 | CHAPTER XII. The Red Rover |  |
12. CHAPTER XII.
—“Good: Speak to the mariners: Fall to't yarely, or we run
ourselves aground.”
—Tempest.
A GOOD deal of the day had been wasted during
the time occupied by the scenes just related. The
breeze had come in steady, but far from fresh. So
soon, however, as Wilder found himself left without
the molestation of idlers from the shore, and the busy
interposition of the consignee, he cast his eyes about
him, with the intention of immediately submitting
the ship to its power. Sending for the pilot, he communicated
his determination, and withdrew himself
to a part of the deck whence he might take a proper
survey of the materials of his new command, and
where he might reflect on the unexpected and extraordinary
situation in which he found himself.
The “Royal Caroline” was not entirely without
pretensions to the lofty name she bore. She was a
vessel of that happy size in which comfort and convenience
had been equally consulted. The letter of
the Rover affirmed she had a reputation for her
speed; and her young and intelligent Commander
saw, with great inward satisfaction, that she was not
destitute of the means of enabling him to exhibit all
her finest properties. A healthy, active, and skilful
crew, justly proportioned spars, little top-hamper,
and an excellent trim, with a superabundance of light
sails, offered all the advantages his experience could
suggest. His eye lighted, as it glanced rapidly over
these several particulars of his command, and his
lips moved like those of a man who uttered an inward
self-gratulation, or who indulged in some vaunt,
that propriety suggested should go no farther than his
own thoughts.
By this time, the crew, under the orders of the
heaving-in upon the cable. The labour was
of a nature to exhibit their individual powers, as well
as their collective force, to the greatest advantage.
Their motion was simultaneous, quick, and full of
muscle. The cry was clear and cheerful. As if
to feel his influence, our adventurer lifted his own
voice, amid the song of the mariners, in one of those
sudden and inspiriting calls with which a sea officer
is wont to encourage his people. His utterance was
deep, animated, and full of authority. The seamen
started like mettled coursers when they first hear
the signal, each man casting a glance behind him, as
though he would scan the qualities of his new superior.
Wilder smiled, like one satisfied with his success;
and, turning to pace the quarter-deck, he found
himself once more confronted by the calm, considerate,
but certainly astonished eye of Mrs Wyllys.
“After the opinions you were pleased to express
of this vessel,” said the lady, in a manner of the
coldest irony, “I did not expect to find you filling a
place of such responsibility here.”
“You probably knew, Madam,” returned the
young mariner, “that a sad accident had happened
to her Master?”
“I did; and I had heard that another officer had
been found, temporarily, to supply his place. Still,
I should presume, that, on reflection, you will not
think it remarkable I am amazed in finding who this
person is.”
“Perhaps, Madam, you may have conceived, from
our conversations, an unfavourable opinion of my
professional skill. But I hope that on this head you
will place your mind at ease; for”—
“You are doubtless a master of the art! it would
seem, at least, that no trifling danger can deter you
from seeking proper opportunities to display this
knowledge. Are we to have the pleasure of your
us at the mouth of the port?”
“I am engaged to conduct the ship to the end of
her voyage.”
“We may then hope that the danger you either
saw or imagined is lessened in your judgment, otherwise
you would not be so ready to encounter it in
our company.”
“You do me injustice, Madam,” returned Wilder,
with warmth, glancing his eye unconsciously towards
the grave, but deeply attentive Gertrude, as
he spoke; “there is no danger that I would not
cheerfully encounter, to save you, or this young lady,
from harm.”
“Even this young lady must be sensible of your
chivalry!” Then, losing the constrained manner
with which, until now, she had maintained the discourse,
in one more natural, and one far more in
consonance with her usually mild and thoughtful
mien, Mrs Wyllys continued, “You have a powerful
advocate, young man, in the unaccountable interest
which I feel in your truth; an interest that my reason
would fain condemn. As the ship must need your
services, I will no longer detain you. Opportunities
cannot be wanting to enable us to judge both of your
inclination and ability to serve us. Gertrude, my
love, females are usually considered as incumbrances
in a vessel; more particularly when there is any delicate
duty to perform, like this before us.”
