CHAPTER FIVE.
A "CUTTING-OUT" EXPEDITION.
On going on deck to stand my watch that night shortly after my dismissalby Captain Pigot, found the squadron heading to the northward on an easybowline, under reefed topsails, with the island of Tortuga bearingsouth-east, about ten miles distant. We continued on the starboard tackduring the whole of that night, tacking at eight o'clock on thefollowing morning, and heading in toward the land once more, at the sametime shaking the reefs out of our topsails. An hour later the lookoutaloft reported a sail to leeward; and, on signalling the fact to theadmiral, the _Hermione_ received permission to chase.
We managed to approach within ten miles of the stranger without excitinghis suspicions; but shortly afterwards a doubt appeared to enter hismind as to the honesty of our intentions, and he tacked, no doubt withthe object of ascertaining whether our business had anything to do withhim or not. He soon found that it _had_; for before he was fairly roundour course had been altered so as to intercept him. This sufficed tothoroughly alarm him, and, wearing short round, he went square offbefore the wind, setting every stitch of canvas his little vessel--aschooner of some seventy tons--could spread to the breeze. The chasenow showed herself to be a very smart little craft, staggering alongunder her cloud of canvas in a really surprising manner; indeed, had thepursuit lasted an hour longer we should probably have lost her, for shewas within five miles of the harbour of Jean Rabel when we succeeded inbringing her to.
The obstinate craft having at length consented to back her topsail,Courtenay was sent away in the gig, with the crew fully armed, to giveher an overhaul.
He remained on board nearly half an hour, and when he returned hebrought the skipper of the schooner, a negro, with him. The littlevessel, it now appeared, was a coaster, sailing under French colours,and was bound from Jean Rabel to Porto Caballo. She was consequently aprize, though utterly valueless to us; and Courtenay's instructions hadbeen that, if such proved to be the case, he was to take her crew out ofher and set her on fire. She, however, belonged to the negro whocommanded her, and he had begged so earnestly that his property might bespared, and had backed up his petition by representations of soimportant a nature, that Courtenay had deemed it best, before carryingout his instructions, to bring the man on board the _Hermione_, and givehim an interview with Captain Pigot. The skipper was in his cabin whenthe gig returned alongside, so Courtenay went in and made his report,the result being that the negro was speedily admitted to Captain Pigot'spresence. The next thing that happened was the summoning of the firstlieutenant to the cabin, Courtenay being at the same time dismissed. Aconference of some twenty minutes' duration now ensued, at thetermination of which Courtenay, with half a dozen men as a prize-crew,was sent away to take charge of the schooner; and on the return of theboat, both vessels filled away and stood off the land on a taut bowline,the negro owner of the schooner being detained on board the frigate.
Early the next morning the remainder of the squadron was sighted, andimmediately after breakfast Captain Pigot boarded the commodore, takingthe negro with him. He was absent for the greater part of the morning,and that something of moment was on the _tapis_ soon became apparent,from the fact that the captains of the _Quebec, Mermaid, Drake_, and_Penelope_ were signalled for. Everybody was now on the _qui vive_, apleasant excitement taking the place of that stolid sullen indifferenceand apathy on the part of our crew which had gradually resulted from theskipper's ill-advised harshness to them. At length the boats were seento push off on their way back to their respective ships; and, a fewminutes later, Captain Pigot passed up the gangway and came in on deck.Everybody now waited in breathless expectation for the anticipated orderwhich should convey to us an inkling of the nature of the work in hand;but, to our general disappointment, no such order was given. Theskipper's face, however, wore a look of exultant satisfaction, and hisdemeanour was so much less unpleasant than usual that we felt convincedthere was something in the wind; and all hands settled down accordinglyto await, with what patience we could muster, the development of events.
It was not, however, until two days later, the 20th of April, that ourcuriosity was satisfied. A signal from the commodore requesting thecaptains of the _Hermione, Quebec, Mermaid, Drake_, and _Penelope_ torepair on board him, was the first incident of the day; and this wasfollowed by a conference so protracted that the gigs' crews only gotback to their ships barely in time for dinner. A most careful andscrupulous inspection of the arm-chest consumed nearly the whole of theafternoon watch; and finally, at eight bells, or four o'clock p.m.,after a considerable amount of signalling, the ships already nameddetached themselves from the rest of the squadron, and, under CaptainPigot's orders, made sail to the westward; the negro captain being atthe same time restored to his command and allowed to proceed on his way.
