The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald Volume I Part 5

I thought that our counsel had much the best of the argument, and I believe the judge, Sir William Scott, thought so too, as he put off his sentence to a future day." On the future day the judge admitted as much. "We have gained a bit of a victory in the Admiralty Court," said the same writer in a letter dated the 9th of June, "the judge having been compelled to p.r.o.nounce in favour of his lords.h.i.+p's right to be believed on his oath." The time taken by him to arrive at this decision, however, was so long that the case had to be adjourned to November term, and thereby Lord Cochrane's enemies so far attained their object, that it was impossible for him, in November term, to renew the suit.

In the interval he had gone to France, preparatory to a much longer and more momentous journey to South America, in antic.i.p.ation of which he was winding up his affairs and realizing his property during and after the summer of 1817.

In this settlement of accounts there was at any rate one amusing incident. It will be remembered that, on the occasion of his being elected Member of Parliament for Honiton in 1806, Lord Cochrane had refused to follow the almost universal fas.h.i.+on of bribery, but, after the election was over, had thoughtlessly yielded to the proposal of his agent that he should entertain his const.i.tuents at a public supper.[A] This entertainment, either through spite or through wanton extravagance, was turned by those to whom the management of it was a.s.signed into a great occasion of feasting for all the inhabitants of the town; and for defrayment of the expenses thus incurred a claim for more than 1200_l._ was afterwards made upon Lord Cochrane. Through eleven years he bluntly refused to pay the preposterous demand; but his creditors had the law upon their side, and in the spring of 1817 an order was granted for putting an execution into his house at Holly Hill.

[Footnote A: 'The Autobiography of a Seaman,' vol. i. pp. 203, 204.]

Lord Cochrane, however, having resisted the demand thus far, determined to resist to the end. For more than six weeks he prevented the agents of the law from entering the house. "I still hold out,"

he said in a letter to his secretary, "though the castle has several times been threatened in great force. The trumpeter is now blowing for a parley, but no one appears on the ramparts. Explosion-bags are set in the lower embrasures, and all the garrison is under arms." In the explosion-bags there was nothing more dangerous than powdered charcoal; but, supposing they contained gunpowder or some other combustible, the sheriff of Hamps.h.i.+re and twenty-five officers were held at bay by them, until at length one official, more daring than the rest, jumped in at an open window, to find Lord Cochrane sitting at breakfast and to be complimented by him upon the wonderful bravery which he had shown in coming up to a building defended by charcoal dust.

That battle with the sheriff and bailiffs of Hamps.h.i.+re occupied nearly the whole of April and May, 1817. In the latter month, if not before, Lord Cochrane began to think seriously of proceeding to join in battles of a more serious sort in South America, under inducements and with issues that will presently be detailed. "His lords.h.i.+p has made up his mind to go to South America," wrote his secretary on the 31st of May. "Numbers of gentlemen of great respectability are desirous of accompanying him, and even Sir Francis Burdett has declared that he feels a great temptation to do so; but Lord Cochrane discourages all.

They think he is going to immolate the Spaniards by his secret plans; but he is not going to do anything of the kind, having promised the Prince Regent not to divulge or use them otherwise than in the service of his country."

With this expedition in view, and purposing to start upon it nearly a year sooner than he found himself able to do, Lord Cochrane sold Holly Hill and his other property in Hamps.h.i.+re, in July. In August he went for a few months to France, partly for the benefit of Lady Cochrane's health, partly, as it would seem, in the hope of introducing into that country the lamps which he had lately invented, and from which he hoped to derive considerable profit.

To this matter, and to his efforts to obtain some share, at any rate, of his rights from the English Government, the letters written by him from France chiefly refer. But there are in them some notes and ill.u.s.trations of more general interest. "I am quite astonished at the state of Boulogne," he wrote thence on the 14th of August. "Neither the town nor the heights are fortified; so great was Napoleon's confidence in the terror of his name and the knowledge he possessed of the stupidity and ignorance of our Government." In a letter from Paris, dated the 23rd of August, we read: "Everything is looking much more settled than when I was formerly here, and I do really think that the Government, from the conciliatory measures wisely adopted, will stand their ground against the adherents of Buonaparte. We are to have a great rejoicing to-morrow. All Paris will be dancing, fiddling, and singing. They are a light-hearted people. I wish I could join in their fun. I was hopeful that I should; but the cursed recollection of the injustice that has been done to me is never out of my mind; so that all my pleasures are blasted, from whatever source they might be expected to arise."

