We were busy the remainder of that night, and a good part of the following day, making good the damages sustained. By evening, however, we were all ataunto once more; and as soon as the work was finished, Captain Hood mustered the hands and made them a speech, thanking them, both officers and men, for the courage and determination with which all had co-operated with him in effecting the escape of the ship from an enemy’s port, wherein she actually lay aground surrounded by armed ships, and with numerous heavily armed batteries opposing our departure. Percival was specially referred to, his skill in piloting the ship in and out again being dwelt upon in highly commendatory terms; and then—the skipper being a rare hand at turning out a neat speech and rounding it off with a compliment—the men were told that, having behaved so exceptionally well, their officers would now have no hesitation about engaging in any enterprise, however hazardous or hopeless it might appear, confident that the men they led would support them as long as they had strength to stand.
At the close of this speech the men, as in duty bound, gave three cheers, the hammocks were piped down, and life on board the “Juno” resumed once more its normal conditions.
The first question which suggested itself to the skipper, after getting his ship once more into fighting order, naturally was what was to be done with the supernumeraries which we had on board. His instructions, it appeared, made no provision whatever for the possibility of such a contretemps as had befallen us, and he was, in consequence, quite at a loss what to do. Finally, after talking the affair over with Mr Annesley, he resolved to take them back to Malta, and a course was accordingly shaped for that island. We accomplished the passage in five days, and landed the men, who were glad enough to plant their feet on mother earth once more, after knocking about in their confined quarters for nearly a fortnight.
During our absence, information of the evacuation of Toulon by Lord Hood had reached the island, and it was taken quite for granted that, going to the place in ignorance of this important fact, as we were, we should inevitably fall into some trap and be made prisoners; when therefore we put in an appearance once more, and the details of our escape were made known, we immediately became the object of unbounded curiosity and admiration. Hundreds flocked to see the ship (many of them being intensely disappointed at the almost entire absence of visible indications of the peril through which she had passed), and officers and men alike were pointed out and looked after in the streets, until we ran the greatest risk of becoming inordinately vain of our exploit. The admiration of the islanders did not end here, however; for it being deemed advisable to place the frigate in dry dock to examine her bottom and smooth her copper, after having touched the ground, as well as to make good a few defects which were beyond our own unaided powers, we were balled, fêted, picnicked, and generally made much of for three days by the excitable and pleasure-loving inhabitants, at the end of which time, our repairs being completed, we were hurried away to sea with sealed orders, to be opened off Cape Spartivento.
We arrived off this headland on the 22nd of January, and Captain Hood then learned that we were to remain on the spot until the evening of the 24th, when, if no farther instructions reached him, he was to open a sealed paper which he found enclosed with his orders. The ship was accordingly hove-to and placed under reefed topsails, a private signal was hoisted at the main-royal-mast-head, and in order that the time might not be absolutely wasted, the crew were put through a special course of drill.
A sharp lookout was maintained, in order that there might be no possibility of our being passed unobserved by any craft bearing later instructions; but though we saw plenty of feluccas passing along the coast, the only craft which came at all near us was a magnificent 40-gun frigate, which hoisted French colours and bore down towards us on our showing our ensign; but having approached within four miles and lying hove-to for half an hour, she resumed her original course to the northward, leaving us in a most unchristian frame of mind towards the admiral, whose orders tied us to the spot, and prevented our accepting the challenge she had given. We at first cherished the hope that if we did not go out to her, she would come down and attack us, but such a slice of good luck was not just then to fall to our lot.
The stipulated period of our stay off Cape Spartivento having at length expired, Captain Hood broke open the packet to which reference has already been made, and having acquainted himself with the farther instructions therein contained, orders were forthwith issued to make sail to the northward and westward.
We had a fine breeze from the eastward, to which we showed a heavy press of canvas; the frigate accordingly made short miles of the trip along the Sardinian coast, and on the following evening arrived off the Gulf of Ajaccio in Corsica, the coast-line being about twenty miles distant, and consequently “hull-down;” the mountain-chain, however, which forms as it were the backbone of Corsica, was distinctly visible, lighted up as it was by the gorgeous tints of sunset. Sail was now shortened to topsails, and the frigate hove-to.
While all hands were wondering more or less what the next move would be, I was sent for by the skipper to go to him in his cabin. On arriving there, I found him and Mr Annesley seated at the cabin-table with a decanter of port standing between them, glasses of the same at their elbows, and a large map spread out in the full light of the cabin lamp, which had just been lighted; the table being further littered with a large number of official-looking documents.
As I entered the cabin, Captain Hood raised his eyes from the map, over which both officers had been earnestly poring, and said,—