Chapter I: Ravenau De Lussan (3)

To this dangerous river and its merciless falls, these way-worn men trusted themselves on frail rafts, and sank up to their middles in water. Sometimes they were hurried, in spite of all their resistance, into boiling pools, where they were buried with their rafts in the darkness beneath the foam, at others drifted under rocks and against fallen trees. Some tied themselves to their barks. "As for those great falls," says Lussan, "they had, to our good fortunes, at their entrances and goings out, great basins of still water, which gave us the opportunity to get upon the banks of the river, and draw our piperies ashore to take off those things we had laid on them, which were as wet as we were. These we carried with us, leaping from rock to rock, till we came to the end of the fall, from whence one of us afterwards returned to put our pipery into the water, and let her swim along to him who waited for her below. But if he failed to catch hold (by swimming) of those pieces of wood before they got out of the basin below, the violence of the stream would carry them away to rights, and the men were necessitated to go and pick out trees to make another."

The rafts at first went all together for the sake of mutual assistance; but at the end of three days, finding this dangerous, Ravenau de Lussan advised their going in a line apart, so that, if any were carried against the rocks, they might get off before the next pipery arrived, which at first occasioned many disasters. De Lussan, being himself cast away, found much safety in this plan; for, uncording his raft, he straddled upon one piece and his companion upon another, and floated down, till, reaching a place less rapid, they got on land and reconstructed the raft. By his advice, those who went first put up flags at the end of long poles, to give notice on which side to land, not to signal the falls, for their roar could be clearly heard a league off.

During all these dangers the men lived on the bananas that they found growing by the river side, some of which the Indians had sown, and others floated down and self-planted during the inundations. The horse-flesh they had brought the water had spoiled, compelling them to throw it away after two days; and although game abounded on the land, they could kill none, for their arms were continually wet and their ammunition all damaged.

It was at this crisis the conspirators we have before mentioned chose to carry out their cruel plot. Hiding behind some rocks, they killed and plundered five Englishmen, who were known to be rich. Lussan whose raft came last of all, and followed the English float, found their bodies, and thanked God he had given others his treasure to carry. When the Buccaneers were all met together, lower down the river, Lussan told them of the murder, of which they had not heard, but the murderers were seen no more. On the 20th of February the river grew wider, slower, and deeper, the falls ceased, but the stream was encumbered with trees and bamboos, drifted together by the floods. These snags frequently overturned the rafts, but the water being, though deeper, much slower, none were drowned. Some leagues further, the stream became gentle and free from all impediment, and they determined for the next sixty leagues to the sea to build canoes. Dividing themselves into parties of sixty men, they landed and cut down mapou trees, and, working with wonderful diligence, built four canoes by the first of March. Leaving 140 men still working, 120 embarked, eager for home, ease, and rest. The English, too impatient to make canoes, had long since reached the sea-shore in their piperies. They here met a Jamaica boat lying at anchor, and attempted to persuade the captain to return, and obtain leave for them to land, as they had no commission. The captain refused to go without receiving L6000 in advance, which they could not afford, as many of them had lost all by the upsetting of the piperies. The sailors, therefore, resolved to remain with the friendly Mosquito Indians, who dwelt about the mouth of this river, and to whom they had often brought trinkets from Jamaica. The English, unable to buy the boat, determined to send word to the French, hoping to get to St. Domingo by their aid. Two Mosquito Indians were despatched in a canoe, forty leagues up the river, to bring down forty Frenchmen, as the vessel was small and short of provision, and could not hold more. But, in spite of all this, 120, instead of forty, hurried down to get on board, waiting five days for the ship that had gone to the Isle of Pearls. Great was the delight of the French to pass Cape Gracias a Dios, and enter the North Sea.

The Mulattoes that lived on this cape, Lussan says, were descended from the crew of a negro vessel, lost on a shoal. They slept in holes dug in the sand, to avoid the mosquitoes, which stung them till they appeared like lepers. Lussan speaks much of the fiery darts of this mischievous insect. He says, "It is no small pain to be attacked with them, for, besides that they caused us to lose our rest at night, it was then that we were forced to go naked for want of shirts, when the troublesomeness of these animals made us run into despair and such a rage as set us beside ourselves." At last the longed-for vessel arrived, and, regardless of lots that had been drawn, fifty of the more vigilant, including Lussan, crowded in, one on the top of the other, and instantly weighed anchor, engaging the master for forty pieces of eight a head to take them to St. Domingo, afraid of venturing to Jamaica. At Cuba they landed, and surprising some hunters, compelled them to sell them food, uncertain whether France and Spain were at war or peace.

On the 4th of April they rode at anchor at Petit Guaves, hoping to hear news from France. De Lussan relates a curious instance here of the effect of habit and instinctive imagination. "There were some of our people," he says, "so infatuated with the long miseries we had suffered, that they thought of nothing else but the Spaniards, insomuch that, when from the deck they saw some horsemen riding along the sea-side, they flew to arms to fire upon them, as imagining they were enemies, though we assured them we were now come among those of our own nation." De Lussan, at once going on shore, demanded of Mons. Dumas, the King's lieutenant, in the Governor Mons. de Cussy's absence, indemnity and protection, by favour of an amnesty granted by the French king to those who, in remote places, had continued to make war on the Spaniards, not hearing of the peace that had been concluded between the two nations.

De Lussan relates with much unpretending pathos the feelings of himself and his Ulyssean friends upon once more landing in a friendly country. "When we all were got ashore," he says, "to a people that spoke French, we could not forbear shedding tears for joy that, after we had run so many hazards, dangers, and perils, it had pleased the Almighty Maker of the earth and seas to grant a deliverance, and bring us back to those of our own nation, that at length we may return without any more ado to our own country; whereunto I cannot but further add, that, for my own part, I had so little hopes of ever getting back, that I could not, for the space of fifteen days, take my return for any other than an illusion, and it proceeded so far with me, that I shunned sleep, for fear when I awaked I should find myself again in those countries out of which I was now safely delivered."

From the preface to De Lussan's book, we learn that he returned to Dieppe, with letters of introduction from De Cussy, the Governor of Tortuga and St. Domingo, to Mons. de Lubert, Treasurer-General of Marine in France. Of the end of this brave man we know nothing. He had many requisites for a great general.