Chapter Twenty Nine.
Mutiny.
A week of light and fickle winds brought us through the Channel and well on our way to Yarmouth Roads, off which we understood Admiral Duncan was lying. As we passed the Downs, strange and ugly rumours of trouble ahead met us. One night, as we lay anchored waiting for our wind, I was on deck at my watch when I caught the sound of oars approaching the Zebra. Shortly after several missives were pitched on deck, one of which alighted just at my feet.
I examined it with some curiosity. It was a bundle of printed papers addressed to the sailors of England, calling upon them to insist on the redress of grievances, and to stand by their brethren who at that moment were in a state of mutiny at the Nore. Other papers described the success which had attended a similar mutiny at Spithead a week or so previously. Another was a flaring proclamation, signed “Parker, President,” on board H.M.S. Sandwich at the Nore, announcing that the fleet was in the hands of the men; that all the obnoxious officers were under arrest; that the Thames was under strict blockade; that conditions had been offered to the Admiralty; and that, if these were not accepted within a given time, it was the intention of the leaders of the mutiny to put to sea and hand the ships in their possession to the enemy. Further, it was stated that the fleet at the Nore was being daily recruited by deserters from the North Sea squadron and elsewhere; that arms and supplies were abundant; and that England was at the mercy of those whom up till now she had treated as veritable slaves. And so on.
All this greatly troubled me; for, from what I knew of the crew of the Zebra, such seditious stuff furnished just the fuel required to set the spirit of the men in a blaze. The other missives thrown on board, no doubt containing the same or similar matter, had pretty certainly fallen into the hands of those who would read the call to mutiny with different eyes from mine. If so, the mischief was already far gone.
I hastened with my papers to Lieutenant Adrian, who glanced over them contemptuously.
“All bunkum and wind,” said he, pitching them into a corner. “We have heard this sort of thing before.”
“If it is true, sir,” I ventured to say, “that the ships at the Nore have mutinied, we had better give them a wide berth, for it’s a catching thing.”