THE TRAGEDY OF THE FRIGATE _MEDUSA_
Among the countless episodes of disaster at sea, the fate of the French
frigate _Medusa_ and her people still possesses a poignant and mournful
distinction. Other ships have gone down with much greater loss of life,
including such modern instances as the _Titanic_ and the _Lusitania_,
or have been missing with all hands, but the story of the _Medusa_
casts a dark shadow across the chronicles of human suffering, even
though a century has passed since the event. There are some enterprises
which seem foredoomed to failure by a conspiracy of circumstances, as
if a spell of evil enchantment had been woven to thwart and destroy
them. Of such a kind was this most unhappy voyage.
As an incident of the final overthrow of Napoleon, Great Britain
returned to France the colonial territory of Sénégal on the west
coast of Africa, between Cape Blanco and the Gambia River. A French
expedition was equipped and sent out to reoccupy and govern the
little settlements and clearings which thinly fringed the tropical
wilderness. It included officials, scientists, soldiers, servants, and
laborers, who sailed from Rochefort in the _Medusa_ frigate and three
smaller vessels on the seventeenth of June, 1816.
The French Navy had been shattered and swept from the seas by the
broadsides of Nelson’s fleets, and its morale had ebbed. This mission,
moreover, was not a strictly naval affair, and the personnel of the
frigate was recruited with no particular care. The seamen were the
scrapings of the waterfront, and the officers had not been selected for
efficiency. They were typical neither of the French arms nor people. It
seemed a commonplace task, no doubt, to sail with the summer breezes on
a voyage not much farther than the Cape Verd Islands and disembark the
passengers and cargo.
Captain de Chaumareys of the _Medusa_ was a light-hearted, agreeable
shipmate, but he appears to have been a most indifferent seaman and a
worse master of men and emergencies. When no more than ten days out
from port he discovered that his reckoning had set him thirty leagues,
or almost a hundred miles, out of his course. This was not enough to
condemn him utterly, because navigation was a crude art a century ago
and ships blundered about the high seas and found their way to port
in the most astonishing manner. But Captain de Chaumareys was not
made cautious by his error, and he drove along with fatuous confidence
in his ability and would pay no heed to the opinions of his officers.
He also managed to lose touch with the three smaller ships of the
squadron, and they vanished from his ken. It was one fatal mischance
after another.
On the first of July, when the frigate crossed the tropic of Cancer,
the debonair captain made it an excuse for a holiday and took personal
charge of the gaieties which so absorbed him that he turned over the
command of the ship to M. Richefort, one of the civilian officials who
had seen naval service. There was a feeling of uneasiness on board, for
all the fiddling and singing and dancing, and the officers discussed it
over their wine in the ward-room and the passengers were aware of it in
the cabins, “while the crew performed the fantastic ceremonies usual on
such occasions although the frigate was surrounded by all the unseen
perils of the ocean. A few persons, aware of the danger, remonstrated,
but without effect, even when it was ascertained that the _Medusa_ was
on the bank of Arguin.”
The ship was, in fact, entrapped among the shoals and reefs which
extended like a labyrinth far out from the African coast. It was an
area of many disasters to stout ships, whose crews had been taken
captive or killed by savage tribes, if they survived the hostility of
the sea. M. Richefort, who was so obligingly acting as commander of the
_Medusa_, insisted that there were a hundred fathoms of water under the
keel and not the slightest cause for anxiety, and they still danced on
deck to the scraping of the fiddles.
With a crash that flung the merry-makers this way and that, and brought
the spars tumbling about their ears, the _Medusa_ struck in only
sixteen feet of water, and the deadly sands had inextricably gripped
her. She was a lost ship on this bright day of calm seas and sunny
weather and the sailors blithely tripping it heel-and-toe. It was soon
realized that the frigate might pound to pieces in the first gale of
wind, and that advantage had best be taken of the quiescent ocean to
get away from her. The coast was known to be no more than forty miles
distant, and the hope of escape was strong.