Gertrude started, blushed, and proceeded, after
her governess, to the opposite side of the quarter-deck,
followed by an expressive look from our adventurer,
which seemed to say, he considered her
presence any thing else but an incumbrance. As
the ladies immediately took a position apart from
every body, and one where they were least in the
way of working the ship, at the same time that they
could command an entire view of all her manœuvres,
communication which he would gladly have continued
until compelled to take the charge of the vessel
from the hands of the pilot. By this time, however,
the anchor was a-weigh, and the seamen were already
actively engaged in the process of making sail. Wilder
lent himself, with feverish excitement, to the
duty; and, taking the words from the officer who was
issuing the necessary orders, he assumed the immediate
superintendence in person.
As sheet after sheet of canvas fell from the yards,
and was distended by the complicated mechanism,
the interest that a seaman ever takes in his vessel
began to gain the ascendancy over all other feelings.
By the time every thing was set, from the royals
down, and the ship was cast with her head towards
the harbour's mouth, our adventurer had probably
forgotten (for the moment only, it is true) that he was
a stranger among those he was in so extraordinary a
manner selected to command, and how precious a
stake was intrusted to his firmness and decision.
After every thing was set to advantage, alow and
aloft, and the ship was brought close upon the wind,
his eye scanned every yard and sail, from the truck
to the hull, and concluded by casting a glance along
the outer side of the vessel, in order to see that not
even the smallest rope was in the water to impede
her progress. A small skiff, occupied by a boy, was
towing under the lee, and, as the mass of the vessel
began to move, it was skipping along the surface of
the water, light and buoyant as a feather. Perceiving
that it was a boat belonging to the shore, Wilder
walked forward, and demanded its owner. A mate
pointed to Joram, who at that moment ascended
from the interior of the vessel, where he had been
settling the balance due from a delinquent, or, what
was in his eyes the same thing, a departing debtor.
The sight of this man recalled Wilder to a recollection
of the whole delicacy of the task he had undertaken
to perform. But the publican, whose ideas appeared
always concentrated when occupied on the subject
of gain, seemed troubled by no particular emotions
at the interview. He approached the young mariner,
and, saluting him by the title of “Captain,”
bade him a good voyage, with those customary wishes
which seamen express, when about to separate on
such an occasion.
“A lucky trip you have made of it, Captain Wilder,”
he concluded, “and I hope your passage will
be short. You'll not be without a breeze this afternoon;
and, by stretching well over towards Montauck,
you'll be able to make such an offing, on the
other tack, as to run the coast down in the morning.
If I am any judge of the weather, the wind will
have more easting in it, than you may happen to
find to your fancy.”
“And how long do you think my voyage is likely
to last?” demanded Wilder, dropping his voice so
low as to reach no ears but those of the publican.
Joram cast a furtive glance aside; and, perceiving
that they were alone, he suffered an expression
of hardened cunning to take possession of a countenance
that ordinarily seemed set in dull, physical
contentment, as he replied, laying a finger on his
nose while speaking,—
“Didn't I tender the consignee a beautiful oath,
master Wilder?”
“You certainly exceeded my expectations with
your promptitude, and”—
“Information!” added the landlord of the `Foul
Anchor,' perceiving the other a little at a loss for a
word; “yes, I have always been remarkable for the
activity of my mind in these small matters; but,
when a man once knows a thing thoroughly, it is a
great folly to spend his breath in too many words.”
“It is certainly a great advantage to be so well
instructed. I suppose you improve your knowledge
to a good account.”
“Ah! bless me, master Wilder, what would become
of us all, in these difficult times, if we did not
turn an honest penny in every way that offers? I
have brought up several fine children in credit, and
it sha'n't be my fault if I don't leave them something
too, besides my good name. Well, well; they
say, `A nimble sixpence is as good as a lazy shilling;'
but give me the man who don't stand shilly-shally
when a friend has need of his good word, or a lift
from his hand. You always know where to find
such a man; as our politicians say, after they have
gone through thick and thin in the cause, be it right
or be it wrong.”
