c109CHAPTER IX.HOW REGINALD BRANDON RETURNED TO MOOSHANNE WITH HIS SISTER, ACCOMPANIED BY WINGENUND; AND WHAT BEFELL THEM ON THE ROAD.Lucy Brandon was not a little surprised at the chief’s sudden departure; and, with the frankness natural to her character, inquired of her brother whether he could explain its cause. Reginald appeared either unable or unwilling to do so; and an appeal to the guide produced only the following unsatisfactory reply:“War–Eagle is like the bird after which he’s called—it ain’t easy to explain or to follow his flight.”Wingenund remained silent, but every now and then he fixed his bright and speaking eyes upon Lucy, as if he would divine her thoughts. That young lady, though at a loss to account for her embarrassment, entertained a fear that all was not right, and proposed to her brother to return to Mooshanne.Snowdrop was soon caught, and the little party moved leisurely homeward, Reginald and the guide leading the way, and Wingenund walking by the side of Lucy’s pony; after riding a few minutes, she recovered her spirits, and remembering that there was no foundation for any surmises of evil, she resumed the conversation with her young companion, which the chief’s departure had interrupted. “Tell me, Wingenund, who is the ‘Black Father,’ of whom you speak?”“He is very good,” said the boy, seriously; “He talks with the Great Spirit; and he tells us all that the Great Spirit has done; how He made the earth, and the water; and how He punishes bad men, and makes good men happy.”“He is a white man, then?” said Lucy.“He is,” replied the lad; “but though he is a white man, he always speaks truth, and does good, and drinks no fire–water, and is never angry.”What a humiliating reflection is it, thought Lucy to herself, that in the mind of this young savage the idea of white men is naturally associated with drunkenness and strife! “Tell me, Wingenund,” she continued, “is the ‘Black Father’ old?”“Many winters have passed over his head, and their snow rests upon his hair.”“Does he live with you always?”“He comes and he goes, like the sunshine and the rain; he is always welcome; and the Lenapé love him.”“Can he speak your tongue well?”“He speaks many tongues, and tries to make peace between the tribes; but he loves the Lenapé, and he teaches ‘the Prairie–bird’ to talk with the Great Spirit.”“Does your sister speak to the Black Father in her own tongue?”“Sometimes, and sometimes in the English; but often in a strange tongue, written on a great book. The Black Father reads it, and the Prairie–bird opens her ears, and looks on his face, and loves his words; and then she tells them all to me. But Wingenund is a child of the Lenapé—he cannot understand these things!”“You will understand them,” said Lucy, kindly, “if you only have patience: you know,” she added, smiling, “your sister understands them, and she is a Lenapé too!”“Yes,” said the boy; “but nobody is like Prairie–bird.”“She must, indeed, be a remarkable person,” said Lucy, humouring her young companion’s fancy; “still, as you have the same father and mother, and the same blood, whatever she learns, you can learn too.”“I have no father or mother,” said Wingenund, sadly, and he added, in a mysterious whisper, drawing near to Lucy, “Prairie–bird never had a father or mother.”“Never had a father or mother!” repeated Lucy, as the painful thought occurred to her, that poor Wingenund was deranged.“Never,” said the boy, in the same tone; “she came fromthere,” pointing, as he spoke, towards the north–west quarter of the heaven.“How melancholy is it,” said Lucy to herself, “to think that this brave, amiable boy should be so afflicted! that so intelligent and quick a mind should be like a lyre with a broken string! Still,” thought she, “I will endeavour to understand his meaning, and to undeceive him.”“Dear Wingenund, you are mistaken—your sister had the same father and mother as yourself; she may have learnt much, and may understand things strange to you, but you might learn them too.”“Wingenund’s father and mother are dead,” said the boy, in a voice of deep and suppressed emotion; “he will not tell youhowthey died, for it makes his heart throb and his eyes burn; but you are good to him, and shall not see his anger. Prairie–bird never had a father; the Great Spirit gave her to the Lenapé.”While Lucy was musing how she should endeavour to dispel this strange delusion, which seemed to have taken such firm hold of her young companion’s mind, Reginald and Baptiste halted, and the latter said, “You see that party approaching; they may put some troublesome questions, leave me to answer them. Wingenund, you know what I mean?”“Wingenund does not understand English,” said the boy, a slight smile of irony lurking in the corner of his mouth.The approaching party consisted of eight or ten men, all armed with rifles, excepting two, who were mounted, and who carried cutlasses and large horse–pistols; among the pedestrians towered the gigantic form of young Mike Smith, who has already been presented to the reader before the store of David Muir in Marietta; and among the horsemen was the younger Hervey, leading his friends to scour the whole country in search of the slayer of his brother: they were all in a high state of excitement; and despite the cool and unmoved demeanour of the guide, he was not without apprehension that they might desire to wreak their vengeance on Wingenund.