Bartelli now came to tell me, that my bath was ready, and descending to the cabin, I bathed, and dressed for breakfast, whilst the boarding-officer was boarding the prize. She proved to be the Alert, of, and from New London, and bound, by the way of the Azores, and Cape de Verde Islands, to the Indian Ocean. She was only sixteen days from port, with files of late newspapers; and besides her own ample outfit for a large crew, and a long voyage, she had on board supplies for the group known as the Navigators’ Islands, in the South Indian Ocean, where among icebergs and storms, the Yankees had a whaling and sealing station. This capture proved to be a very opportune one, as we were in want of just such a lot of clothing, for the men, as we found on board the prize; and the choice beef, and pork, nicely put up ship-bread, boxes of soap, and tobacco, and numerous other articles of seaman’s supplies did not come amiss. We had been particularly short of a supply of tobacco, this being a costly article in England, and I could see Jack’s eye brighten, as he rolled aft, and piled up on the quarter-deck, sundry heavy oaken boxes of good “Virginia twist.” That night the pipes seemed to have wonderfully increased in number, on board the Alabama, and the song and the jest derived new inspiration from the fragrance of the weed. We paroled the officers and crew of the Alert, and sent them ashore, in their own boats, as we had done the others.
I had now three prizes on my hands, viz.: the Starlight, the Ocean Rover, and the Alert, with a prize crew on board of each, and as I could make no better use of them than to destroy them, thanks to the unfriendly conduct of neutrals, so often referred to, it became necessary to think of burning them. They were lying at distances, ranging from half a mile to three miles from the Alabama, and were fired within a short time of each other, so that we had three funeral pyres burning around us at the same moment. The other whalers at a distance must have thought that there were a good many steamers passing Flores, that day. It was still early in the afternoon, and there was more work before us ere night set in. I had scarcely gotten my prize crews on board, and my boats run up, before another sail was discovered standing in for the island. We immediately gave chase, or rather, to speak more correctly, proceeded to meet the stranger, who was standing in our direction. The ships approached each other very rapidly, and we soon discovered the new sail to be a large schooner, of unmistakable Yankee build and rig. We hoisted the United States colors, and she responded soon afterward with the stars and stripes. She came on quite unsuspiciously, as the two last prizes had done, until she arrived near enough to see that the three mysterious cones of smoke, at which she had probably been wondering for some time past, proceeded from three ships on fire. Coupling this unusual spectacle with the approach toward her of a rakish-looking barkentine, she at once smelt rather a large rat, and wheeled suddenly in flight. But it was too late. We were already within three miles of her, and a pursuit of half an hour brought her within effective range of our bow-chaser. We now changed colors, and fired a blank cartridge. This was sufficient. She saved us the expenditure of a shot, and hove to, without further ado. Upon being boarded, she proved to be the Weathergauge, a whaler of Provincetown, Massachusetts, six weeks from the land of the Puritan, with other files of newspapers, though not so late as those captured on board the Alert.
In running over these files, it was wonderful to observe the glibness with which these Massachusetts brethren of ours now talked of treason, and of rebels, and traitors, at no greater distance, in point of time, than forty-five years, from the Hartford Convention; to say nothing of certain little idiosyncrasies of theirs, that were developed during the annexation of Texas. There were some “Sunday” papers among the rest, and all the pious parsons and deacons in the land were overflowing with patriotism, and hurling death and damnation from their pulpits, against those who had dared to strike at the “Lord’s anointed,” the sainted Abraham Lincoln. But as the papers contained little or no war news, we had no time to bestow upon the crotchets of the Yankee brain, and they were promptly consigned to the waste-paper basket. Another sail being discovered, whilst we were receiving the surrender of the Weathergauge, we hastily threw a prize crew on board this latter vessel, directing the prize-master to “hold on to the island of Corvo,” during the ensuing night, which was now falling, until we should return, and started off in pursuit of the newly discovered sail.
Chasing a sail is very much like pursuing a coy maiden, the very coyness sharpening the pursuit. The chase, in the present instance, seemed determined to run away from us; and as she was fast, and we were as determined to overhaul her as she was to run away, she led us a beautiful night-dance over the merry waters. The moon rose bright, soon after the chase commenced, and, striking upon the canvas of the fleeing vessel, lighted it up as though it had been a snow-bank. The American vessels are distinguished, above all others, for the whiteness of their canvas; being clothed, for the most part, in the fibre of our cotton-fields. The cut of the sails, and the taper of the spars of the chase looked American, and then the ship was cracking on every stitch of canvas that would draw, in the effort to escape—she must surely be American, we thought. And so we “looked on her, to lust after her,” and gave our little ship the benefit of all our skill in seamanship. The speed of the two ships was so nearly matched, that, for the first hour or two, it was impossible to say whether we had gained on her an inch. We were both running dead before the wind, and this was not the Alabama’s most favorable sailing-point. With her tall lower masts, and large fore-and-aft sails, she was better on a wind, or with the wind abeam. The chase was leading us away from our cruising-ground, and I should have abandoned it, if I had not had my pride of ship a little interested. It would never do for the Alabama to be beaten in the beginning of her cruise, and that, too, by a merchantman; and so we threw out all our “light kites” to the wind, and gave her the studding-sails “alow and aloft.” To make a long story short, we chased this ship nearly all night, and only came up with her a little before dawn; and when we did come up with her, she proved to be a Dane! She was the bark Overman, from Bankok, in Siam, bound to Hamburg. There had been no occasion, whatever, for this neutral ship to flee, and the long chase which she had given me was evidently the result of a little spleen; and so, to revenge myself in a good-natured way, I insisted upon all my belligerent rights. Though satisfied from her reply to my hail, that she was what she proclaimed herself to be, I compelled her to heave to, which involved the necessity of taking in all that beautiful white canvas, with which she had decoyed me so many miles away from my cruising-ground, and sent a boat on board of her to examine her papers. She thus lost more time than if she had shortened sail earlier in the chase, to permit me to come up with her.
