The Two Admirals Part 44

As most of the day was still before him, Sir Gervaise had little doubt of being able to secure the latter, ere night should come to render it indispensable.

The vice-admiral and his captain shook hands cordially on the p.o.o.p, and the former pointed out to the latter, with honest exultation, the result of his own bold man[oe]uvres.

"We've clipped the wings of two of them," added Sir Gervaise, "and have fairly bagged a third, my good friend; and, G.o.d willing, when Bluewater joins, there will not be much difficulty with the remainder. I cannot see that any of our vessels have suffered much, and I set them all down as sound. There's been time for a signal of inability, that curse to an admiral's evolutions, but no one seems disposed to make it. If we really escape that nuisance, it will be the first instance in my life!"

"Half-a-dozen yards may be crippled, and no one the worse for it, in this heavy weather. Were we under a press of canva.s.s, it would be a different matter; but, now, so long as the main sticks stand, we shall probably do well enough. I can find no injury in my own s.h.i.+p that may not be remedied at sea."

"And she has had the worst of it. 'Twas a decided thing, Greenly, to engage such an odds in a gale; but we owe our success, most probably, to the audacity of the attack. Had the enemy believed it possible, it is probable he would have frustrated it. Well, Master Galleygo, I'm glad to see you unhurt! What is your pleasure?"

"Why, Sir Jarvy, I've two opportunities, as a body might say, on the p.o.o.p, just now. One is to shake hands, as we always does a'ter a brush, you knows, sir, and to look a'ter each other's health; and the other is to report a misfortin that will bear hard on this day's dinner. You see, Sir Jarvy, I had the dead poultry slung in a net, over the live stock, to be out of harm's way; well, sir, a shot cut the lanyard, and let all the chickens down by the run, in among the gun-room grunters; and as they never half feeds them hanimals, there isn't as much left of the birds as would make a meal for a sick young gentleman. To my notion, no one ought to _have_ live stock but the commanders-in-chief."

"To the devil with you and the stock! Give me a shake of the hand, and back into your top--how came you, sir, to quit your quarters without leave?"

"I didn't, Sir Jarvy. Seeing how things was a going on, among the pigs, for our top hoverlooks the awful scene, I axed the young gentleman to let me come down to condole with your honour; and as they always lets me do as I axes, in such matters, why down I come. We has had one rattler in at our top, howsever, that came nigh lo clear us all out on it!"

"Is any spar injured?" asked Sir Gervaise, quickly. "This must be looked to--hey! Greenly?"

"Not to signify, your honour; not to signify. One of them French eighteens aboard the prize just c.o.c.ked its nose up, as the s.h.i.+p lurched, and let fly a round 'un and a grist of grape, right into our faces. I see'd it coming and sung out 'scaldings;' and 'twas well I did. We all ducked in time, and the round 'un cleared every thing, but a handful of the marbles are planted in the head of the mast, making the spar look like a plum-pudding, or a fellow with the small-pox."

"Enough of this. You are excused from returning to the top;--and, Greenly, beat the retreat. Bunting, show the signal for the retreat from quarters. Let the s.h.i.+ps pipe to breakfast, if they will."

This order affords a fair picture of the strange admixture of feelings and employments that characterize the ordinary life of a s.h.i.+p. At one moment, its inmates find themselves engaged in scenes of wild magnificence and fierce confusion, while at the next they revert to the most familiar duties of humanity. The crews of the whole fleet now retired from the guns, and immediately after they were seated around their kids, indulging ravenously in the food for which the exercise of the morning had given keen appet.i.tes. Still there was something of the sternness of battle in the merriment of this meal, and the few jokes that pa.s.sed were seasoned with a bitterness that is not usual among the light-hearted followers of the sea. Here and there, a messmate was missed, and the vacancy produced some quaint and even pathetic allusion to his habits, or to the manner in which he met his death; seamen usually treating the ravages of this great enemy of the race, after the blow has been struck, with as much solemnity and even tenderness, as they regard his approaches with levity. It is when spared themselves, that they most regard the destruction of battle. A man's standing in a s.h.i.+p, too, carries great weight with it, at such times; the loss of the quarter-master, in particular, being much regretted in the Plantagenet.

This man messed with a portion of the petty officers, a set of men altogether more thoughtful and grave than the body of the crew; and who met, when they a.s.sembled around their mess-chest that morning, with a sobriety and even sternness of mien, that showed how much in the management of the vessel had depended on their individual exertions.

Several minutes elapsed in the particular mess of the dead man, before a word was spoken; all eating with appet.i.tes that were of proof, but no one breaking the silence. At length an old quarter-gunner, named Tom Sponge, who generally led the discourse, said in a sort of half-inquiring, half-regretting, way--

"I suppose there's no great use in asking why Jack Gla.s.s's spoon is idle this morning. They says, them forecastle chaps, that they see'd his body streaming out over the starboard quarter, as if it had been the fly of one of his own ensigns. How was it, Ned? you was thereaway, and ought to know all about it."