That last sentence fairly indicates the state of Lord Cochrane's mind during these painful years. Weighed down by troubles heavy enough to break the heart of an ordinary man, he fought n.o.bly for the thorough justification of his character and for the protection of others from such persecution as had befallen him. In both objects, altogether praise-worthy in themselves, he may have sometimes been intemperate; but ample excuse for far greater intemperance would be found in the troubles that oppressed him. "The cursed recollection of the injustice that has been done to me is never out of my mind; all my pleasures are blasted!"

In the same temper, after a lapse of nine months, about which it is only necessary to say that, like their forerunners, they were employed in private cares, and, especially after the rea.s.sembling of Parliament, in zealous action for the public good, he made his last speech in the House of Commons on the 2nd of June, 1818. The occasion was a debate upon a second motion by Sir Francis Burdett in favour of parliamentary reform, more cogent and effective than that of the 20th of May, 1817, to Lord Cochrane's share in which we have already referred. The former speech was wholly of public interest. This has a personal significance, very painful and very memorable. It brings to a pathetic close the saddest epoch in Lord Cochrane's life--so very full of sadness.

"I rise, sir," he said, "to second the motion of my honourable friend.

In what I have to say, I do not presume to think that I can add to the able arguments that have just been uttered; but it is my duty distinctly to declare my opinions on the subject. When I recollect all the proceedings of this House, I confess that I do not entertain much hope of a favourable result to the present motion. To me it seems chiefly serviceable as an exhibition of sound principles, and as showing the people for what they ought to pet.i.tion. I shall perhaps be told that it is unparliamentary to say there are any representatives of the people in this House who have sold themselves to the purposes and views of any set of men in power; but the history of the degenerate senate of that once free people, the Romans, will serve to show how far corruption may make inroads upon public virtue or patriotism. The tyranny inflicted on the Roman people, and on mankind in general, under the form of acts pa.s.sed by the Roman senate, will ever prove a useful memento to nations which have any freedom to lose.

It is not for me to prophesy when our case will be like theirs; but this I will say, that those who are the slaves of a despotic monarch are far less reprehensible for their actions than those who voluntarily sell themselves when they have the means of remaining free.

"And here," he continued, in sentences broken by his emotions, "as it is probably the last time I shall ever have the honour of addressing the House on any subject, I am anxious to tell its members what I think of their conduct. It is now nearly eleven years since I have had the honour of a seat in this House, and since then there have been very few measures in which I could agree with the opinions of the majority. To say that these measures were contrary to justice would not be parliamentary. I will not even go into the inquiry whether they tend to the national good or not; but I will merely appeal to the feelings of the landholders present, I will appeal to the knowledge of those members who are engaged in commerce, and ask them whether the acts of the legislative body have not been of a description, during the late war, that would, if not for the timely intervention of the use of machinery, have sent this nation to total ruin? The country is burthened to a degree which, but for this intervention, it would have been impossible for the people to bear. The cause of these measures having such an effect upon the country has been examined and gone into by my honourable colleague (Sir Francis Burdett); they are to be traced to that patronage and influence which, a number of powerful individuals possess over the nomination of a great proportion of the members of this House; a power which, devolving on a few, becomes thereby the more liable to be affected by the influence of the Crown; and which has in fact been rendered almost entirely subservient to that influence. To reform the abuses which arise out of this system is the object of my honourable friend's motion. I will not, cannot, antic.i.p.ate the success of the motion; but I will say, as has been said before by the great Chatham, the father of Mr. Pitt, that, if the House does not reform itself from within, it will be reformed with a vengeance from without. The people will take up the subject, and a reform will take place which will make many members regret their apathy in now refusing that reform which might be rendered efficient and permanent. But, unfortunately, in the present formation of the House, it appears to me that from within no reform can be expected, and for the truth of this I appeal to the experience of the few members, less than a hundred, who are now present, nearly six hundred being absent; I appeal to their experience to say whether they have ever known of any one instance in which a pet.i.tion of the people for reform has been taken into consideration, or any redress afforded in consequence of such a pet.i.tion? This I regret, because I foresee the consequence which must necessarily result from it. I do trust and hope that before it is too late some measures shall be adopted for redressing the grievances of the people; for certain I am that unless some measures are taken to stop the feelings which the people entertain towards this House and to restore their confidence in it, you will one day have ample cause to repent the line of conduct you have pursued. The gentlemen who now sit on the benches opposite with such triumphant feelings will one day repent their conduct. The commotions to which that conduct will inevitably give rise will shake, not only this House, but the whole framework of Government and society to its foundations. I have been actuated by the wish to prevent this, and I have had no other intention.