“Very commendable principles! and such as will
surely be the means of exalting you in the world
sooner or later! But you forget to answer my question:
Will the passage be long, or short?”
“Heaven bless you, master Wilder! Is it for a
poor publican, like me, to tell the Master of this
noble ship which way the wind will blow next?
There is the worthy and notable Commander Nichols,
lying in his state-room below, he could do any thing
with the vessel; and why am I to expect that a gentleman
so well recommended as yourself will do
less? I expect to hear that you have made a famous
run, and have done credit to the good word
I have had occasion to say in your favour.”
Wilder execrated, in his heart, the wary cunning
of the rogue with whom he was compelled, for the
moment, to be in league; for he saw plainly that a
determination not to commit himself a tittle further
than he might conceive to be absolutely necessary,
was likely to render Joram too circumspect, to answer
his own immediate wishes. After hesitating a
moment, in order to reflect, he continued hastily,—
“You see that the ship is gathering way too fast
to admit of trifling. You know of the letter I received
this morning?”
“Bless me, Captain Wilder! Do you take me for
a postmaster? How should I know what letters
arrive at Newport, and what stop on the main?”
“As timid a villain as he is thorough!” muttered
the young mariner. “But this much you may surely
say, Am I to be followed immediately? or is it expected
that I should detain the ship in the offing,
under any pretence that I can devise?”
“Heaven keep you, young gentleman! These are
strange questions, to come from one who is fresh off
the sea, to a man that has done no more than look at
it from the land, these five-and-twenty years. According
to my memory, sir, you will keep the ship
about south until you are clear of the islands; and
then you must make your calculations according to
the wind, in order not to get into the Gulf, where,
you know, the stream will be setting you one way,
while your orders say, `Go another.' ”
“Luff! mind your luff, sir!” cried the pilot, in a
stern voice, to the man at the helm; “luff you can;
on no account go to leeward of the slaver!”
Both Wilder and the publican started, as if they
found something alarming in the name of the vessel
just alluded to; and the former pointed to the skiff,
as he said,—
“Unless you wish to go to sea with us, Mr Joram,
it is time your boat held its master.”
“Ay, ay, I see you are fairly under way, and I
must leave you, however much I like your company,”
returned the landlord of the `Foul Anchor,'
bustling over the side, and getting into his skiff in
the best manner he could. “Well, boys, a good time
to ye; a plenty of wind, and of the right sort; a
safe passage out, and a quick return. Cast off.”
His order was obeyed; the light skiff, no longer
course; and, after making a little circuit, it became
stationary, while the mass of the vessel passed on,
with the steadiness of an elephant from whose back
a butterfly had just taken its flight. Wilder followed
the boat with his eyes, for a moment; but his
thoughts were recalled by the voice of the pilot,
who again called, from the forward part of the
ship,—
“Let the light sails lift a little, boy; let her lift;
keep every inch you can, or you'll not weather the
slaver. Luff, I say, sir; luff.”
“The slaver!” muttered our adventurer, hastening
to a part of the ship whence he could command
a view of that important, and to him doubly interesting
ship; “ay, the slaver! it may be difficult, indeed,
to weather upon the slaver!”
He had unconsciously placed himself near Mrs
Wyllys and Gertrude; the latter of whom was leaning
on the rail of the quarter-deck, regarding the
strange vessel at anchor, with a pleasure far from
unnatural to her years and sex.
“You may laugh at me, and call me fickle, and
perhaps credulous, dear Mrs Wyllys,” the unsuspecting
girl cried, just as Wilder had taken the foregoing
position, “but I wish we were well out of this
`Royal Caroline,' and that our passage was to be
made in yonder beautiful ship!”
“It is indeed a beautiful ship!” returned Wyllys;
“but I know not that it would be safer, or more
comfortable, than the one we are in.”
“With what symmetry and order the ropes are
arranged! and how like a bird it floats upon the
water!”
“Had you particularized the duck, the comparison
would have been exactly nautical,” said the
governess, smiling mournfully; “you show capabilities,
my love, to be one day a seaman's wife.”