“Ha! Baptiste,” said Hervey, grasping the guide’s hand;“you are the very man we are in search of; we have already been to the Colonel’s, and he told us we should find you with his son, and with Miss Brandon, in this quarter. We want your assistance, man, and that speedily too.”“How can I serve you?” said the guide; “what is the matter? you seem bent on a hunt.”“A hunt?” exclaimed Hervey, “yes, a hunt of a red–skin devil! Harkee, Baptiste!” and stooping from his horse, he repeated to the guide, in a low voice, but clear enough to be heard by all present, the circumstances attending his brother’s death.“A daring act, indeed,” said the guide musing: “but could not you follow the trail while it was fresh, yesterday?”“We followed it to a creek leading to the Muskingum, and there we lost it.”“Can you describe the appearance of the Indian?” inquired the guide.“A tall, handsome fellow, as straight as a poplar, and with a leap like a painter, so he seemed; but d—n him, he gave me such a knock on the head, that my eyes swam for five minutes.”A cold shudder ran through Lucy’s limbs as, comparing this slight sketch of War–Eagle with his sudden departure and the guide’s caution to Wingenund, she recognised in the chief the object of their search: glancing her eye timidly at Wingenund, she could read on his countenance no traces of uneasiness; he was playing with Snowdrop’s mane; his gun resting on the ground, and he himself apparently unconscious of what was passing.After a minute’s reflection, the guide continued: “You say that the Indian’s rifle was broken in half; did you notice anything about it?”“Nothing: it was a strong coarse piece; we have brought the stock with us; here it is,” he added, calling up one of his party to whom it had been entrusted.The guide took it in his hand, and at the first glance detected the imitation of a feather, roughly but distinctly cut with a knife: his own suspicions were at once confirmed, although his countenance betrayed no change of expression; but Mike Smith, who had been looking over his shoulder, had also observed the marks of the feather, and noticed it immediately aloud, adding, “Come, Baptiste, you know all the Ingianmarks between Alleghany and the Missouri; what red–skin has this belonged to?”“Mike,” said the guide coolly, “a man’s tongue must shoot far and true to hit such a mark as that.”“And yet, Baptiste, if I’d been as long at the guiding and trapping as you, I think I’d a’ know’d something about it.”“Ay, that’s the way of it,” replied Baptiste; “you young ‘uns always think you can shave a hog with a horn spoon! I’spose, Master Mike, you can tell a buzzard from a mockingbird; but if I was to show you a feather, and ask youwhatbuzzard it belonged to, the answer might not be easy to find.”“You’re an old fool,” growled Mike, angrily; and he added, as his eye rested suddenly upon Wingenund, “What cub is that standing by Miss’s white pony? we’ll see if he knows this mark. Come here, you devil’s brat.”Not a muscle in the boy’s face betrayed his consciousness that he was addressed.“Come here, you young red–skin!” shouted Mike yet more angrily, “or I’ll sharpen your movements with the point of my knife.”Reginald’s fiery temper was ill calculated to brook the young backwoods–man’s coarse and violent language: placing himself directly between him and Wingenund, he said to the former in a stern and determined tone, “Master Smith, you forget yourself; that boy is one of my company, and is not to be exposed either to insult or injury.”“Here’s a pretty coil about a young red–skin,” said Mike, trying to conceal his anger under a forced laugh; “how do we know that he ain’t a brother or a son of the Ingian we’re in search of? s’ blood, if we could find out that he was, we’d tar him, and burn him over a slow fire!”“I tell you again,” said Reginald, “that he is guilty of no crime; that he saved my life, yesterday, at the risk of his own; and that, while I live, neither you nor any of your party shall touch a hair of his head.”Baptiste fearing the result of more angry words, and moved by an appealing look from Miss Brandon, now interposed, and laying his hand on Smith’s shoulder, said, “Come, Master Mike, there is no use in threatening the young red–skin, when you see that he does not understand a word that you say:tell me what you wish to inquire of him, and I will ask him in his own tongue.”“His tongue be d——d,” said Mike; “I’ll wager a hat against a gallon of David Muir’s best, that the brat knows English as well as you or I, although he seems to have nothing to do but to count the tassels on the edge of his shirt. I’ll show you, without hurting him,” he added in a lower tone, “that I’m not far wrong.”“You swear not to injure him?” said Reginald, who overheard what passed.“I do,” said Mike; “I only want to show you that he can’t make a fool of Mike Smith.” Here he called up one of the men from the rear; and having whispered something in his ear, he said, in a loud and distinct tone of voice, “Jack, we have found out that this Indian cub belongs to the party, one of whom murdered poor Hervey. Life for life is the law of the backwoods: do you step a little on one side; I will count four, and when I come to the four, split me the young rascal’s head, either with a bullet or with your axe.”