"I shall not trespa.s.s longer on your time," he continued, in a few broken sentences, uttered painfully and with agitation that aroused much sympathy in the House. "The situation I have held for eleven years in this House I owe to the favour of the electors of Westminster. The feelings of my heart are gratified by the manner in which they have acted towards me. They have rescued me from a desperate and wicked conspiracy which has nearly involved me in total ruin. I forgive those who have so done; and I hope when they depart to their graves they will be equally able to forgive themselves. All this is foreign to the subject before the House, but I trust you will forgive me. I shall not trespa.s.s on your time longer now--perhaps never again on any subject. I hope his Majesty's ministers will take into their serious consideration what I now say. I do not utter it with any feelings of hostility--such feelings have now left me--but I trust they will take my warning, and save the country by abandoning the present system before it is too late."

CHAPTER VI.

THE ANTECEDENTS OF LORD COCHRANE'S EMPLOYMENTS IN AMERICA.--THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE IN THE SPANISH COLONIES.--MEXICO.--VENEZUELA.

--COLOMBIA.--CHILI.--THE FIRST CHILIAN INSURRECTION.--THE CARRERAS AND O'HIGGINS.--THE BATTLE OF BANCAGUA.--O'HIGGINS'S SUCCESSES.--THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE CHILIAN REPUBLIC.--LORD COCHRANE INVITED TO ENTER THE CHILIAN SERVICE.

(1810--1817.)

To an understanding of Lord Cochrane's share in the South American wars of independence a brief recapitulation of their antecedents, and of the state of affairs at the time of his first connection with them, is necessary.

The Spanish possessions in both North and South America, which had reached nearly their full dimensions before the close of the sixteenth century, had been retained, with little opposition from without, and with still less from within, down to the close of the eighteenth century. These possessions, including Mexico and Central America, New Granada, Venezuela, Peru, La Plata, and Chili, covered an area larger than that of Europe, more than twice as large as that of the present United States. Through half a dozen generations they had been governed with all the short-sighted tyranny for which the Spanish Government is famous; the resources of the countries had been crippled in order that each day's greed might be satisfied; and the inhabitants, who, for the most part, were the mixed offspring of Spanish and native parents, had been kept in abject dependence and in ignorant ferocity. There was plenty of internal hatred and strife; but no serious thought of winning their liberty and working out their own regeneration seems to have existed among the people of the several provinces, until it was suggested by the triumphant success of the United States in throwing off the stronger but much less oppressive thraldom of Great Britain.

That success having been achieved, however, it was soon emulated by the colonial subjects of Spain.

The first leader of agitation was Francisco Miranda, a Venezuelan Creole. He visited England in 1790, and received some encouragement in his revolutionary projects from Pitt. He went to France in 1792, and there, while waiting some years for fit occasion of prosecuting the work on which his heart was set, he helped to fight the battle of the revolution against the Bourbons and the worn-out feudalism of which they were representatives. During his absence, in 1794, conspiracies against Spain arose in Mexico and New Granada, and, these continuing, he went in 1794, armed by secret promises of a.s.sistance from Pitt, to help in fomenting them. They prospered for several years; and in 1806 Miranda obtained substantial aid from Sir Alexander Cochrane, Lord Cochrane's uncle, then the admiral in command of the West India station. But in 1806 Pitt died. The Whigs came into power, and with their coming occurred a change in the English policy. In 1807, General Crawfurd was ordered to throw obstacles in the way of Miranda, then heading a formidable insurrection. The result was a temporary check to the work of revolution. In 1810 Miranda renewed his enterprise in Venezuela, still with poor success; and in the same year a fresh revolt was stirred up in Mexico by Miguel Hidalgo, of Costilla, a priest of Dolores. Hidalgo's insurrection was foolish in design and bloodthirsty in execution. It was continued, in better spirit, but with poor success, by Morelos and Rayon, who, sustaining a serious defeat in 1815, left the strife to degenerate into a coa.r.s.e bandit struggle, very disastrous to Spain, but hardly beneficial to the cause of Mexican independence.

