 | CHAPTER XV The pilot |  |
15. CHAPTER XV
Furious he repels their rage,
Loss of blood at length enfeebles;
Who can war with thousands wage?”
Spanish War Song.
We cannot detain the narrative, to detail the
scenes which busy wonder, aided by the relation
of divers marvellous feats, produced among the
curious seamen who remained in the ship, and
their more fortunate fellows, who had returned in
glory from an expedition to the land. For nearly
an hour the turbulence of a general movement
was heard, issuing from the deep recesses of
the frigate, and the boisterous sounds of hoarse
merriment were listened to by the officers in indulgent
silence; but all these symptoms of unbridled
humour ceased by the time the morning
repast was ended, when the regular sea-watch was
set, and the greater portion of those whose duty
did not require their presence on the vessel's
deck, availed themselves of the opportunity to repair
the loss of sleep sustained in the preceding
night. Still no preparations were made to put
the ship in motion, though long and earnest consultations,
which were supposed to relate to their
future destiny, were observed by the younger officers,
to be held between their captain, the first
threw many an anxious glance along the eastern
horizon, searching it minutely with his glass, and
then would turn his impatient looks at the low,
dense bank of fog, which, stretching across the
ocean like a barrier of cloud, entirely intercepted
the view towards the south. To the north and
along the land, the air was clear, and the sea
without spot of any kind; but in the east a small
white sail had been discovered since the opening
of day, which was gradually rising above the water,
and assuming the appearance of a vessel of
some size. Every officer on the quarter-deck in
his turn, had examined this distant sail, and had ventured
an opinion on its destination and character;
and even Katherine, who with her cousin was
enjoying, in the open air, the novel beauties of the
ocean, had been tempted to place her sparkling
eye to a glass, to gaze at the stranger.
“It is a collier,” Griffith said, “who has hauled
from the land in the late gale, and who is luffing
up to his course again. If the wind holds here in the
south, and he does not get into that fog bank, we
can stand off for him and get a supply of fuel before
eight bells are struck.”
“I think his head is to the northward, and that
he is steering off the wind,” returned the Pilot, in
a musing manner. “If that Dillon succeeded
in getting his express far enough along the coast,
the alarm has been spread, and we must be wary.
The convoy of the Baltic trade is in the North Sea,
and news of our presence could easily have been
taken off to it by some of the cutters that line the
coast—I could wish to get the ship as far south
as the Helder!”
“Then we lose this weather tide!” exclaimed
the impatient Griffith; “surely we have the cutter as
a look-out! besides, by beating into the fog, we
thought meet for an American frigate to skulk
from her foes!”
The scornful expression that kindled the eye of
the Pilot, like a gleam of sunshine lighting for an
instant some dark dell and laying bare its secrets,
was soon lost in the usually quiet look of his
glance, though he hesitated like one who was
struggling with his passions, before he answered—
“If prudence and the service of the States require
it, even this proud frigate must retreat and
hide from the meanest of her enemies. My
advice, Capt. Munson, is, that you make sail, and
beat the ship to windward, as Mr. Griffith has suggested,
and that you order the cutter to precede
us, keeping more in with the land.”
The aged seaman, who evidently suspended his
orders, only to receive an intimation of the other's
pleasure, immediately commanded his youthful assistant
to issue the necessary mandates to put these
measures in force. Accordingly, the Alacrity,
which vessel had been left under the command of the
junior lientenant of the frigate, was quickly under
way; and making short stretches to windward, she
soon entered the bank of fog, and was lost to the
eye. In the mean time the canvass of the ship was
loosened, and spread leisurely, in order not to disturb
the portion of the crew who were sleeping, and
following her little consort, she moved heavily
through the water, bearing up against the dull
breeze.
The quiet of regular duty had succeeded to the
bustle of making sail, and as the rays of the sun fell
less obliquely on the distant land, Katherine and
Cecilia were amusing Griffith by vain attempts to
point out the rounded eminences which they
fancied lay in the vicinity of the deserted mansion
his former station in the frigate, as her second lieutenant,
was pacing the opposite side of the quarterdeck,
holding under his arm the speaking trumpet,
which denoted that he held the temporary control
of the motions of the ship, and inwardly cursing the
restraint that kept him from the side of his mistress.
At this moment of universal quiet, when
nothing above low dialogues interrupted the dashing
of the waves as they were thrown lazily
aside by the bows of the vessel, the report of a
light cannon burst out of the barrier of fog, and
rolled by them on the breeze, apparently vibrating
with the rising and sinking of the waters.
