Chapter III: Part 3

While at Havre de Grâce, in the summer of 1797, engaged in making preparations for pursuing the voyage, I had the mortification to learn, by letters from my employer, that some derangement had occurred in his affairs, which made it necessary to abandon the Mocha enterprise, and to place in his hands, with the least possible delay, the funds destined for that object. Among the numerous commercial adventures, in which our merchants, at that time, had been engaged to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, no voyage had been undertaken to Mocha. To be the first, therefore, in an untried adventure was highly gratifying to my ambition; and my disappointment was proportionately great when compelled to relinquish it. To have detained the vessel in France, while waiting the slow progress of the sale of the cargo, would have been injudicious; and she was therefore despatched for home, under charge of the mate, William Webb, of Salem.

Being thus relieved from the necessity of an immediate return to the United States, I flattered myself, that, even with the very contracted means which I possessed, I might still engage, with a little assistance, and on a very humble scale, in some enterprise to the Isle of France and India. When, therefore, I had accomplished the business with which I had been charged, by remitting to the owner in Salem his property with me, I began earnestly to put to the test the practicability of the object of which I was so desirous. A coincidence of favorable and very encouraging circumstances aided my views. A friend of mine had become proprietor of a little cutter of thirty-eight tons burden, which had been a packet between Dover and Calais. This vessel had been taken for a debt; and the owner, not knowing what to do with her, offered her to me for a reasonable price, and to pay when I had the ability. This credit would enable me to put all my capital in the cargo, excepting what was required for coppering and fitting the cutter for the contemplated voyage, about five hundred dollars; leaving me fifteen hundred to be invested in the cargo. On making known to others of my friends the plan of my voyage, two of them engaged to embark to the amount of a thousand dollars each, on condition of sharing equally the profits at the end of the voyage. Having become proprietor of the cutter, which, with all additional expenses, cost, ready for sea, about one thousand dollars, an investment of articles best suited to the market of the Isle of France, was purchased to the amount of three thousand five hundred dollars; making vessel and cargo amount to four thousand five hundred. It is not probable that the annals of commerce can furnish another example of an Indiaman and cargo being fitted and expedited on so humble a scale.

I had now the high gratification of uncontrolled action. An innate love of independence, an impatience of restraint, an aversion to responsibility, and a desire to have no other limits to my wanderings than the globe itself, reconciled me to the endurance of fatigues and privations, which I knew to be the unavoidable consequence of navigating in so frail a bark, rather than to possess the comparative ease and comfort, coupled with the restraint and responsibility, which the command of a fine ship belonging to another would present.

As there are, doubtless, many persons, not excepting those, even, who are familiar with commercial and maritime affairs, who will view this enterprise as very hazardous from sea risk, and as offering but a very small prospect of emolument, it is proper, so far as I am able, to do away with such impressions by briefly stating the object I had in view. On my late voyage to the Isle of Bourbon, I had perceived a great deficiency in the number of vessels requisite for the advantageous conveyance of passengers and freight to and from the Isles of France and Bourbon. If my cutter had been built expressly for the purpose, she could not have been more suitable. With a large and beautifully finished cabin, where passengers would be more comfortably accommodated than in many vessels of greater dimensions; with but small freighting room, and requiring, therefore, but little time to load, and of greater speed in sailing than the generality of merchant vessels, I had no doubt of being able to sell her there for more than double the cost; or I might find it to be more advantageous to employ her in freighting between the islands. In either event, I felt entire confidence in being amply remunerated for the time and risk. On the cargo, composed of such articles as my late experience had proved to be most in demand, I had no doubt of making a profit of from fifty to one hundred per cent on its cost. The proceeds of vessel and cargo, invested in the produce of the island, and shipped to Europe or the United States, would, at that time, have yielded a clear gain of thirty-three and one-third per cent. Thus, in the course of one year, I should make two hundred per cent on the original capital; a result which might be considered abundant compensation for the time it would consume, and should take from the enterprise the character of quixotism, with which it had been stigmatized.