“For Heaven’s sake, as you are men,” exclaimed Lucy, in an agony, “spare him!”“Peace, Miss Brandon,” said Mike; “your brother will explain to you that it must be so.”The guide would fain have whispered a word to the boy, but he was too closely watched by Smith, and he was obliged to trust to Wingenund’s nerves and intelligence.“Are you ready, Jack?” said Mike, audibly.“Yes!” and he counted slowly, pausing between each number, “one—two—three!” At the pronunciation of this last word, Wingenund, whose countenance had not betrayed, by the movement of a muscle, or by the expression of a single feature, the slightest interest in what was passing, amused himself by patting the great rough head which Wolf rubbed against his hand as if totally unconscious that the deadly weapon was raised, and that the next word from the hunter’s lips was to be his death warrant.“D—n it, you are right, after all, Baptiste,” said Mike Smith; “the brat certainly does not understand us, or he’d have pricked his ears when I came to number three; so, do you ask him, in his own lingo, if he knows that mark on the rifle–butt, and can tell us to what red–skin tribe it belongs?”The guide now addressed a few words to Wingenund in the Delaware tongue, while Reginald and Lucy interchanged a glance of wonder and admiration at the boy’s sagacity and courage.“He tells me that he has seen this mark before,” said the guide.“Has he?” replied Mike; “ask him whether it is that of a Shawnee or a Wyandot, of an Iroquois or of a Delaware?”After again conferring with Wingenund, the guide muttered to himself, “This youngster won’t tell a lie to keep a bullet from his brain or a halter from his neck; I must act for him.” He added, in a louder tone, “Mike, a word with you: it is not unlikely that the Ingian you’re in search of, is the same who gave the boy that wound, and who tried to kill Master Reginald yesterday: if it is so, he wants no more punishing; he has his allowance already.”“How so?” said Mike.“He is dead, man,—killed on the spot. Do you and Hervey meet me here to–morrow, an hour before noon; I will take you to the place where the body is buried, and you shall judge for yourselves whether it is that of the man you seek.”“It’s a bargain,” said Mike; “we’ll come to the time. Now, lads, forward to Hervey’s clearing. Let’s have a merry supper to–night; and to–morrow, if the guide shows us the carcase of this rascal, why we can’t hurt that much; but we’ll pay off a long score, one day or other, with some of the red–skins. Sorry to have kept you waitin’, Miss; and hope we haven’t scared you,” said the rough fellow, making, as he drew off his party, an awkward attempt at a parting bow to Lucy.“That was a clever turn of Baptiste’s,” said Reginald in a low voice to his sister; “he has made them believe that the cowardly knave who tried to stab me was the perpetrator of the daring outrage which they seek to avenge!”“And was it really War–Eagle?” said Lucy, with a slight shudder,—“he who looks so noble and so gentle,—was it he who did it?”“I believe so,” said Reginald.“But is it not wrong in us to be friends with him, and to aid his escape?”“Indeed,” replied her brother, “it admits of doubt; let usask the guide, he will speak now without reserve;” and accordingly Reginald repeated to Baptiste the question and his sister’s scruples.“Why you see, Miss,” said the wary hunter, “there is no proof that War–Eagle did it; though I confess it was too bold a deed to have been done by that dog of a Wyandot: but I will tell you, Miss,” he added, with increasing energy and vehemence, “ifthe War–Eagle did it, you will yourself, when you know all, confess that he did it nobly, and that he deserves no punishment from man. That elder Hervey was one of the bloodthirsty band by whom the harmless Christian Indians[21]were murdered; and it is believed that it was by Hervey’s own hand that Wingenund’s father fell;ifWar–Eagle revenged this cruel murder, and yet spared the life of the younger brother, when lying helpless at his feet, who shall dare to blame him, or move a foot in his pursuit?”“He speaks the truth, Lucy,” said her brother; “according to the rules by which retaliation is practised by mankind, War–Eagle would have been justified in punishing with death such an act of unprovoked atrocity: but it is a dangerous subject to discuss; you had better forgetallyou have heard about it; and in case of further inquiries being made in your presence, imitate the happy unconsciousness lately displayed by Wingenund.”“Come here, my dear young brother,” he added in a kindly tone, “and tell us,—did you really think that hot–headed chap was going to shoot you when he counted number three?”“No,” said the boy with a scornful smile.“And why not? for he’s a violent and angry man.”“He dared not,” was the reply.“How so?”“He is a fool!” said the boy, in the same scornful tone; “a fool scarcely fit to frighten the fawn of an antelope! If he had touched me or attempted to shoot me, Netis and Grande–Hâche would have killed him immediately.”“You are right, my young brave,” said Reginald, “he dared not hurt you. See, dear Lucy,” he added apart to his sister, “what a ripe judgment, what an heroic spirit, what nerves of iron, are found in the slender frame of this wounded boy, exhausted by fatigue and suffering!”