“The mouse ne’er shunned the cat, as they did budge
From rascals worse than they.”
Coriolanus.
Day dawned on the Atlantic, with its pearly light, succeeded by the
usual flushing of the skies, and the stately rising of the sun from out
the water. The instant the vigilant officer, who commanded the morning
watch, caught the first glimpses of the returning brightness, Ludlow
was awakened. A finger laid on his arm, was sufficient to arouse one
who slept with the responsibility of his station ever present to his
mind. A minute did not pass, before the young man was on the
quarter-deck, closely examining the heavens and the horizon. His first
question was to ask if nothing had been seen during the watch. The
answer was in the negative.
“I like this opening in the north-west,” observed the captain, after
his eye had thoroughly scanned the whole of the still dusky and limited
view. “Wind will come out of it. Give us a cap-full, and we shall try
the speed of this boasted Water-Witch!—Do I not see a sail, on our
weather-beam?—or is it the crest of a wave?”
“The sea is getting irregular, and I have often been thus deceived,
since the light appeared.”
“Get more sail on the ship. Here is wind, in-shore of us; we will be
ready for it. See everything clear, to show all our canvas.”
The lieutenant received these orders with the customary deference and
communicated them to his inferiors again, with the promptitude that
distinguishes sea discipline. The Coquette, at the moment, was lying
under her three top-sails, one of which was thrown against its mast, in
a manner to hold the vessel as nearly stationary as her drift and the
wash of the waves would allow. So soon, however, as the officer of the
watch summoned the people to exertion, the massive yards were swung;
several light sails, that served to balance the fabric as well as to
urge it ahead, were hoisted or opened; and the ship immediately began
to move through the water. While the men of the watch were thus
employed, the flapping of the canvas announced the approach of a new
breeze.
The coast of North America is liable to sudden and dangerous
transitions, in the currents of the air. It is a circumstance of no
unusual occurrence, for a gale to alter its direction with so little
warning, as greatly to jeopard the safety of a ship, or even to
overwhelm her. It has been often said, that the celebrated Ville de
Paris was lost through one of these violent changes, her captain having
inadvertently hove-to the vessel under too much after-sail, a mistake
by which he lost the command of his ship during the pressing emergency
that ensued. Whatever may have been the fact as regards that ill-fated
prize, it is certain that Ludlow was perfectly aware of the hazards
that sometimes accompany the first blasts of a north-west wind on his
native coast, and that he never forgot to be prepared for the danger.
When the wind from the land struck the Coquette, the streak of light,
which announced the appearance of the sun, had been visible several
minutes. As the broad sheets of vapor, that had veiled the heavens
during the prevalence of the south-easterly breeze, were rolled up into
dense masses of clouds, like some immense curtain that is withdrawn
from before its scene, the water, no less than the sky, became
instantly visible, in every quarter. It is scarcely necessary to say,
how eagerly the gaze of our young seaman ran over the horizon, in order
to observe the objects which might come within its range. At first
disappointment was plainly painted in his countenance, and then
succeeded the animated eye and flushed cheek of success.
“I had thought her gone!” he said to his immediate subordinate in
authority. “But here she is, to leeward, just within the edge of that
driving mist, and as dead under our lee as a kind fortune could place
her. Keep the ship away, sir, and cover her with canvas, from her
trucks down. Call the people from their hammocks, and show yon insolent
what Her Majesty’s sloop can do, at need!”
This command was the commencement of a general and hasty movement, in
which every seaman in the ship exerted his powers to the utmost. All
hands were no sooner called, than the depths of the vessel gave up
their tenants, who, joining their force to that of the watch on deck,
quickly covered the spars of the Coquette with a snow-white cloud. Not
content to catch the breeze on such surfaces as the ordinary yards
could distend, long booms were thrust out over the water, and sail was
set beyond sail, until the bending masts would bear no more. The low
hull, which supported this towering and complicated mass of ropes,
spars, and sails, yielded to the powerful impulse, and the fabric,
which, in addition to its crowd of human beings, sustained so heavy a
load of artillery, with all its burthen of stores and ammunition, began
to divide the waves, with the steady and imposing force of a vast
momentum. The seas curled and broke against her sides, like water
washing the rocks, the steady ship feeling, as yet, no impression from
their feeble efforts. As the wind increased, however, and the vessel
went further from the land, the surface of the ocean gradually grew
more agitated, until the highlands, which lay over the villa of the
Lust in Rust, finally sunk into the sea; when the top-gallant-royals of
the ship were seen describing wide segments of circles against the
heavens, and her dark sides occasionally rose, from a long and deep
roll, glittering with the element that sustained her.