There was ample time in which to abandon ship with some order and
method, to break out provisions and water-barrels, to build a number of
buoyant rafts and carefully equip them, to safeguard the lives of the
people as far as possible. The frigate carried carpenters, mechanics,
and other artisans, and all manner of tools for the colony of Sénégal.
Hundreds of people had been saved from other ships in situations
even more desperate than this. There had been strong men, unwavering
authority, and disciplined obedience in them, however, but this doomed
frigate was like a madhouse, and panic ran from deck to deck. The crew
was slack at best, but it could not be held altogether responsible for
the demoralization. The soldiers and laborers were Spanish, French,
Italian, and negroes, many of whom had probably been in prison or the
convict hulks, and were sent to Africa for their country’s good.
The frigate had five seaworthy boats, which were hurriedly launched and
filled with people whose only thought was to save their own skins. In
one of them was the governor of Sénégal and his family, and in another
were placed four children and the wives of the officials. In this
respect the ancient chivalry of the sea was lived up to. There were
heroes among the French army officers, as might have been expected, for
they kept clear of the struggle for the boats, and succeeded in holding
most of their men, who were assigned to the one raft which had been
frantically thrown together.
The five boats shoved off and waited for the raft, which it was
proposed to take in tow. Barrels of bread and wine and water had been
hoisted on deck, but in the confusion almost all the stores were
thrown into the boats. M. Correard, geographical engineer attached to
the expedition, had gallantly volunteered to take chances with his own
men on the raft. He had kept his wits about him, and delayed to ask
Captain de Chaumareys whether navigation instruments and charts had
been provided for the raft. He was assured that a naval officer was
attending to these essentials and would be in charge of the party.
Forgetting his duty entirely, this faithless officer scrambled into one
of the boats, and the raft was left without means of guidance.
There are cowards in all services, afloat and ashore, but they are
seldom conspicuous. Among those who fled away in the boats was the gay
Captain de Chaumareys, who oozed through a port-hole without delaying
a moment. In this manner he disappeared from the narrative, the last
glimpse of him as framed in the port-hole while his ship was still
crowded with terrified castaways for whom there were no boats. He was a
feather-brained poltroon who, by accident, happened to be a Frenchman.
[Illustration: BOATS WERE FILLED WITH MEN WHOSE ONLY THOUGHT WAS TO
SAVE THEIR SKINS]
There were intrepid men in the _Medusa_ who bullied the others into
helping make a raft. The best that they could do was to launch a
pitiful contrivance of spars and planks held together by lashings. It
was sixty-five feet long and twenty broad, not even decked over,
twisting and working to the motion of the waves which slapped over it
or splashed between the timbers when the ocean was smooth. As soon
as it floated alongside the frigate, _one hundred and fifty persons_
wildly jammed themselves upon it, standing in water to their waists
and in danger of slipping between the spars and planks. The only part
of the raft which was unsubmerged when laden had room for no more than
fifteen men to lie down upon it.
The weather was still calm, and the ship rested solidly upon her sandy
bed, the upper decks clear of water. It seems incredible that no
barrels of beef and biscuit were lashed to the timbers of the raft,
no water-casks rolled from the tiers and swung overside. A kind of
mob hysteria swept these people along, and the men of resolution were
carried with it. They were unaccustomed to the sea, and a frenzied
fear of it stampeded them. The flimsy, wave-washed raft floated away
from the _Medusa_ with only biscuit enough for one scanty meal and a
few casks of wine. The stage was set, as one might say, for inevitable
horrors.
One of the boats which was not so crowded as the others had the grace
to row back to the ship with orders to take off a few, if there were
men still aboard. To the surprise of the lieutenant in the boat, sixty
men had been left behind because there was not even a foothold for them
upon the raft. The boat managed to stow all but seventeen of them, who
were very drunk by this time and preferred to stand by the ship and the
spirit-room. The fear of death had ceased to trouble them.
For the moment let us shift the scene to survey the fate of these
seventeen poor wretches who were abandoned on board of the _Medusa_.