As soon as it became known at Havre, that my destination was the Isle of France, some of my friends, anxious for my safety, and perceiving in the enterprise only the ardor and temerity of inexperienced youth, endeavored to dissuade me from it, by painting to me, in glowing colors, the distress and probable destruction I was preparing for myself and men. But, however friendly and considerate the advice, I felt myself more competent to judge of the risk than they were, and, consequently, disregarded them.

The vessel, being all ready for sea on the 20th of September, 1797, was detained several days by the difficulty of procuring men. Those who were engaged one day would desert the next; and the dangerous character of the enterprise having been discussed and admitted among the seamen in port, I began to be seriously apprehensive, that I might not succeed in procuring a crew. At length, however, with much difficulty, and some additional pay, I succeeded in procuring four men; and, having previously engaged a mate, our number was complete.

To delay proceeding to sea a moment longer than was necessary, would have been incurring a risk of the loss of my men, and the pay I had advanced them. Hence, I was induced to sail when appearances were very inauspicious. A strong north wind was blowing into the bay with such violence as already to have raised a considerable sea; but I flattered myself, that, as the sun declined, it would abate; that, if we could weather Cape Barfleur, we should make a free wind down channel; and that, if this should be found impracticable, we could, at all events, return to Havre Roads, and wait there a more favorable opportunity.

With such impressions, we sailed from Havre on the 25th of September. A great crowd had assembled on the pier head to witness our departure, and cheered us as we passed. It was about noon, and we were under full sail; but we had scarcely been out two hours, when we were obliged to reduce it to a double-reefed mainsail, foresail, and second-sized jib. With the sail even thus diminished, the vessel, at times, almost buried herself; still, as every part of the equipment was new and strong, I flattered myself with being able to weather the Cape, and pressed forward through a sea in which we were continually enveloped, cheered with the hope that we had nothing worse to experience, and that we should soon be relieved by the ability to bear away and make a free wind. I was destined, however, to a sad disappointment; for the wind and sea having increased towards midnight, an extraordinary plunge into a very short and sharp sea completely buried the vessel, and, with a heavy crash, snapped off the bowsprit by the board. The vessel then luffed into the wind, in defiance of the helm, and the first shake of the foresail stripped it from the bolt rope.

No other alternative now presented, than to endeavor to regain the port of Havre; a task, under existing circumstances, of very difficult and doubtful accomplishment. The sea had increased in so great a degree, and ran so sharp, that we were in continual apprehension of having our decks swept. This circumstance, combined with the sea-sickness, which none escaped, retarded and embarrassed the operation of wearing round on the other tack. The violent motion of the vessel had also prevented the possibility of obtaining sleep; indeed, no person had been permitted to go below before the disaster; and none had the disposition to do so afterwards; but all were alert in the performance of their duty, which had for its immediate object the getting of the vessel’s head pointed towards Havre.

This was at length effected; but, as we had no spar suitable for a jury bowsprit, we could carry only such part of our mainsail as was balanced by a jib, set in the place of a foresail. With this sail, we made so much lee way, that it was evident, as soon as daylight enabled me to form a judgment, that we could not reach Havre; nor was it less evident, that nothing but an abatement of the gale could save us from being stranded before night. With the hope of this abatement, the heavens were watched with an intensity of interest more easily imagined than described; but no favorable sign appeared; and before noon we had evidence of being to leeward of the port of Havre. We now cleared away the cables and anchors, and secured with battens the communications with the cabin and forecastle. While thus engaged, the man at the mast head announced the appalling, but expected intelligence, of “breakers under the lee.”