Urged forward by a brisk trade-wind, to which we exposed every possiblestitch of canvas, the little squadron made short miles of it, arriving,at three o'clock in the morning, off Port a l'Ecu; where, at a distanceof about a mile off the shore and some two miles from the harbour ofJean Rabel on the one hand, and Port au Paix on the other, the trade-wind encountering the land-breeze, we ran into a calm. A carefully-masked lantern was now exhibited on board the _Hermione_, the utmostcaution being observed to prevent its light being seen from the shore,and at the same moment our launch, pinnace, and first and secondcutters, the two former each carrying a boat's gun in the bows, wereordered away.
To Mr Reid, who, in conjunction with Lieutenant Burdwood of the_Penelope_, had been closeted with the skipper for at least two hourspreviously, was intrusted the command of one division of the boats whichwas about to be sent away, Lieutenant Burdwood being placed at the headof the other division. Mr Reid went, of course, in our launch; MrDouglas commanded the pinnace; Farmer, a master's mate, was put incharge of the first cutter; and, to my supreme surprise andgratification, I was instructed to take charge of the second.
In less than five minutes, so well planned had been Captain Pigot'sarrangements, our boats were joined by the rest of the flotilla; and,the whole having been quietly but rapidly marshalled by Mr Reid intotwo divisions, our muffled oars dropped simultaneously into the water,and we departed on our several ways.
Mr Burdwood, with his division, consisting of four boats from the_Mermaid_, two from the _Drake_, and two from his own vessel, pulledbriskly away to the eastward, his destination being, as I shortlyafterwards learned, Port au Paix, whilst the division to which Ibelonged headed west for Jean Rabel.
The night was fine, but very dark; a broad belt of dappled cloudoverspreading almost the entire heavens, and permitting only an isolatedstar or two to twinkle feebly through it here and there. A couple ofmiles in the offing the trade-wind was blowing briskly, and inshore ofus, at a distance of less than a quarter of a mile, the land-breeze wasroaring down off the hills with the strength of half a gale. Where thetwo met there occurred a narrow belt of calm, broken into momentarily byan eddying puff of wind, now warm, as the trade-wind got slightly thebetter of the land-breeze, and anon cool, refreshing, and odoriferouswith the perfume of a thousand flowers, as the land-breeze regained theascendency and pushed forward in its turn on the domain of the trade-wind. Mr Reid availed himself of the opportunity afforded by ourpassage across this narrow belt of calm to rally the rest of the boatsround the launch for a moment, in order to explain the object of theexpedition, and to give a few brief directions respecting the movementsof each boat. From this explanation we now learned that we were aboutto make an attack upon two privateer brigs, together with a ship andbrig which had been captured by them, all of which were lying in JeanRabel harbour, and were believed to be well protected and very stronglymanned. The ship--a very fine vessel, which had recently been armedwith eighteen 9-pounder brass guns, and manned by a crew of over onehundred men--our gallant "first" proposed to attack in person, thelaunch being supported by the first and second cutters. Mr Douglas,our second lieutenant, aided by the _Quebec's_ launch,
was to tackle theheaviest of the privateer brigs; the _Quebec's_ first and second cutterswere to attack the other; whilst the _Mermaid's_ second cutter and the_Quebec's_ gig were to make a dash at the remaining brig, a prize, and,having secured her, hold themselves in readiness to lend a hand wherevertheir presence might seem to be most required. Our work having thusbeen explicitly set out for us, Mr Reid gave the word for us to renewour advance, and we once more pushed ahead.
No night could well have been more favourable for such an attack asours--which was meant to be a surprise, if possible--than the oneselected; so dark, indeed, was it that, by a piece of the rarest goodfortune, we had actually entered the harbour before we were able tocompletely identify our whereabouts.
It now became necessary for us to pause for a moment and look about us,in order to ascertain the locality of our game; and the word wasaccordingly quietly passed from boat to boat for the men to lay on theiroars. At first it was simply impossible for us to distinguishanything--except the land, which loomed vague and dark, like a broadshadow, above the water. At length, however, one of the men in thelaunch announced, in a low cautious whisper, that he could make out thespars of a vessel directly ahead; and immediately afterwards, the cloudsoverhead breaking slightly away for a moment, we were able todistinguish the craft herself.