It was late next day before I rejoined the Weathergauge off Corvo, and I felt, as I was retracing my steps, pretty much as Music or Rover may be supposed to feel, as he is limping back to his kennel, after a run in pursuit of a fox that has escaped him. Bartelli failed to call me at the usual hour, that morning, and I need not say that I made a late breakfast. We now landed the crew of the Weathergauge, in their own boats, with the usual store of provisions, and traps, and burned her. Two days elapsed now without a capture, during which we overhauled but one ship, a Portuguese bark homeward bound. Having beaten the “cover” of which Flores was the centre, pretty effectually, I now stretched away to the north-west, and ran the island out of sight, intending to skirt it, at the distance of forty or fifty miles. On the third day, the welcome cry of “sail ho!” again rang from the masthead, and making sail in the direction indicated by the look-out, we soon discovered that the chase was a whaler. Resorting to the usual ruse of the enemy’s flag, the stranger did not attempt to escape, and in an hour or two more, we were alongside of the American whaling brig Altamaha, from New Bedford, five months out. The Altamaha had had but little success, and was comparatively empty. She did not make so beautiful a bonfire, therefore, as the other whalers had done.
In the afternoon, we overhauled a Spanish ship. Our position, to-day, was latitude 40° 34′ N., and longitude 35° 24′ 15″ W. The barometer stood at 30.3 inches, and the thermometer at 75°; from which the reader will see that the weather was fine and pleasant. It was now the middle of September, however, and a change might be looked for at any moment. On the night after capturing the Altamaha, we had another night-chase, with more success, however, than the last. It was my habit, when there was no “game up,” to turn in early, usually at nine o’clock, to enable my physique to withstand the frequent drafts upon its energies. I was already in a sound sleep, when about half-past eleven, an old quartermaster came below, and giving my cot a gentle shake, said: “There has a large ship just passed to windward of us, on the opposite tack, sir.” I sprang out of bed at once, and throwing on a few clothes, was on deck almost as soon as the quartermaster. I immediately wore ship, and gave chase. My ship was under topsails, and it took us some little time to make sail. By this time the chase was from two and a half to three miles distant, but quite visible to the naked eye, in the bright moonlight. We were both close-hauled on the starboard tack, the chase about three points on the weather bow. The stranger, who was probably keeping a better look-out than is usual with merchant-ships, in consequence of the war, had discovered our movement, and knew he was pursued, as we could see him setting his royals and flying jib, which had been furled. The Alabama was now at her best point of sailing. The sailors used to say, when we drew aft the sheets of those immense trysails of hers, and got the fore-tack close aboard, that she was putting on her seven-league boots. She did, indeed, then seem
“To walk the waters like a thing of life,”
and there were few sailing ships that could run away from her.
We gained from the start upon the chase, and in a couple of hours, were on his weather-quarter, having both head-reached, and gone to windward of him. He was now no more than about a mile distant, and I fired the accustomed blank cartridge to heave him to. The sound of the gun broke upon the stillness of the night, with startling effect, but the chase did not stir tack or sheet in obedience to it. She was evidently resolved to try conclusions with me a little farther. Finding that I had the advantage of him, on a wind, he kept off a little, and eased his sheets, and we could see, with our night-glasses, that he was rigging out his studding-sail booms preparatory to setting the sails upon them. We kept off in turn, bringing the wind a little forward of the beam, and such good use did the Alabama make of her seven-league boots, that before the stranger could get even his foretopmast studding-sail set, we had him within good point-blank range of a 32-pounder. The moon was shining very poetically, and the chase was very pretty, but it was rather “after hours,” and so I resolved to shift the scenes, cut short the drama an act or two, and bring it to a close. I now fired a second gun, though still unshotted, and the smoke had hardly blown away before we could see the stranger hauling up his courses, and bringing his ship to the wind, as much as to say, “I see you have the heels of me, and there is no use in trying any longer.” I gave the boarding-officer orders, in case the ship should prove to be a prize, of which I had but little doubt, to show me a light as soon as he should get on board of her. The oars of his boat had scarcely ceased to resound, before I saw the welcome light ascending to the stranger’s peak, and knew that another of the enemy’s ships had fallen into my power. It was now nearly daylight, and I went below and finished the nap which had been so unceremoniously broken in upon. I may as well observe here, that I scarcely ever disturbed the regular repose of the officers and crew during these night operations. Everything was done by the watch on deck, and “all hands” were never called except on emergencies.
When I came on deck the next morning, there was a fine large ship lying under my lee, awaiting my orders. She proved to be the Benjamin Tucker, of New Bedford, eight months out, with three hundred and forty barrels of oil. We received from her an additional supply of tobacco, and other small stores. As early as ten o’clock, the crew of the Tucker, numbering thirty persons, were on board the Alabama, and the ship was on fire. The remainder of this day, and the next, passed without incident, except the incidents of wind, and weather, which have so often been recorded. We improved the leisure, by exercising the men at the guns, and caulking the decks, which were again beginning to let water enough through them, to inconvenience the men in their hammocks below. Just as the sun was setting, on the evening of the second day, we caught a glimpse from the mast-head of the island of Flores, distant about forty miles.