Gertrude blushed a little; and, turning back her
head to answer in the playful vein of her governess,
her eye met the riveted look of Wilder, fastened on
herself. The colour on her cheek deepened to a
carnation, and she was mute; the large gipsy hat
she wore serving to conceal both her face and the
confusion which so deeply suffused it.
“You make no answer, child, as if you reflected
seriously on the chances,” continued Mrs Wyllys,
whose thoughtful and abstracted mien, however,
sufficiently proved she scarcely knew what she uttered.
“The sea is too unstable an element for my taste,”
Gertrude coldly answered. “Pray tell me, Mrs
Wyllys, is the vessel we are approaching a King's
ship? She has a warlike, not to say a threatening
exterior.”
“The pilot has twice called her a slaver.”
“A slaver! How deceitful then is all her beauty
and symmetry! I will never trust to appearances
again, since so lovely an object can be devoted to
so vile a purpose.”
“Deceitful indeed!” exclaimed Wilder aloud, under
an impulse that he found as irresistible as it was
involuntary. “I will take upon myself to say, that
a more treacherous vessel does not float the ocean
than yonder finely proportioned and admirably equipped”—
“Slaver,” added Mrs Wyllys, who had time to
turn, and to look all her astonishment, before the
young man appeared disposed to finish his own sentence.
“Slaver;” he said with emphasis, bowing at the
same time, as if he would thank her for the word.
After this interruption, a profound silence occurred.
Mrs Wyllys studied the disturbed features of
the young man, for a moment, with a countenance
that denoted a singular, though a complicated, interest;
deeply occupied with intense, if not painful reflection.
The light symmetrical form of Gertrude continued
leaning on the rail, it is true, but Wilder was
unable to catch another glimpse of her averted and
shadowed lineaments. In the mean while, events,
that were of a character to withdraw his attention
entirely from even so pleasing a study, were hastening
to their accomplishment.
The ship had, by this time, passed between the
little island and the point whence Homespun had
embarked, and might now be said to have fairly left
the inner harbour. The slaver lay directly in her
track, and every man in the vessel was gazing with
deep interest, in order to see whether they might yet
hope to pass on her weather-beam. The measure
was desirable; because a seaman has a pride in keeping
on the honourable side of every thing he encounters,
but chiefly because, from the position of the
stranger, it would be the means of preventing the
necessity of tacking before the “Caroline” should
reach a point more advantageous for such a manœuvre.
The reader will, however, readily understand
that the interest of her new Commander took its
rise in far different feelings from those of professional
pride, or momentary convenience.
Wilder felt, in every nerve, the probability that a
crisis was at hand. It will be remembered that he
was profoundly ignorant of the immediate intentions
of the Rover. As the fort was not in a state for
present service, it would not be difficult for the latter
to seize upon his prey in open view of the townsmen,
and bear it off, in contempt of their feeble
means of defence. The position of the two ships
was favourable to such an enterprise. Unprepared,
and unsuspecting, the “Caroline,” at no time a
match for her powerful adversary, must fall an easy
victim; nor would there be much reason to apprehend
them, before the captor, and his prize, would be at
such a distance as to render the blow next to impotent,
if not utterly innocuous. The wild and audacious
character of such an enterprise was in full accordance
with the reputation of the desperate freebooter,
on whose caprice, alone, the act now seemed
solely to depend.
Under these impressions, and with the prospect
of such a speedy termination to his new-born authority,
it is not to be considered wonderful that our adventurer
awaited the result with an interest far exceeding
that of any of those by whom he was surrounded.
He walked into the waist of the ship,
and endeavoured to read the plan of his secret confederates,
by some of those indications that are familiar
to a seaman. Not the smallest sign of any
intention to depart, or in any manner to change her
position, was, however, discoverable in the pretended
slaver. She lay in the same deep, beautiful, but
treacherous quiet, as that in which she had reposed
throughout the whole of the eventful morning. But
a solitary individual could be seen amid the mazes
of her rigging, or along the wide reach of all her
spars. It was a seaman seated on the extremity of
a lower yard, where he appeared to busy himself
with one of those repairs that are so constantly required
in the gear of a large ship. As the man was
placed on the weather side of his own vessel, Wilder
instantly conceived the idea that he was thus stationed
to cast a grapnel into the rigging of the “Caroline,”
should such a measure become necessary, in
order to bring the two ships foul of each other.