Feeling sure that this must be one of the vessels of which we were inquest, Mr Reid at once gave the order for the flotilla to again movecautiously forward; and the boats' oars immediately dipped into thephosphorescent water, causing it to gleam and flash brilliantly. Thereis no doubt that this vivid phosphorescence of the water--which musthave been visible at a long distance in the intense darkness of thenight--occasioned the premature discovery of our presence which now tookplace; for the men had not pulled half a dozen strokes before a startledhail came pealing out across the water; to which we of course paid notthe slightest attention. Failing to get a reply, the hail was hurriedlyrepeated, a musket was fired, and a port-fire was burned on board thecraft first sighted, which now proved to be the brig which our pinnaceand the _Quebec's_ launch were destined to attack. For the burning ofthis port-fire, though it rendered further concealment on our partimpossible, we were very much obliged, as by its unearthly glare we wereenabled to discern the whereabouts of the remaining vessels, at which,with a wild cheer, the crews of the boats at once dashed with the mostcommendable promptitude.
The ship happened to be moored in the innermost berth, or that which wasfarthest up the harbour; our contingent, therefore--consisting of the_Hermione's_ launch, first, and second cutters--was the last to getalongside; and by the time that we reached the craft her crew were quiteready to receive us. She was, fortunately for us, riding head to wind,with her bows pointing up the harbour, and her stern directly towardsus; consequently the only guns which she could bring to bear upon uswere her two stern-chasers, each of which she fired twice, withouteffect. We were within twenty yards of her when the guns were fired forthe second time; and immediately afterwards a most formidable volley ofmusketry was poured into us. Strange to say, though the bullets sent aperfect shower of splinters flying about our ears, not a man in eitherboat was hit; and before the Frenchmen had time to load again we werealongside--the launch on the port quarter, the first cutter under themain chains on the starboard side, and my boat under the bows. Luckilyfor us, they had not had time to trice up the boarding nettings, sothat, with the aid of a volley from our pistols, we had not muchdifficulty in making our way in over the craft's low bulwarks. But whenwe gained the deck we found it literally crowded with Frenchmen, who metus with a most stubborn resistance; and had there been light enough forthem to see what they were doing, we should probably have been drivenback to our boats in less than three minutes. But the port-fire had bythis time burnt itself out, or been extinguished, and the darkness, savefor the intermittent flash of the pistols, was profound; so that,although there was a great deal of firing, of hacking, and hewing, andshouting, there was very little harm being done, at least to our side,so far as I could see. And if the French had the advantage of us inpoint of numbers, we had the advantage of them in an equally importantmatter; for whilst our men were dressed in their ordinary rig of blue-jackets and trousers, rendering them almost invisible in the darkness,the suddenness of our attack had compelled our enemies to turn out ondeck in their shirts only, by which we were able to distinguish thempretty clearly.
The fight had been progressing in this unsatisfactory manner for aboutten minutes, when suddenly the dash and rattle of oars was heardalongside, immediately followed by a ringing British cheer. In anotherinstant a ghastly blue glare of light illumined the decks; and we sawDouglas, at the head of the pinnace's crew, fling himself in over thebulwarks, with a lighted port-fire held aloft in one hand, whilst hebrandished his sword with the other. This timely reinforcement at oncebrought the fight to a conclusion, the Frenchmen forthwith flinging downtheir weapons and crying for quarter. The help came not a moment toosoon, so far as Farmer was concerned; for the very first act of MrDouglas, on reaching the deck, was to cleave to the chin a Frenchmanwhom he saw with both knees on Farmer's chest and with his swordshortened in his hand about to pin the unfortunate master's mate to thedeck.
The Frenchmen were at once driven below and the hatches clapped overthem; after which our lads were sent aloft to loose the topsails; and,the cable being cut, the ship was got under weigh. Whilst this wasdoing, I had time to question our gallant "second" as to the cause ofhis opportune appearance; and I then learned that so complete had beenthe surprise that the other craft had been taken almost without aneffort; and that as soon as this was accomplished and the crews securedMr Douglas had hastened to our assistance, rightly surmising that, fromthe longer warning given to the ship's crew and their great strength, weshould have our hands pretty full with them. The moon, in her lastquarter, and dwindled to the merest crescent, was just rising over thehills to the eastward of us as we swept before the land-breeze out ofJean Rabel harbour; and by her feeble light I was enabled with somedifficulty to discern that, by my watch, it was just four o'clock in themorning. Thus satisfactorily terminated this cutting-out expedition;the most surprising circumstance connected with which was, perhaps, thefact that, when the hands were mustered, not one was found to havereceived a hurt worthy of being termed a wound.
We had scarcely got clear of the land with our prizes--consisting of oneship and three brigs--when we discovered three schooners and two sloopsstanding out from Port au Paix; and as they, like ourselves, wereheading directly for the squadron in the offing, we conjectured--andrightly, as it afterwards proved--that they were the vessels whichLieutenant Burdwood had been sent in to attack.