When Ludlow first descried the object which he believed to be the
chase, it seemed a motionless speck on the margin of the sea. It had
now grown into all the magnitude and symmetry of the well-known
brigantine. Her slight and attenuated spars were plainly to be seen,
rolling, easily but wide, with the constant movement of the hull, and
with no sail spread, but that which was necessary to keep the vessel in
command on the billows. But when the Coquette was just within the range
of a cannon, the canvas began to unfold; and it was soon apparent that
the “Skimmer of the Seas” was preparing for flight.
The first manœuvre of the Water-Witch was an attempt to gain the wind
of her pursuer. A short experiment appeared to satisfy those who
governed the brigantine that the effort was vain, while the wind was so
fresh and the water so rough. She wore, and crowded sail on the
opposite tack, in order to try her speed with the cruiser; nor was it
until the result sufficiently showed the danger of permitting the other
to get any nigher, that she finally put her helm aweather, and ran off,
like a sea-fowl resting on its wing, with the wind over her taffrail.
The two vessels now presented the spectacle of a stern chase. The
brigantine also opened the folds of all her sails, and there arose a
pyramid of canvas, over the nearly imperceptible hull, that resembled a
fantastic cloud driving above the sea, with a velocity that seemed to
rival the passage of the vapor that floated in the upper air. As equal
skill directed the movements of the two vessels, and the same breeze
pressed upon their sails, it was long before there was any perceptible
difference in their progress. Hour passed after hour, and were it not
for the sheets of white foam that were dashed from the bows of the
Coquette, and the manner in which she even outstripped the caps of the
combing waves, her commander might have fancied his vessel ever in the
same spot. While the ocean presented, on every side, the same
monotonous and rolling picture, there lay the chase, seemingly neither
a foot nearer, nor a foot farther, than when the trial of speed began.
A dark line would rise on the crest of a wave, and then, sinking again,
leave, nothing visible, but the yielding and waving cloud of canvas,
that danced along the sea.
“I had hoped for better things of the ship, Master Trysail!” said
Ludlow, who had long been seated on a night-head, attentively watching
the progress of the chase. “We are buried to the bob-stays; and yet,
there yon fellow lies, nothing plainer than when he first showed his
studding-sails!”
“And there he will lie, Captain Ludlow, while the light lasts. I have
chased the rover in the narrow seas, till the cliffs of England melted
away like the cap of a wave; and we had raised the sand-banks of
Holland high as the sprit-sail-yard, and yet what good came of it? The
rogue played with us, as your sportsman trifles with the entangled
trout; and when we thought we had him, he would shoot without the range
of our guns, with as little exertion as a ship slides into the water,
after the spur shoars are knocked from under her bows.”
“Aye, but the Druid had a little of the rust of antiquity about her.
The Coquette has never got a chase under her lee, that she did not
speak.”
“I disparage no ship, sir, for character is character, and none should
speak lightly of their fellow-creatures, and, least of all, of anything
which follows the sea. I allow the Coquette to be a lively boat on a
wind, and a real scudder going large; but one should know the wright
that fashioned yonder brigantine, before he ventures to say that any
vessel in Her Majesty’s fleet can hold way with her, when she is driven
hard.”
“These opinions, Trysail, are fitter for the tales of a top, than for
the mouth of one who walks the quarter-deck.”
“I should have lived to little purpose, Captain Ludlow, not to know
that what was philosophy in my young days, is not philosophy now. They
say the world is round, which is my own opinion—first, because the
glorious Sir Francis Drake, and divers other Englishmen, have gone in,
as it were, at one end, and out at the other; no less than several
seamen of other nations, to say nothing of one Magellan, who pretends
to have been the first man to make the passage, which I take to be
neither more nor less than a Portuguee lie, it being altogether
unreasonable to suppose that a Portuguee should do what an Englishman
had not yet thought of doing;—secondly, if the world were not round, or
some such shape, why should we see the small sails of a ship before her
courses, or why should her truck heave up into the horizon before the
hull? They say, moreover, that the world turns round, which is no doubt
true; and it is just as true that its opinions turn round with it,
which brings me to the object of my remark—yon fellow shows more of his
broadside, sir, than common! He is edging in for the land, which must
lie, hereaway, on our larboard beam, in order to get into smoother
water. This tumbling about is not favorable to your light craft, let
who will build them.”