“We will at least give him a hearty supper,” said Lucy, “and an affectionate welcome to our home.”Wingenund thanked her with his dark eyes, and the little party proceeded leisurely, without incident or interruption, to Mooshanne.c110CHAPTER X.IN WHICH THE READER IS UNCEREMONIOUSLY TRANSPORTED TO ANOTHER ELEMENT IN COMPANY WITH ETHELSTON; THE LATTER IS LEFT IN A DISAGREEABLE PREDICAMENT.It is time that we should now turn our attention to Ethelston, who is much too important a personage in our narrative to be so long neglected, and respecting whose safety Lucy began to feel the jealous anxiety of love; for The Pride of Ohio had been long expected in Marietta, and several French frigates and corvettes were reported to be cruising among the West Indian Islands, actively engaged in revenging upon American commerce the loss which they had sustained in The Insurgente. We shall soon see that Lucy’s alarm was not altogether groundless, and that her lover’s prolonged absence was not without sufficient cause. About a month preceding the occurrences detailed in the last chapter, Ethelston, having landed his merchandise in safety at Port Royal, and having taken on board a small cargo of sugar and coffee, prepared to return to New Orleans. He had heard of the French men–of–war cruising in the neighbourhood, and prudently resolved to risk as little as possible on this trip: he took therefore securities for a great portion of the amount due to him, which he left in the charge of the vessel’s consignees, and conveyed on board only a sufficient cargo to put The Pride of Ohio in perfect sailing trim, and to give her a fair chance of escape in case she were chased by an enemy. His little brig was well rigged and manned, and he felt confident that few, if any, of the French cruisers would match her for speed. His mate, or sailing–master, was Gregson, a hardy weather–beaten old sailor, who had served on board of every kind of craft, from a man–of–war to a fishing–cobble,and knew every headland, reef, and current in that dangerous sea, as well as a Liverpool pilot knows the banks and shoals in the mouth of the Mersey. The Pride of Ohio mounted three guns; two eighteen–pound carronades, and one long nine–pounder: ten stout fellows and a black cook completed her complement: the last–mentioned person deserves special notice, as he was a character strangely formed by the alternations of fortune which he had seen. A native of the interior of western Africa, he had in early life been chosen, on account of his extraordinary strength and courage, a chief of the Lucumi tribe, to which he belonged; but having been unfortunately made a prisoner, he was taken down to the coast and sold to a slaver: thence he had been conveyed to some of the Spanish Islands, and afterwards to Virginia, where he had come into possession of Colonel Brandon, who finding him possessed of many good qualities, and of a sagacity very rare among his countrymen, had offered him his liberty when he moved to Ohio; but Cupid (for so was the negro called) had grown so much attached to his master, that he begged to be allowed to remain in his service, and, from one employment to another, had now become cook and steward on board The Pride of Ohio. In frame he was Herculean; and though he rarely exerted his strength, he had shown on various occasions that it was nearly if not quite equal to that of any other two men in the vessel. He spoke but little, and was sullen and reserved in his manners; but as he never disobeyed orders, and never was guilty of aggression or violence, Cupid was, upon the whole, a favourite with the crew.To Ethelston he was invaluable; for he was always at his post, was scrupulously honest with respect to money or stores placed under his charge, and on more than one occasion his shrewdness and readiness had surprised his young commander. The captain (for so was Ethelston called on board) always treated Cupid kindly, and never allowed him to be made the subject of those jeers and insults to which free negroes in the States are usually exposed. On this account the cook, who never forgot that hehadbeen a warrior, entertained towards him the warmest feelings of attachment and gratitude.How or where he had obtained the name he bore, none seemed to know; and Ethelston remembered having heard that when first he came into Colonel Brandon’s possession, and wasasked his name, he had sullenly replied, “The name I once had is at home: a slave has neither name nor home!” A terrible gash across his forehead and left cheek (received, probably, in the war when he was captured,) had disfigured a countenance that had been originally expressive of haughtiness and determination, and had, perhaps, led the slave–dealer to bestow upon him in irony the name by which he was now called.The Pride of Ohio had made good two days of her homeward passage, when, in endeavouring to round a point on the southern coast of Cuba, Ethelston descried a ship some miles to windward, and a–head, which a careful examination through his glass convinced him was a French frigate. His mate being below at the time, he sent for him on deck, anxious to see whether the experienced sailor’s observation would confirm his opinion. As soon as he appeared, handing him the glass, he said, “Gregson, see what you make of that fellow on our larboard bow.”“Make of her!” said the mate; “the devil take him that made her, and him that brought her athwart us, say I, captain! She’s a Frenchman; and though we can’t well see her hull yet, I doubt it won’t be long before we see her row of teeth.”