“There goes the cutter!” exclaimed Griffith,
the instant the sound was heard.
“Surely,” said the captain, “Somers is not
so indiscreet as to scale his guns, after the caution
he has received!”
“No idle scaling of guns is intended there,”
said the Pilot, straining his eyes to pierce the
fog, but soon turning away in disappointment at
his inability to succeed—“that gun is shotted,
and has been fired in the hurry of a sudden signal!
—can your look-outs see nothing, Mr. Barnstable?”
The lieutenant of the watch hailed the man
aloft, and demanded if any thing were visible in the
direction of the wind, and received for answer, that
the fog intercepted the view in that quarter of the
heavens, but that the sail in the east was a ship,
running large or before the wind. The Pilot shook
his head doubtingly at this information, but still
he manifested a strong reluctance to relinquish the
attempt of getting more to the southward. Again
he communed with the commander of the frigate,
apart from all other ears, and while they yet deliberated,
a second report was heard, leaving no
their particular attention.
“Perhaps,” said Griffith, “he wishes to point
out his position, or to ascertain ours; believing that
we are lost like himself in the mist.”
“We have our compasses!” returned the doubting
captain; “Somers has a meaning in what he
says!”
“See!” cried Katherine, with girlish delight,
“see, my cousin! see Barnstable! how beautifully
that vapour is wreathing itself in clouds above
the smoky line of fog! It stretches already into
the very heavens like a lofty pyramid!”
Barnstable sprang lightly on a gun, as he repeated
her words—
“Pyramids of fog! and wreathing clouds! By
heaven!” he shouted, “'tis a tall ship! Royals,
skysails, and studding-sails all abroad! She is
within a mile of us, and comes down like a race
horse, with a spanking breeze, dead before it!
Now know we why Somers is speaking in the
mist!”
“Ay,” cried Griffith, “and there goes the
Alacrity, just breaking out of the fog, hovering
in for the land!”
“There is a mighty hull under all that cloud
of canvass, Capt. Munson,” said the observant but
calm Pilot—“it is time, gentlemen, to edge
away to leeward.”
“What, before we know from whom we run!”
cried Griffith; “my life on it, there is no single
ship king George owns, but would tire of the sport
before she had played a full game of bowls with”—
The haughty air of the young man was daunted
by the severe look he encountered in the eye of
the Pilot, and he suddenly ceased, though inwardly
chafing with impatient pride.
“The same eye that detected the canvass above
fluttering still nearer the heavens,” returned the
collected stranger; “and England, faulty as she
may be, is yet too generous to place a flag-officer
in time of war, in command of a frigate, or a captain
in command of a fleet. She knows the value
of those who shed their blood in her behalf, and
it is thus that she is so well served! Believe me,
Capt. Munson, there is nothing short of a ship of
the line under that symbol of rank, and that broad
show of canvass!”
“We shall see, sir, we shall see,” returned the
old officer, whose manner grew decided, as the
danger appeared to thicken; “beat to quarters,
Mr. Griffith, for we have none but enemies to
expect on this coast.”
The order was instantly issued, when Griffith
remarked, with a more temperate zeal—
“If Mr. Gray be right, we shall have reason to
thank God that we are so light of heel!”
The cry of “a strange vessel close aboard the
frigate,” having already flown down the hatches,
the ship was in an uproar at the first tap of the drum.
The seamen threw themselves from their hammocks
and lashing them rapidly into long, hard bundles,
they rushed to the decks, where they were dexterously
stowed in the netting, to aid the defences of the
upper part of the vessel. While this tumultuous
scene was exhibiting, Griffith gave a secret order to
Merry, who disappeared, leading his trembling
cousins to a place of safety in the inmost depths
of the ship.
The guns were cleared of their lumber, and
loosened. The bulk-heads were knocked down, and
the cabin relieved of its furniture, and the gun
deck exhibited one unbroken line of formidable cannon,
arranged in all the order of a naval battery
ready to engage. Arm chests were thrown open,
and all the various weapons for boarding. In short,
the yards were slung, and every other arrangement
was made with a readiness and dexterity that were
actually wonderful, though all was performed amid
an appearance of disorder and confusion that rendered
the ship another Babel during the continuance
of the preparations. In a very few minutes every
thing was completed, and even the voices of the
men ceased to be heard answering to their names,
as they were mustered at their stations, by their
respective officers. Gradually the ship became as
quiet as the grave, and when even Griffith or his
commander found it necessary to speak, their voices
were calmer, and their tones more mild than
usual. The course of the vessel was changed to an
oblique line from that in which their enemy was approaching,
though the appearance of flight was to
be studiously avoided to the last moment. When
nothing further remained to be done, every eye became
fixed on the enormous pile of swelling canvass
that was rising, in cloud over cloud, far
above the fog, and which was manifestly moving,
like driving vapour, swiftly to the north. Presently
the dull, smoky boundary of the mist which rested
on the water, was pushed aside in vast volumes,
and the longtaper spars that projected from the bowsprit
of the strange ship, issued from the obscurity,
and were quickly followed by the whole of the enormous
fabric, to which they were merely light appendages.
