Ford of H.M.S. Vigilant: A Tale of the Chusan Archipelago

by T. T. Jeans

We had time to look after Adams and Cooke now—Adams had one thigh broken, and I knew that that wasn't so bad; but Cooke had his hands and face and legs all badly burnt with the explosion, and was in awful pain. We made them as comfortable as we could down below under the poop, but it was horrid to hear Cooke moaning and shrieking sometimes.

We soon got so close inshore that we had to go about on the starboard tack, and we swung round and plugged away for the entrance, which never seemed to get any nearer. The junks behind us were still gaining, two of them very quickly. These two were leaving the others a long way astern, and just to show you what asinine ideas come to one, I thought for a moment that we might draw them on and on, till they were so separated that we could tackle them one at a time.

The breeze had been gradually freshening, and was now blowing down the channel quite hard, and as we went off on the starboard tack, we heeled over till the deck seemed almost upright (we were heeling over to port—the left side).

But then an awful thing happened. Suddenly, above my head, there was a noise like a pistol shot, and, looking up, I saw that one of the starboard main shrouds had parted, and that the mainmast was beginning to bend over. If I held on for another minute, the other two would be certain to go—the strain on them was awful—and the mast would have gone too. There was only one thing to be done, and I shrieked to "Hard a-port!" She heeled over, another shroud uncurled and parted, but before the last could go she staggered round into the wind, the strain was taken off, and the mast straightened again.

Sharpe came running aft; he was as white as a sheet. "It will take us an hour to repair, sir! What can we do?"

It was plain as a pikestaff that we couldn't beat out. Everyone on board knew that at once, and they all looked to me, but knew what would have to be done just as well as I did, and I could see them watching the pirates out of the corners of their eyes.

The current was taking us down towards them, and they were all coming along at a tremendous rate. It was no use drifting among them helplessly; we couldn't beat out with only the mizzen and foresail, so the only thing to do was to get before the wind again, with our sails out to starboard, so that most of the strain came on our port rigging, and try to run past them. Clarke and another man sprang up the mainmast, going up the big bamboo hoops which kept the sail close to the mast, and began reeving a temporary rope to act as a backstay, and we swung round, gybed very carefully, and the little Sally went bounding back to them.

The only one on board who wasn't—well—frightened was Dicky. He'd have charged an express train; he was so mad with fighting and killing people with that Maxim. We moved Cooke and Adams from under the poop, and put them down below in the big hold, out of danger, and by that time we were abreast the sinking junk; and as we went rushing by she gave a lurch, we saw her guns slide overboard, she went under, and we could see at least fifty Chinamen struggling in the water. Dicky yelled and shook his fist at them, and called them all the names he could lay his tongue to.

I had tried to keep my eye on those four junks all the time, and though I was still feeling "silly" after being "bashed" against the mast, I could see that they didn't seem to know quite what to make of us. The leading ones were half a mile ahead of the others, and we were coming down so fast towards them that we didn't give them much time to make up their minds. We saw them run into the wind for a second or two, and then they came along, on the other tack, straight for us, the leading one about two hundred yards in front of the second. They were almost as big as the one we had sunk, but only had three masts, so didn't look quite so ferocious.

I thought that we could slip by and pass the first two to port (our left-hand side), but as we got closer it seemed to me that the first one was trying to ram us, and I had sense enough to know that if she did, our masts would probably go overboard, and that all would be U P with us. Sharpe was still up aloft, reeving that temporary shroud, so I couldn't ask him what to do, and began to feel very frightened. Fergusson kept on firing the six-pounder very fast, and kept on hitting her, but that didn't seem to have any effect, and she didn't alter course. We were hardly fifty yards away now, and Fergusson let off that gun faster than ever, and we could actually hear the shells bursting and see the pieces of wood flying out of her bows, and gashes opening out in her foresail. Her crew were yelling most awfully, and making such a banging noise with tom-toms and brass clappers, that that frightened me all the more. We were simply tearing along, with the water bubbling along the sides like a mill stream. We should be into her, or she into us, in a moment, and I held my breath and clutched hold of something, not knowing what to do. The men at the helm were looking at me for orders—they looked scared, too—and I was just going to tell them to "starboard", when I saw her begin to luff up. I yelled to them to "steady", and before you could say "knife", she slid along our port side, with her huge sails leaning right over us. The horrid brutes were all hanging on and glaring at us, and they shrieked and yelled, and I saw some of them throw things at us, and some of them fire off rifles. She couldn't fire her guns, because she was heeling over so much; but I knew she would let them off directly she was on a level keel, and I saw a lot of them scrambling over each other to get at them, and knew they would fire almost directly—right in our faces. But as they slid past, like an express train, Dicky began firing the Maxim right down in the middle of them.