“I had hoped to drive him off the coast. Could we get him fairly into
the Gulf Stream, he would be ours, for he is too low in the water to
escape us in the short seas. We must force him into blue water, though
our upper spars crack in the struggle! Go aft, Mr. Hopper, and tell the
officer of the watch to bring the ship’s head up, a point and a half,
to the northward, and to give a slight pull on the braces.”
“What a mainsail the rogue carries! It is as broad as the instructions
of a roving commission, with a hoist like the promotion of an admiral’s
son! How everything pulls aboard him! A thorough-bred sails that
brigantine, let him come whence he may!”
“I think we near him! The rough water is helping us, and we are
closing. Steer small, fellow; steer small! You see the color of his
mouldings begins to show, when he lifts on the seas.”
“The sun touches his side—and yet, Captain Ludlow, you may be right—for
here is a man in his fore-top, plainly enough to be seen. A shot, or
two, among his spars and sails, might now do service.”
Ludlow affected not to hear; but the first-lieutenant having come on
the forecastle, seconded this opinion, by remarking that their position
would indeed enable them to use the chase-gun, without losing any
distance. As Trysail sustained his former assertion by truths that were
too obvious to be refuted, the commander of the cruiser reluctantly
issued an order to clear away the forward gun, and to shift it into the
bridle-port. The interested and attentive seamen were not long in
performing this service; and a report was quickly made to the captain,
that the piece was ready.
Ludlow then descended from his post on the night-head, and pointed the
cannon himself.
“Knock away the quoin, entirely;” he said to the captain of the gun,
when he had got the range; “now mind her when she lifts, forward; keep
the ship steady, sir—fire!”
Those gentleman ‘who live at home at ease,’ are often surprised to read
of combats, in which so much powder, and hundreds and even thousands of
shot, are expended, with so little loss of human life; while a struggle
on the land, of less duration, and seemingly of less obstinacy, shall
sweep away a multitude. The secret of the difference lies in the
uncertainty of aim, on an element as restless as the sea. The largest
ship is rarely quite motionless, when on the open ocean; and it is not
necessary to tell the reader, that the smallest variation in the
direction of a gun at its muzzle, becomes magnified to many yards at
the distance of a few hundred feet. Marine gunnery has no little
resemblance to the skill of the fowler; since a calculation for a
change in the position of the object must commonly be made in both
cases, with the additional embarrassment on the part of the seaman, of
an allowance for a complicated movement in the piece itself.
How far the gun of the Coquette was subject to the influence of these
causes, or how far the desire of her captain to protect those whom he
believed to be on board the brigantine, had an effect on the direction
taken by its shot, will probably never be known. It is certain,
however, that when the stream of fire, followed by its curling cloud,
had gushed out upon the water, fifty eyes sought in vain to trace the
course of the iron messenger among the sails and rigging of the
Water-Witch. The symmetry of her beautiful rig was undisturbed, and the
unconscious fabric still glided over the waves, with its customary ease
and velocity. Ludlow had a reputation, among his crew, for some skill
in the direction of a gun. The failure, therefore, in no degree aided
in changing the opinions of the common men concerning the character of
the chase. Many shook their heads, and more than one veteran tar, as he
paced his narrow limits with both hands thrust into the bosom of his
jacket, was heard to utter his belief of the inefficacy of ordinary
shot, in bringing-to that brigantine. It was necessary, however to
repeat the experiment, for the sake of appearances. The gun was several
times discharged, and always with the same want of success.
“There is little use in wasting our powder, at this distance, and with
so heavy a sea,” said Ludlow, quitting the cannon, after a fifth and
fruitless essay. “I shall fire no more. Look at your sails, gentlemen,
and see that everything draws. We must conquer with our heels, and let
the artillery rest.—Secure the gun.”
“The piece is ready, sir;” observed its captain, presuming on his known
favor with the commander, though he qualified the boldness by taking
off his hat, in a sufficiently respectful manner—“’Tis a pity to balk
it!”