For a moment, streaks of reluctant
vapour clung to the huge, floating pile, but they
were soon shaken off by the rapid vessel, and
the whole of her black hull became distinct to the
eye.
“One, two, three rows of teeth!” said Boltrope,
deliberately counting the tiers of guns that
decker! Jack Manly would show his stern to
such a fellow! and even the bloody Scotchman
would run!”
“Hard up with your helm, quarter-master!”
cried Capt. Munson; “there is indeed no time to
hesitate, with such an enemy within a quarter of a
mile! Turn the hands up Mr. Griffith, and pack
on the ship from her trucks to her lower studding-sail
booms. Be stirring, sir, be stirring! Hard
up with your helm! Hard up, and be damn'd to
you!”
The unusual earnestness of their aged commander
acted on the startled crew like a voice from
the deep, and they waited not for the usual signals
of the boatswain and drummer to be given, before
they broke away from their guns, and rushed tumultuously
to aid in spreading the desired canvass.
There was one minute of ominous confusion,
that, to an inexperienced eye would have foreboded
the destruction of all order in the vessel,
during which every hand, and each tongue, seemed
in motion; but it ended with opening the immense
folds of light duck which were displayed along
the whole line of the masts, far beyound the ordinary
sails, overshadowing the waters for a great distance,
on either side of the vessel. During the moment of
inaction that succeeded this sudden exertion, the
breeze which had brought up the three decker, fell
fresher on the sails of the frigate, and she started
away from her dangerous enemy with a very perceptible
advantage in point of sailing.
“The fog rises! cried Griffith; “give us but
the wind for an hour, and we shall run her out of
gun-shot!”
“These ninety's are very fast off the wind;”
returned the captain, in a low tone, that was intended
and the Pilot, “and we shall have a struggle
for it.”
The quick eye of the stranger was glancing
over the movements of his enemy, while he answered—
“He finds we have the heels of him already!
he is making ready, and we shall be fortunate to
escape a broadside! Let her yaw a little, Mr.
Griffith; touch her lightly with the helm; if we
are raked, sir, we are lost!”
The captain sprang on the taffrail of his ship,
with the activity of a younger man, and in an instant
he perceived the truth of the other's conjecture.
Both vessels now ran for a few minutes, keenly
watching each other's motions like two skilful combatants;
the English ship making slight deviations
from the line of her course, and then, as her
movements were anticipated by the other, turning
as cautiously in the opposite direction, until a
sudden and wide sweep of her huge bows, told the
Americans plainly on which tack to expect her.
Capt. Munson made a silent, but impressive gesture
with his arm, as if the crisis were too important
for speech, which indicated to the watchful
Griffith, the way he wished the frigate sheered,
to avoid the weight of the impending danger.
Both vessels whirled swiftly up to the wind, with
their heads towards the land, and as the huge black
side of the three-decker, checkered with its triple
batteries, frowned full upon her foe, it belched
forth a flood of fire and smoke, accompanied
by a bellowing roar that mocked the surly
moanings of the sleeping ocean. The nerves of the
bravest man in the frigate contracted their fibres,
eye appeared to gaze in stupid wonder, as if tracing
the flight of the swift engines of destruction.
But the voice of Capt. Munson was heard in the
din, shouting, while he waved his hat earnestly in
the required direction—
“Meet her! meet her with the helm, boy! meet
her, Mr. Griffith, meet her!”
Griffith had so far anticipated this movement, as
to have, already, ordered the head of the frigate
turned in its former course, when struck by the
unearthly cry of the last tones uttered by his commander,
he bent his head, and beheld the venerable
seaman driven through the air, his hat still waving,
his gray hair floating in the wind, and his eye set
in the wild look of death.