This information had the effect of an electric shock to rouse the crew from that apathy which was a natural consequence of twenty-four hours’ exposure to great fatigue, incessant wet and cold, and want of sleep and food; for we had not been able to cook anything. The rapidity with which we were driven to leeward, soon made the breakers discernible from deck; and they were of such extent, as to leave us no choice, whether we headed east or west; for the forlorn hope of being held by our anchors was all that remained to us. No one on board possessed any knowledge of the shore we were approaching; but our chart denoted it as rocky. It was easy to perceive, that to be thrown among rocks, by such a sea, must be the destruction of us all. Hence it was of the utmost importance to discover, and to anchor off, the part of the shore which appeared to be most free from rocks; and with this view the mate was looking out from the mast head. As he perceived an apparently clear beach east of us, and within our ability of reaching, we steered for it; and when the water was only six fathoms deep, we lowered our sails and came to anchor. But as our anchor dragged, a second was let go, which, for a moment only, brought the vessel head to the sea, when one cable parted; and as we were drifting rapidly with the other, we cut it, then hoisted the jib, and steered directly for the clear space in the beach. Going in with great velocity, on the top of a high breaker, we were soon enveloped in its foam, and in that of several others which succeeded. The vessel, however, notwithstanding she struck the ground with a violence which appeared sufficient to dash her in pieces, still held together, in defiance of this and several minor shocks; and, as the tide was falling, she soon became so still, and the water so shoal, as to enable us to go on shore.

As the alarm gun had been fired, the peasantry had come down in great numbers; and when they perceived us leaving the vessel, they ran into the surf, and, with such demonstrations of humanity and kindness as our forlorn situation was calculated to excite, supported us to the shore, which we had no sooner reached, than they complimented us on the judicious selection we had made of a place to come on shore. And it was now obvious to us, that if we had struck half a mile, either on one side or the other from this spot, there would have been scarce a possibility of saving our lives.

We were fortunate, not only in the selection of the spot, but also in the circumstance of its being nearly high water when the vessel struck. The concurrence of two such circumstances turned the scale in my favor; and immediately after landing I was convinced, that the vessel and cargo, though much damaged, would both be saved. When the tide had so fallen as to leave the vessel dry, the inhabitants showed no disposition to take advantage of our distress, by stipulating for a certain proportion of what they might save, before going to work; but, prompted by their humane feelings, set about discharging the vessel, in such numbers and with such earnestness, that before sunset she was completely unloaded, and the cargo carried above high water mark.

The gale, towards evening, had very much abated, and, before the next high water, was fortunately succeeded by a calm and a great decrease of sea. In the mean time, the leaks, made in the bottom, were stopped, as well as time and circumstances would permit; an anchor was carried as far as the retreat of the tide would admit, and the cable hove taut. Having made these dispositions, I engaged a pilot and a sufficient number of men, to attend, at full tide, to heave the vessel off, and to endeavor to remove her into the river Orme, which was near by. These arrangements being made, I went with my men to an inn, in the neighboring town of Oistreham, to get some refreshment, and to pass the night; compelled by exhaustion to place entire dependence on those who were strangers to us, for getting the vessel afloat, as well as to secure the cargo from being plundered.

Though worn out by fatigue and anxiety, my distress of mind was so great, that I could not sleep. The thoughts, that I had contracted a debt which I might never be able to pay, that no insurance had been effected, that, without credit, I might be compelled to sacrifice what had been saved to defray the expenses incurred, and that my fortune and prospects were ruined, were so incessantly haunting my imagination, that the night rather added to, than diminished my feelings of exhaustion.

The following morning, I found the vessel lying safely in the river Orme; and men were also there, ready to make those temporary repairs which were indispensable to enable us to return to Havre. In the forenoon it was required of me to go to Caen (two or three miles distant) for the purpose of making the customary report to the municipal authorities, which was a business of very little intricacy, and of very speedy accomplishment. An examination of the vessel and cargo satisfied me, that the former could be repaired at very trifling expense, and that the latter was not damaged to much amount. The alacrity to render us assistance, in the people of this place, from the beginning of our disaster, was extended to the period, when, the cargo having been transported to the vessel and re-shipped, we were prepared to return to Havre.