"To be sure I does," said Ned, who was Bunting's remaining a.s.sistant. "I was there, as you says, and see'd as much of it as a man can see of what pa.s.ses between a poor fellow and a shot, when they comes together, and that not in a very loving manner. It happened just as we come upon the weather beam of that first chap--him as we winged so handsomely among us. Well, Sir Jarvy had clapped a stopper on the signals, seeing as we had got fairly into the smoke, and Jack and I was looking about us for the muskets, not knowing but a chance might turn up to chuck a little lead into some of the parly-woos; and so says Jack, says he, 'Ned, you's got my musket;--(as I _had_, sure enough)--and says he, 'Ned, you's got my musket; but no matter arter all, as they're much of a muchness.' So when he'd said this, he lets fly; but whether he hit any body, is more than I can say. If he _did_, 'twas likely a Frenchman, as he shot that-a-way. 'Now,' says Jack, says he, 'Ned, as this is your musket, you can load it, and hand over mine, and I'll sheet home another of the b----s.' Well, at that moment the Frenchman lifted for'ard, on a heavy swell, and let drive at us, with all his forecastle guns, fired as it might be with one priming--"

"That was bad gunnery," growled Tom Sponge, "it racks a s.h.i.+p woundily."

"Yes, they'se no judgment in s.h.i.+ps, in general. Well, them French twelves are spiteful guns; and a _little_ afore they fired, it seemed to me I heard something give Jack a rap on the check, that sounded as if a fellow's ear was boxed with a clap of thunder. I looked up, and there was Jack streaming out like the fly of the ensign, head foremost, with the body towing after it by strings in the neck."

"I thought when a fellow's head was shot off," put in another quarter-master named Ben Barrel, "that the body was left in the s.h.i.+p while only the truck went!"

"That comes of not seeing them things, Ben," rejoined the eye-witness.

"A fellow's head is staid in its berth just like a s.h.i.+p's mast. There's for'ard and back-stays, and shrouds, all's one as aboard here; the only difference is that the lanyards are a little looser, so as to give a man more play for his head, than it might be safe to give to a mast. When a fellow makes a bow, why he only comes up a little aft, and bowses on the fore-stay, and now and then you falls in with a chap that is stayed altogether too far for'ard, or who's got a list perhaps from having the shrouds set up too taut to port or to starboard."

"That sounds reasonable," put in the quarter-gunner, gravely; "I've seen such droggers myself."

"If you'd been on the p.o.o.p an hour or too ago, you'd ha' seen more on it! Now, there's all our marines, their back-stays have had a fresh pull since they were launched, and, as for their captain, I'll warrant you, _he_ had a luff upon luff!"

"I've heard the carpenter overhauling them matters," remarked Sam Wad, another quarter-gunner, "and he chalked it all out by the square and compa.s.s. It seems reasonable, too."

"If you'd seen Jack's head dragging his body overboard, just like the Frenchman dragging his wreck under his lee, you'd ha' _thought_ it reasonable. What's a fellow's shoulders for, but to give a spread to his shrouds, which lead down the neck and are set up under the arms somewhere. They says a great deal about the heart, and I reckons it's likely every thing is key'd there."

"Harkee, Ned," observed a quarter-master, who knew little more than the mess generally, "if what you say is true, why don't these shrouds lead straight from the head to the shoulders, instead of being all tucked up under a skin in the neck? Answer me that, now."

"Who the devil ever saw a s.h.i.+p's shrouds that wasn't cat-harpened in!"

exclaimed Ned, with some heat. "A pretty hand a wife would make of it, in pulling her arms around a fellow's neck if the rigging spread in the way you mean! Them things is all settled according to reason when a chap's keel's laid."

This last argument seemed to dispose of the matter, the discourse gradually turning on, and confining itself to the merits of the deceased.

Sir Gervaise had directed Galleygo to prepare his breakfast as soon as the people were piped to their own; but he was still detained on deck in consequence of a movement in one of his vessels, to which it has now become necessary more particularly to recur.

The appearance of the Druid to the northward, early in the morning, will doubtless be remembered by the reader. When near enough to have it made out, this frigate had shown her number; after which she rested satisfied with carrying sail much harder than any vessel in sight. When the fleets engaged, she made an effort to set the fore-top-sail, close-reefed, but several of the critics in the other s.h.i.+ps, who occasionally noticed her movements, fancied that some accident must have befallen her, as the canva.s.s was soon taken in, and she appeared disposed to remain content with the sail carried when first seen. As this s.h.i.+p was materially to windward of the line, and she was running the whole time a little free, her velocity was much greater than that of the other vessels, and by this time she had got so near that Sir Gervaise observed she was fairly abeam of the Plantagenet, and a little to leeward of the Active. Of course her hull, even to the bottom, as she rose on a sea, was plainly visible, and such of her people as were in the tops and rigging could be easily distinguished by the naked eye.

