At Aboukir and Acre: A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt

by G. A. Henty

"That is enough!" Sir Sidney said. "Now, can you roughly give me an idea what proportion of European goods, dried fruits, and what we may call generally Eastern goods, you have?"

"There are about twenty tons of fruit, sir, thirty tons of European bales, and fifty or sixty tons of Eastern goods. Of these, I should say that two-thirds are carpets and rugs, we could pretty well tell these from the others by the size and feel of the bales; the rest are, judging from the few we opened, cloth for female garments—muslin, silks, scarves, sashes, and embroidered goods.

"It is extraordinary how so great a collection could have been made."

"There have been a great many vessels employed in the making of it, sir, and we may say that we have here the pick from at least a hundred, perhaps several times that number, of captured craft of several sizes. No doubt the pirates would, in all cases, put aside goods of this kind, for although of no use to themselves, and no doubt very difficult to sell, they would store them away under the idea that some time or other an opportunity would occur of turning them into money."

"Well, there is no doubt that you have an extremely rich prize. I should be afraid to give even an approximate calculation of what all this is worth. Some of our East-Indiamen bring very valuable cargoes home; but I should doubt whether any one ship ever carried as much costly merchandise as you have stored here. I will think over how they had best be got to England. The things will require careful handling, for if they were consigned to an ordinary prize agent they might be sold anyhow and for half their value."

On the following day the two midshipmen were signalled to come on board the Tigre.

"I have been thinking your matter over, gentlemen," Sir Sidney said when they had entered his cabin. "I have power to appoint a prize agent in England. As a matter of fact I have not done so. Coming out here, as I did, on a diplomatic mission, I had no thought of taking prizes. Those we have picked up here I simply sent to the agent at Gibraltar, which, by the way, is one of the very worst places one can send them to, as the vessels are sold at ridiculous prices. Ordinarily Malta would be the port we should have sent them to from here, but as it is still in the possession of the French, Gibraltar is the only port in the Mediterranean. Of course they might be sent to England; but there is the difficulty of detaching men and officers, and the risk of their being captured by French privateers, so that practically we are driven to Gibraltar.

"Of course the prize court will have the disposal of the cargo, but I will write to the head of the court, who is a personal friend of mine, asking him to intrust the sale of the Eastern goods to your father, Mr. Blagrove, saying that as he has been for years engaged in trade in the East, and must therefore be acquainted with the value of these things, is in the habit of sending Egyptian silks and so on to London for sale, he must know the channels in which they could be best disposed of. Of course the dried fruits and the English goods could be sold by the court, but it would never do to throw such a quantity of Eastern goods on the market at once. Among the prizes that have been taken is a smart brig of about the same size as the Tigress. She was caught making for Alexandria with powder and ball for the French army. Fortunately for us her captain was not a first-class navigator, and so missed his mark by about ten miles, and found himself, to his consternation and our satisfaction, close under our guns.

"I was going to send her to Gibraltar to be sold. I do not think that we can do better than buy her to carry home your cargo. I will call a court of four officers to put on her the price they consider it probable that she will fetch, which, I should say, if she were sold at Gibraltar, would not be over eight or nine hundred pounds. You, Mr. Blagrove, can buy her in the name of your father, and I will take your bill at three months upon him. Then there is the question of the crew. As to the officers, I can send you home, Mr. Wilkinson, with despatches. I have not had an opportunity of forwarding any for some weeks now; and to you, Mr. Blagrove, I can give three months' leave on urgent private business. As to men, we have small craft coming over here constantly from Sicily with fruit and fresh provisions, and I have no doubt that, with the offer of good wages, you would be able to pick up ten or twelve men without much difficulty.

"On board our ships there are, I should say, at least twenty men who have been invalided by boards of doctors as being unfit for service, either from the effects of wounds or climate, and this would be a good opportunity for sending them home. Many of them are still fit for easy work, and would, at any rate, counterbalance your Italian crew. Of course I should formally take a passage for them in Mr. Blagrove's ship. The prize mounts six guns, but I would advise you to keep well out of the way of French privateers. Of course the final result of the sale of the merchandise would have to be paid by your father, Mr. Blagrove, into the prize court for division among those entitled to it.