In the morning, the storm abated and the weather fair, Captain Jones was anxious to return immediately to the attack. But the other captains were unwilling to run the risk. In conference they said:
“The alarm of our approach has spread throughout the whole country. The inhabitants of Leith have had several hours to prepare to repel us. The city of Edinburgh will certainly have sent all its military force into Leith. British men-of-war are all along the coast. They will be immediately informed of our presence. Unless we disappear we shall be overwhelmed by numbers. We dare not remain here. If Captain Jones decides to do so, we must leave him.”
It may seem very strange that Captain Jones, who was the commodore of the fleet, should not have had the power to command in such a case. But he was crippled, and his energies almost paralyzed, by instructions, which, through the address of Landais, had been given to him by the French Minister of Marine the evening before he sailed.
By this singular document, called a concordat, the five captains, Jones, Landais, Cottineau, Varage, and Ricot, were bound to act together. This seemed to make them colleagues, without any supreme head. This unfortunate order, in a military point of view, was an absurdity—as absurd as to order the commander-in-chief of an army first to obtain the approval of all his generals before ordering any important movement. To this wretched concordat Captain Jones justly attributed nearly all his troubles. Landais, from the beginning, assumed that he was the colleague of Jones.
The intrepid Captain Jones could only argue the point with his officers. He said:
“We know that there are no batteries to oppose us. There is no naval force in the harbor which we cannot instantly silence. The wind is such that we can run in and out of the harbor at our pleasure. No matter how many thousand men stand on the shore with their muskets, they cannot harm us. From the harbor we can throw our broadsides of shot into the crowded city, and in a short time lay it in ashes. We can also destroy all the shipping. Rather than submit to this terrible loss, they will promptly pay the ransom we demand. Thus, in all probability, we have only to sail into the harbor, receive the ransom, and go on our way.”
These were strong arguments. They show that Captain Jones was not a reckless desperado. His plans were maturely considered. Those of his enterprises which appeared most desperate were sanctioned by the decisions of sound judgment. His arguments were unavailing; and he was compelled to yield. In his official account, he says, in mild language, which commands our respect for the man:
“I am persuaded even now that I should have succeeded. And to the honor of my young officers, I found them as ardently disposed to the business as I could desire. Nothing prevented me from pursuing my design, but the reproach that would have been cast upon my character, as a man of prudence, had the enterprise miscarried. It would have been said: Was he not warned by Captain Cottineau, and others?”
The Alliance having disappeared, there were now but two vessels, the Pallas and the Vengeance, accompanying the Richard. This little fleet continued its course in a southerly direction along the eastern coast of Scotland. On the 19th, three vessels were captured, which were of but little worth. The next day three more were taken. One of them, Captain Cottineau, contrary to orders, ransomed. The others were either retained or sunk. On the 21st, when off Flamborough Head, a remarkably bold English promontory jutting out from the Yorkshire coast, two vessels appeared in sight, one in the northeast, and the other in the southwest. The Bon Homme Richard and the Vengeance pursued, the one in the southwest, while the Pallas was sent in chase of the other. Captain Jones overtook the one he chased. It was a brig in ballast. As a large fleet was then discovered between Flamborough Head and Spurn Head, another remarkable promontory about thirty miles farther south, Captain Jones sunk the brig, and pressed forward in pursuit of the fleet. While eagerly engaged in the chase, night came on. He had, however, got so near one vessel of the fleet as to compel her to run ashore. As the twilight faded away he overtook and captured a brig. The night was long and dark. The affrighted vessels improved every moment in running into such harbors as could be reached.
The dawn of the next day revealed another fleet rounding the point of Spurn Head. This fleet was convoyed by apparently a single armed ship. The achievements of Captain Jones’s little fleet had, by this time, spread alarm everywhere. As soon as the fleet caught sight of the Richard and the Vengeance, though there was nothing to distinguish these vessels from others of the innumerable ships which were ever traversing the Channel, suspicions were aroused, and the whole fleet turned to, and fled back into the river Humber, as fast as their wings could bear them.