“I thought so myself,” said Ethelston. “We must hold our course steady; and if we can round the point, we may then bear away, and show her a pair of heels. Turn the hands up, Gregson; trim the sails, and stand by for a run. Put Harrison at the helm; he can keep her a point nearer than that youngster.”“Ay, ay, sir!” was the reply; and having executed the order, he returned to Ethelston, who was still sweeping the southern horizon with his glass, and examining the strange ship, whose hull was now distinctly visible.The young man’s countenance wore a grave expression, as, returning the glass to his mate, he said, “Gregson, it is, as we supposed, a French frigate. We may, perhaps, creep along under the shore without his noticing our small craft.”The old seaman riveted the glass upon the stranger, as if he wished to count every sail and plank. During the examination, he grunted two or three inarticulate ejaculations, in unison with which his hard features underwent various contortions;and his young commander waited with no little impatience for what he called his “overhauling.”“She’s neither more nor less than that infernal Epervier, commanded by L’Estrange. She’s one of the fastest sailers in their navy; and as for our creeping past her without being seen, he’s the wrong sort o’ man for that fun: herring or whale, all’s fish for his net!”“I have often heard of him,” said Ethelston: “they say he’s a fine fellow.”“That he is, to give the devil his due, as jolly an old dog as ever lived, and much too good a seaman for a mounseer. Look’ee there, captain,” added he, after another squint through the glass; “he’s altering his course already—two or three points free, and the reefs shaken out o’ the tops’ls. We shall hear from him soon.”“Can we give him the slip by bearing up for the eastern passage?—We should then show him our tail; and a stern chase is a long one.”“We might try if you wish it, captain; but it blows fresh, and she won’t be very fond of this lee shore. I think, if you allow me to advise, we’d better hug it; take the chance of a long shot in rounding that headland, and then run for the inner channel behind the Isle of Pines. He’ll not be after following us there; or, if he does, the frigate’s keel will chance to scrape acquaintance with a reef.”“You are right, Gregson,” said Ethelston. “The Pride may fetch that point on this tack. Keep a close luff, Harrison.”“Luff it is, sir,” was the reply, as Ethelston went below to consult his chart, and to prepare himself for entering the intricate channel between the Isle de Pinos and the main island.The gallant little brig well sustained her high character as a sailer, and dashed her bows fearlessly through the foaming waves, under a press of canvasss such as few vessels of her tonnage could have borne. The breeze was freshening, and the frigate now shaped her course with the evident intention of cutting off the chase from rounding the headland before mentioned.The men on board the brig were now clustered forward, anxiously debating the probable issue; while Cupid steamedaway in his caboose, preparing the dinner as quietly as if there had been no frigate to windward, nor a rock–bound shore to leeward; but though he seemed thus busied in his usual avocations, he cast every now and then his dark eye upon The Epervier; and few on board could estimate better than himself the danger of their situation.Ethelston, having finished a careful examination of his chart, now came on deck, and a single glance sufficed to show him that he could not round the point a–head without coming within range of the frigate’s guns: but the brig had kept her offing, and he had little doubt of her making good her escape, unless she were crippled by a shot from the enemy.The Epervier now hoisted her colours for the brig to heave–to; and that being disregarded, she fired a shot, which fell short of her bows. Finding that no notice was taken of this, L’Estrange ordered his first lieutenant to fire at the saucy brig in good earnest, to bring her to her senses. Fortunately for the latter, there was a short angry sea running, and the distance being considerable, the first shot did not take effect. Several of the hands on board the brig had served in men–of–war; these were now oracles among their messmates, and they looked with some anxiety at their young captain, curious to see how he would behave under fire, for they believed he had never smelt powder: and although strict and firm in his command, he was usually so gentle and quiet in his manner, that they considered him rather a studious than a fighting character. Their curiosity was not, however, much gratified; for Ethelston, without appearing to notice the frigate, kept his eye steadfastly fixed upon the cape a–head; and, after a brief silence, he said, “Gregson, there is a strong current which sets in shore here, The Pride cannot weather that point on this tack.”“You are right, sir,” said the mate; “L’Estrange has got his bristles up, he is nearing us every minute, and if we carry on this course, in another half–hour, both will go ashore.”