“Great God!” exclaimed the young man, rushing
to the side of the ship, where he was just in
time to see the lifeless body disappear in the waters
that were dyed in its blood; “he has been
struck by a shot! Lower-away the boat, lower-away
the jolly-boat, the barge, the tiger, the—
“'Tis useless,” interrupted the calm, deep voice
of the Pilot; “he has met a warrior's end, and he
sleeps in a sailor's grave! The ship is getting before
the wind again, and the enemy is keeping his
vessel away.”
The youthful lieutenant was recalled by these
words to his duty, and reluctantly turned his eyes
away from the bloody spot on the dark waters,
which the busy frigate had already passed, to resume
the command of the vessel with a forced
composure.
“He has cut some of our running gear,” said
the master, whose eye had never ceased to dwell
on the spars and rigging of the ship, “and there's
a splinter out of the main-top-mast, that is big
enough for a fid! He's let day-light through some
squall has gone over and little harm done.—Didn't
I hear something said of Capt. Munson getting
jamm'd by a shot?”
“He is killed!”—said Griffith, speaking in a
voice that was yet husky with horror—“he is dead,
sir, and carried overboard; there is more need
that we forget not ourselves, in this crisis.”
“Dead!” said Boltrope, suspending the operation
of his active jaws for a moment, in surprise;
“and buried in a wet jacket! well, it is lucky
'tis no worse, for, damme if I did not think every
stick in the ship would have been cut out of her!”
With this consolatory remark on his lips, the
master walked slowly forward, continuing his orders
to repair the damages with a singleness of
durpose that rendered him, however uncouth as a
friend, an invaluable man in his station.
Griffith had not yet brought his mind to the
calmness that was so essential to discharge the
duties which had thus suddenly and awfully devolved
on him, when his elbow was lightly touched
by the Pilot, who had drawn closer to his side—
“The enemy appear satisfied with the experiment,”
said the stranger, “and as we work the
quicker of the two, he loses too much ground to
repeat it, if he be a true seaman.”
“And yet, as he finds we leave him so fast,”
returned Griffith, “he must see that all his hopes
rest, in cutting us up aloft. I dread that he will
come by the wind again, and lay us under his
broadside; we should need a quarter of an hour to
run without his range, if he were anchored!”
“He plays a surer game—see you not that the
vessel we made in the eastern board, shows the hull
of a frigate? 'Tis past a doubt that they are of
one squadron, and that the expresses have sent
spread a broad clue, Mr. Griffith, and as he
gathers in his ships, he sees that his game has
been successful.”
The faculties of Griffith had been too much occupied
with the hurry of the chase to look at the
ocean; but startled at the information of the
Pilot, who spoke coolly, though like a man sensible
of the existence of approaching danger, he
took the glass from the other, and with his own
eye examined the different vessels in sight. It is
certain that the experienced officer, whose flag
was flying above the light sails of the three-decker,
saw the critical situation of his chase, and reasoned
much in the same manner as the Pilot, or
the fearful expedient apprehended by Griffith,
would have been adopted. Prudence, however,
dictated that he should prevent his enemy from
escaping by pressing so closely on his rear, as to
render it impossible for the American to haul
across his bows and run into the open sea between
his own vessel and the nearest frigate of his
squadron. The unpractised reader will be able to
comprehend the case better by accompanying the understanding
eye of Griffith as it glanced from point
to point, following the whole horizon. To the
west lay the land, along which the Alacrity was
urging her way industriously, with the double
purpose of keeping her consort abeam, and of
avoiding a dangerous proximity to their powerful
enemy. To the east, bearing off the starboard
bow of the American frigate, was the vessel first
seen, and which now began to exhibit the hostile
appearance of a vessel of war, steering in a line converging
towards themselves, and rapidly drawing
nigher, while far in the north-east, was a vessel,
as yet faintly discerned, whose evolutions could
of nautical warfare.
“We are hemmed in, effectually,” said Griffith,
dropping the glass from his eye; “and I know
not but our wisest course would be to haul in to
the land, and cutting every thing light adrift, endeavour
to pass the broadside of the flag-ship?”
“Provided she left a rag of canvass to do it
with!” returned the Pilot. “Sir, 'tis an idle
hope! She would strip your ship, in ten minutes,
to her plank shears. Had it not been for
a lucky wave on which so many of her shot struck
and glanced upward, we should have had nothing
to boast of left from the fire she has already given;
we must stand on, and drop the three decker as
ar as possible.”
“But the frigates!” said Griffith, “what are we
to do with the frigates?”
