Under the Meteor Flag: Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War

by Harry Collingwood

  CHAPTER THREE.

  The "Sans-Culotte."

  The adage that "it is an ill wind that blows nobody good" maintained itsreputation for truth, even in the case of the seemingly unmitigateddisaster of the previous night--that is to say, at least, as far as Iwas concerned; inasmuch as the knowledge and experience which I acquiredof my profession during the operation of clearing away the wreck,recovering the sails, rigging, and undamaged spars, fitting the newtopmasts into their places, and restoring the ship generally to herformer condition, gave me an advantage which I could scarcely have hopedto secure in less than six months of the ordinary run of active service.I watched with unflagging interest the progress of every operation asthe work went forward, with the result that I learned by actualobservation, coupled with the best use of my reasoning faculties, andfrequent questions to Mr Sennitt (who, I may say, heard and answered myinquiries with quite astonishing patience), the position and use ofevery rope that I saw fitted, the mode of working the yards, and muchother valuable knowledge.

  It is surprising how speedily human curiosity becomes quickened andaroused, if the individual devotes himself earnestly to the study of anart or science. The thirst for knowledge increases with itsacquisition--at least, such is my experience--and is not to be satisfieduntil every mystery connected with such art or science has beenmastered, and made the inalienable property of the student. It was sowith me in relation to everything connected with my profession. Havinggained a certain amount of knowledge concerning the mysteries ofseamanship, I craved for more; and throwing all my energies into thedischarge of my daily round of duties, made such rapid progress asastonished everybody, myself included.

  The "Scourge," meanwhile, was slowly pursuing her course down channel;the wind, after the recent blow, having fallen light and baffling; itwas not, therefore, until the morning of the 13th that she reached hercruising-ground, Scilly bearing at the time about N.E., distant 26miles.

  The day broke clear and cloudless, with a light air of wind from thesouthward; the water being smooth, save for the long, rolling swell ofthe Atlantic, which at the spot in question made itself very distinctlyfelt. The air was mild and springlike, the unclouded sunbeams struckwith a perceptible sensation of warmth, and every one on board,forgetting the recent misery of cold and wet, greeted the welcome changewith a corresponding flow of exuberant animal spirits.

  The hands had just been piped to breakfast, when the lookout aloftreported, "A sail right ahead!"

  Recalling to mind the skipper's request on a previous occasion, I atonce ran down into the cabin for his telescope, which I brought on deckand handed to him.

  "Thank you, Mr Chester," said he. "I have remarked with very greatpleasure your real in the discharge of your duties. Go on as you havebegun, my boy, and you will soon become a valuable and efficientofficer."

  Captain Brisac did not, however, himself go aloft this time; MrClewline, the second lieutenant, happened to be on deck at the moment,and the skipper handed him the glass, with a polite request that hewould "see what he could make of her."

  Mr Clewline, I thought, seemed rather to resent the suggestion as anaffront to his dignity; he, however, made no demur, but proceeded aloftwith great deliberation, and, seating himself upon the fore-topsailyard, took a very leisurely observation of the stranger.

  Having devoted about a quarter of an hour to this occupation, he slowlyclosed the telescope, and carefully slinging it over his shoulder,descended to the deck with the same deliberation which had characterisedhis ascent. It was not until he had regained the skipper's side that hecondescended to make his report; when, handing back the glass with astiff bow, he said, "I make out the stranger to be, sir, a brig,apparently French, of about our own size; she is standing directlytoward us, upon the starboard tack, under topgallant-sails."

  "Thank you, sir," returned the skipper shortly; then turning upon hisheel he went below to his cabin, Patterson having come on deck a minuteor two before, to announce that breakfast was ready.

  The news quickly spread through the ship that the sail in sight wassupposed to be a Frenchman; and as the two vessels were approaching eachother, and an action, in the event of Mr Clewline's supposition provingcorrect, inevitable, a considerable amount of excitement prevailed. Themen bolted their breakfast in less than half the time usually devoted tothat meal, and returned to the deck the moment they had disposed oftheir last morsel; while the officers betrayed at least an equal amountof eagerness, two or three of them hastily swallowing a cup of scaldingcoffee, and munching up a biscuit, without giving themselves time evento sit down.