The five boats reached the African coast and most of their company
lived to find Sénégal. The governor bethought himself that a large
amount of specie had been left in the wreck, and he sent a little
vessel off; but lack of provisions and bad weather drove her twice back
to port, so that fifty-two days, more than seven weeks, had passed
before the _Medusa_ was sighted, her upper works still above water.
Three of the seventeen men were found alive, “but they lived in
separate corners of the hulk and never met but to run at each other
with drawn knives.” Several others had sailed off on a tiny raft which
was cast up on the coast of the Sahara, but the men were drowned. A
lone sailor drifted away on a hencoop as the craft of his choice, and
foundered in sight of the frigate. All the rest had died of too little
food and too much rum, after the provisions had been lost or spoiled
by the breaking up of the ship.
It was understood that the raft, with its burden of one hundred and
fifty souls, was to be taken in tow by the five boats strung in a line,
and this flotilla would make for the nearest coast, which might have
been reached in two or three days of favoring weather. After a few
hours of slow, but encouraging, progress, the tow-line of the captain’s
boat parted. Instead of making fast to the raft again, all the other
boats cast off their cables and, under sail and oar, set off to the
eastward to save themselves. The miserable people who beheld this
desertion denounced it as an act of cruelty and perfidy beyond belief.
It may have been in the captain’s mind to make haste and send a vessel
to pick up the castaways, but his previous behavior had been such that
he scarcely deserves the benefit of the doubt.
On the makeshift raft there were those who knew how to die like
Frenchmen and gentlemen. What they endured has been handed down to
us in the personal accounts of M. Correard and M. Savigny, colonial
officials who wrote with that touch, vivid and dramatic, which is
the gift of many of their race. Even in translation it is profoundly
moving. When they saw the boats forsake them and vanish at the edge of
the azure horizon, a stupor fell upon these unfortunate people as they
clung to one another with arms locked and bodies pressed together so
that they might not be washed off the raft.
A small group in whom nobility of character burned like an unquenchable
flame assumed the leadership, attempting to maintain some sort of
discipline and decency, to ration the precious wine, to make the raft
more seaworthy. One of the artisans had a pocket compass, which he
displayed amid shouts of joy, but it slipped from his fingers and was
lost. They had no chart or any other resource of the kind.
“The first day passed in a manner sufficiently tranquil. We talked
of the means by which we would save ourselves; we spoke of it
as a certain circumstance, which reanimated our courage; and we
sustained that of the soldiers by cherishing in them the hope of
being able, in a short time, to revenge themselves on those who had
abandoned them.... In the evening our hearts and our prayers, by
a feeling natural to the unfortunate, were turned toward Heaven.
Surrounded by inevitable dangers, we addressed that invisible
Being who has established the order of the universe. Our vows were
fervent and we experienced from our prayers the cheering influence
of hope. It is necessary to have been in similar circumstances
before one can rightly imagine what a solace to the hearts of the
sufferers is the sublime idea of a God protecting the afflicted.”
Such were the reflections of a little group of devout and high-minded
Frenchmen whose example helped to steady the rest of the castaways
in the early hours of their ordeal. During the first night the wind
increased, and the sea became so boisterous that the waves gushed and
roared across the raft, most of which was three feet under water. A few
ropes were stretched for the people to cling to, but they were washed
to and fro, and many were caught and killed or cruelly hurt between the
grinding timbers. Others were swept into the sea. Twenty of the company
had perished before dawn. Two ship’s boys and a baker, after bidding
farewell to their comrades, threw themselves into the ocean as the
easier end. A survivor wrote:
“During the whole of this night we struggled against death, holding
ourselves closely to those spars which were firmly bound together;
tossed by the waves from one end to the other, and sometimes
precipitated into the sea; floating between life and death,
mourning over our misfortunes, certain of perishing, yet contending
for the remainder of existence with that cruel element which had
determined to swallow us up. Such was our situation till break of
day.”
Already the minds of some of the castaways were affected. When the
day came clear and beautiful, they saw visions of ships, of green
shores, of loved ones at home. While the ocean granted them a respite,
the emotion of hope strongly revived, and their manifold woes were
forgotten as they gazed landward or waited for sight of a sail.