As in cases of vessels stranding, it seems to be a practice, sanctioned by long established usage (particularly on the other side of the channel), to consider the unfortunate as those abandoned by Heaven, from whom may lawfully be taken all that the elements have spared, I was prepared for a demand of salvage to a considerable amount. But in this expectation I found I had done great injustice to these good people; for, on presenting their account, it appeared they had charged no more than for ordinary labor, and that at a very moderate rate. It is a circumstance, also, very creditable to them, that notwithstanding some packages of the cargo, of much value, and of such bulk as to be easily concealed, were in their possession, exclusively, for several days and nights, yet nothing was lost. Although these transactions are of a date so remote, that probably many of the actors therein have “ceased from their earthly labors,” yet I never recall them to mind, without a feeling of compunction that I had not ascertained the names of the principals in the business, and made that public acknowledgment for the disinterested and important services rendered me, which gratitude, no less than justice, demanded. For this omission my perturbed state of mind is my only apology.

With a favorable wind for Havre, we proceeded for that port, where we arrived in about ten days after having sailed from there. The reception I met with at Havre, from my friend James Prince, Esq., of Boston, who was more largely interested in the adventure than any other individual excepting myself, was kind and friendly in the extreme, and tended to counteract the effects of my deep mortification, and to raise my spirits for the prosecution of the original plan. He relieved my anxiety relative to the means of defraying the expenses of repairs, by engaging to provide them. He gave me a room at his house; and while I was ill there (for this I did not escape) he facilitated my recovery by his care and kindness. With such attentions, my health was soon reëstablished, my spirits renewed, and I pursued the repairing and refitting the vessel with my accustomed ardor.

On examination of the cargo, it was found to be very little damaged. The vessel was considerably injured so near the keel, that it was necessary to lay her on blocks, where it was discovered that the lower plank was so much broken that several feet of it would require to be replaced with new. This being accomplished, the other repairs made, and the cargo again put on board, there was nothing to prevent proceeding immediately to sea, excepting a difficulty in procuring men, which seemed to be insurmountable. No one of my former crew, excepting a black man (George), would try it again. We had arrived at the close of the month of November; and each day’s delay, by the advance of winter, increased the difficulty and danger of our enterprise. Indeed, the westerly gales were already of frequent occurrence; the nights had become long, and when I heard the howling winds and beating rain, and recollected in what a frail boat I had to contend with them, I wished that my destiny had marked out for me a task of less difficult accomplishment.

THE PILOT

The hero of Cooper’s stirring sea-tale is a mysterious Pilot known as Mr. Gray, who, during the American Revolution, came aboard the Yankee frigate Alliance one stormy night to guide her in a privateering expedition along the east coast of England. Captain Munson had been intrusted by Congress with the dangerous errand of venturing into the enemy’s own waters in order to capture prize ships and prisoners of war, who were to be held for exchange. Inspired by the Pilot’s presence, the daring Yankee bluejackets captured the British cutter Alacrity, in a sharp contest near the shore. Following this victory, the frigate’s officers in council determined upon an invasion of the enemy’s country. Accordingly, one night a party of officers and marines from the Alliance, headed by the Pilot himself, landed near the abbey of St. Ruth, and after many exciting adventures and narrow escapes, secured as prisoners Captain Borroughcliffe of the king’s service, Colonel Howard, a wealthy Tory recently returned from America, and the latter’s nieces, Cecilia Howard and Katherine Plowden. Before leaving America the girls had become engaged to Griffith and Barnstaple, young lieutenants on this very frigate; and it was to separate them from their Yankee lovers that Colonel Howard had brought his wards to England, guarding them like prisoners at St. Ruth. Moreover, Merry, the midshipman on board the Alliance was the girls’ favorite cousin. They therefore willingly accepted the situation, and were not sorry to be transported to the frigate, preparing to enjoy a sea voyage in pleasant company. But the officers knew that reports of the Yankee cruiser must have spread abroad and that pursuit was to be expected. The following pages describe the narrow escape of the Alliance from a British man-of-war.

