As the last words left my lips the leading canoes dashed alongside, and the next instant some thirty or forty savages could be seen scrambling over the bulwarks and leaping down on the main-deck. They seemed somewhat disconcerted at finding no one to oppose them, and paused irresolutely as though not quite knowing what to do, and perhaps fearing a trap of some sort. Meanwhile others came close upon their heels; while the general and his volunteers suddenly found their hands full in repelling an attack upon the poop by way of the mizzen chains. As for that part of the crew that had retired to the poop at my order, I formed them up along the fore end of the structure; and now, as, one after another, they reloaded their muskets, they and their comrades on the topgallant-forecastle opened a brisk, if somewhat irregular, fire upon the multitude of savages who came pouring in over the bulwarks into the waist of the ship. By the light of the musketry flashes I saw several of the savages throw up their arms and fall to the deck—so many of them, indeed, in proportion to the number of shots fired, that I felt convinced many of the bullets must be doing double or triple duty. But for every savage who fell at least half a dozen fresh ones came in over the bulwarks to take his place, and I soon recognised that such musketry fire as ours must be absolutely ineffectual to deal with the overwhelming odds brought against us. And how warmly I congratulated myself that I had not been foolish enough to attempt anything like a systematic defence of the waist of the ship. Had I done that we should have all been exterminated within the first minute of the attack. As it was we were doing very well—at our end of the ship, at all events; for although the savages quickly recovered themselves after the first moment of astonishment at finding nobody on the main-deck to oppose them, and began to pour in a hot fire of arrows, not one of our party—who were somewhat scattered, and were all lying down, most of them behind some sort of shelter—was hit.
By the time that the attack had been raging some five minutes, however, there must have been quite three hundred savages crowded on the main-deck, between the poop and the topgallant forecastle, and the affair began to wear a very serious aspect for us defenders; for by this time the blacks were making desperate efforts to climb up on to the poop and carry it by escalade, and a few of us had sustained more or less serious hurts in resisting them. The critical moment, when we must either conquer or go under, was close upon us, and I was about to call to Simpson to ask whether they were ready on the forecastle with the carronades, when his voice rose above the din, hailing:
“Poop ahoy! Look out there, aft, for we’re goin’ to fire. We can’t hold out here another half a minute.”
“Very well,” I answered, “fire as soon as you like; the sooner the better!” And I then added:
“Jump to your feet, everybody on the poop, and run as far aft as you can, or shelter yourselves behind the companion or skylight—anywhere, until they have fired the carronades!”
We had just time to make good our rush for shelter—leaving the natives who were endeavouring to storm the poop evidently much astonished at our sudden and inexplicable retreat—when the two carronades barked out simultaneously; and the terrific hubbub of shouts and yells down in the waist ceased as though by magic, to be succeeded the next instant by surely the most dreadful outburst of screams and groans that human ears had ever listened to. The carnage, I knew, must have been terrific, but it would not do to trust to the effect of that alone, we must instantly follow it up by action of some sort that would complete the panic already begun; so I shouted:
“Hurrah, lads; now down on the main-deck, all of us, and drive the remainder of the savages over the side before they have had time to recover from their dismay!” And, seizing hold of the first rope that came to hand, I swung myself off the poop down on the main-deck, and began to lay about me right and left with my sword, the remainder of our party, fore and aft, instantly following my example. For a few seconds the savages who still stood on their feet—and how very few there seemed to be of them!—appeared to be too completely dazed by what had happened to take any steps to secure their safety; they even allowed themselves to be shot and struck down without raising a hand to defend themselves! Then, all in a moment, their senses seemed to return to them, and the panic upon which I had reckoned took place; they glanced about them and saw, that, whereas a minute before the deck upon which they stood had been crowded with a surging throng of excited fellow savages all striving to get within reach of those hated white men, it was now heaped and cumbered with dead and dying, with only a stray uninjured man left here and there; and incontinently, with shrill yells of terror, they made for the bulwarks and tumbled over them, careless, apparently, whether they dropped into a canoe or into the water, so long as they could effect their escape from that awful shambles. Many of them, of course, dropped into the canoes, and made good their escape; but the splashing and commotion alongside, and the frequent shrieks of agony, told only too plainly that many of them, in their haste, had missed the canoes and fallen into the water, where the sharks were making short work of them. As for us, as soon as the panic set in, and the retreat was fairly under way, we held our hands, allowing the poor wretches to get away without further molestation; and in two minutes from the moment of that terrible discharge of the carronades not a native remained on the deck of the Indian Queen save those who were either dead, or too severely injured to be able to escape.