“Two young men raised and recognized their father who had fallen
and was lying insensible among the feet of the soldiers. They
believed him to be dead and their despair was expressed in the
most affecting manner. He slowly revived and was restored to life
in response to the prayers of his sons who supported him closely
folded in their arms. This touching scene of filial piety drew our
tears.”
The second night again brought clouds and squally weather, which
agitated the ocean and swept the raft. In a wailing mass the people
were dashed to and fro and were crushed or drowned. The ruffianly
soldiers and sailors broached the wine-casks, and so lost such last
glimmerings of reason as terror had not deprived them of. They insanely
attacked the other survivors, and at intervals a battle raged all night
long, with sabers, knives, and bayonets. The brave M. Correard had
fallen into a swoon of exhaustion, but was aroused by the cries of “To
arms, comrades! Rally, or we are lost!” He mustered a small force of
loyal laborers and a few officers and led them in a charge. The rebels
surrounded them, but were beaten back after much bloodshed. The scenes
were thus depicted by the pen of M. Savigny:
The day had been beautiful and no one seemed to doubt that the
boats would appear in the course of it, to relieve us from our
perilous state; but the evening approached and none was seen.
From that moment a spirit of sedition spread from man to man, and
manifested itself by the most furious shouts. Night came on, the
heavens were obscured by thick clouds, the wind rose and with
it the sea. The waves broke over us every moment, numbers were
carried into the sea, particularly at the ends of the raft, and the
crowding towards the centre of it was so great that several poor
people were smothered by the pressure of their comrades who were
unable to keep their legs.
Firmly persuaded that they were all on the point of being drowned,
both soldiers and sailors resolved to soothe their last moments by
drinking until they lost their reason. Excited by the fumes acting
on empty stomachs and heads already disordered by danger, they
now became deaf to the voice of reason and boldly declared their
intention to murder their officers and then cut the ropes which
bound the raft together. One of them, seizing an axe, actually
began the dreadful work. This was the signal for revolt. The
officers rushed forward to quell the tumult and the mutineer with
the axe was the first to fall, his head split by a sabre.
The passengers joined the officers but the mutineers were still
the greater number. Luckily they were but badly armed, or the few
bayonets and sabres of the opposite party could not have kept them
at bay. One fellow, detected in secretly cutting the ropes, was
immediately flung overboard. Others destroyed the shrouds and
halliards of the sail, and the mast, deprived of support, fell upon
a captain of infantry and broke his thigh. He was instantly seized
by the soldiers and thrown into the sea, but the officers saved
him. A furious assault was now made upon the mutineers, many of
whom were cut down.
At length this fit of desperation subsided into weeping cowardice.
They cried out for mercy and asked for forgiveness upon their
knees. It was now midnight and order appeared to be restored, but
after an hour of deceitful calm the insurrection burst forth anew.
The mutineers ran upon the officers like madmen, each having a
knife or sabre in his hand, and such was the fury of the assailants
that they tore with their teeth the flesh and even the clothing
of their adversaries. There was no time for hesitation, a general
slaughter took place, and the raft was strewn with dead bodies.
There was one woman on the raft, and the villains had thrown her
overboard during the struggle, together with her husband, who had
heroically defended her. M. Correard, gashed with saber-wounds as
he was, leaped into the sea with a rope and rescued the wife, while
Lavilette, the head workman, swam after the husband and hauled him to
the raft.
[Illustration: THE BRIG, WHICH HAD MADE A LONG TACK AND WAS NOW
STEERING STRAIGHT TOWARD THE RAFT]
The first thing the poor woman did, after recovering her senses,
was to acquaint herself with the name of the person who had saved
her and to express to him her liveliest gratitude. Finding that
her words but ill reflected her feelings, she recollected that she
had in her pocket a little snuff and instantly offered it to him.
Touched with the gift but unable to use it, M. Correard gave it
to a wounded sailor, which served him two or three days. But it is
impossible to describe a still more affecting scene,--the joy this
unfortunate couple testified when they were again conscious, at
finding they were both saved.
