done in fact as though we had not been in the presence of an enemy. The French had, in the meantime, been quite as active as ourselves, and if their work was not so neatly done as our own, still it was done after a fashion, and they were ready to make sail a few minutes before us, an advantage of which they availed themselves with such alacrity that it became evident their chief anxiety was to place, in the shortest possible time, the greatest possible distance between us and themselves.
This project, however, by no means met the views of us “Scourges,” and the instant that it was possible, every available stitch of canvas was packed upon our ship, with the view of closing with the enemy again as promptly as possible.
Then began that most wearisome of all wearisome businesses, a stern chase in a light breeze, during which the whole crew, from the skipper downwards, whistled most devoutly for a wind.
Slowly—very slowly we gained upon the chase, the master, who had resigned the wheel at the cessation of the action, standing upon the forecastle with his sextant, measuring, about once every five minutes, the angle between the mast-head and the water-line of the chase, to ascertain which ship gained upon the other. At last “I think we are within range now, sir; shall we try a shot from our bow-chasers?” said Mr Sennitt.
“We can scarcely reach him yet, I am afraid,” said the skipper; “but there will be no harm in trying.”
The order was given, and old Tompion, the gunner, undertook in person the task of levelling the gun. He went about the work with much deliberation and a great display of science, and at length, watching a favourable opportunity, fired. In another moment a white sear started into view near the Frenchman’s rudder and close to the water’s edge.
“Hulled him! by all that’s clever,” exclaimed the first luff, while the gratified Tompion looked slowly round upon his messmates, with modest pride beaming from every feature.
“Returned, with thanks,” murmured young Harvey, who was stationed close beside me, as a puff of smoke veiled for an instant the stern of our antagonist; and then the shot was seen bounding toward us, its path marked by the jets of water which flew up wherever the ball struck. At last it was seen to scurry along the surface for a short distance; finally disappearing within about fifty fathoms of our bows.
“Try another shot there, forward,” said the skipper, “and aim for his spars. A guinea to the first man who knocks away a spar big or little.”
Every man in the ship was of course anxious to try his hand, and Mr Sennitt was obliged to interfere, with the view of allowing the best shots to have the first chance.
Some curiously indifferent shooting now ensued, the very eagerness of the men seeming to render them unsteady. I had strolled forward to watch the game, and, after several most exasperating misses, exclaimed, “I should like very much to try; I believe I could do better than that.”
“Then try you shall, youngster,” said Mr Sennitt; “the first shot a man ever fires is often a very lucky one, and perhaps yours may be so. You shall fire the next shot.”
While the gun was being loaded, Tompion availed himself of the opportunity to deliver a short lesson on gunnery, for my especial benefit, of which all that I remember was that he attached great importance to the “trajectory,” and was eloquent on the subject of the “parabolic curve.”
I had watched with much impatience the very scrupulous nicety with which most of the men pretended to lay the gun, and I was strongly impressed with the conviction that over-carefulness had much to do with their repeated failures; I took very little trouble, therefore, beyond seeing that the muzzle of the gun had a good elevation, after which I simply waited, squinting along the sights, until I saw that the weapon was just about to come in line with the Frenchman’s masts, when I pulled the trigger-line smartly, and was dragged forcibly backwards by the collar, just in time to avoid a serious blow from the recoiling gun.
I turned angrily round to ascertain what reckless individual it was who had thus dared to lay unholy hands upon me, when my thoughts were diverted by a ringing cheer from all hands. My shot had lodged in the Frenchman’s mainmast-head, just above the cap; and, while we still looked, away went the main-topmast dragging the fore-topgallant-mast down with it. I received a vast amount of praise for my exploit, but of course it was merely a lucky shot, with which skill had nothing whatever to do.