Tom Cringle's Log Page 9

  Bermuda, as all the world knows, is a cluster of islands in the middle of the Atlantic. There are Lord knows how many of them, but the beauty of the little straits and creeks which divide them no man can describe who has not seen them. The town of St George’s, for instance, looks as if the houses were cut out of chalk; and one evening the family where I was on a visit proceeded to the main island, Hamilton, to attend a ball there. We had to cross three ferries, although the distance was not above nine miles, if so far. The ‘Mudian women are unquestionably beautiful—so thought Thomas Moore, a tolerable judge, before me. By the by, touching this ‘Mudian ball, it was a very gay affair—the women pleasant and beautiful; but all the men, when they speak, or are spoken to, shut one eye and spit;—a lucid and succinct description of a community.

  The second day of my sojourn was fine—the first fine day since our arrival—and with several young ladies of the family, I was prowling through the cedar wood above St George’s, when a dark good-looking man passed us; he was dressed in tight worsted net pantaloons and Hessian boots, and wore a blue frock-coat and two large epaulets, with rich French bullion, and a round hat. On passing, he touched his hat with much grace, and in the evening I met him in society. It was Commodore Decatur. He was very much a Frenchman in manner, or, I should rather say, in look, for although very well bred, he, for one ingredient, by no means possessed a Frenchman’s volubility; still, he was an exceedingly agreeable and very handsome man.

  The following day we spent in a pleasure cruise amongst the three hundred and sixty-five islands, many of them not above an acre in extent—fancy an island of an acre in extent!—with a solitary house, a small garden, a red-skinned family, a piggery, and all around clear deep pellucid water. None of the islands, or islets, rise to any great height, but they all shoot precipitously out of the water, as if the whole group had originally been one huge platform of rock, with numberless grooves subsequently chiselled out in it by art.

  We had to wind our way amongst these many small channels for two hours, before we reached the gentleman’s house where we had been invited to dine; at length, on turning a corner, with both lateen sails drawing beautifully, we ran bump on a shoal; there was no danger, and knowing that the ‘Mudians were capital sailors, I sat still. Not so Captain K——, a round plump little homo,— “Shove her off, my boys, shove her off.” She would not move, and thereupon he, in a fever of gallantry, jumped overboard up to the waist in full fig; and one of the men following his example, we were soon afloat. The ladies applauded, and the captain sat in his wet breeks for the rest of the voyage, in all the consciousness of being considered a hero. Ducks and onions are the grand staple of Bermuda, but there was a fearful dearth of both at the time I speak of—a knot of young West India merchants, who, with heavy purses and large credits on England, had at this time domiciled themselves in St George’s, to batten on the spoils of poor Jonathan, having monopolised all the good things of the place. I happened to be acquainted with one of them, and thereby had less reason to complain; but many a poor fellow, sent ashore on duty, had to put up with but Lenten fare at the taverns. At length, having refitted, we sailed in company with the Rayo frigate, with a convoy of three transports, freighted with a regiment for New Orleans, and several merchantmen bound for the West Indies.

  “The still vexed Bermoothes”—I arrived at them in a gale of wind, and I sailed from them in a gale of wind. What the climate may be in the summer I don’t know; but during the time I was there it was one storm after another.

  We sailed in the evening with the moon at full, and the wind at west-northwest. So soon as we got from under the lee of the land the breeze struck us, and it came on to blow like thunder so that we were all soon reduced to our storm staysails; and there we were, transports, merchantmen, and men-of-war, rising on the mountainous billows one moment, and the next losing sight of everything but the water and sky in the deep trough of the sea, while the seething foam was blown over us in showers from the curling manes of the roaring waves. But overhead, all this while, it was as clear as a lovely winter moon could make it, and the stars shone brightly in the deep blue sky; there was not even a thin fleecy shred of cloud racking across the moon’s disc. Oh, the glories of a northwester!

  But the devil seize such glory! Glory, indeed! with a fleet of transports, and a regiment of soldiers on board! Glory! why, I daresay five hundred rank and file, at the fewest, were all cascading at one and the same moment—a thousand poor fellows turned outside in, like so many pairs of old stockings. Any glory in that? But to proceed.