“Ha!” exclaimed the young captain, the colour rising in his cheek, as a sudden thought flashed across him. “If we could ensure that both would go to pieces among those breakers, it would be a glorious death for the little brig to die!”He spoke these words in an under tone, and rather musing to himself than addressing his officer. The latter, however,overheard them, and looked at him with an astonishment which he could not repress; for he also knew as little as the crew of the determined courage that reposed under the calm and quiet demeanour of his young commander. Again a wreath of smoke issued from the bows of the frigate, and a round shot passed through the rigging of the chase, doing fortunately no material damage, but proving that they were now within easy range.“I fear it will not do, sir,” said the mate, in reply to Ethelston’s last words; “she can pepper away at us, and yet make her offing good.”“Then there remains but one chance for us,” said the captain; “answer her signal, show your colours, ‘bout ship, and stand for the frigate.”The mate was, if possible, more surprised at this order than he had been before at the proposal to try and cast both vessels ashore; but he was too good a seaman to hesitate or to ask any questions; and in a few minutes the gallant little brig had answered the signal, and was standing out towards the frigate on the starboard tack.We will now transport the reader for a few minutes on board The Epervier, and make him acquainted with the captain, into whose clutches the poor little brig seemed destined to fall. L’Estrange was a fine–looking, middle–aged man, who had spent the greater part of his life at sea, and had married, when very young, a Spanish creole, whose beauty was her only dower; he had several children by this marriage, the eldest of whom was now a lieutenant on board his ship; the remainder of the family resided at Point à Pitre, in Guadaloupe, for the captain was in truth rather of the “ancien régime;” he loved his country, but he hated the Directory and other fruits of the French revolution; so that he never went to Europe, and would have been but rarely employed, had he not been known to be one of the most skilful and experienced officers in the French navy. Such was the man who now stood on the frigate’s quarter–deck; and after examining The Pride again through his glass, turned to his first lieutenant and desired him to cease firing. “That obstinate trader,” added he, “seemed very anxious to escape, and thought but little of the risk she ran of going ashore, or of being riddled by our shot!”“She’s one of those saucy Americans,” said the lieutenant, “that think nothing afloat can match ‘em; however, she’s made a mistake this time; and I hope, sir, when she’s overhauled, she’ll prove worth the trouble she’s given.”The frigate, by this time, finding herself too close in on a lee shore, hauled to the wind; and, disliking the broken and rugged appearance of the coast, determined not to lie–to for the brig until she had made sufficient offing. This was precisely the calculation that Ethelston had made; and he now paced his deck with a calm and satisfied countenance; whilst his men, grouped on the forecastle, were quite at a loss to discover his intentions: the mate, however, was clearer sighted, and could not withhold his admiration from the decision and boldness of a manœuvre, the success of which must soon be tested.The captain of the frigate went below to dinner, having given orders to the lieutenant to stand out on the same tack for another half–hour, then to lie–to, until the brig should come alongside.Meantime, Ethelston, who had kept his eye fixed upon the headland so often mentioned, muttering to himself, “she will fetch it now,” desired the man at the helm to yaw the brig about, to throw her up now and then in the wind, so as to fall astern of the frigate as much as possible, yet not apparently varying the course. Having done so as long as he judged it practicable without awakening the enemy’s suspicion, he saw, to his inexpressible delight, the frigate shorten sail to enable him to come up; instantly seizing this advantage, he ordered his mate to put the brig about, and run for the Isle of Pines. It may well be imagined that this bold manœuvre was not many moments unperceived on board the frigate; and L’Estrange’s astonishment was great, when, from the noise overhead, and from the heeling of the ship, he found that her course was being altered. Springing on deck, he saw that he had been outwitted by the saucy brig, which was crowding all sail, and seemed not unlikely to effect her escape. The old captain chafed, and stormed, and swore that the obstinate little trader should pay dearly for her insolence.The Epervier was a fast sailer, and, as she now dashed the spray from her bows under a press of canvass, it was soonevident that the brig could not yet round the point without coming within range of her guns.Ethelston’s mind was now made up; and finding his men cheerful and inspirited by the success of his manœuvre, he yet hoped to bring his vessel into the intricate channel behind the island, where the frigate would not venture to follow: it was not long before she again saluted him; and one of the shot passing through the brig’s bulwarks, close to him, shivered the binnacle into a hundred pieces. Observing symptoms of uneasiness in the man at the helm, and that he swerved from the course, Ethelston gave him a stern reproof, and again desired Harrison to come to the helm. The frigate, which still held the weather–gage, seemed now resolved to cut off the brig from the headland, and to sink her if she attempted to weather it. Ethelston saw his full danger, and was prepared to meet it; had he commanded a vessel of war, however small, he would not have shrunk from the responsibility he was about to incur; but, remembering that his little brig was but a trader, and that the crew ought not to be exposed, without their own consent, to danger so imminent as that before them, he desired Gregson to call them aft, when he addressed them as follows:“My lads,—you see the scrape we are in: if we can round that point, we may yet escape; but to do so, we must run within a few hundred yards of the frigate’s broadside. What say you, my lads, shall we strike, or stand the chance?