A COMING STORM.
There had been a morning, not many days after the _Noank_ sailed away
from Porto Rico, when the gunners of the seaward battery of Fort
Griswold, New London, ran hastily to their cannon. They put in powder
only, and quickly they were firing a salute of welcome, in response to
the arrival guns of a handsome bark that was entering the harbor mouth.
She was under full sail, she carried the American flag, and with it she
also floated the well-known private signal of Captain Avery and the
_Noank_.
"Lyme's taken a big prize!" shouted voice after voice in the fort,
while all the people within hearing of the guns understood that they
were roaring good news only. Men in shops dropped their tools.
Teamsters unhitched their horses from loaded sleighs, to mount and
hurry into town. Fishermen pulled in their lines. Women put away
their knitting or left their carding and their looms. Such a rousing
announcement of stirring news from the sea could not be disregarded,
and the excitement grew apace.
An hour or so later Captain Sam Prentice and some of his men were on
the central wharf, shaking hands with old neighbors until their own
were lame, and telling the story of the old whaling schooner among the
West Indies.
"Samuel," remarked Rachel Tarns, "thy story promiseth to be a long one.
Thee had better hold thy tongue a moment, and turn thy gray head to see
what cometh behind thee."
"Sam! Sam! I'm here!"
"There!" said the old Quakeress, dryly. "It was on my mind that his
wife could stop his talking. So she squeezeth him not to death, he may
then hug his daughters."
"Glory to God!" shouted good Mrs. Ten Eyck. "My son is safe! Not one
of our men has been killed."
"Anneke," suggested Rachel Tarns, "thee may also thank Him that they do
not seem to have been led to the killing of other people."
"That isn't jest so," said Sam; "we saved a ship-load of Spaniards from
some pirates, and we had to kill a good many of the pirates. We didn't
really hurt anybody else."
"I trust thy God will forgive thee concerning those wicked men," said
Rachel. "He slayeth the wicked in their wickedness. Thee did no
wrong. I think it was a friendly and righteous thing for thee to do.
I once had many that were dear to me murdered at sea by those devilish
destroyers."
"No mercy for pirates!" shouted more voices than one.
"We didn't have to show any," said Sam. "I can't tell it, jest now."
"The ship thou hast taken seemeth a fine one," said Rachel. "How did
thee manage to escape the war vessels of thy good king?"
"Oh! 'Bout that?" he replied. "We had the best kind of luck. There
wasn't a cruiser off Nantucket. We came along as safe as a mackerel
smack. It was a kind of wonder, though, that we didn't sight a
solitary's king's flag hereaway."
"That's explained," he was told by a white-headed fisherman. "The
British are goin' after the Continentals down Philadelfy way, and all
their cruisers are called off to Delaware Bay and the Chesapeake. Some
of 'em's ferryin' troops, ye know. We can't say, yit, as to whether or
not Washington has licked 'em. Anyhow, things ain't as bad as they
was."
Endless news telling was to come, evidently, concerning events on shore
as well as on the sea, and there could be no long lingering at the
wharf. Every sailor that could be spared from the ship had somebody
eagerly waiting for him, and there were many gladdened households that
day.
"This is getting to be a thieves' harbor," remarked Rachel Tarns to a
group of which she was the centre. "The wicked rebels against our good
king are stealing much. This is the nineteenth British vessel that
hath been brought in hither. I trust that all ships designing to enter
this port under the American flag will arrive safely. It would be a
pity if any of them should be wrecked or otherwise prevented."
She had other things as kindly to say and sincere wishes to express
concerning whatever shipping might here and there be under the flag of
England. Neither did she forget to extend her benevolence to the tents
in all the camps of George the Third.
Those who listened to her were plainly in sympathy with all her
friendly or Quakerish aspirations, and it appeared as if she were even
a favorite.
