"What are they like?" inquired the first lieutenant.
"I can't make out, sir," was the answer. "One seems to me as if she had
boarded the other, for she's close alongside."
Mr Saunders at once sent me aloft to have a look at the strangers. I
was also at first puzzled, till the light increased, when I made out an
English merchant vessel, and a foreign-looking ship alongside her. Soon
after I came down, and had reported what I had seen, we made them out
clearly from the deck.
"We must overhaul those fellows," said the first lieutenant, and he
instantly gave orders to make all sail.
The breeze was increasing, and we soon neared them. At last we saw the
larger ship make sail, and stand in for the land, while the other
remained, with her yards some one way some another. As she was not
likely to move, we steered after the first. The captain had been
called, and now made his appearance on deck. Our fear was that the
stranger would run on shore, or get into some harbour before we could
come up with her. That she was an Algerine pirate, and had been engaged
in plundering the brig, we had no doubt. However, she was not a very
fast sailer, and we soon got her within range of our guns.
"Give her a shot across the forefoot, and make her heave to," cried the
captain, who was more animated than I had ever yet seen him.
Our larboard bow-chaser was fired, but the Algerine took no notice of
it. We now sent our shot as fast as our guns could be run in and
loaded. Several struck her, and at last her main-yard was knocked away.
Still she stood on, her object being, apparently, to induce us to
follow till we ran ashore. The men were sent into the chains to heave
the lead. Occasionally the chase fired at us, but her shot did us no
damage.
"She will escape us after all," cried the captain, stamping with
impatience.
Scarcely had he uttered the words than there came a loud roar. Up rose
the masts of the Algerine, with her deck, and fragments of wreck and
human bodies, and then down they fell into the water, and, except a few
spars and planks, the fine vessel we had just seen vanished from sight.
The frigate's head was at once put off shore; the boats were lowered,
and pulled away to rescue any of the unfortunate wretches who had
escaped destruction. I went in one of the boats, and we approached the
scene of the catastrophe. We saw two or three people clinging to the
spars, but as they perceived us they let go their hold and sank from
sight, afraid, probably, of falling into our hands alive. As soon as
the boats returned on board, the frigate's sails were filled, and we
stood for the brig alongside which we had seen the Algerine, hoping to
find that her crew had escaped with their lives, even though the vessel
might have been plundered. As we again caught sight of her, however, we
observed that her yards were braced, some one way, some another, and she
lay like a boy's model vessel on a pond, without a hand to guide the
helm.
"That looks bad," observed Nettleship.
"Perhaps the poor fellows are below, thinking the Algerine still in
sight, and are afraid to return on deck," I remarked.
"Very little chance of that," he replied; "however, we shall see
presently."
On getting near the brig, the frigate was hove-to, and I was sent in a
boat with the second lieutenant to board her. A fearful sight met our
eyes. On her deck lay stretched the bodies of her officers and crew,
almost cut to pieces by the sharp scimitars of their assailants. We
hurried below, hoping to find some still alive, but not a voice answered
to our shouts. Finding a couple of lanterns, we explored the vessel
fore and aft, but the wretches who had just met their doom had made
certain work of it, having killed every human being who had attempted to
resist them. Many of the sufferers whom they had captured must have
perished when their vessel blew up. The lieutenant sent me back to
report the state of things to the captain. After a short talk with Mr
Saunders, Lord Robert sent for Nettleship.
"I put you in charge of the brig," he said. "You may take Pim and
Finnahan with you, and follow close in our wake, I intend to steer for
Gibraltar, and will there ascertain whether it is necessary for me to
send the brig to England or not."
On receiving the captain's orders through Mr Saunders, we immediately
got our traps ready, and the boat carried us on board the brig, with
eight hands to form our crew. Among them was Larry, who jumped into the
boat in the place of another man, who was glad enough to escape having
to go, and Jack Patchett, our coach friend, who proved himself, though a
sulky, self-conceited fellow, a prime seaman. As we were short-handed
we were not sorry to have him. On getting on board the brig we had
first to bury the bodies of the murdered crew. Her ship's papers showed
her to be the _Daisy_ of London, John Edwards, master. The pirates had
rifled his pockets, and those of his mates, so that we were unable to
identify them. We at once, therefore, set to work to sew the murdered
men up in canvas, when, without further ceremony, they were launched
overboard. We then washed down decks, to try and get rid of the dark
red hue which stained them; but buckets of water failed to do that.
The lieutenant and his men having assisted us in knotting and splicing
the rigging, and in bracing the yards the proper way, returned on board
the frigate, which directly made sail, we following in her wake. The
_Daisy_ was not a fast craft, and though we made all sail we could
carry, we found she was dropping astern of the frigate.
"It matters very little," said Nettleship, who had brought his quadrant
and Nautical Almanac; "we can find our way by ourselves."
We saw the frigate's lights during the early part of the night, but
before morning they had disappeared. This being no fault of ours, we
did not trouble ourselves about the matter. As daylight approached the
breeze fell, and became so light that we scarcely made more than a knot
an hour. As soon as it was daylight, we turned to with the holy-stones
to try and get the blood-stains out of the deck before they had sunk
deeply in. We were thus employed till breakfast. By this time the wind
had completely dropped, and it became a stark calm, such as so often
occurs in the Mediterranean. The brig's head went boxing round the
compass, and chips of wood thrown overboard lay floating alongside,
unwilling to part company. The heat, too, was almost as great as I ever
felt it in the West Indies. Still we tried to make ourselves as happy
as we could. We were out of sight of the African coast, and were not
likely to be attacked by Salee, Riff, or Algerine corsairs; and Tom
observed that if we were, it would be a pleasing variety to our day's
work, as we should to a certainty beat them off.
"We must not trust too much to that," observed Nettleship. "We have
only six small pop-guns, and as we muster only eleven hands, all told,
we might find it a hard job to keep a crew of one hundred ruffians or
more at bay."
We kept the men employed in putting the brig to rights, and setting up
the rigging, which had become slack from the hot weather. As the vessel
was well provisioned, and one of the men sent with us was a tolerable
cook, we had a good dinner placed on the table. Nettleship and I were
below discussing it, while Tom Pim had charge of the deck. I hurried
over mine, that I might call him down, and was just about to do so,
having a glass of wine to my lips, when there came a roar like thunder,
and over heeled the brig, capsizing everything on the table, and sending
Nettleship and me to the lee side of the cabin. We picked ourselves up,
and rushed to the companion ladder, but it was upset.