During the whole of that night we stood to the northward and eastward; and all night long, too, we were hard at work, watch and watch, getting up jury spars; the result of our labours being that, by daybreak next morning, we had got a very serviceable jury foremast in place, enabling us to set a fore-staysail, and also a main-topsail in place of a foresail. With this head sail we were also enabled to give the frigate her close-reefed mizzen-topsail and spanker; with which canvas we began to move through the water at quite a respectable pace—that is to say about four knots per hour. This, however, was not all; for the carpenter had been hard at work all through the night preparing a jury fore-topmast and jib-boom; while we had got a spare main-yard swung aloft and slung; by mid-day, therefore, we were enabled to set a fore-topsail, jib, and mainsail, which further increased our speed. By four bells in the afternoon watch the island of Jersey was in sight, broad upon our lee bow, some six miles distant; and at eight bells we tacked ship, being anxious not to draw too close in with the French coast in our then disabled condition.
As the sun went down that night the weather manifested a tendency to improve, and by midnight the wind had softened down to a gentle breeze that barely gave us steerage-way through the water. Finally it died away altogether, and when the sun rose next morning, clear and bright, the Dolphin and ourselves were boxing the compass, not half a cable’s length apart. This in itself was rather provoking, as we were exceedingly anxious to get our prize into port, and off our hands; but the delay was as nothing compared with the disagreeable circumstance that there were three exceedingly suspicious-looking sails in sight, about ten miles to the westward of us, apparently consorts, for we could see a good deal of signalling going on between them, of which we could make nothing.
They were a ship, a brig, and a large lugger, and the cut of their canvas left us little room to doubt that they were French. Of course it was quite possible that they might all three be perfectly harmless merchantmen, but there was a certain smart, knowing look about them eminently suggestive of the privateersman, and if that was their character there could be no doubt whatever that we should find them very objectionable and dangerous neighbours immediately that a breeze happened to spring up. So little did Captain Winter like their appearance that, immediately after breakfast—the calm seeming likely to continue for some few hours—he ordered his own gig to be lowered, and went away in her to get a nearer look at them. There was not much danger in this course, as the gig was a beautifully light, splendidly modelled, fast-pulling boat, exactly suited for such a service, and not in the least likely to be overtaken by any boat such as either of the three vessels in sight might be expected to carry. I did not, therefore, greatly concern myself with the skipper’s movements, but gave my whole attention to the getting of additional jury spars aloft, in order that, if possible, the frigate might be brought into something like fighting order by the time that the breeze should come.
We were busy pointing a new main-topmast when the boatswain, who was in the top, hailed the deck to say that the lugger and brig had rigged out their sweeps, and were heading in our direction, while the ship had lowered her boats and sent them ahead to tow. I went up into the mizzen-topmast cross-trees, taking my glass with me, and soon discovered that the report was only too correct; for when I reached my perch all three craft were heading straight for us, the lugger churning up the water with her sweeps and coming along at quite a smart pace, the brig following close behind, and the ship, in tow of her own boats, bringing up the rear. This effectually disposed of the theory that they might possibly be merchantmen; they were far too heavily-manned to be anything but privateers or men-o’-war, and it was perfectly clear that they were fully bent upon paying us a visit.
It afterwards appeared that Captain Winter did not suspect this new development until some time after the strangers had got into motion; then, observing that all three vessels kept their heads persistently pointed in our direction, and that he appeared to be nearing them much faster than at first, an inkling of the truth dawned upon him, and he ordered his crew to pull easy, that they might reserve their strength for a spurt in case of need. Nevertheless, he continued to pull toward them until he had arrived within gun-shot of the lugger—the crew of which at once opened fire upon him—when, having ascertained the force of the squadron, he returned with all speed to us, having meanwhile made up his mind how to act.
He discovered that the lugger mounted six six-pounders; the brig showed five ports of a side, but the weight of her metal he could not ascertain, since her guns were run in and her ports closed; and the ship mounted sixteen guns, apparently nine-pounders. Now this was a force altogether too strong for us to cope with, even had we not been hampered with a prize to look after; for, unlike the case of the frigate, the force was distributed among three vessels instead of being concentrated on board of one only; and while Captain Winter was always ready to trust something to the chapter of accidents, and to risk a good deal upon the chance that a lucky shot might seriously disable a single antagonist, it became a different matter altogether when there were three craft to contend with. He, therefore, reluctantly came to the conclusion that our prize must be sacrificed in order to ensure our own safety. He therefore pulled straight to the Dolphin, and ordering the whole of her boats to be lowered and manned, sent them alongside the frigate, coming on board himself to superintend the operations upon which he had decided.
His first act was to order the whole of the frigate’s boats to be stripped of their oars, rowlocks, and bottom-boards, and when this was done they were lowered, and the prisoners, wounded as well as sound, sent down into them; when, as soon as he had satisfied himself that the whole of the Frenchmen were out of the ship, the frigate’s boats were towed about a mile away and cast adrift. Meanwhile, in obedience to instructions, I had collected all the inflammable material that I could lay hands upon, and had set the ship on fire in four places, with the result that when the Dolphin’s boats returned alongside our prize to take us off, she was well alight, with the smoke pouring in dense clouds up through every opening in the deck. It took us but a short time to leave her, and the moment that we were once more on board the schooner the sweeps were manned and the vessel put upon a northerly course, this direction having been chosen in consequence of the discovery that a light air had sprung up and was coming down from the northward and eastward, which would place us dead to windward of our formidable antagonists by the time that it reached us.
At the moment when the Dolphin began to move, the lugger was some seven miles away, bearing due west, the brig being about half a mile astern of her, and the ship perhaps a mile astern of the brig. Very shortly afterwards the flames burst up through the frigate’s main hatchway, and half an hour later she was blazing from stem to stern; so that, although we had lost her, there was no chance of her again falling into the hands of the French.
The breeze was a long time in finding its way down to us; so long, indeed, that after waiting a full half-hour, with the cat’s-paws playing upon the water within biscuit-toss of us, the helm was ported and the schooner headed straight for the fringe of delicate blue that marked the dividing line where the calm and the wind were contending together for the mastery. This was reached in about a quarter of an hour, when, after a feeble preliminary rustling, our canvas filled, the sweeps were laid in, and we began to move through the water at a speed of some two and a half knots per hour, heading up nearly due north, while the lugger and the brig at the same time kept away, in the hope apparently of intercepting us, and the ship despatched two of her boats to the rescue of their helpless compatriots adrift in the frigate’s boats.
The lugger, which was a very fine and evidently very fast vessel of her class, was making desperate efforts to close with us, with such success that at the end of another half-hour it became evident that, unless the light and fickle breeze freshened somewhat in the interim, another couple of hours would see her within gun-shot of us. This, however, gave us no concern whatever, for we were far more than a match for her alone, and although the brig also was doing her best, we were both drawing away from her so steadily that we of the Dolphin quite reckoned upon being able in due time to fight and take the lugger before her consort could come up to her assistance.