by G. A. Henty
The four native officers at once stated their willingness to join in the plan. Hossein did not consider any reply necessary. With him, it was a matter of course to do whatever Charlie suggested.
The latter then went into the next casemate, and unfolded his plan to the sailors, who heartily agreed to make an effort for their liberty.
The fire continued all day unabated; and at nightfall, when a man, as usual, brought the captives food, he exultingly told them that no damage whatever had been effected by the guns of the fleet.
In the evening, the party cut a number of pieces of wood; these, measuring by the cannon in the casemate, they made of just sufficient size and length to push down, with a slight effort, through the touch hole. When pushed down to their full length, they touched the interior of the cannon below, and were just level with the top of the touch hole. Thus, it would be next to impossible to extricate them in a hurry. They might, indeed, be broken and forced in by a solid punch, of the same size as the touch hole; but this would take time, and would not be likely to occur, on the moment, to the pirates.
The skewers, for this is what they resembled, were very strong and tough; being made of slips of bamboo. The prisoners had all knives, which they used for cutting their food. With these the work was accomplished.
Towards morning the five natives, with the skewers hidden away in their loincloths, and their turbans twisted in Mahratta fashion, stole out from the casemate. Charlie had ordered that, in case they should see that the ships had drawn off from the position they occupied on the preceding day, they should return without attempting to carry out their task.
He himself, with Tim, joined the sailors; and, first ascending the ramparts and seeing that the ships were still at anchor, abreast of the fort, he and his comrades strolled across the interior of the fort, in the direction of the magazine. They did not keep together, nor did all move directly towards the position which they wished to gain.
The place was already astir. Large numbers of the pirates thronged the interior. Groups were squatted round fires, busy in cooking their breakfasts. Numbers were coming from the magazine, with powder to fill up the small magazines on the walls. Others, again, were carrying shot from the pyramids of missiles, piled up here and there in the courtyard. None paid any attention to the English prisoners.
Presently a dull boom was heard. There was a whistling sound; and with a thud, followed by a loud explosion, a bomb fell and burst in the open space.
This was the signal for action. The pirates, in a moment, hurried down to the bastions overlooking the sea; and the Englishmen gathered, in a group, near the entrance to the magazine. Besides their knives they had no arms, but each had picked up two or three heavy stones.
A minute after the explosion of the shell, the cannonade of the ships broke out. It was answered by only a few guns from the fortress, and yells of astonishment and rage were heard to arise.
A moment later, five natives ran up to the group of Englishmen. Their work had been well done, and more than three-fourths of the guns on the sea face had been rendered temporarily useless.
Charlie gave the word, and with a rush they entered the upper fort. There were but two or three men there, who were just hurrying out with their bags of powder. These, before they realized the position, were instantly knocked down and bound. The gate of the fort was then shut and barred, and the party ran up to the bastion above.
Not a single pirate was to be seen there. The six guns, which stood there, were at once loaded with grape; and a heavy discharge was poured into the crowded masses of pirates, upon the bastions on the sea face. These, already greatly disturbed at finding that most of their guns had, in some way, been rendered useless; were panic stricken at this sudden and unexpected attack from the rear. Many of them broke from their guns and fled to shelter, others endeavoured to turn their cannon to bear upon the magazine.
The wildest confusion raged. At last some of their leaders rallied the men; and, with yells of fury, a rush was made towards the magazine. They were received with another discharge of grape, which took terrible effect. Many recoiled, but their leaders, shouting to them that the guns were discharged, and there were but a dozen men there, led them on again.
Charlie leaped upon the edge of the parapet, and shouted:
"If you attack us, we will blow up the magazine. I have but to lift my hand, and the magazine will be fired."
The boldest of the assailants were paralysed by the threat. Confusion reigned throughout the fortress. The fleet kept up their fire with great vigour; judging, by the feebleness of the reply, that something unusual must be happening within the walls. The gunners, disheartened by finding their pieces useless, and unable to extract the wooden plugs, while Charlie's men continued to ply them with grape, left their guns and, with the greater portion of the garrison, disorganized and panic stricken, retired into shelter.
A shell from the ships, falling on to a thatched building, set it on fire. The flames rapidly spread, and soon all the small huts occupied by the garrison were in flames. The explosion of a magazine added to the terror of the garrison, and the greater portion of them, with the women and children, ran down to the water; and, taking boats, attempted to cross to Fort Goa, on the mainland. They were, however, cut off by the English boats, and captured.
Commodore James, who commanded the squadron, now directed his fire at Fort Goa; which was being feebly attacked, on the land side, by a Mahratta force; which had been landed from the Mahratta fleet, accompanying the English ships, a few miles down the coast. The fort shortly surrendered; but while the Mahrattas were marching to take possession, the governor, with some of his best men, took boat and crossed over to the island; of which, although the fire had ceased after the explosion of the magazine, the English had not taken possession.