“Fight them!” returned the Pilot, in a low,
determined voice, “fight them! Young man, I
have borne the stars and stripes aloft in greater
straits than this, and even with honour! Think
not that my fortune will desert me now!”
“We shall have an hour of desperate battle!”
“On that we may calculate; but I have lived
through whole days of bloodshed! you seem not
one to quail at the sight of an enemy.”
“Let me proclaim your name to the men!”
said Griffith; “'twill quicken their blood, and at
such a moment, be a host in itself.”
“They want it not,” returned the Pilot, checking
the hasty zeal of the other with his hand. “I
would be unnoticed, unless I am known as becomes
me. I will share your danger, but would not rob
you of a tittle of your glory. Should we come to
a grapple,” he continued, while a smile of conscious
pride gleamed across his face, “I will give
these English will quail before it!”
Griffith submitted to the stranger's will, and
after they had deliberated further on the nature of
their evolutions, he gave his attention again to the
management of the vessel. The first object which
met his eye, on turning from the Pilot, was Col.
Howard, pacing the quarter-deck, with a determined
brow, and a haughty mien, as if already in the
enjoyment of that triumph which now seemed
certain.
“I fear, sir,” said the young man, approaching
him with respect, “that you will soon find the
deck unpleasant and dangerous: your wards
are—”
“Mention not the unworthy term!” interrupted
the colonel. “What greater pleasure can there
be than to inhale the odour of loyalty that is wafted
from yonder floating tower of the king!—
And danger! you know but little of old George
Howard, young man, if you think he would for
thousands miss seeing that symbol of rebellion
levelled before the flag of his Majesty.”
“If that be your wish, Col. Howard,” returned
Griffith, biting his lip as he looked around
at the wondering seamen who were listeners, “you
will wait in vain—but I pledge you my word, that
when that time arrives, you shall be advised, and
that your own hands shall do the ignoble deed.”
“Edward Griffith, why not this moment? This
is your moment of probation—submit to the clemencyof
the crown, and yield your crew to the royal
mercy! In such a case I would remember the
child of my brother Harry's friend; and believe
me, my name is known to the ministry. And you,
misguided and ignorant abettors of rebellion! cast
vengeance of yonder powerful and victorious servant
of your prince.”
“Fall back! back with ye, fellows!” cried
Griffith, fiercely, to the men who were gathering
around the colonel, with looks of sullen vengeance.
“If a man of you dare approach him, he shall be
cast into the sea.”
The sailors retreated at the order of their commander;
but the elated veteran had continued to
pace the deck for many minutes before stronger interests
diverted the angry glances of the seamen to
other objects.
Notwithstanding the ship of the line was slowly
sinking beneath the distant waves, and in less than
an hour from the time she had fired the broadside,
no more than one of her three tiers of guns was visible
from the deck of the frigate, she yet presented
an irresistible obstacle against retreat to the south.
On the other hand the ship first seen, drew so nigh as
to render the glass no longer necessary in watching
her movements. She proved to be a frigate,
though one so materially lighter than the American,
as to have rendered her conquest easy, had
not her two consorts continued to press on for the
scene of battle with such rapidity. During
the chase the scene had shifted from the point
opposite to St. Ruth, to the verge of those shoals
where our tale commenced. As they approached
the latter, the smallest of the English ships
drew so nigh as to render the combat unavoidable.
Griffith and his crew had not been idle
in the intermediate time, but all the usual preparations
against the casualties of a sea-fight had been
duly made, when the drum once more called the men
to their quarters, and the ship was deliberately stripped
of her unnecessary sails, like a prizefighter about
dress; at the instant she gave this intimation of
her intention to abandon flight, and trust the issue
to the combat, the nearest English frigate also
took in her light canvass in token of her acceptance
of the challenge.
“He is but a little fellow,” said Griffith to the
Pilot, who hovered at his elbow with a sort of
fatherly interest in the other's conduct of the battle,
“though he carries a stout heart.”
“We must crush him at a blow,” returned the
stranger; “not a shot must be delivered until our
yards are locking.”
“I see him training his twelves upon us already;
we may soon expect his fire.”
“After standing the brunt of a Ninety-gun-ship,”
observed the collected Pilot, “we shall not shrink
from the broadside of a Two-and-thirty!”
“Stand to your guns, men!” cried Griffith,
through his trumpet—“not a shot is to be fired
without the order.”
This caution, so necessary to check the ardour of
the seamen, was hardly uttered, before their enemy
became wrapped in sheets of fire and volumes of
smoke, as gun after gun hurled its iron missiles at
their vessel in quick succession. Ten minutes
might have passed, the two vessels sheering
closer to each other every foot they advanced,
during which time the crew of the American
were compelled, by their commander, to suffer the
fire of their adversary, without returning a shot.