After that, indeed, as week after week went by, her hopes and wishes
were remarkably fulfilled, for there were other Yankee privateers as
capable and as busy as the _Noank_. Some of them were also much larger
craft with heavier armaments. Prize after prize came in, and there
were New London merchants whose trade promised to rival that of the
ancient house of Opdyke Brothers, of the port of Brest.
Throughout all New England, throughout the greater part of New York,
there was undisturbed security. The war was touching the northerly
edge of Pennsylvania, and there were savage raids into some districts
of that colony. Large areas of New Jersey were desolated, and so were
parts of South Carolina and Georgia where the Tory element was strong.
The western frontier of New York was severely harried by the Iroquois.
The counties of that state nearest the city of New York were entirely
ruined.
The farmers of the Mohawk Valley gathered their summer crops safely,
but toward them and toward the rebel stronghold at Albany, where the
legislature was sitting, there was an avalanche of danger coming down
from the north. It was well understood that even the forces under the
British generals in the Middle States were not considered so effective,
so well furnished, so sure of winning speedy victories, as were the
chosen regiments to be led by General Burgoyne for a crushing blow at
the heart of the rebellion. He was to be reenforced by the entire
power of the Six Nations and the Hurons. If he should succeed, as he
and his admirers believed he would, his army would obtain complete
possession of New York and New England. All the other colonies would
then give up in despair, and the Continental army would disband or
surrender.
The British campaign and its intended consequences were thoroughly
discussed by the New England people, and a considerable number of them
very promptly determined to visit their friends in Albany or in Vermont.
The shore people were deeply interested, for, in addition to all other
considerations, their entire sea-going fleet was at stake. No more
British prizes would then be brought, for instance, to Boston or New
London, and all the privateers at sea would be hopelessly forfeited to
the crown. All their prizes in European ports would share the same
fate. One, however, was now on its homeward way in charge of Vine
Avery, promoted from third mate to skipper. He was handling his ship
very well, but he as yet knew very little about her cargo. His orders
were to let the taking account of that wait until he should be safe in
port.
"The main thing," he had been told by his father, "is to git there.
You've a gantlet to run that's thousands o' miles long, and your
chances are only jest about even."
"I'll make 'em a good deal more'n even!" Vine had replied, and he had
sailed away full confidently.
Three days after the _Noank_ and the _Killarney_ parted company, there
was a great stir in a fishing village on the Irish coast. A strange
schooner was tacking into the cove in front of the village, and such a
thing as that did not happen every day. All the cabins were emptied at
once. Even the babies, of which there seemed to be a large number,
were carried to the shore by their mothers that they might not lose
this chance to see something.
The schooner furled her sails, and dropped her anchor, while her
probable or improbable character was undergoing vigorous discussion all
along the beach. Not a soul on board the _Noank_, among her crew, at
least, could have understood the primitive Erse dialect in which the
fisher people told their opinions of her and the boat-loads of men and
women that were quickly put out from her toward the shore. More and
more extraordinary became the clatter after the passengers were landed
and the boats pulled away for their next cargoes. Trip after trip was
made, and all the while there was a vast amount of kindly pity
expressed, most of it in Erse, but much in Irish-English, for Captain
Syme and all his miscellaneous ship's company. Quite an erroneous
opinion appeared to prevail that the American pirates had murdered all
their captives entirely before landing them.
Here they were, now, however, not a hair of their heads injured, and
Captain Syme even thanked Captain Avery, the privateersman, for having
treated him and his so very well.
"We shall find our way to Belfast, sir," he said. "Just how we are to
transport them all, I don't know, but the neighboring authorities will
take care of that. I shall have them notified at once. You'd better
look out for yourself."
"All right," laughed Captain Avery, "but I'm less afraid of a constable
than I would be of a three-master with two tiers of guns. Not many o'
them in shore, I guess."
Captain Syme had his hands full, he said, and away he went without
uttering aloud the reply that was so near his lips: "Three-master?
Yes, you rebel pirate! A seventy-four and you and your schooner within
point-blank range!"