With a view to prevent so rude an encounter, he instantly
determined to defeat the plan. Calling to the
pilot, he told him the attempt to pass to windward
was of very doubtful success, and reminded him that
the safer way would be to go to leeward.
“No fear, no fear, Captain,” returned the stubborn
conductor of the ship, who, as his authority
was so brief, was only the more jealous of its unrestrained
exercise, and who, like an usurper of the
throne, felt a jealousy of the more legitimate power
which he had temporarily dispossessed; “no fear of
me, Captain. I have trolled over this ground oftener
than you have crossed the ocean, and I know the
name of every rock on the bottom, as well as the
town-crier knows the streets of Newport. Let her
luff, boy; luff her into the very eye of the wind;
luff, you can”—
“You have the ship shivering as it is, sir,” said
Wilder, sternly: “Should you get us foul of the slaver,
who is to pay the cost?”
“I am a general underwriter,” returned the opinionated
pilot; “my wife shall mend every hole I
make in your sails, with a needle no bigger than a
hair, and with such a palm as a fairy's thimble!”
“This is fine talking, sir, but you are already
losing the ship's way; and, before you have ended
your boasts, she will be as fast in irons as a condemned
thief. Keep the sails full, boy; keep them a rap
full, sir.”
“Ay, ay, keep her a good full,” echoed the pilot,
who, as the difficulty of passing to windward became
at each instant more obvious, evidently began to waver
in his resolution. “Keep her full-and-by,—I
have always told you full-and-by,—I don't know,
Captain, seeing that the wind has hauled a little, but
we shall have to pass to leeward yet; but you will
acknowledge, that, in such case, we shall be obliged
to go about.”
Now, in point of fact, the wind, though a little
lighter than it had been, was, if any thing, a trifle more
favourable; nor had Wilder ever, in any manner,
denied that the ship would not have to tack, some
twenty minutes sooner, by going to leeward of the
experiment of passing on the more honourable
side; but, as the vulgarest minds are always the
most reluctant to confess their blunders, the discomfited
pilot was disposed to qualify the concession he
found himself compelled to make, by some salvo of
the sort, that he might not lessen his reputation for
foresight, among his auditors.
“Keep her away at once,” cried Wilder, who was
beginning to change the tones of remonstrance for
those of command; “keep the ship away, sir, while
you have room to do it, or, by the”—
His lips became motionless; for his eye happened
to fall on the pale, speaking, and anxious countenance
of Gertrude.
“I believe it must be done, seeing that the wind
is hauling. Hard up, boy, and run her under the
stern of the ship at anchor. Hold! keep your luff
again; eat into the wind to the bone, boy; lift again;
let the light sails lift. The slaver has run a warp
directly across our track. If there's law in the
Plantations, I'll have her Captain before the Courts
for this!”
“What means the fellow?” demanded Wilder,
jumping hastily on a gun, in order to get a better
view.
His mate pointed to the lee-quarter of the other
vessel, where, sure enough, a large rope was seen
whipping the water, as though in the very process of
being extended. The truth instantly flashed on the
mind of our young mariner. The Rover lay secretly
moored with a spring, with a view to bring his
guns more readily to bear upon the battery, should
his defence become necessary, and he now profited,
by the circumstance, in order to prevent the trader
from passing to leeward. The whole arrangement
excited a good deal of surprise, and not a few execrations
among the officers of the “Caroline;” though
of the real reason why the kedge had thus been laid,
and why a warp was so awkwardly stretched across
their path. Of the whole number, the pilot alone
saw cause to rejoice in the circumstance. He had,
in fact, got the ship in such a situation, as to render
it nearly as difficult to proceed in one way as in the
other; and he was now furnished with a sufficient
justification, should any accident occur, in the course
of the exceedingly critical manœuvre, from whose
execution there was now no retreat.
“This is an extraordinary liberty to take in the
mouth of a harbour,” muttered Wilder, when his
eyes put him in possession of the fact just related.