This short period, which seemed an age to the
seamen, was distinguished in their vessel by deep
silence. Even the wounded and dying, who fell
in every part of the ship, stifled their groans, under
the influence of the severe discipline, which
gave a character to every man and each movement of
speak, were heard only in the lowest tones of
resolute preparation. At length the ship slowly
entered the skirts of the smoke that enveloped their
enemy, and Griffith heard the man who stood at
his side whisper the word “now.”
“Let them have it!” cried Griffith, in a voice
that was heard in the remotest parts of the ship.
The shout that burst from the seamen, appeared
to lift the decks of the vessel, and the affrighted
frigate trembled like an aspen, with the recoil of
her own massive artillery, that shot forth a single
sheet of flame, the sailors having disregarded, in
their impatience, the usual order of firing. The
effect of the broadside on the enemy was still more
dreadful, for a death-like silence succeeded to the
roar of the guns, which was only broken by the
shrieks and execrations that burst from her, like the
moanings of the dammed. During the few moments in
which the Americans were again loading their
cannon, and the English were recovering from
their confusion, the vessel of the former moved slowly
past her antagonist, and was already doubling
across her bows, when the latter was suddenly,
and, considering the inequality of their forces, it
may be added desperately, headed into her enemy.
The two frigates grappled. The sudden and furious
charge made by the Englishman, as he threw his
masses of daring seamen along his bowsprit, and
out of his channels, had nearly taken Griffith by
surprise; but Manual, who had delivered his first
fire with the broadside, now did good service, by
ordering his men to beat back the intruders, by a
steady and continued discharge. Even the wary
Pilot lost sight of their other foes, in the high
daring of that moment, and smiles of stern pleasure
were exchanged between him and Griffith, as
“Lash his bowsprit to our mizzen-mast,” shouted
the lieutenant, “and we will sweep his decks as
he lies!”
Twenty men sprang eagerly forward to execute
the order, among the foremost of whom were Boltrope
and the stranger.
“Ay, now he's our own!” cried the busy master,
“and we will take an owner's liberties with
him, and break him up—for by the eternal—”
“Peace, rude man,” said the Pilot, in a voice of
solemn remonstrance; “at the next instant you
may face your God; mock not his awful name!”
The master found time, before he threw himself
from the spar, to the deck of the frigate again, to
cast a look of amazement at his companion, who,
with a steady mien, but with an eye that lighted
with a warrior's ardour, viewed the battle that
raged around him, like one who marked its progress,
to control the result.
The sight of the Englishmen, rushing onward
with shouts, and bitter menaces, warmed the blood
of Col. Howard, who pressed to the side of the
frigate, and encouraged his friends, by his gestures
and voice, to come on.
“Away with ye, old croaker!” cried the master,
seizing him by the collar; “away with ye to the
hold, or I'll order you fired from a gun.”
“Down with your arms, rebelliousdog!” shouted
the colonel, carried beyond himself by the ardour
of the fray; “down to the dust, and implore
the mercy of your injured prince!”
Invigorated by a momentary glow, the veteran
grappled with his brawny antagonist, but the issue
of the short struggle was yet suspended, when the
English, driven back by the fire of the marines, and
presented, retreated to the forecastle of their own
ship, and attempted to return the deadly blows they
were receiving in their hull from the cannon
that Barnstable directed. A solitary gun was all
they could bring to bear on the Americans,
but this, loaded with cannister, was fired so
near as to send its glaring flame into the very
faces of their enemies. The yielding colonel,
who was already sinking beneath the arm of his
foe, felt the rough grasp loosen from his throat,
and the two combatants sunk powerless on their
knees, facing each other.
“How now, brother!” exclaimed Boltrope, with
a smile of grim fierceness; “some of that grist has
gone to your mill, ha!”
No answer could, however be given, before the
yielding forms of both fell to the deck, where they
lay helpless, amid the din of the battle and the
wild confusion of the eager combatants.
Notwithstanding the furious struggle they witnessed,
the elements did not cease their functions;
and urged by the breeze, and lifted irresistibly
on a wave, the American ship was forced
through the water still further across the bows of
her enemy. The idle fastenings of hemp and iron,
were snapped asunder, like strings of tow, and
Griffith saw his own ship borne away from the
Englishman at the instant that the bowsprit
of the latter was torn from its lashings, and tumbled
into the sea, followed by spar after spar, until
nothing of all her proud tackling was remaining,
but the few parted and useless ropes that were left
dangling along the stumps of her lower masts.