THE ESCAPE OF THE AMERICAN FRIGATE ALLIANCE

(From the Pilot.)

By J. F. COOPER.

“Furious press the hostile squadron,
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 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 those symptoms of unbridled humor 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 lieutenant, and the mysterious Pilot. The latter 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, the 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 ships as far south as the Helder!”

“Then we lose this weather tide!” exclaimed the impatient Griffith. “Surely we have the cutter as a lookout! besides, by beating into the fog, we shall lose the enemy, if enemy it be, and is it 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, Captain 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 lieutenant 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 meantime the canvas 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 of St. Ruth. Barnstable, who had resumed his former station in the frigate, as her second lieutenant, was pacing the opposite side of the quarter-deck, 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 then 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 lookout see nothing, Mr. Barnstable?”

The lieutenant of the watch hailed the man aloft, and demanded if anything 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 doubt that the Alacrity was firing signal-guns for 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 vapor 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, sky-sails, 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 canvas, Captain 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 canvas above the fog, might have seen the flag of a vice-admiral 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, Captain Munson, there is nothing short of a ship of the line under that symbol of rank, and that broad show of canvas!”

“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 the decks strewed with pikes, cutlasses, pistols, 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 everything 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 canvas that was rising, in cloud over cloud, far above the fog, and which was manifestly moving, like driving vapor, 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 long taper 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 vapor 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 bristled along the sides of the enemy; “a three-decker! Jack Manly would show his stern to such a fellow! and even the Scotchman would run!”

“Hard up with your helm, quartermaster!” cried Captain 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, sir!”

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 canvas. 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 in opening the immense folds of light duck which were displayed along the whole line of the masts, far beyond 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 gunshot!”

“These nineties are very fast off the wind,” returned the captain, in a low tone, that was intended only for the ears of his first lieutenant 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. Captain 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, as the hurricane of iron hurtled by them, and each eye appeared to gaze in stupid wonder, as if tracing the flight of the swift engines of destruction. But the voice of Captain 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 to be 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 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 maintopmast, that is big enough for a fid! He has let daylight through some of our canvas too; but, taking it by-and-large, the squall has gone over and little harm done. Didn’t I hear something said of Captain Munson getting jammed 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 purpose 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 them in our wake. The English admiral has spread a broad clew, 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 ship of war, steering in a line converging towards themselves, and rapidly drawing nigher; while far in the northeast was a vessel as yet faintly discerned, whose evolutions could not be mistaken by one who understood the movements 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 everything light adrift, endeavor to pass the broadside of the flagship.”

“Provided she left a rag of canvas 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 nothing to boast of left from the fire she has already given; we must stand on, and drop the three-decker as far 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 honor! 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 forth the word as a war-cry, and, believe me, 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 Colonel 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 odor 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, Colonel 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 hand shall do the ignoble deed.”

“Edward Griffith, why not this moment? This is your moment of probation—submit to the clemency of 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 aside your useless weapons, or prepare to meet the 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 prize-fighter about to enter the arena, casting aside the incumbrances of 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 canvas 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 ardor of the seamen, was hardly uttered, before the 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 close 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 the vessel; and those officers who were required to 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 deathlike silence succeeded to the roar of guns, which were only broken by the shrieks and execrations that burst from her, like the moanings of the damned. 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 both comprehended, at a glance, their advantages.

“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 on 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 ardor, viewed the battle that raged around him, like one who marked its progress to control the result.

The sight of the Englishman rushing onward with shouts and bitter menaces, warmed the blood of Colonel 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, rebellious dog!” shouted the colonel, carried beyond himself by the ardor 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 the menacing front that Griffith with his boarders 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 canister, was fired so near as to send its glaring flame into the very faces of their enemies. The struggling colonel, who was already sinking beneath the arm of his foe, felt the rough grasp loosen from his throat at the flash, 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!”