“You must shove her by to windward, pilot; there
is no remedy.”
“I wash my hands of the consequences, as I call
all on board to witness,” returned the other, with
the air of a deeply offended man, though secretly
glad of the appearance of being driven to the very
measure he was a minute before so obstinately bent
on executing. “Law must be called in here, if
sticks are snapped, or rigging parted. Luff to a hair,
boy; luff her short into the wind, and try a halfboard.”
The man at the helm obeyed the order. Releasing
his hold of its spokes, the wheel made a quick
evolution; and the ship, feeling a fresh impulse of
the wind, turned her head heavily towards the quarter
whence it came, the canvas fluttering with a
noise like that produced by a flock of water-fowl
just taking wing. But, met by the helm again, she
soon fell off as before, powerless from having lost
her way, and settling bodily down toward the fancied
slaver, impelled by the air, which seemed, however,
to have lost much of its force, at the critical instant
it was most needed.
The situation of the “Caroline” was one which
so far ahead as to lie directly on the weather-beam
of the stranger, but too near to enable her to fall-off
in the least, without imminent danger that the vessels
would come foul. The wind was inconstant,
sometimes blowing in puffs, while at moments there
was a perfect lull. As the ship felt the former, her
tall masts bent gracefully towards the slaver, as if
to make the parting salute; but, relieved from the
momentary pressure of the inconstant air, she as
often rolled heavily to windward, without advancing
a foot. The effect of each change, however, was
to bring her still nigher to her dangerous neighbour,
until it became evident, to the judgment of the
youngest seaman in the vessel, that nothing but a
sudden shift of wind could enable her to pass ahead,
the more especially as the tide was on the change.
As the inferior officers of the “Caroline” were
not delicate in their commentaries on the dulness
which had brought them into so awkward and so
mortifying a position, the pilot endeavoured to conceal
his own vexation, by the number and vociferousness
of his orders. From blustering, he soon
passed into confusion, until the men themselves stood
idle, not knowing which of the uncertain and contradictory
mandates they received ought to be first
obeyed. In the mean time, Wilder had folded his
arms with an appearance of entire composure, and
taken his station near his female passengers. Mrs
Wyllys closely studied his eye, with the wish of
ascertaining, by its expression, the nature and extent
of their danger, if danger there might be, in
the approaching collision of two ships in water that
was perfectly smooth, and where one was stationary,
and the motion of the other scarcely perceptible.
The stern, determined look she saw settling about
the brow of the young man excited an uneasiness
that she would not otherwise have felt, perhaps, under
vivid appearance of hazard.
“Have we aught to apprehend, sir?” demanded
the governess, endeavouring to conceal from her
charge the nature of her own disquietude.
“I told you, Madam, the `Caroline' would prove
an unlucky ship.”
Both females regarded the peculiarly bitter smile
with which Wilder made this reply as an evil omen,
and Gertrude clung to her companion as to one on
whom she had long been accustomed to lean.
“Why do not the mariners of the slaver appear,
to assist us—to keep us from coming too nigh?” anxiously
exclaimed the latter.
“Why do they not, indeed! but we shall see them,
I think, ere long.”
“You speak and look, young man, as if you
thought there would be danger in the interview!”
“Keep near to me,” returned Wilder, in tones
that were nearly smothered by the manner in which
he compressed his lips. “In every event, keep as
nigh my person as possible.”
“Haul the spanker-boom to windward,” shouted
the pilot; “lower away the boats, and tow the
ship's head round—clear away the stream anchor—
aft gib-sheet—board main tack, again.”
The astonished men stood like statues, not knowing
whither to turn, some calling to the rest to do
this or that, and some as loudly countermanding the
order; when an authoritative voice was heard calmly
to say,—
“Silence in the ship.”