  Next morning the gale still continued, and when the day broke there was the frigate standing across our bows, rolling and pitching, as she tore her way through the boiling sea, under a close-reefed main-topsail and reefed foresail, with topgallant-yards and royal masts, and everything that could be struck with safety in war-time, down on deck. There she lay, with her clear black bends, and bright white streak, and long tier of cannon on the maindeck, and the carronades on the quarterdeck and forecastle grinning through the ports in the black bulwarks, while the white hammocks, carefully covered by the hammock-cloths, crowned the defences of the gallant frigate fore and aft, as she delved through the green surge—one minute rolling and rising on the curling white crest of a mountainous sea, amidst a hissing snow-storm of spray, with her bright copper glancing from stem to stern, and her scanty white canvass swelling aloft, and twenty feet of her keel forward occasionally hove into the air clean out of the water, as if she had been a sea-bird rushing to take wing—and the next, sinking entirely out of sight-hull, masts, and rigging—behind an intervening sea, that rose in hoarse thunder between us, threatening to overwhelm both us and her. As for the transports, the largest of the three had lost her fore-topmast, and had bore up under her foresail; another was also scudding under a close-reefed fore-topsail; but the third or head-quarter ship was still lying-to to windward, under her storm staysails. None of the merchant vessels were to be seen, having been compelled to bear up in the night, and to run before it under bare poles.

  At length, as the sun rose, we got before the wind, and it soon moderated so far that we could carry reefed topsails and foresail; and away we all bowled, with a clear, deep, cold, blue sky, and a bright sun overhead, and a stormy leaden-coloured ocean with whitish green-crested billows, below. The sea continued to go down, and the wind to slacken, until the afternoon, when the commodore made the signal for the Torch to send a boat’s crew, the instant it could be done with safety, on board the dismasted ship to assist in repairing damages and in getting up a jury-foretopmast.

  The damaged ship was at this time on our weather-quarter; we accordingly handed the fore-topsail, and presently she was alongside. We hailed her, that we intended to send a boat on board, and desired her to heave-to, as we did, and presently she rounded to under our lee. One of the quarter-boats was manned, with three of the carpenter’s crew, and six good men over and above her complement; but it was no easy matter to get on board of her, let me tell you, after she had been lowered, carefully watching the rolls, with four hands in. The moment she touched the water, the tackles were cleverly unhooked, and the rest of us tumbled on board, shin leather growing scarce, when we shoved off. With great difficulty, and not without wet jackets, we, the supernumeraries, got on board, and the boat returned to the Torch. The evening when we landed in the lobster-box, as Jack loves to designate a transport, was too far advanced for us to do anything towards refitting that night; and the confusion and uproar and numberless abominations of the crowded craft, were irksome to a greater degree than I expected, after having been accustomed to the strict and orderly discipline of a man-of-war. The following forenoon the Torch was ordered by signal to chase in the south-east quarter, and, hauling out from the fleet, she was soon out of sight.

  “There goes my house and home,” said I, and a feeling of desolateness came over me, that I would have been ashamed at the time to have acknowledged. We stood on, and worked hard all day in repairing the dam
age sustained during the gale.

  At length dinner was announced, and I was invited, as the officer in charge of the seamen, to go down. The party in the cabin consisted of an old gizzened major, with a brown wig, and a voice melodious as the sharpening of a saw—I fancied sometimes that the vibration created by it set the very glasses in the steward’s pantry a-ringing—three captains and six subalterns, every man of whom, as the devil would have it, played on the flute, and drew bad sketches, and kept journals. Most of them were very white and blue in the gills when we sat down, and others of a dingy sort of whitey-brown, while they ogled the viands in a most suspicious manner. Evidently most of them had but small confidence in their moniplies; and one or two, as the ship gave a heavier roll than usual, looked wistfully towards the door, and half rose from their chairs, as if in act to bolt. However, hot brandy grog being the order of the day, we all, landsmen and sailors, got on astonishingly, and numberless long yarns were spun of what “what’s-his-name of this, and so-and-so of t’other, did or did not do.”