As his own stately vessel moved from the confusion
she had caused, and left the dense cloud of smoke
in which her helpless antagonist lay, the eye of
horizon, where he now remembered he had more foes
to contend against.
“We have shaken off the thirty-two most happily!”
he said to the Pilot, who followed his motions
with singular interest; “but here is another fellow
sheering in for us, who shows as many ports as
ourselves, and who appears inclined for a closer
interview; besides the hull of the Ninety is rising
again, and I fear she will be down but too soon!”
“We must keep the use of our braces and sails,”
returned the Pilot. “and on no account close with
the other frigate—we must play a double game, sir,
and fight this new adversary with our heels as well
as with our guns.”
“ 'Tis time then that we were busy, for he is
shortening sail, and as he nears so fast we may
expect to hear from him every minute; what do
you propose, sir?
“Let him gather in his canvass,” returned the
Pilot, “and when he thinks himself snug, we can
throw out a hundred men at once upon our yards
and spread every thing alow and aloft; we may
then draw ahead of him by surprise; if we can once
get him in our wake I have no fears of dropping
them all.”
“A stern chace is a long chase,” cried Griffith,
and the thing may do! Clear up the decks, here,
and carry down the wounded; and as we have
our hands full, the poor fellows who have done
with us, must go overboard at once.”
This melancholy duty was instantly attended to,
while the young seaman who commanded the frigate
returned to his duty, with the absorbed air of
one who felt all its responsibility. His occupations,
however, did not prevent his hearing the sounds of
Barnstable's voice, calling eagerly to young Merry.
Bending his head towards the sound, Griffith beheld
his friend, looking anxiously up the main
off, and his shirt bespattered with human blood—
“Tell me, boy,” he said, “is Mr. Griffith untouched?
They say that a shot came in upon the quarter
deck that tripped up the heels of half a dozen.”
Before Merry could answer, the eyes of Barnstable,
which even while he spoke were scanning the
state of the vessel's rigging, encountered the kind
looks of Griffith, and from that moment perfect
harmony was restored between the friends.
“Ah! you are there Griff. and with a whole skin,
I see,” cried Barnstable, smiling with pleasure;”
“they have passed poor Boltrope down into one
of his own store-rooms! If that fellow's bowsprit
had held on ten minutes longer, what a mark I
should have made on his face and eyes!”
“ 'Tis perhaps best as it is,” returned Griffith;
“but what have you done with those whom we are
bound to protect?
Barnstable made a significant gesture towards
the depths of the vessel as he answered—
“On the cables; safe as wood, iron, and water
can keep them—though Katherine has had her
head up three times to—”
A summons from the Pilot drew Griffith away,
and the young officers were compelled to forget
their individual feelings, in the pressing duties of
their stations.
The ship which the American frigate had now
to oppose, was a vessel of near her own size and
equipage, and when Griffith looked at her again,
he perceived that she had made her preparations
to assert her equality in manful fight.
Her sails had been gradually reduced to the
usual quantity, and, by certain movements on her
decks, the lieutenant and his constant attendant the
Pilot, well understood that she only wanted to
the action.
“Now spread every thing,” whispered the
stranger.
Griffith applied the trumpet to his mouth, and
shouted in a voice that was carried even to his
enemy—“Let fall—out with your booms—sheet
home, and hoist away every thing!”
The inspiriting cry was answered by a universal
bustle; fifty men flew out on the dizzy heights of
the different spars, while broad sheets of canvass
rose as suddenly along the masts, as if some mighty
bird were spreading its wings. The Englishman instantly
perceived his mistake, and he answered the
artifice by a roar of artillery. Griffith watched the
effects of the broadside with an absorbing interest,
as the shot whistled above his head, but when he
perceived his masts untouched and the few unimportant
ropes only that were cut, he replied to the
uproar with a burst of pleasure. A few men were
however seen clinging with wild frenzy to the cordage,
dropping from rope to rope like wounded
birds fluttering through a tree, until they fell
heavily into the ocean, the sullen ship sweeping by
them, in cold indifference. At the next instant the
spars and masts of their enemy exhibited a display
of men similar to their own, when Griffith again
placed the trumpet to his mouth, and called aloud:
“Give it to them; drive them from their yards,
boys; scatter them with your grape—unreeve
their rigging!”