The tones were of that sort which, while they
denote the self-possession of the speaker, never fail
to inspire the inferior with a portion of the confidence
of him who commands. Every face was turned
towards the quarter of the vessel whence the
sound proceeded, as if each ear was ready to catch
on the head of the capstan, where he could command
a full view on every side of him. With a quick
and understanding glance, he had made himself a
perfect master of the situation of his ship. His eye
was at the instant fixed anxiously on the slaver, as if
it would pierce the treacherous calm which still
reigned on all about her, in order to know how far
his exertions might be permitted to be useful. But
it appeared as if the stranger lay like some enchanted
vessel on the water, not a human form even appearing
about all her complicated machinery, except
the seaman already named, who still continued his
employment, as though the “Caroline” was not within
a hundred miles of the place where he sat. The
lips of Wilder moved: it might be in bitterness; it
might be in satisfaction; for, a smile of the most
equivocal nature lighted his features, as he continued,
in the same deep, commanding voice as before,—
“Throw all aback—lay every thing flat to the
masts, forward and aft.”
“Ay!” echoed the pilot, “lay every thing flat to
the masts.”
“Is there a shove-boat alongside the ship?” demanded
our adventurer.
The answer, from a dozen voices, was in the affirmative.
“Show that pilot into her.”
“This is an unlawful order,” exclaimed the other;
“and I forbid any voice but mine to be obeyed.”
“Throw him in,” sternly repeated Wilder.
Amid the bustle and exertion of bracing round the
yards, the resistance of the pilot produced little or
no sensation. He was soon raised on the extended
arms of the two mates; and, after exhibiting his
limbs in sundry contortions in the air, he was dropped
into the boat, with as little ceremony as though
he had been a billet of wood. The end of the
guide was left, with singular indifference, to his
own meditations.
In the mean time, the order of Wilder had been
executed. Those vast sheets of canvas which, a
moment before, had been either fluttering in the air,
or were bellying inward or outward, as they touched
or filled, as it is technically called, were now all
pressing against their respective masts, impelling the
vessel to retrace her mistaken path. The manœuvre
required the utmost attention, and the nicest delicacy
in its direction. But her young Commander proved
himself, in every particular, competent to his task.
Here, a sail was lifted; there, another was brought
with a flatter surface to the air; now, the lighter
canvas was spread; and now it disappeared, like
thin vapour suddenly dispelled by the sun. The
voice of Wilder, throughout, though calm, was breathing
with authority. The ship itself seemed, like an
animated being, conscious that her destinies were
reposed in different, and more intelligent, hands than
before. Obedient to the new impulse they had received,
the immense cloud of canvas, with all its tall
forest of spars and rigging, rolled to and fro; and
then, having overcome the state of comparative rest
in which it had been lying, the vessel heavily yielded
to the pressure, and began to recede.
Throughout the whole of the time necessary to
extricate the “Caroline,” the attention of Wilder
was divided between his own ship and his inexplicable
neighbour. Not a sound was heard to issue from
the imposing and death-like stillness of the latter.
Not a single anxious countenance, not even one lurking
eye, was to be detected, at any of the numerous
outlets by which the inmates of an armed vessel can
look abroad upon the deep. The seaman on the
yard continued his labour, like a man unconscious
of any thing but his own existence. There was,
in the ship itself, which was apparently made,
like the lazy movement of a slumbering whale, more
by listless volition, than through any agency of human
hands.
Not the smallest of these changes escaped the
keen and understanding examination of Wilder. He
saw, that, as his own ship retired, the side of the
slaver was gradually exposed to the “Caroline.”
The muzzles of the threatening guns gaped constantly
on his vessel, as the eye of the crouching tiger
follows the movement of its prey; and at no time,
while nearest, did there exist a single instant that
the decks of the latter ship could not have been
swept, by a general discharge from the battery of the
former. At each successive order issued from his
own lips, our adventurer turned his eye, with increasing
interest, to ascertain whether he would be permitted
to execute it; and never did he feel certain
that he was left to the sole management of the “Caroline”
until he found that she had backed from her
dangerous proximity to the other; and that, obedient
to a new disposition of her sails, she was falling off,
before the light air, in a place where he could hold
her entirely at command.
Finding that the tide was getting unfaourable,
and the wind too light to stem it, the sails were then
drawn to her yards in festoons, and an anchor was
dropped to the bottom.
| CHAPTER XII. The Red Rover | |