That night our skipper took me into council and developed his plan, which was to load in a port in the Mozambique channel. To effect his purpose with more security, he had provided the brig with an armament sufficient to repel a man-of-war of equal size—(a fancy I never gave way to)—and on all occasions, except in presence of a French cruiser, he intended to hoist the Bourbon lilies, wear the Bourbon uniform, and conduct the vessel in every way as if she belonged to the royal navy. Nor were the officers to be less favored than the sailors in regard to double salary, certificates of which were handed to me for myself and my two subordinates. A memorandum book was then supplied, containing minute instructions for each day of the ensuing week, and I was specially charged, as second in command, to be cautiously punctual in all my duties, and severely just towards my inferiors.
I took some pride in acquitting myself creditably in this new military phase of a slaver’s life. Very few days sufficed to put the rigging and sails in perfect condition; to mount my sixteen guns; to drill the men with small arms as well as artillery; and by paint and sea-craft, to disguise the Saint Paul as a very respectable cruiser.
In twenty-seven days we touched at the Cape de Verds for provisions, and shaped our way southward without speaking a single vessel of the multitude we met, until off the Cape of Good Hope we encountered a stranger who was evidently bent upon being sociable. Nevertheless, our inhospitable spirit forced us to hold our course unswervingly, till from peak and main we saw the white flag and pennant of France unfurled to the wind.
Our drum immediately beat to quarters, while the flag chest was brought on deck. Presently, the French transport demanded our private signal; which out of our ample supply, was promptly answered, and the royal ensign of Portugal set at our peak.
As we approached the Frenchman every thing was made ready for all hazards;—our guns were double-shotted, our matches lighted, our small arms distributed. The moment we came within hail, our captain,—who claimed precedence of the lieutenant of a transport,—spoke the Frenchman; and, for a while, carried on quite an amiable chat in Portuguese. At last the stranger requested leave to send his boat aboard with letters for the Isle of France; to which we consented with the greatest pleasure, though our captain thought it fair to inform him that we dared not prudently invite his officers on deck, inasmuch as there were “several cases of small-pox among our crew, contracted, in all likelihood, at Angola!”
The discharge of an unexpected broadside could not have struck our visitor with more dismay or horror. The words were hardly spoken when her decks were in a bustle,—her yards braced sharply to the wind,—and her prow boiling through the sea, without so much as the compliment of a “bon voyage!”
Ten days after this ruse d’esclave we anchored at Quillimane, among a lot of Portuguese and Brazilian slavers, whose sails were either clewed up or unbent as if for a long delay. We fired a salute of twenty guns and ran up the French flag. The salvo was quickly answered, while our captain, in the full uniform of a naval commander, paid his respects to the Governor. Meantime orders were given me to remain carefully in charge of the ship; to avoid all intercourse with others; to go through the complete routine and show of a man-of-war; to strike the yards, haul down signal, and fire a gun at sunset; but especially to get underway and meet the captain at a small beach off the port, the instant I saw a certain flag flying from the fort.
I have rarely seen matters conducted more skilfully than they were by this daring Gaul. Next morning early the Governor’s boat was sent for the specie; the fourth day disclosed the signal that called us to the beach; the fifth, sixth, and seventh, supplied us with eight hundred negroes; and, on the ninth, we were underway for our destination.
The success of this enterprise was more remarkable because fourteen vessels, waiting cargoes, were at anchor when we arrived, some of which had been detained in port over fifteen months. To such a pitch had their impatience risen, that the masters made common cause against all new-comers, and agreed that each vessel should take its turn for supply according to date of arrival. But the astuteness of my veteran circumvented all these plans. His anchorage and non-intercourse as a French man-of-war lulled every suspicion or intrigue against him, and he adroitly took advantage of his kegs of specie to win the heart of the authorities and factors who supplied the slaves.
But wit and cleverness are not all in this world. Our captain returned in high spirits to his vessel; but we hardly reached the open sea before he was prostrated with an ague which refused to yield to ordinary remedies, and finally ripened into fever, that deprived him of reason. Other dangers thickened around us. We had been several days off the Cape of Good Hope, buffeting a series of adverse gales, when word was brought me after a night of weary watching, that several slaves were ill of small-pox. Of all calamities that occur in the voyage of a slaver, this is the most dreaded and unmanageable. The news appalled me. Impetuous with anxiety I rushed to the captain, and regardless of fever or insanity, disclosed the dreadful fact. He stared at me for a minute as if in doubt; then opening his bureau and pointing to a long coil of combustible material, said that it communicated through the decks with the powder magazine, and ordered me to—“blow up the brig!”