The crew of the American wanted but little encouragement
to enter on this experiment with hearty
good will, and the close of his cheering words were
uttered amid the deafening roar of his own cannon.
The Pilot had, however, mistaken the skill and readiness
of their foe, for notwithstanding the disadvantageous
increased his sail, the duty was steadily and dexterously
performed.
The two ships were now running rapidly on
parallel lines, hurling at each other their instruments
of destruction, with furious industry, and
with severe and certain loss to both, though with no
manifest advantage in favour of either. Both Griffith
and the Pilot witnessed with deep concern
this unexpected defeat of their hopes, for they could
not conceal from themselves, that each moment lessened
their velocity through the water, as the shot
of their enemy, stripped the canvass from the yards,
or dashed aside the lighter spars in their terrible
progress.
“We find our equal here!” said Griffith to the
stranger. “The Ninety is heaving up again, like
a mountain, and if we continue to shorten sail at
this rate, she will soon be upon us!”
“You say true, sir,” returned the Pilot, musing;
“the man shows judgment as well as spirit; but—”
He was interrupted by Merry, who rushed from
the forward part of the vessel, his whole face betokening
the eagerness of his spirit, and the importance
of his intelligence—
“The breakers!” he cried, when nigh enough
to be heard amid the din; “we are running dead
on a ripple, and the sea is white not two hundred
yards ahead!”
“The Pilot jumped on a gun, and bending to
catch a glimpse through the smoke, he shouted,
in those clear, piercing tones, that could be even
heard among the roaring of the cannon. “Port, port
your helm! we are on the Devil's Grip! pass up
the trumpet, sir; port your helm, fellow; give it
them, boys—give it to the proud English dogs!”
Griffith unhesitatingly relinquished the symbol of
quick eye of the Pilot, and gathering assurance
from the high confidence he read in the countenance
of the stranger. The seamen were too busy
with their cannon and their rigging to regard the
new danger, and the frigate entered one of the
dangerous passes of the shoals, in the heat of a
severely contested battle. The wondering looks
of a few of the older sailors glanced at the sheets
of foam that flew by them, in doubt whether the
wild gambols of the waves were occasioned by the
shot of the enemy, when suddenly the noise of cannon
was succeeded by the sullen wash of the disturbed
element, and presently the vessel glided out of
her smoky shroud, and was boldly steering in the
centre of the narrow passages. For ten breathless
minutes longer the Pilot continued to hold an uninterrupted
sway, during which the vessel ran swiftly
by ripples and breakers, by streaks of foam and
darker passages of deep water, when he threw down
his trumpet and exclaimed—
“What threatened to be our destruction has
proved our salvation!—keep yonder hill crowned
with wood, one point open from the church tower
at its base, and steer east and by north; you will
run through these shoals on that course in an hour,
and by so doing, you will gain five leagues of
your enemy, who will have to double their tail.”
The moment he stepped from the gun, the Pilot
lost the air of authority that had so singularly
distinguished his animated form, and even the close
interest he had manifested in the incidents of the
day, became lost in the cold, settled reserve he had
affected during his intercourse with his present associates.
Every officer in the ship, after the
breathless suspense of uncertainty had passed,
rushed to those places where a view might be
steering boldly onward, and had already approached
the Two-and-thirty, which lay, a helpless
wreck, rolling on the unruly seas, that were
rudely tossing her on their wanton billows. The
frigate last engaged was running along the edge of
the ripple, with her torn sails flying loosely in the
air, her ragged spars tottering in the breeze, and
every thing above her hull exhibiting the confusion
of a sudden and unlooked-for check to her
progress. The exulting taunts and mirthful congratulations
of the seamen, as they gazed at the
English ships, were, however, soon forgotten in the
attention that was required to their own vessel.
The drums beat the retreat, the guns were lashed,
the wounded again removed, and every individual,
able to keep the deck, was required to lend his
assistance in repairing the damages of the frigate
and securing her masts.
The promised hour carried the ship safely
through all the dangers, which were much lessened
by daylight, and by the time the sun had begun to
fall over the land, Griffith, who had not quitted
the deck during the day, beheld his vessel once
more cleared of the confusion of the chase and battle,
and ready to meet another foe. At this period
he was summoned to the cabin, at the request of
the ship's chaplain. Delivering the charge of the
frigate to Barnstable, who had been his active assistant,
no less in their subsequent labours than
in the combat, he hastily devested himself of the
vestiges of the fight, and proceeded to obey the
repeated and earnest call.
| CHAPTER XV The pilot | |