  About half-past five in the evening the captain of the transport, or rather the agent, an old lieutenant in the navy, and our host, rang his bell for the steward.

  “Whereabouts are we in the fleet, steward?” said the ancient.

  “The sternmost ship of all, sir,” said the man.

  “Where is the commodore?”

  “About three miles ahead, sir.”

  “And the Torch, has she rejoined us?”

  “No, sir; she has been out of sight these two hours; when last seen she was in chase of something in the south-east quarter, and carrying all the sail she could stagger under.”

  “Very well, very well.”

  A song from Master Waistbelt, one of the young officers. Before he had concluded the mate came down. By this time it was near sundown.

  “Shall we shake a reef out of the main and mizen topsails, sir, and set the mainsail and spanker? The wind has lulled, sir, and there is a strange sail in the north-west that seems to be dodging us—but she may be one of the merchantmen, after all, sir.”

  “Never mind, Mr Leechline,” said our gallant captain. “Mr Bandalier—a song if you please.”

  Now, the young soldiers on board happened to be men of the world, and Bandalier, who did not sing, turned off the request with a good-humoured laugh, alleging his inability with much suavity; but the old rough Turk of a tar-bucket chose to fire at this, and sang out—”Oh, if you don’t choose to sing when you are asked, and to sport your damned fine airs—”

  “Mr Crowfoot—”

  “Captain,” said the agent, piqued at having his title by courtesy withheld.

  “By no means,” said Major Sawrasp, who had spoken—”I believe I am speaking to Lieutenant Crowfoot, agent for transport No.———, wherein it so happens I am commanding officer—so—”

  Old Crowfoot saw he was in the wrong box, and therefore hove about, and backed out in good time—making the amende as smoothly as his gruff nature admitted, and trying to look pleased.

  Presently the same bothersome mate came down again—

  “The strange sail is creeping up on our quarter, sir.”

  “Ay?” said Crowfoot, “how does she lay?”

  “She is hauled by the wind on the starboard tack, sir,” continued the mate.

  We now went on deck, and found that our suspicious friend had shortened sail, as if he had made us out, and was afraid to approach, or was lying by until nightfall.

  Sawrasp had before this, with the tact and ease of a soldier and a gentleman, soldered his feud with Crowfoot, and, with the rest of the lobsters, was full of fight. The sun at length set, and the night closed in, when the old major again addressed Crowfoot.

  “My dear fellow, can’t you wait a bit, and let us have a rattle at that chap?” And old Crowfoot, who never bore a grudge long, seemed much inclined to fall in with the soldier’s views; and, in fine, although the weather was now moderate, he did not make sail. Presently the commodore fired a gun, and showed lights. It was the signal to close. “Oh, time enough,” said old Crowfoot—”what is the old man afraid of?” Another gun—and a fresh constellation on board the frigate. It was “an enemy in the north-west quarter.”

  “Hah, hah,” sang out the agent, “is it so? Major, what say you to a brush—let her close, eh?—should like to pepper her wouldn’t you—three hundred men, eh?”

  By this time we were all on deck—the schooner came bowling along under a reefed mainsail and jib, now rising, and presently disappearing behind the stormy heavings of the roaring sea, the rising moon shining brightly on her canvass pinions, as if she had been an albatross skimming along the surface of the foaming water, while her broad white streak glanced like a silver ribbon along her clear black side. She was a very large craft of her class, long and low in the water, and evidently very fast; and it was now clear, from our having been unable as yet to sway up our fore-topmast, that she took us for a disabled merchantman, which might be cut off from the convoy.

  As she approached we could perceive by the bright moonlight that she had six guns of a side, and two long ones on pivots—the one forward on the forecastle, and the other choke up to the mainmast.

  Her deck was crowded with dark figures, pike and cutlass in hand: we were by this time so near that we could see a trumpet in the hand of a man who stood in the fore rigging, with his feet on the hammock netting, and his back against the shrouds. We had cleared away our six eighteen-pound carronades, which composed our starboard broadside, and loaded them, each with a round shot and a bag of two hundred musket-balls, while three hundred soldiers in their foraging jackets, and with their loaded muskets in their hands, were lying on the deck, concealed by the quarters, while the blue-jackets were sprawling in groups round the carronades.