"The Druid must have some communication for us from the other division of the fleet," observed the vice-admiral to his signal-officer, as they stood watching the movements of the frigate; "it is a little extraordinary Blewet does not signal! Look at the book, and find me a question to put that will ask his errand?"

Bunting was in the act of turning over the leaves of his little vocabulary of questions and answers, when three or four dark b.a.l.l.s, that Sir Gervaise, by the aid of the gla.s.s, saw suspended between the frigate's masts, opened into flags, effectually proving that Blewet was not absolutely asleep.

"Four hundred and sixteen, ordinary communication," observed the vice-admiral, with his eye still at the gla.s.s. "Look up that, Bunting, and let us know what it means."

"The commander-in-chief--wish to speak him!" read Bunting, in the customary formal manner in which he announced the purport of a signal.

"Very well--answer; then make the Druid's number to come within hail!

The fellow has got cloth enough spread to travel two feet to our one; let him edge away and come under our lee. Speaking will be rather close work to-day."

"I doubt if a s.h.i.+p _can_ come near enough to make herself heard,"

returned the other, "though the second lieutenant of that s.h.i.+p never uses a trumpet in the heaviest weather, they tell me, sir. Our gents say his father was a town-crier, and that he has inherited the family estate."

"Ay, our gents are a set of saucy fellows, as is usually the case when there isn't work enough aboard."

"You should make a little allowance, Sir Gervaise, for being in the s.h.i.+p of a successful commander-in-chief. That makes us all carry weather-helms among the other messes."

"Up with your signal, sir; up with your signal. I shall be obliged to order Greenly to put you upon watch-and-watch for a month, in order to bring you down to the old level of manners."

"Signal answered, already, Sir Gervaise. By the way, sir, I'll thank you to request Captain Greenly to give me another quarter-master. It's nimble work for us when there is any thing serious to do."

"You shall have him, Bunting," returned the vice-admiral, a shade pa.s.sing over his face for the moment. "I had missed poor Jack Gla.s.s, and from seeing a spot of blood on the p.o.o.p, guessed his fate. I fancied, indeed, I heard a shot strike something behind me."

"It struck the poor fellow's head, sir, and made a noise as if a butcher were felling an ox."

"Well--well--let us try to forget it, until something can be done for his son, who is one of the side boys. Ah! there's Blewet keeping away in earnest. How the deuce he is to speak us, however, is more than I can tell."

Sir Gervaise now sent a message to his captain to say that he desired his presence. Greenly soon appeared, and was made acquainted with the intention of the Druid, as well as with the purport of the last signals.

By this time, the rent main-top-sail was mended, and the captain suggested it should be set again, close-reefed, as before, and that the main-sail should be taken in. This would lessen the Plantagenet's way, which s.h.i.+p was sensibly drawing ahead of her consorts. Sir Gervaise a.s.senting, the change was made, and the effects were soon apparent, not only in the movement of the s.h.i.+p, but in her greater ease and steadiness of motion.

It was not long before the Druid was within a hundred fathoms of the flag-s.h.i.+p, on her weather-quarter, shoving the brine before her in a way to denote a fearful momentum. It was evidently the intention of Captain Blewet to cross the Plantagenet's stern, and to luff up under her lee quarter; the safest point at which he could approach, in so heavy a swell, provided it were done with discretion. Captain Blewet had a reputation for handling his frigate like a boat, and the occasion was one which would be likely to awaken all his desire to sustain the character he had already earned. Still no one could imagine how he was to come near enough to make a communication of any length. The stentorian lungs of the second lieutenant, however, might effect it; and, as the news of the expected hail pa.s.sed through the s.h.i.+p, many who had remained below, in apathy, while the enemy was close under their lee, came on deck, curious to witness what was about to pa.s.s.

"Hey! Atwood?" exclaimed Sir Gervaise, for the little excitement had brought the secretary up from the commander-in-chief's cabin;--"what is Blewet at! The fellow cannot mean to set a studding-sail!"

"He is running out a boom, nevertheless, Sir Gervaise, or my thirty years' experience of nautical things have been thrown away."

"He is truly rigging out his weather fore-topmast-studding-sail-boom, sir!" added Greenly, in a tone of wonder.

"It _is_ out," rejoined the vice-admiral, as one would give emphasis to the report of a calamity. "Hey!--what? Isn't that a man they're running up to the end of it, Bunting? Level your gla.s.s, and let us know at once."

"A gla.s.s is not necessary to make out that much, Sir Gervaise. It is a man, beyond a doubt, and there he hangs at the boom-end, as if sentenced by a general court-martial."