  "Old Sennitt"--as he was irreverently termed in the midshipmen's berth--was one of the earliest to put in an appearance after breakfast, and hisfirst act was to go straight aloft with his glass. He devoted more timeeven than Mr Clewline to the examination of the stranger, and it wasnot until Captain Brisac had returned to the deck and hailed him that hemade a move.

  As he came aft and joined his superior upon the quarter-deck, exultationwas visible in his face, and in every movement of his body.

  "It is all right, sir," he exclaimed; "she is French beyond allpossibility of doubt. The cut of her canvas is alone sufficientevidence of her nationality; but in order that there may be no room forquestion of it, she has furled her royals, and has run up the tricolourto her main-royal-mast-head. She is a brig, as far as I can make outher rig, coming end-on to us as she is, and seems about our size, orperhaps a trifle larger. I suppose we may as well clear for action atonce?"

  "If you please, Mr Sennitt; and, not to be behindhand with them, letthem see the colour of our bunting before you do anything else."

  The order to clear for action was received with enthusiasm; and thelittle round ball which immediately soared aloft, breaking abroad anddisplaying the naval ensign as it touched the main truck, was greetedwith a rousing cheer. The "green" hands were by this time not quite soverdant as they had been a few days before, Mr Sennitt having drilledthem most remorselessly at every available opportunity--and as they hadbeen very judiciously intermingled with the experienced "salts," inappointing them to their various stations, the work went on with, asCaptain Brisac remarked, "very creditable celerity." In little morethan half an hour, the yards had been slung, bulkheads knocked down, themagazine opened, guns cast loose, loaded, and run out, and every otherpreparation completed.

  Meanwhile the two brigs had been slowly drawing together, and by 10 a.m.were within a couple of miles of each other. There had been a littlemanoeuvring on each side to secure the weather-gage; but our skipper,perceiving that the action was likely to be thereby delayed, speedilyyielded the point, and allowed the Frenchman to take the covetedposition.

  "It will make very little difference, five minutes after we areengaged," he remarked to the first lieutenant, who, after having gonethe rounds and personally seen that everything was ready, had rejoinedhim aft, just as the order had been given to the helmsman of the"Scourge" to "keep away."

  "There is one thing which we have not yet done," he continued, "it seemsquite unnecessary, but we may as well avoid all possibility of mistakeby showing the private signal."

  The private signal was accordingly shown but evoked, as was expected, noresponse. It was consequently hauled down again, and now everybody madehimself finally ready for the impending conflict. My readers willnaturally feel curious to know whether on this, the first occasion of my"smelling gunpowder," I experienced any sensation of fear. I am oldenough now, and have seen enough of service, to have no misapprehensionof being misunderstood, or rather misjudged; I will therefore confessthe truth, and candidly acknowledge that, for a few minutes after thecompletion of our preparations, I felt most horribly frightened. I knewthat I was about to be involved in a scene of death and destruction, ofsickening slaughter, and of even more sickening physical suffering; Ianticipated seeing my fellow-men struck down right and left, their limbstorn away, and, quite possibly, their bodies cut in two by the cruelchain-shot; I looked round upo
n the order and cleanliness whicheverywhere prevailed on board our ship, and contrasted the existentcondition of things with the picture which my imagination conjured up ofimpending blood and carnage; and I admit that for a few minutes my heartalmost failed me. That state of feeling, however, soon passed away, andwas succeeded by a condition of painful excitement and impatience, whichlasted until the first shot was fired, when it abruptly subsided,leaving me as cool and collected as I am at the present moment.

  I was not too frightened, however, to notice and admire the perfect_sang-froid_ with which Captain Brisac and Mr Sennitt contemplated theapproach of our antagonist. They stood side by side, just abaft themain-rigging, scrutinising every movement on board the French ship, andexchanging critical remarks upon the smartness of her crew in shorteningsail and executing the various manoeuvres usual on board a ship goinginto action; and I gathered, with no very comfortable feelings, that,from what they observed, they quite anticipated a hard fight.