  I was lying down beside the gallant old major, who had a bugler close to him, while Crowfoot was standing on the gun nearest us; but getting tired of this recumbent position, I crept aft, until I could see through a spare port.

  “Why don’t the rascals fire?” quoth Sawrasp.

  “Oh, that would alarm the commodore. They intend to walk quietly on board of us; but they will find themselves mistaken a little,” whispered Crowfoot.

  “Mind, men, no firing till the bugle sounds,” said the major.

  The word was passed along.

  The schooner was by this time ploughing through it within half pistol-shot, with the white water dashing away from her bows, and buzzing past her sides—her crew as thick as peas on her deck. Once or twice she hauled her wind a little, and then again kept away from us, as if irresolute what to do. At length, without hailing, and all silent as the grave, she put her helm a-star-board, and ranged alongside.

  “Now, my boys, give it him,” shouted Crowfoot—”Fire!”

  “Ready, men,” shouted the major—”Present,—fire!”

  The bugles sounded, the cannon roared, the musketry rattled, and the men cheered, and all was hurra, and fire, and fury. The breeze was strong enough to carry the smoke forward, and I saw the deck of the schooner, where the moment before all was still and motionless, and filled with dark figures till there scarcely appeared standing room, at once converted into a shambles. The blasting fiery tempest had laid low nearly the whole mass, like a maize-plat before a hurricane; and such a cry arose, as if

  “Men fought on earth,

  And fiends in upper air.”

  Scarcely a man was on his legs, the whole crew seemed to have been levelled with the deck, many dead, no doubt, and most wounded, while we could see numbers endeavouring to creep towards the hatches, while the black blood, in horrible streams, gushed through her scuppers across the bright white streak that glanced in the moonlight.

  Some one on board of the privateer now hailed, “We have surrendered; cease firing, sir.” But devil a bit—we continued blazing away—a lantern was run up to his main gaff, and then lowered again.

  “We have struck, sir,” shouted another voice; “don’t murder
us—don’t fire, sir, for Godsake.”

  Put fire we still did; no sailor has the least compunction at even running down a privateer. Mercy to privateersmen is unknown. “Give them the stem,” is the word, the curs being regarded by Jack at the best as highwaymen; so when he found we still peppered away, sailing two feet for our one, he hauled his wind, and speedily got beyond range of our carronades, having all this time never fired a shot. Shortly after this we ran under the Rayo’s stern—she was lying to.

  “Mr Crowfoot, what have you been after? I have a mind to report you, sir.”

  “We could not help it, sir,” sang out Crowfoot, in a most dolorous tone, in answer to the captain of the frigate; “we have been nearly taken, sir, by a privateer, sir—an immense vessel, sir, that sails like a witch, sir.”

  “Keep close in my wake then, sir,” rejoined the captain, in a gruff tone, and immediately the Rayo bore up.

  Next morning we were all carrying as much sail as we could crowd. By this time we had gotten our jury-foretopmast up, and the Rayo, having kept astern in the night, was now under topsails and top-gallantsails, with the wet canvass at the head of the sails, showing that the reefs had been freshly shaken out—rolling, wedge-like on the swell, and rapidly shooting ahead, to resume her station. As she passed us, and let fall her foresail, she made the signal to make more sail, her object being to get through the Caicos Passage, into which we were now entering before nightfall. It was eleven o’clock in the forenoon. A fine clear breezy day, fresh and pleasant, sometimes cloudy overhead, but always breaking away again, with a bit of a sneezer and a small shower. As the sun rose there were indications of squalls in the north-eastern quarter, and about noon one of them was whitening to windward. So “hands by the topgallant clewlines” was the word, and we were all standing by to shorten sail when the commodore came to the wind as sharp and suddenly as if he had anchored; but on a second look I saw his sheets were let fly, haulyards let go, and apparently all was confusion on board of her. I ran to the side and looked over. The long heaving dark-blue swell had changed into a light-green hissing ripple.