In the meanwhile a more prosperous and worthier contest was being waged in South America. Besides the efforts of Miranda in Venezuela, which were renewed between 1810 and 1812, when he was taken prisoner and sent to Spain, there to die in a dungeon, a separate standard of revolt was raised in Quito by Narinno and his friends in 1809. After fighting desperately, in guerilla fas.h.i.+on, for five years, Narinno was captured and forced to share Miranda's lot. A greater man, the greatest hero of South American independence, Simon Bolivar, succeeded them.

Bolivar, a native of Caraccas, had pa.s.sed many years in Europe, when in 1810, at the age of twenty-seven, he went to serve under Miranda in Venezuela. Miranda's defeat in 1812 compelled him to retire to New Granada, but there he did good service. He improved the fighting ways and extended the fighting area, and in December, 1814, was appointed captain-general of Venezuela and New Granada, soon, however, to be driven back and forced to take shelter in Jamaica by the superior strength of Morillo, the Spanish general, who arrived with a formidable army in 1815. In 1816 Bolivar again showed himself in the field at the head of his famous liberating army, which, crossing over from Trinidad, and gaining reinforcements at every step, planted freedom, such as it was, all along the northern parts of South America, in which the new republic of Colombia was founded under his presidency, in the neighbouring district of New Granada, and down to the La Plata province, where he established the republic of Bolivia, so named in his honour. With these patriotic labours he was busied upon land, while Lord Cochrane was securing the independence of the Spanish colonies by his brave warfare on the sea.

As the cause of liberty progressed in South America, it became apparent that it had poor chance of permanence, while the revolutionists were unable to cope with the Spaniards in naval strife or to wrest from Spain her strongholds on the coast. This was especially the case with the maritime provinces of Chili and Peru.

Peru, held firmly by the army garrisoned in Lima, to which Callao served as an almost impregnable port, had been unable to share in the contest waged on the other side of the Andes; and Chili, though strong enough to declare its independence, was too weak to maintain it without foreign aid.

The Chilian struggle began in 1810, when the Spanish captain-general, Carrasco, was deposed, and a native government set up under Count de la Conquista. By this government the sovereignty of Spain was still recognised, although various reforms were adopted which Spain could not be expected to endorse. Accordingly, in April, 1811, an attempt was made by the Spanish soldiers to overturn the new order of things. The result was that, after brief fighting, the revolutionists triumphed, and the yoke of Spain was thrown off.

But the independence of Chili, thus easily begun, was not easily continued. Three brothers, Jose Miguel, Juan Jose, and Luis Carreras, and their sister, styled the Anne Boleyn of Chili, determined to pervert the public weal to their own aggrandis.e.m.e.nt. Winning their way into popularity, they overturned the national congress that had been established in June, and in December set up a new junta, with Jose Miguel Carrera at its head. A dismal period of misrule ensued, which encouraged the Spanish generals, Pareja and Sanchez, to attempt the reconquest of Chili in 1813. Pareja and Sanchez were successfully resisted, and a better man, General Bernardo O'Higgins, the republican son of an Irishman who had been Viceroy of Peru, was put at the head of affairs. He succeeded to the command of the Chilian army in November, 1813, when a fresh attack from the Spaniards was expected.

At first his good soldiers.h.i.+p was successful. The enemy, having come almost to the gates of Santiago, was forced to retire in May, 1814; and the Chilian cause might have continued to prosper under O'Higgins, had not the Carreras contrived, in hopes of reinstating themselves in power, to divide the republican interests, and so, while encouraging renewed invasion by the Spaniards from Lima, make their resistance more difficult. Wisely deeming it right to set aside every other consideration than the necessity of saving Chili from the danger pressing upon it from without, O'Higgins effected a junction with the Carreras, hoping thus to bring the whole force of the republic against the royalist army, larger than its predecessors, which was marching towards Santiago and Valparaiso. Had his magnanimous proposals been properly acted upon, the issue might have been very different. But the Carreras, even in the most urgent hour of danger, could not forget their private ambitions. Holding aloof with their part of the army, they allowed O'Higgins and his force of nine hundred to be defeated by four thousand royalists under General Osorio, in the preliminary fight which took place at the end of September. They were guilty of like treachery during the great battle of the 1st of October. On that day the royalists entered Rancagua, the town in which O'Higgins and his little band had taken shelter. They were fiercely resisted, and the fighting lasted through thirty-six hours. So brave was the conduct of the patriots that the Spanish general was, after some hours'

