The sight was now awful; the tide had risen, and the storm was at its height. We could scarcely keep our feet, except by clinging to the rocks. The bursts of wind came almost with the force of cannon shot, and the men, who now seemed to amount to several hundreds, were seen by the glare of the lightnings grasping each other in groups along the shore and the hills, the only mode in which they could save themselves from being swept away like chaff. The rain had now ceased its continual pour, but it burst in sharp, short showers, that smote us with the keenness of hail. The sea, to the horizon, was white with its own dashings, and every mountain surge that swept to the shore was edged with light—the whole, one magnificent sheet of phosphor and foam. Yet, awful as all was, all was so exciting that I actually enjoyed the scene. But the excitement grew stronger still, when the sudden report of two guns from seaward, the signal for the approach of the lugger, followed almost immediately by a broadside, told us that we were likely to see an action before her arrival. As she rose rapidly upon the horizon, her signals showed that she was chased by a Government cruiser, and one of double her size. Of the superior weight of metal in the pursuer we saw sufficient proofs in the unremitting fire. Except by superior manœuvering there was clearly no chance for the lugger. But in the mean time all that could be done on shore was done. A huge fire sprang up instantly on the cliff, muskets were discharged, and shouts were given, to show that her friends were on the alert. The captain's countenance fell, and as he strode backwards and forwards along the shore, I could hear his wrath in continued grumblings.
"Fool and brute!" he cried, "this all comes of his being unable to hold his tongue. He has clearly blabbed, otherwise we should not have had any thing better than a row-boat in our wake. He will be captured to a certainty. Well, he will find the comfort of being a cabin-boy or a foremast-man on board the fleet for the rest of his days. I would not trust him with a Thames lighter, if ever he gets on shore again.'
The cannonade began now to be returned by the lugger, and the captain's spirits revived. Coming up to me, he said, wiping the thick perspiration from his brow, "This, sir, is a bad night's job, I am afraid; but if the fellow in command of that lugger had only sea room, I doubt whether he would not give the revenue craft enough to do yet. If he would but stand off and try a fair run for it, but in this bay, in this beggarly nook, where a man cannot steer without rubbing his elbows upon either shore, he gives his seamanship no chance."
He now stood with his teeth firm set, and his night-glass to his eye, bluff against the storm. A broadside came rolling along.
"By Jove! one would think that he had heard me," he exclaimed. "Well done, Dick Longyarn! The Shark has got that in his teeth. He is leading the cruiser a dance. What sort of report will the revenue gentleman have to make to my Lords Commissioners to-morrow or the next day, I should wish to know?"
The crowd on shore followed the Manœuvres with not less interest. Every glass was at the eye; and I constantly heard their grumblings and disapprovals, as some luckless turn of the helm exposed the lugger to the cruiser's fire. "She will be raked; she will lose her masts," was the general groan. As they neared the shore, the effect of every shot was visible. "There goes the mainsail all to ribands; the yards are shot in the slings." Then public opinion would change. "Fine fellow that! The Shark's main-top shakes like a whip." In this way all went on for nearly an hour, which, however, I scarcely felt to be more than a few minutes. "The skipper in command of that boat," said the captain at my side, "is one of the best seamen on the coast, as bold as a bull, and will fight any thing; but he is as leaky as a sieve; and when the wine gets into him, in a tavern at Calais or Dunkirk, if he had the secrets of the Privy Council, they would all be at the mercy of the first scoundrel who takes a bottle with him."
"But he fights his vessel well," I observed.
"So he does," was the reply; "but if he should have that lugger captured before a keg touches the sand, and if the whole goes into the custom-house before it reaches the cellars of the owners, it will be all his fault."
They were at length so near us that we could easily see the splinters flying from the sides of both, and the havoc made among the rigging was fearful; yet, except for the anxiety, nothing could be more beautiful than the manœuvres of both. The doublings of the hare before the greyhound, the flight of the pigeon before the hawk, all the common images of pursuit and evasion were trifling to the doublings and turnings, the attempts to make fight, and the escape at the moment when capture seemed inevitable. The cruiser was gallantly commanded, and her masterly management upon a lee shore, often forced involuntary admiration even from the captain.
"A clever lad that revenue man, I must own," said he, "it is well worth his while, for if he catch that lugger he will have laid hold of twenty thousand pounds' worth of as hard-earned money as ever crossed the Channel. I myself have a thousand in silk on board."