“‘Then, mounseer, I must obey orders and make you come with me,’ says our captain just as politely as before, and without further ado he ordered the crew of the foremost main-deck gun to fire a shot across the French ship’s bows. It was the first shot fired during the war. We in return got the Frenchman’s whole broadside crashing aboard us.
“We then began pounding away at each other as close as we could get. It seemed wonderful to me that we were not both of us blown out of the water. Our men were falling pretty thickly, some killed and many more wounded, while our sails and rigging were getting much cut up.
“You see the enemy had twenty guns on a side to our sixteen, but we tossed ours in and out so sharply that we made up for the difference. For two mortal hours we kept blazing away, getting almost as much as we gave, till scarcely a stick could stand aboard us; but our captain was not the man to give in, and while he could he kept at it. At last, our rigging and canvas being cut to pieces, and our masts ready to fall, so that we could not make sail, the Belle Poule having had enough of it, shot ahead, and succeeded in getting under the land where we were unable to follow her.
“The song says that we drove her ashore; but though we did no exactly do that, we knocked her well about, and she had forty-eight men and officers killed and fifty wounded. As it was, as I have said, the first action in the old war, it was more talked about than many others. We lost our captain, not from his being killed, but from his getting a bigger ship, and Captain Everitt was appointed in his stead.
“The old Arethusa, after this, continued a Channel cruiser. We had pretty sharp work at different times, chasing the enemy, and capturing their merchantmen, and cutting-out vessels from their harbours; but we had no action like the one the song was wrote about.
“At last, in the March of the next year, when some fifty leagues or more off Brest, we made out a French frigate inshore of us. Instead of standing bravely out to fight the saucy Arethusa, she squared away her yards and ran for that port. We made all sail in chase, hoping to come up with her before she could get into harbour. We were gaining on her, and were expecting that we should have another fight like that with the Belle Poule, when, as we came in sight of the outer roads of Brest, what should we see but a thumping seventy-four, which, guessing what we were, slipping her cable, stood out under all sail to catch us.
“We might have tackled the seventy-four alone, with a good breeze; but we well knew that if we did not up stick and cut, we should either be knocked to pieces or be sent to the bottom; so our captain, as in duty bound, ordered us to brace up the yards and try to make the best of our way out of danger. We might have done so had there been a strong breeze blowing, but we could not beat the ship off shore as fast as we wanted.
“Night came down upon us, and a very dark night it was. We could not see the land, but we knew it was under our lee, when presently thump goes the ship ashore. Our captain did his best to get her off, but all our attempts were of no use. The saucy Arethusa was hard and fast on the rocks.
“The word was given to lower the boats. I was one of the first cutter’s crew. We had got her into the water, and the master, as good a seaman as ever stepped, came with us, and two young midshipmites.
“‘We’ll not be made prisoners if we can help it, lads,’ said the master. ‘Here, lower down these two casks of bread, and this breaker of water.’