"Cases, in which hope and fear are brought into fierce struggle with each other, are those which are the worst to support and which bear heavily on the fortitude even of strongest minds. This was shown in Sir Morgan: there was still a chance that the smuggler might be intercepted: and that chance might be defeated in a thousand ways. Hence it was perhaps that then first during my whole knowledge of him, and then last, I saw Sir Morgan Walladmor lose his self-possession. Now was Gillie Godber avenged: even in his own hall--that hall which had echoed to her maternal groans and rung with the agony of her fruitless supplications, even there--on the very spot where her curse was muttered--had it taken effect: where it was breathed, there had it caught him: just where she stood--he stood: where she was shaken as by fierce convulsions--there was he shaken: where she raved--he raved: and under the very light of that same lamp, which lighted up the ghastly despair of the wretched mother as she heard the decree which sealed for ever the fate of her blooming boy, did I read in Sir Morgan's features too surely a revelation of his foreboding soul, that one night had stripped him bare of comfort and left him a poor forlorn man to a life of self-reproach--of shipwrecked hopes--and blasted affections.
"What was to be done? All were eager to be in motion; all fretting, I may say, to follow and avenge; but how, or with what hope? One bold fellow offered to man Sir Morgan's pinnace, barge, and all the other small craft he could collect, with sailors and others from the neighbourhood--to pursue the smuggler--and to carry her, if possible, by boarding. But this, considering the strength of the smuggler, was too hopeless an attempt to be countenanced. There were however king's ships cruising or in port all the way between Barmouth and Parkgate: the nearest of these, a sloop called the Falcon, was said to be lying at anchor off Aber, between Bangor and Conway: and in that direction expresses were sent off one upon the heels of the other; some having orders to go on to Parkgate and Liverpool. A favourite groom of Sir Morgan's, on this occasion, rode a thoroughbred horse in two hours and a quarter to Bangor Ferry: between Beddgelart and Carnarvon he had learned that the sloop was anchored off Beaumaris: he turned aside therefore from the Bangor road to the Ferry. There he jumped into a six-oared boat, and made for Beaumaris. Faithfully he did his duty: as you will suppose when I tell you that the castle clock had struck ten when he mounted, and a little after one we that stood on the summits of Arthur's chair--the high peak to the northward--heard a sullen report in the direction of Carnarvon: we all knew that this must be a signal to us from the Falcon--giving notice of her approach. She was now standing through the Menai strait. Twenty minutes after this a second gun was fired; and the prodigious roar of echoes, which it awoke in the mountains, proclaimed that she had passed Carnarvon. At two the flashes of her guns became visible, and showed that she had uncovered the point of Llandovery. At a quarter past two there was light enough to make her out distinctly; she carried a press of sail; and a few minutes after that we discovered the smuggler in the offing, about three miles to leeward of the Falcon.
"The same high gale which had carried the Falcon so rapidly through the Menai, had baffled the smuggler in her attempt to go to the northward; for that was obviously her intention; and she still continued to tack in that direction. We expected that, as soon as she descried the Falcon, she would wear and run: but, greatly to our surprize, she took no notice of her--but continued standing on her tack in the evident design of running to the outside of the isle of Anglesea.
"The Falcon, seeing her purpose, fired a shot to bring her to. This the smuggler paid no sort of regard to: and we all began to suspect some mistake: as the light increased, and we could use our glasses with effect, we found too certainly that there was. The smuggler was painted so as to resemble the Viper; and Sir Morgan had taken her for that vessel on the night before: but we now suspected (and the event proved) that she was her partner, the Rattlesnake--a ship of much greater force with a piratical crew from the South Seas, and strengthened by some of the picked hands from the Viper. She had come round expressly on this service from the West coast of Ireland, where she had been hovering for some time back. The officer, who commanded the Falcon, had no doubt found his mistake before we did: but it seemed that, both for the honor of his flag and on account of the affecting occasion, he resolved to fight her under any odds. The wind moderated at this time: but he kept on his course, and neared her fast.
"At three o'clock the Falcon ranged up within pistol shot. At this moment the Rattlesnake showed her colors--black, striped with horizontal crimson bars, the well-known flag of a rover that had of late years fixed his nest in the Gallapagos, and thence infested the South Seas. Not a shot had yet been exchanged: and just before the action commenced we could distinguish Griffiths making her way across the decks from the cabin to the cock-pit. Oh! what a moment of suspense for us!--Oh! for some arm from heaven to strengthen the righteous cause! Some angel to intercept the oppressor's triumph; or some darkness to hide it from the oppressed!