—a French prison, or hurrah for the Belise?”“Hurrah for the Belise,” shouted the men, animated by their young commander’s words, and by his fearless bearing; so the little brig held on her way.A few minutes proved that he had neither magnified nor underrated the danger: his chart gave him deep water round the headland; and he now ordered Harrison to keep her away, and let her run close in shore, thereby increasing her speed, and the distance from the enemy.The surprise and wrath of L’Estrange, at the impudent daring of a craft which he now perceived to be really nothing but an insignificant trader, are not to be described. He bore up after her, and having desired the men to stand to their guns, generously determined to give the saucy chase one more chance; but finding his repeated signal for her to heave–to,disregarded, he reluctantly gave the order to fire. Fortunately for The Pride, the sea was running high, and naval gunnery had not then reached the perfection which it has since attained; and though her rigging was cut up from stem to stern, and her fore–topmast was shot away, and though she received several shot in her hull, she still answered her helm, and gallantly rounding the point, ran in shore, and was in a few minutes among shoals which, to her light draught, were not dangerous, but where it would have been madness in the frigate to follow.c111CHAPTER XI.ETHELSTON’S FURTHER ADVENTURES AT SEA, AND HOW HE BECAME CAPTOR AND CAPTIVE IN A VERY SHORT SPACE OF TIME.It seemed almost miraculous that not a man on The Pride of the Ohio was killed by the frigate’s broadside; nor was one wounded, excepting Ethelston, who received a slight hurt in the left arm from a splinter; but he paid no attention to it, and calmly gave all the requisite orders for repairing the damaged spars and rigging.As soon as all was made snug, he let the men go below to dinner; and leaning over the shivered bulwarks of his little craft, seemed busily employed in counting the shot that had struck her; but his eyes were for a time fixed upon the water, through which she was cutting her easy way, and his thoughts were afar off, as he whispered almost audibly to himself, “Dear, dear Lucy—your namesake is wounded and disfigured, but she is not disgraced. Thank Heaven, no Frenchman’s foot has yet trodden her deck, and—“Here he was interrupted by Gregson, who having been carefully observing the frigate through his glass, came up to him, and said, “Beg pardon, sir; but she is getting ready her boats, and the breeze is failing fast; in another hour we shall have scarce a cat’s paw.”Ethelston started from his short reverie, and immediately convinced himself that the mate spoke the truth: “You areright,” said he, “but we have a good hour to spare, for the frigate is nearly becalmed. Let the men have their dinner quietly, say nothing to them about the matter, and give ‘em an extra glass of grog; but no drunkenness, Gregson; they may want the full use of their heads and hands to–night; send Cupid to my cabin, and tell him to bring me a slice of cold meat and a glass of Madeira.”So saying, he went below: the mate looked after him, and turning his quid three or four times in his cheek, he muttered, “Damme if he makes any more count of the frigate’s guns or boats than a bear does of a bee–hive! They spoilt as good a commodore as ever stept a deck when they made a trading–skipper of him!” Having vented this characteristic encomium on his young commander, the old seaman went forward to execute his orders.Meanwhile Ethelston, consulting his chart, found that the reefs and shoals, as laid down, rendered the navigation of the coast extremely dangerous, even for the light draught of his brig; having only allowed himself a few minutes for refreshment, he again went on deck, and observing the frigate still becalmed, he ordered the mate to shorten sail, take soundings, and to desire the carpenter to make a report of the leakage, or any other serious injury sustained by the frigate’s shot.During this time L’Estrange was not idle on board The Epervier. Nettled at the successful trick played upon him, he resolved as the breeze gradually died away to capture the chase with his boats: for this duty the launch and the pinnace were assigned: the former had a carronade and twenty–five hands, and was commanded by his son; the latter had a swivel, and thirteen hands, commanded by a junior lieutenant. The object of L’Estrange being to prevent an unnecessary effusion of blood, by sending a force strong enough to render resistance hopeless on the part of what he called a dirty little