The fire from its guns again opened, and as Commodore James thought it probable that the pirates would, in the night, endeavour to throw in large reinforcements, he determined to carry it by storm. The ships opened fire upon the walls; and, under cover of this, half the seamen were landed. These ran up to the gate, and thundered at it with their axes.
Charlie and his companions aided the movement, by again opening a heavy fire of grape upon the guns which bore upon the sally port; and when the gates were forced the garrison, utterly dispirited by the crossfire to which they were subjected, at once laid down their arms.
Chapter 16
: A Tiger Hunt.
Commodore James was greatly astonished at the easy success which he had gained. The extraordinary cessation of fire from the sea face, and the sound of artillery within the walls, had convinced him that a mutiny among the garrison must have taken place; but upon entering the fort he was surprised, indeed, at being received with a hearty English cheer, from a little body of men on the summit of an interior work. The gate of this was at once thrown open, and Charlie, followed by his party, advanced towards the commodore.
"I am Captain Marryat, sir, of the Company's service in Madras; and was captured three months ago by these pirates. When you attacked the place, yesterday, I arranged to effect a small diversion; and with the assistance of these five native officers, of my soldier servant, here, and these ten men of the merchant service, we have, I hope, been able to do so. The native officers disabled the greater portion of the guns, during the night; and when you opened fire this morning we seized this inner work, which is also the magazine, and opened fire upon the rear of the sea defences. By dint of our guns, and of menaces to blow up the place if they assaulted it, we kept them at bay until their flag was hauled down."
"Then, sir," Commodore James said, warmly; "I have to thank you, most heartily, for the assistance you have given. In fact, it is you who have captured the fortress. I was by no means prepared to find it so strong; and, indeed, had come to the conclusion, last night, that the force at my command was wholly insufficient for its capture. Fortunately, I determined to try the effect of another day's fire. But, had it not been for you, this wou
ld assuredly have been as ineffectual as the first. You have, indeed, performed a most gallant action; and I shall have great pleasure in reporting your conduct to the authorities at home."
The sailors had now landed in considerable force. The garrison were disarmed, and taken as prisoners on board the ships. Very large quantities of powder were found, stored up, and strong parties at once began to form mines, for the blowing up of the fortifications.
This was a labour of some days. When they were completed and charged, a series of tremendous explosions took place. Many of the bastions were completely blown to pieces. In others, the walls were shattered.
The prisoners were again landed, and set to work, aided by the sailors. The great stones, which composed the walls, were toppled over the steep faces of the rock on which the fort stood; and, at the end of a fortnight, the pirate hold of Suwarndrug, which had so long been the terror of the Indian Seas, had disappeared.
The fleet returned to Bombay; for it was, evidently, wholly insufficient to attempt an assault on Gheriah; defended, as that place would be, by the whole pirate fleet; which had, even without the assistance of its guns, proved itself a match for a squadron double the strength of that under the command of Commodore James.
The rejoicings at Bombay were immense, for enormous damage had been inflicted on the commerce of that place, by this pirate hold, situated but eighty miles from the port. Commodore James and his officers were feted, and Charlie Marryat had his full share of honor; the gallant sailor, everywhere, assigning to him the credit of its capture.
Charlie would now have sailed, at once, for Madras; but the authorities wished him to remain, as Clive was shortly expected to arrive, with a considerable force, which was destined to act against the French at Hyderabad. The influence of Bussy, with the nizam, rendered this important province little better than a French possession; and the territory of our rivals, upon the seacoast, had been immensely increased by the grant of the five districts, known as the Northern Sirdars, to Bussy.
It was all that the English could do to hold their own, around Madras; and it was out of the question for them to think of attempting, single handed, to dislodge Bussy from Hyderabad. Between the nizam, however, and the Peishwar of the Deccan, there was a longstanding feud; and the Company had proposed, to this prince, to aid him with a strong English force, in an attack upon Hyderabad.
Colonel Scott had, in the first place, been sent out to command this expedition; but when Clive, wearied with two years' life of inactivity in England, applied to be appointed to active service, the directors at once appointed him governor of Fort Saint David, and obtained for him the rank of lieutenant colonel in the royal army. They directed him to sail at once for Bombay, with three companies of the Royal Artillery, each a hundred strong, and three hundred infantry recruits. Upon his arrival there, he was to give Colonel Scott any assistance he required. That officer, however, had died before Clive arrived.
Upon reaching Bombay, Clive found that events had occurred, in the south, which would prevent the intended expedition from taking place. The French government had suddenly recalled Dupleix, the great man whose talent and statesmanship had sustained their cause. On his return to France, instead of treating him with honor for the work he had done for them, they even refused to repay him the large sums which he had advanced, from his private fortune, to carry on the struggle against the English; and Dupleix died in poverty and obscurity.
In his place, the French governor had sent out a man by the name of Godchen, who was weak and wholly destitute of ability. At the time of his arrival the English were hardly pressed, and a strong French fleet and force were expected on the coast. When, however, Mr. Saunders proposed to him a treaty of neutrality between the Indian possessions of the two powers, he at once accepted it; and thus threw away all the advantages, which Dupleix had struggled so hard to obtain. The result of this treaty, however, was that the English were unable to carry out their proposed alliance, with the peishwar, against the nizam and Bussy.