The woman was a native of the Swiss Alps who had followed the armies of
France as a sutler, or vivandière, for twenty years, through many of
Napoleon’s campaigns. Bronzed, intrepid, facing death with a gesture,
she said to M. Correard:
I am a useful woman, you see, a veteran of great and glorious wars.
Therefore, if you please, be so good as to continue to preserve my
life. Ah, if you knew how often I have ventured upon the fields of
battle and braved the bullets to carry assistance to our gallant
men! Whether they had money or not, I always let them have my
goods. Sometimes a battle would deprive me of my poor debtors, but
after the victory others would pay me double or triple for what
they had consumed before the engagement. Thus I came in for a share
of the victories.
It was during a lull of the dreadful conflict among these pitiful
castaways that M. Savigny was moved to exclaim:
The moon lighted with her melancholy rays this disastrous raft,
this narrow space on which were found united so many torturing
anxieties, a madness so insensate, a courage so heroic, and the
most generous, the most amiable sentiments of nature and humanity.
Another night came, and the crazed mutineers made an attack even
more savage. It was not altogether impelled by the blind instinct of
survival, for again they tried to tear the raft apart and destroy
themselves with it. They were so many ravening beasts. Those who
resisted them displayed many instances of brave and beautiful
self-sacrifice. One of the loyal laborers was seized by four of the
rebels, who were about to kill him, but Lavilette, formerly a sergeant
of Napoleon’s Old Guard, rushed in and subdued them with the butt of a
carbine and so saved the victim of their rage.
A young lieutenant fell into the hands of these maniacs, and again
there were volunteers to rush in against overwhelming numbers and
effect a rescue, regardless of their grievous wounds. Bleeding and
exhausted, M. Coudin had fallen upon a barrel, but he still held in
his arms a twelve-year-old sailor-boy whom he was trying to shield
from harm. The rebels tossed them both into the sea, but M. Coudin
clung to the lad and insisted that he be placed upon the raft before he
permitted himself to be helped.
During these periods of hideous combat among men who should have been
brethren and comrades in tribulation, as many as sixty of them were
drowned or died of their wounds. Only two of these belonged to the
little party of finely tempered souls who had shown themselves to be
greatly heroic. They had withstood one onslaught after another, and
there were never more than twenty of them, in honor preferring one
another, untouched by the murderous delirium which had afflicted the
others.
True, they saw phantasms and talked wildly, but the illusions were
peaceful. M. Correard imagined that he was traveling through the
lovely, fruitful fields of Italy. One of the officers said to him,
quite calmly, “I recollect that we were abandoned by the boats, but
there is no cause for anxiety. I am writing a letter to the Government,
and in a few hours we shall be saved.” And while they were babbling
of the cafés of Paris and Bordeaux and ordering the most elaborate
meals, they chewed the leather of the shoulder-belts and cartridges,
and famine took its daily toll of them. In these circumstances it
was inevitable that sooner or later they would begin devouring one
another for food. The details are repugnant, and it is just as well to
pass over them. With this same feeling in mind, one of the survivors
confessed:
It was necessary, however, that some extreme measure should be
adopted to support our miserable existence. We shudder with horror
on finding ourselves under the necessity of recording that which
we put into practice. We feel the pen drop from our hands, a
deadly coldness freezes all our limbs, and our hair stands on
end. Readers, we entreat you not to entertain, for men already too
unhappy, a sentiment of indignation; but to grieve for them, and to
shed a tear of pity over their sad lot.
On the fourth day a dozen more had died, and the survivors were
“extremely feeble, and bore upon their faces the stamp of approaching
dissolution.” Shipwrecked crews have lived much longer than this
without food, but the situation of these sufferers was peculiarly
dreadful. And yet one of them could say:
This day was serene and the ocean slumbered. Our hearts were in
harmony with the comforting aspect of the heavens and received anew
a ray of hope. A shoal of flying fish passed under our raft and as
there was an infinite number of openings between the pieces which
composed it, the fish were entangled in great numbers. We threw
ourselves upon them and took about two hundred and put them in an
empty barrel. This food seemed delicious, but one man would have
required a score. Our first emotion was to give thanks to God for
this unhoped for favor.
