Before advancing towards the French commanding officer, to receive his sword, Captain Moubray sent Lord Reginald and a party of men below to stop the slaughter. He sprang down in time to see Dick Hargrave and two other men engaged in a fierce combat with three Frenchmen, who, ignorant of what had taken place above, were still holding out.
“You mutinous rascals!” exclaimed Lord Reginald to Dick and his companions; “didn’t you hear the captain’s orders to desist from fighting? The frigate has struck, and is our prize.”
Then shouting to the Frenchmen in their own language, he told them what had occurred, when immediately dropping the points of their weapons, they sprang back, to be out of reach of the British seamen’s cutlasses.
“I am not a mutinous rascal,” exclaimed Dick, turning to Lord Reginald; “I didn’t know that the Frenchmen had given in.”
“How dare you speak to me in that way?” exclaimed the young lord, even at that moment not forgetting his enmity towards Dick. “Look out for the consequences!”
He then shouted to Mr Bitts, and in another minute the fighting, which had gone on for so many hours, altogether ceased. Both decks presented a terrible spectacle. In all directions lay the bodies of dead and dying men. Many had already passed away, others were writhing in agony, while the surgeon’s attendants, regardless of what was going on around, were employed in carrying below those to whom assistance might be of use. One lieutenant alone stood on the quarter-deck. Captain Moubray, advancing among the bodies of his late foes, inquired for the French captain. The lieutenant pointed to a form which lay near the wheel, covered with a flag.
“The captain of the Thesbe—the ship I yield to you—lies there,” he answered, presenting the hilt of his sword. “There lies the first lieutenant, and there the second, and I, the third, am in command.”
“I return your sword to as brave a man as I can ever hope to meet. You have fought your ship with the greatest gallantry. Englishmen cannot desire to encounter more noble foes,” said Captain Moubray, returning the sword, which the lieutenant, taking, sheathed with a deep sigh.
Indeed, out of a crew of between four and five hundred men, upwards of a hundred had been killed, and nearly the same number wounded, while the frigate’s hull was fearfully shattered, her bulwarks were torn away—she was a mere wreck.
Captain Moubray, returning to his ship, sent a prize crew on board under the command of Mr Jager, the second lieutenant, who had with him Lord Reginald, Voules, and Paddy Logan, and forty men, Richard Hargrave being among the number.