  When the ships had approached each other within a quarter of a mile, wewere able, for the first time, to ascertain the actual armament of ourfoe. Mr Sennitt was the first to seize the opportunity of counting herports, and he it was who announced, loud enough for everybody to hear,that she showed six guns of a side, making her entire battery heavierthan our own by four guns. "Which makes her a very fair match for us,"he contentedly remarked.

  "We will engage her at close quarters, Mr Sennitt," said the skipper;"be good enough, therefore, to have every gun double-shotted. Let noman fire until I give the word; we will wait until we are fairly abreastof her, and then give her our whole larboard broadside at once. Luff,you may!" to the master, who had taken the wheel. "Luff, and shave heras closely as you can, without actually touching her. Steady--so; thatwill do very nicely."

  As the French ship came up, she fired every gun along her larboardbroadside, commencing from forward, the moment they could be brought tobear; and the shot came tearing in through our bulwarks, making thesplinters fly in all directions. In my ignorance I expected to seeabout half our crew go down before that first discharge, but to myunbounded surprise not a man was hurt.

  The Frenchman was by this time so close that we could not only see withthe utmost distinctness the crew reloading their guns, but could hearthe confused jabber of excited conversation which appeared to be goingon unchecked on board. What a contrast to our own ship, where every manstood at his post, steady and silent as a statue!

  At last the two ships came up fairly abreast of each other, and werepassing so closely that an active man might have jumped from the one tothe other, when the skipper uttered the word "Fire!"

  The four guns of our larboard broadside rang out simultaneously, theconcussion of the air causing the two ships to heel outwards; andthrough the noise of the explosion I distinctly heard the crashing oftimbers, and the piercing shrieks of the wounded.

  "That's one to us; we draw first blood," chuckled a voice behind me; andI looked round to observe young Harvey, a fellow-mid, rubbing his handswith an air of great satisfaction.

  "Hard up with your helm," exclaimed the skipper; "shiver your main-topsail and let her wear short round; stand by your guns there on thestarboard broadside, and fire as you bring each to bear."

  The effect of this manoeuvre was to lay our ship almost directly athwartthe stern of the Frenchman, and so smartly was it executed that we hadpretty effectually raked him before he was able to bear up, and give usanother broadside, the whole of which flew over us harmlessly, exceptfor a hole or two in our sails.

  The fight now became a running one, both ships going off before thewind, and the Frenchman rather evincing a disposition to keep us at adistance. He did not seem to like the taste he'd had of our quality, asI heard the Irish captain of the after-gun, on the port side, remark.But we possessed rather the advantage of him in the matter of speed, andslowly edged down upon him until we were once more close alongside, whenthe ships exchanged broadsides, both firing at the same moment. Wecould see the white marks in our antagonist's sides, where our shot hadstruck, but either from defective aim, or because he wanted to shootaway our spars, all his shot again flew high, with no worse result thanthe severing of the starboard main-topsail-brace, a casualty which ittook but a minute or two to repair.

  Two or three more broadsides were exchanged without visible effect, andthen an unlucky shot wounded our fore-topmast so badly that, aftertottering for a minute or two, it went over the bows, dragging the main-topgallant-mast down with it.

  Captain Brisac proved himself quite equal to the occasion. He could notprevent the "Scourge" from broaching-to, so, ordering the helm to be puthard-a-port, he luffed us right athwart the Frenchman's stern, pouringin the larboard broadside, which had been disengaged since our openingfire, with such good effect that the French ship's main-yard was shotaway, and the mainmast-head badly wounded.

  A strong gang was immediately set to work board on each ship to repairdamages; but as the Frenchman, by reason of the loss of his after-sail,was unable to bring his ship upon a wind, he had no alternative but torun dead before it, fully exposed, meanwhile, to the raking effects ofour larboard guns, which were kept playing upon him until he had passedout of range, not one of his guns during that time being able to reply.