An ounce of gunpowder was discovered, and the sunshine dried it,
so that with a steel and gun-flints a fire was kindled in a wetted
cask and some of the little fish were cooked. This was the only food
vouchsafed them, a mere shadow of substance among so many, “but the
night was made tolerable and might have been happy if it had not been
signalized by a new massacre.”
A mob of Spaniards, Italians, and negroes had hatched a plot to throw
all the others into the sea and so obtain the raft and what wine was
left. The black men argued that the coast was near and that they could
traverse it without danger from the natives and so act as guides. The
leader of this outbreak was a Spaniard, who placed himself behind the
mast, made the sign of the cross with one hand, waved a knife in the
other, and invoked the name of God as the signal to rush forward and
begin the affray. Two faithful French sailors, who were forewarned
of this eruption, lost not a moment in grappling with this devout
desperado, and he was thrown into the sea along with an Asiatic of
gigantic stature who was suspected of being another ringleader. A third
instigator of the mob, perceiving that the plot was discovered, armed
himself with a boarding-ax, hacked his way free, and plunged into the
ocean.
The rest of the mutineers were hardier lunatics, and they fought wildly
in the attempt to kill one of the officers, under the delusion that he
was a Lieutenant Danglass, whom they had hated for his harsh manners
while aboard the _Medusa_. At length they were repulsed, but when the
morning came only thirty persons remained alive of the one hundred
and fifty who had left the frigate. Occasional glimpses of reason
prevailed, as when two soldiers were caught in the act of stealing
wine from the only cask left, and were put to death after a summary
courtmartial conducted with singular regard for form and ceremony.
Among those who mercifully passed out at the end of a week was the
twelve-year-old sailor-boy, whose name was Leon. M. Savigny describes
it so tenderly that the passage is worth quoting:
He died like a lamp which ceases to burn for want of aliment. All
spoke in favor of this young and amiable creature who merited a
better fate. His angelic form, his musical voice, the interest
inspired by an age so infantile, increased still more by the
courage he had shown and the services he had performed, (for he
had already made a campaign in the East Indies), moved us all with
the deepest pity for this young victim. Our old soldiers, and all
the people in general, did everything they could to prolong his
existence. Neither the wine of which they deprived themselves
without regret, nor all the other means they employed, could arrest
his melancholy doom.
He expired in the arms of his friend, M. Coudin, who had not ceased
to give him the most unwearied attention. Whilst he had strength to
move he ran incessantly from one side to the other, loudly calling
for his mother, for water and for food. He trod upon the feet and
legs of his wounded companions who in their turn uttered cries of
anguish, but these were rarely mingled with threats or reproaches.
They freely pardoned all that the poor little lad caused them to
suffer.
When the number of the living was reduced to twenty-seven, a solemn
discussion was held, and a conclusion reached upon which it is not
for us to pass judgment. It was evident that fifteen of the number
were likely to live a few days longer, which gave them a tangible hope
of rescue. The other twelve were about to die, all of them severely
wounded and bereft of reason. There was still some wine in the last
cask. To divide it with these doomed twelve was to deprive the fifteen
stronger men of the chance of survival. It was decided to give these
dying people to the merciful obliteration of the sea. The execution of
this decree was undertaken by three soldiers and a sailor, chosen by
lot, while the others wept and turned away their faces.
Among those whose feeble spark of life was snuffed out in this manner
was that militant woman, the sutler who had followed Napoleon to the
plains of Italy. Both she and her husband had been fatally wounded
during the last night of the mutiny, and so they went out of life
together, which was as they would have wished it. More than once in war
the hopelessly wounded have been put out of the way in preference to
leaving them in the wake of a retreat or burdening a column with them.
In this tragedy of the sea the decision was held to be justifiable
when the French Government investigated the circumstances.