“Fire it, yourself, then, and return the piece to its port;” carelessly
returned the captain, willing to show that others could be as unlucky
as himself.
The men quartered at the gun, left alone, busied themselves in
executing the order.
“Run in the quoin, and, blast the brig, give her a point-blanker!” said
the gruff old seaman, who was intrusted with a local authority over
that particular piece. “None of your geometry calculations, for me!”
The crew obeyed, and the match was instantly applied. A rising sea,
however, aided the object of the directly-minded old tar, or our
narration of the exploits of the piece would end with the discharge,
since its shot would otherwise have inevitably plunged into a wave,
within a few yards of its muzzle. The bows of the ship rose with the
appearance of the smoke, the usual brief expectation followed, and then
fragments of wood were seen flying above the
top-mast-studding-sail-boom of the brigantine, which, at the same time,
flew forward, carrying with it, and entirely deranging, the two
important sails that depended on the spar for support.
“So much for plain sailing!” cried the delighted tar, slapping the
breach of the gun, affectionately. “Witch or no witch, there go two of
her jackets at once; and, by the captain’s good-will, we shall shortly
take off some more of her clothes! In spunge——”
“The order is to run the gun aft, and secure it;” said a merry
midshipman, leaping on the heel of the bowsprit to gaze at the
confusion on board the chase. “The rogue is nimble enough, in saving
his canvas!”
There was, in truth, necessity for exertion, on the part of those who
governed the movements of the brigantine. The two sails that were
rendered temporarily useless, were of great importance, with the wind
over the taffrail. The distance between the two vessels did not exceed
a mile, and the danger of lessening it was now too obvious to admit of
delay. The ordinary movements of seamen, in critical moments, are
dictated by a quality that resembles instinct, more than thought. The
constant hazards of a dangerous and delicate profession, in which delay
may prove fatal, and in which life, character, and property are so
often dependent on the self-possession and resources of him who
commands, beget, in time, so keen a knowledge of the necessary
expedients, as to cause it to approach a natural quality.
The studding-sails of the Water-Witch were no sooner fluttering in the
air, than the brigantine slightly changed her course, like some bird
whose wing has been touched by the fowler; and her head was seen
inclining as much to the south, as the moment before it had pointed
northward. The variation, trifling as it was, brought the wind on the
opposite quarter, and caused the boom that distended her mainsail to
gybe. At the same instant, the studding-sails, which had been flapping
under the lee of this vast sheet of canvas, swelled to their utmost
tension; and the vessel lost little, if any, of the power which urged
her through the water. Even while this evolution was so rapidly
performed, men were seen aloft, nimbly employed, as it has been already
expressed by the observant little midshipman, in securing the crippled
sails.
“A rogue has a quick wit,” said Trysail, whose critical eye suffered no
movement of the chase to escape him; “and he has need of it, sail from
what haven he may! Yon brigantine is prettily handled! Little have we
gained by our fire, but the gunner’s account of ammunition expended;
and little has the free-trader lost, but a studding-sail-boom, which
will work up very well, yet, into top-gallant-yards, and other light
spars, for such a cockle-shell.”
“It is something gained, to force him off the land into rougher water;”
Ludlow mildly answered. “I think we see his quarter-pieces more
plainly, than before the gun was used.”
“No doubt, sir, no doubt. I got a glimpse of his lower dead-eyes, a
minute ago; but I have been near enough to see the saucy look of the
hussy under his bowsprit; yet there goes the brigantine, at large!”
“I am certain that we are closing;” thoughtfully returned Ludlow. “Hand
me a glass, quarter master.”
Trysail watched the countenance of his young commander, as he examined
the chase with the aid of the instrument; and he thought he read strong
discontent in his features, when the other laid it aside.
“Does he show no signs of coming back to his allegiance, sir?—or does
the rogue hold out in obstinacy?”
“The figure on his poop is the bold man who ventured on board the
Coquette, and who now seems quite as much at his ease as when he
exhibited his effrontery here!”