"Never again may the innocent light of early dawn, when visiting our quiet seas, and these peaceful valleys of Merionethshire, ascend upon such a spectacle of human crime and woe as lay before me at that moment of that sweet summer morning. There in front, upon the tranquil sea, began the bloody strife--the thunder and the carnage:----On my right hand stood the unhappy father, praying for some merciful shot to dismiss his children from the evil to come:----In a gloomy fir-grove on my left hand stood the guilty, but most miserable, mother--Gillie Godber, spectatress of Sir Morgan's agonies, writhing with exultation that her vengeance had reached his heart, and laughing like a fell hyæna as she surveyed her work upon the sea.
"But why should I dwell upon these hideous remembrances? Let a few words tell the issue: the Rattlesnake was greatly superior to her antagonist in number of men, and those picked men, three parts of them English and Irish: consequently there was no chance of boarding with success. She had also the advantage in number of guns, but much more advantage in weight of metal. Hence, and from the fatal effect of one broadside upon the rudder and rigging of the Falcon--within half an hour from the commencement of the action, and just as the sun rose--the Rattlesnake beheld her enemy lying unmanageable on the water, and unable to bring a gun to bear. In this condition the Falcon would have lain at the pirate's mercy, but for the appearance of two sail which now hove in sight from the southward: the wind had shifted two or three points and was freshening; the Rattlesnake crowded sail; was out of sight before the strangers came up; and the end of that scene was, that our brave champion was towed into Carnarvon--crippled, helpless, dismantled, all but a wreck, and with the third part of her crew slaughtered.
"But from this scene Sir Morgan was now summoned hastily away to another which, too ruefully he augured, must await him. A second lesson he was now to have upon the sanctity of human affections. For I will maintain, Mr. Bertram,--that however the poor may, upon matters of taste, delicacy, or refinement, seem coarser in their feelings, and less sensitive than the rich (from which aspect it is that many people take their estimate of poor people's sensibilities),--yet in all that regards the primary affections I will maintain, I say, that the distinctions of rich and poor--high and low--are lighter than dew or the dust which is in the balance. The ties, which cement the great elementary relations of human life, are equally strong in every rank; alike sacred in the eyes of God; and in the lowest as in the highest, the anguish of their dissolution as perfect. Now did Sir Morgan learn what that anguish was: the next half hour taught him to estimate the torments of a final parting from the being in whom the whole heart's love lies treasured.--Lady Walladmor had passed the night in convulsions, falling out of one fit into another with intervals of only a few moments. Towards sun-rise the intervals grew longer, but she was evidently sinking fast; she was sensible; and, as she recovered the use of speech, she asked for Sir Morgan.
"I entered the room with Sir Morgan: lady Walladmor was sitting on a sopha propped up by cushions and surrounded by her women. All of us staid in the room; for some could not be spared; and the presence of strangers is distressing only when they are neutral spectators and not participators in the emotion witnessed--as we were in the very deepest degree, and by an interest which far transcended the possibility of any vulgar interest of curiosity.--There is no doubt that lady Walladmor had recollected some circumstance in the application made to her on behalf of Winifred Griffiths--not understood or suspected at that time--but suddenly interpreted to her by the event of the preceding night and too sadly interpreting that event. This was plain: for she asked no information from us: she saw by our countenances that we had none to give her which could shed a comfort on her dying moments: and even to turn her thoughts that way was too terrific a trial for her exhausted nature. She moved her head mournfully with a world of sad meaning: twice she raised and dropped her hand, as if in supplication or internal prayer: a third time she raised it, and the hand fell into that of Sir Morgan's: her lips moved; and at last she said--and the solemnity of her utterance for a moment checked our tears--'That for her sake, and as he hoped for comfort to visit him in his afflictions, she made it her last request that, if ever' (even then she was too tender to say 'ever' again) 'if ever any poor suffering human creature, sinking under trials too great for human fortitude, should lay down the burthen of wretchedness at his feet, he would not close his heart or turn away his ear from the petition.' Saying this, she hid her face in Sir Morgan's arms; strong convulsions again came on: and, before the morning dew was exhaled, she was once more at peace;
'And Nature rested from her work in death.'