contest, on the point of retreating. He saw that he would have no chance of success, had the Carreras brought up their troops, as was expected by both sides of the combatants. But the Carreras, short-sighted in their selfishness, and nothing loth that O'Higgins should be defeated, still held aloof. Thereupon the Spaniards took heart, and made one more desperate effort. With hatchets and swords they forced their way, inch by inch and hour by hour, into the centre of the town. There, in an open square, O'Higgins, with two hundred men--all the remnant of his little army--made a last resistance. When only a few dozen of his soldiers were left alive, and when he himself was seriously wounded, he determined, not to surrender, but to end the battle. The residue of the patriots dashed through the town, cutting a road through the astonished crowd of their opponents, and effected a retreat in which those opponents, though more than twenty times as numerous, durst not pursue them.

That memorable battle of Rancagua caused throughout the American continent, and, across the Atlantic, through Europe, a thrill of sympathy for the Chilian war of independence. But its immediate effects were most disastrous. The Carreras, too selfish to fight before, were now too cowardly. They and their followers fled.

O'Higgins had barely soldiers enough left to serve as a weak escort to the fourteen hundred old men, women, and children who crossed the Andes with him on foot, to pa.s.s two years and a half in voluntary exile at Mendoza.

During those two years and a half the Spaniards were masters in Santiago, and Chili was once more a Spanish province, in which the inhabitants were punished terribly in confiscations, imprisonments, and executions for their recent defection. Deliverance, however, was at hand. General San Martin, through whom chiefly La Plata had achieved its freedom, gave a.s.sistance to O'Higgins and the Chilian patriots. The main body of the Spanish army, numbering about five thousand, had been stationed on the heights of Chacabuco, whence Santiago, Valparaiso, and the other leading towns of Chili were overawed. On the 12th of February, 1817, San Martin and O'Higgins, with a force nearly as large, surprised this garrison, and, with excellent strategy and very little loss of life, to the patriots at any rate, it was entirely subdued. Santiago was entered in triumph on the 14th of February, and a few weeks served for the entire dispersion of the royalist forces. The supreme directors.h.i.+p of the renovated republic was offered to San Martin. On his declining the honour, it was a.s.signed, to the satisfaction of all parties, to O'Higgins.

The new dictator and the wisest of his counsellors, however, were not satisfied with the temporary advantage that they had achieved. They knew that armies would continue to come down from Peru, the defeat of which, even if that could be relied upon, would waste all the resources of the republic. They knew, too, that the Spanish war-s.h.i.+ps which supplied Peru with troops and ammunition from home, pa.s.sing the Chilian coast on their way, would seriously hinder the commerce on which the young state had to depend for its development, even if they did not destroy that commerce at its starting-point by seizing Valparaiso and the other ports. Therefore they resolved to seek for efficient help from Europe. With that end Don Jose Alvarez, a high-minded patriot, who had done much good service to Chili in previous years, was immediately sent to Europe, commissioned to borrow money, to build or buy wars.h.i.+ps, and in all the ways in his power to enlist the sympathies of the English people in the republican cause.

In the last of these projects, at any rate, he succeeded beyond all reasonable expectation.

Beaching London in April, 1817, Alvarez was welcomed by many friends of South American freedom--Sir Francis Burdett, Sir James Mackintosh, Mr. Henry Brougham, and Mr. Edward Ellice among the number. Lord Cochrane was just then out of London, fighting his amusing battle with the sheriffs and bailiffs of Hamps.h.i.+re; but as soon as that business was over he took foremost place among the friends of Don Alvarez and the Chilian cause which he represented. With a message to him, indeed, Alvarez was specially commissioned. He was invited by the Chilian Government to undertake the organization and command of an improved naval force, and so, by exercise of the prowess which he had displayed in the Mediterranean and elsewhere, to render invaluable service to the young republic.