Late in the evening of the following day we rejoined the remainder ofthe squadron, and Captain Pigot at once proceeded on board the admiralto report the complete success of the expedition. Nothing was settledthat night as to the disposal of the prizes, but on the followingforenoon it was arranged that, as both the _Quebec_ and ourselves weregetting short of provisions and water, we should escort the prizes intoPort Royal, and at the same time avail ourselves of the opportunity torevictual.
We reached our destination in due time without adventure, and as it thenseemed likely that there would be some delay in the matter ofrevictualling, Mr Reid improved the occasion to give the spars andrigging a thorough overhaul. This, with such repairs and renewals aswere found necessary, kept all hands busy for four full days, at the endof which time the ship was once more all ataunto. Meanwhile, from someunexplained cause or other, the provisions were coming on board veryslowly, much, it must be confessed, to the delight of the crew, who,having worked hard at the overhauling and repairs of the rigging--to saynothing of their behaviour at Jean Rabel--now confidently expected atleast a day's liberty with its accompanying jollification ashore. Butwhen the request for it was made Captain Pigot point-blank refused inlanguage of the most intemperate and abusive character, stigmatising thewhole crew as, without exception, a pack of sk
ulking, cowardly ruffians.He added a pretty broad hint that in his opinion the officers werenearly, if not quite as bad as the men, and finished up by swearingroundly that not a man or boy, forward or aft, should set foot on shore,even though the ship should remain in harbour until she grounded uponher own beef-bones.
This was exasperating enough in all conscience, even for the handsforward, who, though there were certainly some rough characters amongthem, were by no means _all_ bad--indeed a full half of the entire crewwere really as smart willing fellows as one need wish to see; but it waseven worse for the officers, for we had all been looking eagerly forwardto a certain ball which was about to be given by the governor, to whichevery one of us had received an invitation. The disappointment was sokeen and so general that good-natured "old David"--as our genial "first"was dubbed by all hands--took it upon himself to respectfullyremonstrate with the skipper upon so arbitrary and high-handed atreatment of the ship's company, with no result, however, except thatthe first lieutenant received an unmitigated snubbing for his pains.
The revictualling of the ship was completed about five o'clock in theevening upon which the ball was to take place; there was plenty of time,therefore, for us aft to have availed ourselves of the governor'sinvitation had the skipper seen fit, but he remained obdurate, and weconsequently had to content ourselves with watching the departure of theofficers from the other ships, and framing such excuses as cameuppermost at the moment in reply to the inquiries of such of them aspassed near us as to why we were not going. This was made all the moredifficult from the fact that, though we were under orders to sail atdaybreak next morning, there were no less than three other ships inharbour similarly circumstanced, the officers of which were neverthelessgoing to be present at the ball. The only consolation we could find wasin the reflection that, whereas the others would commence the duties ofthe next day fagged out with a long night's dancing, we should rise tothem refreshed, with a more or less sound night's rest; and with thissmall crumb of comfort we were fain to go below and turn in.
When the hands were called next morning it was found that Captain Pigotwas still absent from the ship, but as he was expected to turn up at anymoment the messenger was passed and the cable hove short. A slight stirwas occasioned by the crews of the other three ships making preparationsto get under way; and as these craft one after the other let fall andsheeted home their topsails, finally tripping their anchors and makingtheir way to sea with the last of the land-breeze, it became evidentthat something out of the ordinary course must have occurred to delayour skipper. It was close upon eight bells when the gig was sightedpulling down from the direction of Kingston, and when a few minuteslater Captain Pigot came up over the side, it was noticed that he wasghastly pale and that his right arm was in a sling. He seemed to besuffering considerably, and it was in a somewhat wavering voice that hesaid to the first-lieutenant:
"Are you all ready, Mr Reid? Then get your anchor, sir, and let us beoff at once. And, Mr Courtenay, be good enough to tell the surgeon Iwish to see him in my cabin."
With which he turned short round and walked somewhat unsteadily away,not making his appearance on deck again for nearly a week.
It afterwards transpired that his awkward temper had led to a quarrel,during the progress of the ball, between himself and one of the soldierofficers from Up-park Camp, which quarrel had terminated in a meeting onthe Palisades, the soldier escaping unscathed, whilst Captain Pigot hademerged from the encounter with his arm broken by a bullet from hisadversary's pistol.
Noon that day found us off Morant Point thrashing to windward undersingle-reefed topsails, with a sea running which every now and then madethe frigate careen gunwale-to.
The Rover's Secret: A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba Page 5