“There is a look of deep water about that rogue; and I thought Her
Majesty had gained a prize, when he first put foot on our decks. You
are right enough, sir, in calling him a bold one! The fellow’s
impudence would unsettle the discipline of a whole ship’s company,
though every other man were an officer, and all the rest priests. He
took up as much room in walking the quarter-deck, as a ninety in
wearing; and the truck is not driven on the head of that
top-gallant-mast, half as hard as the hat is riveted to his head. The
fellow has no reverence for a pennant! I managed, in shifting pennants
at sunset, to make the fly of the one that came down flap in his
impudent countenance, by way of hint; and he took it as a Dutchman
minds a signal—that is, as a question to be answered in the next watch.
A little polish got on the quarter-deck of a man-of-war, would make a
philosopher of the rogue, and fit him for any company, short of
heaven!”
“There goes a new boom, aloft!” cried Ludlow, interrupting the
discursive discourse of the master. “He is bent on getting in with the
shore.”
“If these puffs come much heavier,” returned the master, whose opinions
of the chase vacillated with his professional feelings, “we shall have
him at our own play, and try the qualities of his brigantine! The sea
has a green spot to windward, and there are strong symptoms of a squall
on the water. One can almost see into the upper world, with an air
clear as this. Your northers sweep the mists off America, and leave
both sea and land bright as a school-boy’s face, before the tears have
dimmed it, after the first flogging. You have sailed in the southern
seas, Captain Ludlow, I know; for we were shipmates among the islands,
years that are past: but I never heard whether you have run the
Gibralter passage, and seen the blue water that lies among the Italy
mountains?”
“I made a cruise against the Barbary states, when a lad; and we had
business that took us to the northern shore.”
“Aye! ’Tis your northern shore, I mean! There is not a foot of it all,
from the rock at the entrance to the Faro of Messina, that eye of mine
hath not seen. No want of look-outs and land-marks in that quarter!
Here we are close aboard of America, which lies some eight or ten
leagues there-away to the northward of us, and some forty astern; and
yet, if it were not for our departure, with the color of the water, and
a knowledge of the soundings, one might believe himself in the middle
of the Atlantic. Many a good ship plumps upon America before she knows
where she is going; while in yon sea, you may run for a mountain, with
its side in full view, four-and-twenty hours on a stretch, before you
see the town at its foot.”
“Nature has compensated for the difference, in defending the approach
to this coast, by the Gulf Stream, with its floating weeds and
different temperature; while the lead may feel its way in the darkest
night, for no roof of a house is more gradual than the ascent of this
shore, from a hundred fathoms to a sandy beach.”
“I said many a good ship, Captain Ludlow, and not good
navigator.—No—no—your thorough-bred knows the difference between green
water and blue, as well as between a hand-lead and the deep sea. But I
remember to have missed an observation, once, when running for Genoa,
before a mistrail. There was a likelihood of making our land-fall in
the night, and the greater the need of knowing the ship’s position. I
have often thought, sir, that the ocean was like human life,—a blind
track for all that is ahead, and none of the clearest as respects that
which has been passed over. Many a man runs headlong to his own
destruction, and many a ship steers for a reef under a press of canvas.
To-morrow is a fog, into which none of us can see; and even the present
time is little better than thick weather, into which we look without
getting much information. Well, as I was observing, here lay our
course, with the wind as near aft as need be, blowing much as at
present; for your French mistrail has a family likeness to the American
norther. We had the main-top-gallant-sail set, without studding-sails,
for we began to think of the deep bight in which Genoa is stowed, and
the sun had dipped more than an hour. As our good fortune would have
it, clouds and mistrails do not agree long, and we got a clear horizon.
Here lay a mountain of snow, northerly, a little west, and there lay
another, southerly with easting. The best ship in Queen Anne’s navy
could not have fetched either in a day’s run, and yet there we saw
them, as plainly as if anchored under their lee! A look at the chart
soon gave us an insight into our situation. The first were the Alps, as
they call them, being as I suppose the French for apes, of which there
are no doubt plenty in those regions; and the other were the highlands
of Corsica, both being as white, in midsummer, as the hair of a man of
fourscore. You see, sir, we had only to set the two, by compass, to
know, within a league or two, where we were. So we ran till midnight,
and hove-to; and in the morning we took the light to feel for our
haven——”
“The brigantine is gybing, again!” cried Ludlow. “He is determined to
shoal his water!”
The master glanced an eye around the horizon and then pointed steadily
towards the north. Ludlow observed the gesture, and, turning his head,
he was at no loss to read its meaning.