  It took us rather over one hour to clear away the wreck, and get anothertopmast on end, fully rig it, and make sail once more. Mr Sennitt, whopersonally superintended the work, insisted that it should be thoroughlywell done--as well done in fact as though we had not been in thepresence of an enemy. The French had, in the meantime, been quite asactive as ourselves, and if their work was not so neatly done as ourown, still it _was_ done after a fashion, and they were ready to makesail a few minutes before us, an advantage of which they availedthemselves with such alacrity that it became evident their chief anxietywas to place, in the shortest possible time, the greatest possibledistance between us and themselves.

  This project, however, by no means met the views of us "Scourges," andthe instant that it was possible, every available stitch of canvas waspacked upon our ship, with the view of closing with the enemy again aspromptly as possible.

  Then began that most wearisome of all wearisome businesses, a sternchase in a light breeze, during which the whole crew, from the skipperdownwards, whistled most devoutly for a wind.

  Slowly--_very_ slowly we gained upon the chase, the master, who hadresigned the wheel at the cessation of the action, standing upon theforecastle with his sextant, measuring, about once every five minutes,the angle between the mast-head and the water-line of the chase, toascertain which ship gained upon the other. At last "I think we arewithin range now, sir; shall we try a shot from our bow-chasers?" saidMr Sennitt.

  "We can scarcely reach him yet, I am afraid," said the skipper; "butthere will be no harm in trying."

  The order was given, and old Tompion, the gunner, undertook in personthe task of levelling the gun. He went about the work with muchdeliberation and a great display of science, and at length, watching afavourable opportunity, fired. In another moment a white sear startedinto view near the Frenchman's rudder and close to the water's edge.

  "Hulled him! by all that's clever," exclaimed the first luff, while thegratified Tompion looked slowly round upon his messmates, with modestpride beaming from every feature.

  "Returned, with thanks," murmured young Harvey, who was stationed closebeside me, as a puff of smoke veiled for an instant the stern of ourantagonist; and then the shot was seen bounding toward us, its pathmarked by the jets of water which flew up wherever the ball struck. Atlast it was seen to scurry along the surface for a short distance;finally disappearing within about fifty fathoms of our bows.

  "Try another shot there, forward," said the skipper, "and aim for hisspars. A guinea to the first man who knocks away a spar big or little."

  Every man in the ship was of course anxious to try his hand, and MrSennitt was obliged to interfere, with the view of allowing the bestshots to have the first chanc
e.

  Some curiously indifferent shooting now ensued, the very eagerness ofthe men seeming to render them unsteady. I had strolled forward towatch the game, and, after several most exasperating misses, exclaimed,"I should like very much to try; I believe I could do better than that."

  "Then try you shall, youngster," said Mr Sennitt; "the first shot a manever fires is often a very lucky one, and perhaps yours may be so. Youshall fire the next shot."

  While the gun was being loaded, Tompion availed himself of theopportunity to deliver a short lesson on gunnery, for my especialbenefit, of which all that I remember was that he attached greatimportance to the "trajectory," and was eloquent on the subject of the"parabolic curve."

  I had watched with much impatience the very scrupulous nicety with whichmost of the men pretended to lay the gun, and I was strongly impressedwith the conviction that over-carefulness had much to do with theirrepeated failures; I took very little trouble, therefore, beyond seeingthat the muzzle of the gun had a good elevation, after which I simplywaited, squinting along the sights, until I saw that the weapon was justabout to come in line with the Frenchman's masts, when I pulled thetrigger-line smartly, and was dragged forcibly backwards by the collar,just in time to avoid a serious blow from the recoiling gun.

  I turned angrily round to ascertain what reckless individual it was whohad thus dared to lay unholy hands upon me, when my thoughts werediverted by a ringing cheer from all hands. My shot had lodged in theFrenchman's mainmast-head, just above the cap; and, while we stilllooked, away went the main-topmast dragging the fore-topgallant-mastdown with it. I received a vast amount of praise for my exploit, but ofcourse it was merely a lucky shot, with which skill had nothing whateverto do.