Part 24 (1/2)
After a little further conversation with Armitage it was agreed that the Spaniards should be hailed and ordered to surrender, and this was accordingly done. We had no very great hope of success, as we felt sure the Spaniards must be fully aware of the difficulty we should experience in capturing the hulk. As before stated, she towered so high out of the water and her sides were so bare that the Spaniards, small as was their number, could effectually resist all our efforts to capture her by boarding; to fire into and sink her would only result in the destruction of all the slaves on board her; and as she was moored with heavy chains, instead of hemp hawsers, to cut her adrift and let her ground upon the island was quite as impracticable as would have been any attempt to board her.
We were therefore very agreeably surprised when the Spaniards, in response to our hail, at once consented to abandon the hulk, provided we would allow them to depart unmolested in their boat. This arrangement suited us very well, we being just then anything but anxious to hamper ourselves with prisoners, and the required promise was unhesitatingly made. The Spaniards thereupon provisioned their boat, lowered her into the water, and half an hour later disappeared round a bend of the river on their way down stream. Taking immediate possession of the hulk, we dropped her in alongside the jetty once more, and landed the slaves upon the island. They were all, for a wonder, in fairly good condition, having evidently been well taken care of, with the view of fitting them as thoroughly as possible to withstand the terrible hards.h.i.+ps of the notorious Middle Pa.s.sage.
Having at length cleared the hulk we next transferred the slaves in batches to the boats, by which they were conveyed across the stream to the mainland, where they were freed and left to s.h.i.+ft for themselves, the provisions found on board the hulk being distributed as evenly as possible among them. Landed thus in a possibly hostile country--for they were evidently a different race of people from those with whom we had recently had so desperate a struggle--unarmed, and with only a small supply of provisions, their situation was perhaps not very much better than it had been when they lay prisoners on board the hulk, but it was all we had it in our power to do for them under the circ.u.mstances, and we could only hope that their wit would prove equal to the task of steering them clear of the many dangers to which they were exposed, and conducting them safely back to their own country. There were rather more than eight hundred of them altogether, counting in the piccaninnies, and the transfer of them to the mainland fully occupied us until within half an hour of sunset. As we were by that time pretty well f.a.gged out, and as it was manifestly too late to make any progress worth speaking of on our way back to the creek that night, we resolved to remain until daylight upon the island, which we did without receiving molestation or annoyance of any kind from anybody.
At eight o'clock on the following morning, having previously breakfasted, we started down the river, keeping a bright look-out for the French boat all the way down, and exploring all the most likely creeks and indentations on the south bank of the river, without discovering any trace of her. This protracted search so seriously delayed our progress that we were two whole days making the pa.s.sage back to the creek, and on our arrival there we discovered that three survivors of the French party had turned up on board the _Vestale_ the previous day, reporting the capture of the boat by the natives, and the ma.s.sacre of all hands except the three who had managed somehow to slip their bonds and make good their escape in a canoe. They had reported that their capture was due to our _abandonment_ of them, it appeared, and the insinuation, which Captain Vernon had indignantly repudiated, had occasioned a very serious outbreak of ill-feeling between the two s.h.i.+ps, so much so indeed that the commander of the _Vestale_ had left the river in high dudgeon on the morning of the day of our arrival, refusing absolutely to co-operate with us any further. I was, of course, subjected to a very severe cross-examination by Captain Vernon on the subject; but my detailed narrative of the affair, which was confirmed in every particular by poor old Mildmay, soon satisfied him that the fault, if fault there was, rested not with us; and both Mildmay and myself were fully exonerated from all blame. Nay more--the master generously represented my defence of the battery in such a light that I received the skipper's highest commendations and renewed promises of support and a.s.sistance in my career.
At sunrise next morning we weighed and stood out to sea, bound on a cruise to the westward.
The next two months pa.s.sed away in the most drearily uneventful manner, the s.h.i.+p being at sea the whole time. At the end of that period, being in lat.i.tude 4 degrees south and longitude 5 degrees east on our way back to the Congo, the s.h.i.+p standing to the northward and eastward at the time, under all plain sail, with light baffling south-easterly airs, the look-out aloft, just before being relieved at noon, reported two sail, close together, hove-to broad on our lee bow. The usual form of questions being duly put by Armitage, who happened to be the officer of the watch, the further information was elicited that one of them was a brig and the other a full-rigged s.h.i.+p, but of what nationality they were it was difficult to say, nothing but the heads of their topgallant-sails being visible above the horizon from our fore-topmast crosstrees. The matter being reported to Captain Vernon, orders were given for our course to be so altered as to allow of our edging down upon the strangers; the fact of their being hove-to so close together having a somewhat suspicious appearance.
By three o'clock p.m. we had neared the two vessels sufficiently to bring their hulls into view from the main-royal-yard; they were then lying broadside-on to us with their heads to the eastward, the s.h.i.+p being between us and the brig; but by the aid of our gla.s.ses we were able to make out that they had apparently dropped alongside each other, and the skipper gave it as his decided opinion that foul play was going on on the part of one or the other of the two craft. This opinion was shortly afterwards confirmed by the appearance of thick clouds of black smoke arising from the s.h.i.+p; the brig hauling off and standing to the westward under every st.i.tch of canvas she could spread.
