Luckily, as night came on, the weather became very cloudy, and we were on the dark side of the moon, now setting in the West, which occasionally breaking through the clouds astern of the cruiser, showed us all her movements, while we must have been very difficult to make out, though certainly not more than a mile off. All this time she kept firing away, thinking, I suppose, that she would frighten us into stopping. If we had gone straight on, we should doubtless have been caught; so we altered our course two points to the eastward. After steaming a short distance we stopped quite still, blowing off steam under water, not a spark or the slightest smoke showing from the funnel; and we had the indescribable satisfaction of seeing our enemy steam past us, still firing ahead at some imaginary vessel.
This had been a most exciting chase and a very narrow escape; night only saved us from a New York prison. All this hard running had made an awful hole in our coal-bunkers, and as it was necessary to keep a stock for a run off the blockaded Bahama Islands, we were obliged to reduce our expenditure to as small a quantity as possible. However we were well out to sea, and after having passed the line of cruisers between Wilmington and Bermuda, we had not much to fear till we approached the British possessions of Nassau and the adjacent islands, where two or three very fast American vessels were cruising, although five hundred miles from American waters. I am ignorant, I confess, of the laws of blockade, or indeed if a law there be that allows its enforcement, and penalties to be enacted, five hundred miles away from the ports blockaded. But it did seem strange that the men-of-war of a nation at peace with England should be allowed to cruise off her ports, to stop and examine trading vessels of all descriptions, to capture and send to New York, for adjudication, vessels on the mere suspicion of their being intended blockade-runners; and to chase and fire into real blockade-runners so near to the shore that on one occasion the shot and shell fell into a fishing village, and that within sight of an English man-of-war lying at anchor in the harbour at Nassau. Surely it is time that some well-understood laws should be made, and rules laid down, or such doings will sooner or later recoil on their authors.
Having so little coal on board, we determined on making for the nearest point of the Bahama Islands, and luckily reached a queer little island called Green Turtle Quay, on the extreme north of the group, where was a small English colony, without being seen by the cruisers. We had not been there long, however, before one of them came sweeping round the shore, and stopped unpleasantly near to us; even though we were inside the rock she hovered about outside, not a mile from us.
We were a tempting bait, but a considerable risk to snap, and I suppose the American captain could not quite make up his mind to capture a vessel (albeit a blockade-runner piled full of cotton) lying in an English port, insignificant though that port might be. We had got a large white English ensign hoisted on a pole, thereby showing the nationality of the rock, should the cruiser be inclined to question it. After many longing looks, she steamed slowly away, much to our satisfaction. Coals were sent to us from Nassau the next day, which having been taken on board, we weighed anchor, keeping close to the reefs and islands all the way. We steamed towards that port, and arrived safely, having made the in-and-out voyage, including the time in unloading and loading at Wilmington, in sixteen days.
To attempt to describe at length the state of things at this usually tranquil and unfrequented little spot is beyond my powers. I will only mention some of its most striking features. Nassau differed much from Wilmington, inasmuch as at the latter place there was a considerable amount of poverty and distress, and men's minds were weighted with many troubles and anxieties; whereas, at Nassau, everything at the time I speak of was couleur de rose. Every one seemed prosperous and happy. You met with calculating, far-seeing men who were steadily employed in feathering their nests, let the war in America end as it might; others who, in the height of their enthusiasm for the Southern cause, put their last farthing into Confederate securities, anticipating enormous profits; some men, careless and thoughtless, living for the hour, were spending their dollars as fast as they made them, forgetting that they would 'never see the like again.' There were rollicking captains and officers of blockade-runners, and drunken swaggering crews; sharpers looking out for victims; Yankee spies; and insolent worthless free niggers—all these combined made a most heterogeneous, though interesting, crowd.
The inhabitants of Nassau, who, until the period of blockade-running, had, with some exceptions, subsisted on a precarious and somewhat questionable livelihood gained by wrecking, had their heads as much turned as the rest of the world. Living was exorbitantly dear, as can be well imagined, when the captain of a blockade-runner could realise in a month a sum as large as the Governor's salary. The expense of living was so great that the officers of the West India regiment quartered here had to apply for special allowance, and I believe their application was successful. The hotel, a large building, hitherto a most ruinous speculation, began to realise enormous profits. In fact, the almighty dollar was spent as freely as the humble cent had been before this golden era in the annals of Nassau.
As we had to stay here till the time for the dark nights came round again, we took it easy, and thoroughly enjoyed all the novelty of the scene. Most liberal entertainment was provided free by our owner's agent, and altogether we found Nassau very jolly: so much so, that we felt almost sorry when 'time' was called, and we had to prepare for another run. In fact, it was pleasanter in blockade-running to look backwards than forwards, especially if one had been so far in good luck.