I did not venture to run the Dawn directly down in the Englishman's wake, but we kept her off and on, rather, taking good care not to go within a mile of her. All this time the Speedy was playing upon the Cerf's quarter. The latter ship becoming too crippled to luff, while Mons. Menneval was travelling off to leeward, unmolested, having obtained an advantage in the way of speed, that he was unwilling to put in any jeopardy, by coming again under fire. This officer did not want for spirit, but the French had got to be so accustomed to defeat, in their naval encounters with the English, that, like several other nations on the land, they Had begun to look upon victory as hopeless. The Cerf was very nobly fought. Notwithstanding the disadvantages under which she laboured, that ship held out until the Black Prince had actually given her a close broadside on her larboard quarter; the Speedy being kept the whole time on her starboard, with great skill, pouring in a nearly unresisted fire. The Cerf struck only as she found that the battle was to be two to one, and under so many other disadvantages, in the bargain.
This closed the affair, so far as the fighting was concerned. La Desiree standing on unmolested, though, as I afterwards learned, she was picked up next morning by a homeward-bound English two-decker, hauling down her colours without any resistance.
The reader may feel some curiosity to know how we fell on board the Dawn, during the five hours that elapsed between the firing of the first and the last guns, on this occasion; what was said among us, and how we proceeded as soon as the victory was decided. The last he will learn, in the regular course of the narrative; as for the first, it is soon told. It was not easy to find four men who were more impartial, as between the combatants, than those in the Dawn. My early preferences had certainly been in favour of England, as was very generally the case among all the better-educated Americans of my period, at least as low down as the war of 1812. But going beyond the scene of internal political discussion, and substituting observation for the eulogies and sophisms of the newspapers, had wrought divers changes in my opinion. England was then no more to me than any other nation; I was not of the French school of politics, however, and kept myself as much aloof from one of these foreign schools of political logicians as from the other. I may be said to have been born a Federalist; but this change of sentiment had prevented my ever giving a Federal vote since attaining my majority.
Marble had entertained a strong dislike for England, ever since the Revolution. But, at the same time, he had inherited the vulgar contempt of his class for Frenchmen; and I must own that he had a fierce pleasure in seeing the combatants destroy each other. Had we been near enough to witness the personal suffering inflicted by the terrible wounds of a naval combat, I make no doubt his feelings would have been different; but, as things were, he only saw French and English ships tearing each other to pieces. During the height of the affair, he observed to me:--"If this Monsieur Gallois, and his bloody lugger, could only be brought into the scrape, Miles, my mind would be contented. I should glory in seeing the corvette and the Polisson scratching out each other's eyes, like two fish-women, whose dictionaries have given out."
Neb and Diogenes regarded the whole thing very much as I suppose the Caesars used to look upon the arena, when the gladiators were the most blood-thirsty. The negroes would laugh, cry "golly!" or shake their heads with delight, when half-a-dozen guns went off together; receiving the reports as a sort of evidence that crashing work was going on, on board the vessels. But I overheard a dialogue between these two children of Africa, that may best explain their feelings:
"Which you t'ink whip, Neb?" Diogenes asked, with a grin that showed every ivory tooth in his head.
"I t'ink 'em bot' get it smartly," answered my fellow. "You see how a Speedy make quick work, eh?"
"I wish 'em go a leetle nearer, Neb.--Some shot nebber hit, at all."
"Dat always so, cook, in battle. Dere! dat a smasher for John Bull!"
"He won't want to press more men just now. Eh! Neb?"