”Undoubtedly a most daring act of piracy, committed under our _very_ noses, too,” commented the skipper to me as the smoke rose up into the clear atmosphere and hung like a great pall immediately over the doomed s.h.i.+p. We were walking together fore and aft upon the quarter-deck at the time, whistling most earnestly and devoutly for a wind, as indeed were all hands fore and aft. Suddenly Captain Vernon paused, and, wetting the back of his hand, held it up to the air.
”The wind is failing us,” he remarked, and abruptly dived below to his cabin.
At the same moment I noticed that the corvette was heading three or four points to the eastward of her course.
”Hard up with your helm, man,” I exclaimed impatiently to the man at the wheel. ”Where are you taking the s.h.i.+p?”
”The wheel _is_ hard over, sir,” explained the poor fellow with patient deference; ”but she's lost steerage-way.”
Just then the skipper returned to the deck.
”Pipe away the first and second cutters, Mr Hawkesley,” he exclaimed sharply. ”Take charge of them yourself with one of the mids.h.i.+pmen to help you, and pull down to the burning s.h.i.+p. As likely as not you will find that a similar trick has been played there to the one by which that unfortunate man Richards and his crew so nearly lost their lives. Let the crews of the boats take their cutla.s.ses and pistols with them, so as to be prepared in the event of interference from the brig's crew, and make all the haste you can. Your first duty is to save the crew; your next to save the s.h.i.+p if possible. The gla.s.s is rising, so there will be no wind; but I shall do what I can to shorten the distance between us and the brig yonder. When you have done all that is possible on board the s.h.i.+p, make a dash for the brig, unless you see the recall signal flying.”
Three minutes later the two cutters were darting swiftly away over the long gla.s.sy undulations of the ground-swell toward the great cloud of smoke on the horizon which served as a beacon for us; the men pulling a long steady stroke, which, whilst it sent the boats through the water at a very fair pace, could be maintained for three or four hours at least.
We were scarcely a mile away from the _Daphne_ when she had the rest of her boats in the water and ahead of her towing, whilst, dangling from the yard-arms aloft, could be seen hammocks and bags of shot suspended there to a.s.sist--by the swinging motion imparted to them by the rise and fall of the vessel over the swell--the s.h.i.+p's progress through the water. The brig was hull-down to us; but from the steadiness with which her head was kept pointing to the westward I conjectured that she was either sweeping or being towed by her boats.
The sun set in a perfectly clear and cloudless sky, just as we had brought the s.h.i.+p hull-up; but by that time she was a ma.s.s of flame fore and aft, and I began to fear that we should be too late to save her crew or to do any good whatever on board her. We kept steadily on, however, and reached her half an hour later.
The three masts went over the side when we were within a cable's length of the burning s.h.i.+p, and on arriving within fifty feet of her we found it impossible to approach any nearer, owing to the intense heat. It was manifestly impossible that any living thing could be in the midst of that fiercely flaming furnace, so we were compelled to content ourselves with merely ascertaining the name of the unfortunate craft, which with considerable difficulty we at length made out to be the _Highland Chieftain_ of Glasgow--after which we left her.
On pulling out clear of the smoke and glare of the flames once more we found ourselves to be about six miles distant from the brig, a distance of about eleven miles intervening between us and the _Daphne_. Night had by this time closed completely down upon us; the deep clear violet sky above us was thickly powdered with stars, which were waveringly reflected in the deep indigo of the water beneath, and away to the eastward the broad disc of the full moon was just rising clear of the horizon and casting a long rippling wake of golden light from the ocean's rim clear down to us.
Our first glance was of course in the direction of the _Daphne_. Her towering spread of canvas alternately appeared and vanished as the enormous idly flapping sails caught and lost again, with the heave of the vessel, the glint of the golden moon-beams; but, save this, all was dark and still on board her; no lanterns flashed in her rigging as a recall signal, so I exultingly gave the order for the boats to be headed straight for the brig, determined to win her if dash and courage could do it.
”Pull steadily, lads,” I cautioned, as the two crews bent their backs, and with a ringing cheer started the boats in racing style; ”no racing now, we cannot afford the strength for it, all you have will be wanted when we get alongside the chase; she is doubtless well manned with a determined crew who will not give in without a tough struggle, so husband your strength as much as possible. Mr Peters,” to the mids.h.i.+pman in charge of the second cutter, ”drop in my wake, sir, if you please, and see that your men do not overtask themselves.”
The men obediently eased down at once, and we jogged steadily along at a pace of about four knots an hour; but their eagerness soon got the better of them, the pace gradually increased, and I had to constantly check them, or we should soon have been tearing away as fiercely as ever.
This state of things lasted for about half an hour, and then the gleam of lanterns suddenly appeared in the _Daphne's_ rigging. It was the recall signal, and the men gave audible vent to their feeling of disappointment in an involuntary groan.
”Never mind, men,” I said; ”I have no doubt Captain Vernon has some good reason for it. Answer the signal, c.o.xswain. Ah! I told you so; the sloop has a little breeze, and here it comes creeping up astern of us.
Step the mast, take the covers off the sails, and get the canvas on the boats. Do you see that bright red star close to the horizon, c.o.xswain?
Starboard a bit. So, steady, now you have it fair over the boat's stem.
Steer for it, and we shall just drop alongside the loop nicely, without troubling her to wait for us.”