With so few of them remaining, the fifteen survivors were able to
assemble themselves upon a little platform raised in the center of the
raft and to build a slight protection of plank and spars. To rehearse
their sufferings at greater length would be to repel the modern reader.
It is only in fiction that shipwreck can be employed as a theme for
romance and enjoyable adventure. The reality is apt to be very stark
and grim. It is more congenial to remember such fine bits as this, when
the handful of them huddled upon the tiny platform in the final days of
their agony:
On this new theatre we resolved to meet death in a manner becoming
Frenchmen and with perfect resignation. Our time was almost wholly
spent in talking of our beloved and unhappy country. All our
wishes, our prayers, were for the prosperity of France.
It was the gallant M. Correard who assured his comrades that his
presentiment of rescue was still unshaken, that a series of events so
unheard of could not be destined to oblivion and that Providence would
certainly preserve a few to tell to the world the melancholy story of
the raft. In the bottom of a sack were found thirty cloves of garlic,
which were distributed as a precious alleviation, and there was
rejoicing over a little bottle of tooth-wash containing cinnamon and
aromatics. A drop of it on the tongue produced an agreeable feeling,
and for a short time removed the thirst which destroyed us. Thus
we sought with avidity an empty vial which one of us possessed and
in which had once been some essence of roses. Every one, as he
got hold of it, respired with delight the odor it exhaled, which
imparted to his senses the most soothing impressions. Emaciated by
privations, the slightest comfort was to us a supreme happiness.
On the ninth day they saw a butterfly of a species familiar to the
gardens of France, and it fluttered to rest upon the mast. It was a
harbinger of land and an omen of deliverance in their wistful sight.
Other butterflies visited them, but the winds and currents failed to
set them in close to the coast, and there was never a glimpse of a
sail. They existed in quietude, with no more brawls or mutinies, until
sixteen days had passed since the wreck of the _Medusa_. Then a captain
of infantry, scanning the sea with aching eyes, saw the distant gleam
of canvas.
Soon they were able to perceive that it was a brig, and they took it
to be the _Argus_ of their own squadron, which they had been hoping
would be sent in search of them. They made a flag out of fragments
of clothing, and a seaman climbed to the top of the mast and waved it
until his strength failed. The vessel grew larger through half an hour
of tears and supplication, and then its course was suddenly altered,
and it dropped below the sky-line.
Despair overwhelmed them. They laid themselves down under a covering of
sail-cloth and refused to glance at the ocean which had mocked them.
It was proposed to write their names and a brief account of their
experience upon a plank and affix it to the mast on the chance that the
tidings might some day reach their government and their families in
France.
It was the master gunner who crawled out, two hours later, and
trembled as he stared at the brig which had made a long tack and was
now steering straight toward the raft. The others dragged themselves
to their feet, forgetting their sores and wounds and weakness, and
embraced one another. From the foremast of the brig flew an ensign,
which they joyously recognized, and they cried, as you might have
expected of them, “It is, then, to Frenchmen that we shall owe our
deliverance.”
The _Argus_, which had been sent out by the governor of Sénégal,
rounded to no more than a pistol-shot from the raft while the crew
“ranged upon the deck and in the shrouds announced to us by the waving
of their hands and hats, the pleasure they felt at coming to the
assistance of their unfortunate countrymen.”
Fifteen men were taken on board the brig of the hundred and fifty
who had shoved away from the frigate _Medusa_ a little more than a
fortnight earlier. There was no more fiddling and dancing on deck for
“these helpless creatures almost naked, their bodies shrivelled by
the rays of the sun, ten of them scarcely able to move, their limbs
stripped of skin, their eyes hollow and almost savage, and the long
beards giving them an air almost hideous.”
They were most tenderly cared for by the surgeon of the _Argus_, but
six of them died after reaching the African port of St. Louis. Only
nine of the castaways of the _Medusa’s_ raft, therefore, lived to
return to France. Their minds and bodies were marked with the scars
of that experience, which you will find mentioned very frequently in
the old records of shipwreck and disaster. It was an episode in human
history, the best and the worst of it, and a reminder of man’s eternal
conflict with the sea.