“We shall do the best we can, Doctor,” he says.
“Young as I am, I have lived long enough to know that one can’t have all things ordered as he would.”
Captain Paul Jones, now commodore, clears for the Irish coast on a bright, clear day in June. Besides the Richard, he has with him the Alliance, thirty-two guns, Captain Landais; the Pallas, twenty-eight guns, Captain Cottineau; and the Vengeance, twelve guns, Captain Ricon. Four days later he returns limping into l’Orient for repairs, the Richard having been fouled by the Alliance through the criminal carelessness or worse of Captain Landais.
The breast of the young commodore is on fire with anger over the delay, and the vicious clumsiness that caused it. He burns to destroy Landais, as the mean reason of his troubles, but the thought of Doctor Franklin restrains him. Also, as events unfold, that enforced return to l’Orient proves of good fortune, and he forgets his chagrin in joy over the flattering new turn in his affairs. Doctor Franklin has succeeded in bringing about an exchange of prisoners, and barters to the British admiralty one hundred and nineteen Englishmen, captured in the Drake and other prizes taken by the Ranger, for one hundred and nineteen Americans held by King George. While Commodore Paul Jones is curing the damage done the Richard by the evil Landais, those exchanged Americans are landed under a cartel in Nantes. He goes down to Nantes and enlists one hundred and fifteen of them for the Richard.
Before Commodore Paul Jones weighs anchor for a second start, he goes over to Passy for a final word with Doctor Franklin. The pair walk in the Doctor’s favorite garden, now a wilderness of foliage and flowers, the Doctor serene, the boy commodore cloudy, taciturn and grim. His resolution has set iron-hard to do or die; the cruise shall be a glorious one or be his last. Doctor Franklin asks about his plans.
“I shall make for the west coast of Ireland,” says he, “and go north about the British islands. Wind and weather favoring, I may sack a town or two by way of retaliation for what the foe has done to us. They will find that I have not forgotten Lord Dunmore, and my ruined plantation by the Rappahannock.”
“The waters you will sail in are alive with British ships of war. With your poor force it seems a desperate cruise.”
“Desperate, yes; but, Doctor, we are in no shape to play cautious. We are weak; therefore we must be reckless.”
“It is a strange doctrine,” muses the Doctor. “And yet I will not say but what it smells of judgment. I have faith in you, Paul; it teaches me to hope that, when next I greet you, I shall greet a victor.”
“Doctor,” returns Commodore Paul Jones, and his tones are grave with meaning, “I shall not disappoint you. Nor do I care to conceal from you my resolution. When I sail, I sail looking for battle; and I shall not hesitate to engage an enemy superior to my force. The condition of our cause is such that, to sustain it, we need a striking, ay! a startling naval success, and I shall do all I know, fight all I know, to bring it to pass. More; my mind is made up: If I fail, I fall; I shall return victorious or I shall not return.”