Upon Clive's arrival, Charlie at once reported himself to him. For a time, however, no active duty was assigned to him, as it was uncertain what steps would now be taken. Finally it was resolved that, taking advantage of the presence of Clive and his troops, and of a squadron which had arrived under Admiral Watson, the work commenced by Commodore James should be completed, by the capture of Gheriah and the entire destruction of the pirate power.
The peishwar had already asked them to aid him in his attack upon Angria, and Commodore James was now sent, with the Protector and two other ships, to reconnoitre Gheriah, which no Englishman then living had seen. The natives described it as of enormous strength, and it was believed that it was an Eastern Gibraltar.
Commodore James found the enemy's fleet at anchor in the harbour. Notwithstanding this, he sailed in until within cannon shot, and so completely were the enemy cowed and demoralized, by the loss of Suwarndrug, that they did not venture out to attack him.
After ascertaining the position and character of the defences, he returned, at the end of December, to Bombay; and reported that, while exceedingly strong, the place was by no means impregnable. The Mahratta army, under the command of Ramajee Punt, marched to blockade the place on the land side; and on the 11th of February, 1756, the fleet, consisting of four ships of the line, of seventy, sixty-four, sixty, and fifty guns; a frigate of forty-four, and three of twenty; a native ship called a grab, of twelve guns; and five mortar ships, arrived before the place. Besides the seamen, the fleet had on board a battalion of eight hundred Europeans and a thousand Sepoys.
The fortress of Gheriah was situated on a promontory of rock, a mile and a quarter broad; lying about a mile up a large harbour, forming the mouth of a river. The promontory projects to the southwest, on the right of the harbour on entering; and rises sheer from the water in perpendicular rocks, fifty feet high. On this stood the fortifications. These consisted of two lines of walls, with round towers, the inner wall rising several feet above the outer.
The promontory was joined to the land by a sandy slip, beyond which the town stood. On this neck of land, between the promontory and the town, were the docks and slips on which the pirate vessels were built or repaired; and ten of these, among which was the Derby, which they had captured from the Company, lay moored side by side, close by the docks, when the fleet arrived off the place.
Charlie Marryat had been sent, by Clive, as commissioner with the Mahratta army. A party of Mahratta horsemen came down to Bombay to escort him to Chaule, at which place the Mahratta army were assembled for their march. He was accompanied by Tim and Hossein, who were of course, like him, on horseback.
A long day's ride took them to their first halting place, a few miles from the foot of a splendid range of hills, which rise like a wall from the low land, for a vast distance along the coast. At the top of these hills--called in India, ghauts--lay the plateau of the Deccan, sloping gradually away to the Ganges, hundreds of miles to the east.
"Are we going to climb up to top of them mountains, your honor?"
"No, Tim, fortunately for our horses. We shall skirt their foot, for a hundred and fifty miles, till we get behind Gheriah."
"You wouldn't think that a horse could climb them," Tim said. "They look as steep as the side of a house."
"In many places they are, Tim, but you see there are breaks in them. At some points, either from the force of streams, or from the weather, the rocks have crumbled away; and the great slopes, which everywhere extend halfway up, reach the top. Zigzag paths are cut in these, which can be travelled by horses and pack animals.
"There must be quantities of game," Charlie said to the leader of the escort, "on the mountain sides."
"Quantities?" the Mahratta said. "Tigers and bears swarm there, and are such a scourge that there are no villages within miles of the foot of the hills. Even on the plateau above, the villages are few and scarce near the edge, so great is the damage done by wild beasts.
"But that is not a
ll. There are numerous bands of Dacoits, who set the authority of the peishwar at defiance, plunder travellers and merchants going up and down, make raids into the Deccan, and plunder the low land nearly up to the gates of Bombay. Numerous expeditions have been sent against them, but the Dacoits know every foot of the hills. They have numerous, impregnable strongholds on the rocks; which you can see rising sheer up hundreds of feet, from among the woods on the slopes; and can, if pressed, shift their quarters, and move fifty miles away among the trees, while the troops are, in vain, searching for them."
"I suppose there is no chance of their attacking us," Charlie said.
"The Dacoit never fights if he can help it, and then only when driven into a corner, or when there appears a chance of very large plunder. He will always leave a strong party of armed men, from whom nothing but hard blows is to be got, in peace."
The journey occupied five days, and was most enjoyable. The officer of the escort, as the peishwar's agent, would have requisitioned provisions at each of the villages; but Charlie insisted, under one pretence or another, on buying a couple of sheep or kids at each halting place, for the use of his own party and the escort. For a few copper coins an abundant supply of fruit and vegetables was obtainable; and as, each night, they spread their rugs under the shade of some overhanging tree, and smoked their pipes lazily after the very excellent meal which Hossein always prepared, Charlie and Tim agreed that they had spent no pleasanter time in India than that occupied by their journey.