He promptly accepted the invitation, being induced thereto by many sufficient reasons. Sick at heart, as we have seen, under the cruel treatment to which for so many years he had been subjected by his enemies in power, he saw here an opportunity of, at the same time, escaping from his persecutors, returning to active work in a profession very dear to him, and giving efficient aid to a n.o.ble enterprise.

CHAPTER VII.

LORD COCHRANE'S VOYAGE TO CHILI.--HIS RECEPTION AT VALPARAISO AND SANTIAGO.--THE DISORGANIZATION OF THE CHILIAN FLEET.--FIRST SIGNS OF DISAFFECTION.--THE NAVAL FORCES OF THE CHILIANS AND THE SPANIARDS.--LORD COCHRANE'S FIRST EXPEDITION TO PERU.--HIS ATTACK ON CALLAO.--"DRAKE THE DRAGON" AND "COCHRANE THE DEVIL."--LORD COCHRANE'S SUCCESSES IN OVERAWING THE SPANIARDS, IN TREASURE-TAKING, AND IN ENCOURAGEMENT OF THE PERUVIANS TO JOIN IN THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE.--HIS PLAN FOE ANOTHER ATTACK ON CALLAO.--HIS DIFFICULTIES IN EQUIPPING THE EXPEDITION.--THE FAILURE OF THE ATTEMPT.--HIS PLAN FOR STORMING VALDIVIA.--ITS SUCCESSFUL ACCOMPLISHMENT.

[1818-1820.]

Having accepted, in May, 1817, the offer conveyed to him by the Chilian Government through Don Jose Alvarez, Lord Cochrane's departure from England was delayed for more than a year. This was chiefly on account of the war-steamer, the _Rising Star_, which it was arranged to build and equip in London under his superintendence. But the work proceeded so slowly, in consequence of the difficulty experienced by Alvarez in raising the requisite funds, that, at last, Lord Cochrane, being urgently needed in South America, where the Spaniards were steadily gaining ground, was requested to leave the superintendence of the _Rising Star_ in other hands, and to cross the Atlantic without her.

Accompanied by Lady Cochrane and his two children, he went first from Rye to Boulogne, and there, on the 15th of August, 1818, embarked in the _Rose_, a merchantman which had formerly been a warsloop. The long voyage was uninteresting until Cape Horn was reached. There, and in pa.s.sing along the rugged coast-line of Tierra del Fuego, Lord Cochrane was struck by its wild scenery. He watched the lazy penguins that crowded on the rocks, among evergreens that showed brightly amid the imposing ma.s.s of snow, and caught with hooks the lazier sea-pigeons that skimmed the heavy waves and hovered round the bulwarks and got entangled among the rigging of the _Rose_. He shot several of the huge albatrosses that floated fearlessly over the deck, but was not successful in his efforts to catch the fish that were seen coming to the surface of the troubled sea. The sea was made so boisterous by rain and snow, and such a stiff wind blew from the west, that for two or three days the _Rose_ could not double the Cape. She was forced to tack towards the south until a favourable gale set in, which carried her safely to Valparaiso.

Valparaiso was reached on the 28th of November, after ten weeks pa.s.sed on s.h.i.+pboard. There and at Santiago, the seat of government, to which he proceeded as soon as the congratulations of his new friends would allow him, Lord Cochrane was heartily welcomed. So profuse and prolonged were the entertainments in his favour--splendid dinners, at which zealous patriots tendered their hearty compliments, being followed by yet more splendid b.a.l.l.s, at which handsome women showed their grat.i.tude in smiles, and eagerly sought the honour of being led by him through the dances which were their chief delight--that he had to remind his guests that he had come to Chili not to feast but to fight.

There was prompt need of fighting. The Spaniards had a strong land force pressing up from the south and threatening to invest Santiago.

Their formidable fleet swept the seas, and was being organized for an attack on Valparaiso. Admiral Blanco Encalada had just returned from a cruise in which he had succeeded in capturing, in Talcuanho Bay, a fine Spanish fifty-gun frigate, the Maria Isabel; but his fleet was ill-ordered and poorly equipped, quite unable, without thorough re-organization, to withstand the superior force of the enemy. An instance of the bad state of affairs was induced by Lord Cochrane's arrival, and seemed likely to cause serious trouble to him and worse misfortune to his Chilian employers. One of the republican vessels was the _Hecate_, a sloop of eighteen guns which had been sold out of the British navy and bought as a speculation by Captains Guise and Spry.

Having first offered her in vain to the Buenos Ayrean Government, they had brought her on to Chili, and there contrived to sell her with advantage and to be themselves taken into the Chilian service. They and another volunteer, Captain Worcester, a North American, liking the ascendancy over Admiral Bianco which their experience had won for them, formed a cabal with the object of securing Admiral Blanco's continuance in the chief command, or its equal division between him and Lord Cochrane. Nothing but the Chilian admiral's disinterested patriotism prevented a serious rupture. He steadily withstood all temptations to his vanity, and avowed his determination to accept no greater honour--if there could be a greater--than that of serving as second in command under the brave Englishman who had come to fight for the independence of Chili. Thus, though some troubles afterwards sprang from the disaffections of Guise, Spry, and Worcester, the mischief schemed by them was prevented at starting.

A few days after his arrival Lord Cochrane received his commission as "Vice-Admiral of Chili, Admiral, and Commander-in-Chief of the Naval Forces of the Republic." His flag was hoisted, on the 22nd of December, on board the _Maria Isabel_, now rechristened the _O'Higgins_, and fitted out as the princ.i.p.al s.h.i.+p in the small Chilian fleet. The other vessels of the fleet were the _San Martin_, formerly an Indiaman in the English service, of fifty-six guns; the _Lautaro_, also an old Indiaman, of forty-four guns; the _Galvarino_, as the _Hecate_ of Captains Cruise and Spry was now styled, of eighteen guns; the _Chacabuco_, of twenty guns; the _Aracauno_, of sixteen guns; and a sloop of fourteen guns named the _Puyrredon_.

The Spanish fleet, which these seven s.h.i.+ps had to withstand, comprised fourteen vessels and twenty-seven gunboats. Of the former three were frigates, the _Esmeralda_, of forty-four guns, the _Venganza_, of forty-two guns, and the _Sebastiana_, of twenty-eight guns; four were brigs, the _Maypeu_, of eighteen guns, the _Pezuela_, of twenty-two guns, the _Potrilla_, of eighteen guns, and another, whose name is not recorded, also of eighteen guns. There was a schooner, name unknown, which carried one large gun and twenty culverins. The rest were armed merchantmen, the _Resolution_, of thirty-six guns; the _Cleopatra_, of twenty-eight guns; the _La Focha_, of twenty guns; the _Guarmey_, of eighteen guns; the Fernando, of twenty-six guns, and the San Antonio, of eighteen guns. Only ten out of the fourteen, however, were ready for sea; and before the whole naval force could be got ready for service, it had been partly broken up by Lord Cochrane.

There was delay, also, in getting the Chilian fleet under sail. After waiting at Valparaiso as long as he deemed prudent, Lord Cochrane left the three smaller vessels to complete their equipment under Admiral Blanco's direction, and pa.s.sed out of port on the 16th of January, with the O'Higgins, the San Martin, the Lautaro, and the Chacabuco. He had hardly started before a mutiny broke out on board the last-named vessel, which compelled him to halt at Coquimbo long enough to try and punish the mutineers. Resuming the voyage, he proceeded along the Chilian and Peruvian coast as far northward as Callao Bay, where he cruised about for some days, awaiting an opportunity of attacking the Spanish s.h.i.+pping there collected in considerable force.

While thus waiting he employed his leisure in observations, great and small, of the sort and in the way characteristic of him all through life. One of his rough notes runs thus:--"Cormorants resort in enormous nights, coming in the morning from the northward to Callao Bay, and proceeding along sh.o.r.e to the southward, diving in regular succession one after another on the fish which, driven at the same time from below by shoals of porpoises, seem to have no chance but to be devoured under water or scooped up in the large bags pendent from the enormous bills of the cormorants." "Prodigious seals," we read in another note, "inhabit the rocks, whose grave faces and grey beards look more like the human countenance than the faces of most other animals. They are very unwieldy in their movements when on sh.o.r.e, but most expert in the water. There is a small kind of duck in the bay, which, from the clearness of the water, can be seen flying with its wings under water in chase of small fry, which it speedily overtakes from its prodigious speed."