sugar–boat. The crew of The Pride of Ohio, elated by the success of their captain’s manœuvre, and exhilarated by the extra grog served out, were in high good humour, and laughing over the events of the morning with reckless merriment, when they received an order from Ethelston to come aft. On their obeying the summons, he again addressed them as follows:—“My lads, you have thus far done your duty like men; butour work is not yet over. The Epervier is determined to sink or capture our little craft; she is now getting out her boats for that service: if we resist, we shall have warm work of it; if we strike without a fight, we may rot in a French dungeon. Again I ask you, my lads, will you stick by The Pride, and hurrah for home, or a sailor’s grave?”A hearty and simultaneous cheer from the crew was the only reply.“I knew it, my lads,” continued Ethelston, his countenance, usually so calm, now glowing with enthusiasm; “I knew that you would not desert her while she could float! It is now my duty to tell you that she has received two awkward shots just between wind and water line, and that she leaks apace. We must stop them as well as we may; but be prepared for the boats from The Epervier;—they shall at least buy us a dear bargain!”Ethelston now called the mate, and gave him full instructions for the plan of defence from the expected attack. The long gun and the carronades were got ready and loaded, the former with round shot, the latter with grape; small arms and cutlasses were served out to the men, and the deck cleared of every thing that might impede them in the approaching struggle. Meantime Ethelston ordered to be hoisted a new ensign, given to the brig by Lucy, and said to be partly worked by her own fair fingers. As soon as it was run up, he sent aloft a boy, with orders to nail it to the mast–head, which was done amid the repeated cheers of the crew. They were not long kept in suspense: the breeze had died away; the flapping sails and creaking yards gave the usual sullen indications of a calm, when the boats from The Epervier advanced at a steady and measured stroke towards the brig. Ethelston gave the long gun to the charge of Gregson, reserving to himself that of the carronades; he issued also special orders not to fire, under any circumstances, until he gave the word, or, in case he fell, until they received the order from Gregson, who would succeed him in the command.During all these preparations, Cupid appeared indifferent to what was passing, and continued busily occupied with his pots and pans in the caboose. This conduct caused some little surprise in Ethelston, who knew that the black was not the stupid, phlegmatic character that he now seemed; and he accordinglysent Gregson to inquire whether, in the event of an attack from the frigate’s boats, he meant to fight?—desiring the mate at the same time to offer him a cutlass. The African grinned when he received this message, and replied that he meant to do his best. He declined, however, the proffered cutlass, informing the mate, that he had got a toasting–fork of his own, ready for the mounseers; as he said this, he showed him the fragment of a capstan–bar, the end of which he had sharpened and burnt hard in the hot cinders: it was an unwieldy kind of club, and in the hands of an ordinary man, could have been but of little service; but his gigantic strength enabled him to wield it like a common cudgel. The truth is, that Cupid would have preferred being armed with cutlass and pistol, both of which he could use as well as any man on board; but he had tact enough to know that the prejudice against his colour forbad his taking his place on deck among the other defenders of the vessel.The boats being now within hail, Lieutenant L’Estrange stood up in the launch and ordered the brig to strike her colours and receive him on board. Finding this order unheeded, he repeated it through the trumpet in a sterner tone, adding that, if not immediately obeyed, he should fire upon her. Not a man stirred on board the brig, neither was any reply made to the lieutenant, who forthwith discharged the contents of his carronade into her hull, by which one man was killed dead, and two were wounded by splinters; he then desired his men to pull hard for the brig to board her, while others had orders to fire small arms at all whom they could see above the bulwarks. The boats had approached within fifty yards before Ethelston gave the word to fire. Gregson pointed the long gun upon the smaller boat with so true an aim that the heavy shot went clean through her, and she filled and went down in a few minutes, the survivors of her crew being picked up by the launch. Meanwhile, Ethelston fired a volley of grape into the latter with terrible effect, several being killed on the spot, and many of the remainder severely wounded. Nothing daunted by this murderous fire, the gallant young lieutenant held on his way to the brig, and again discharging his carronade at the distance of only a few yards, her timbers were fearfully rent, and amidst the smoke and confusion thereby created, he and his crew scrambled up her sides to board. Thecombat was now hand to hand; nor was it very unequal, so many of the Frenchmen having been killed and wounded in the boats; they were strong enough, however, to make good their footing on deck, and inch by inch they forced back the crew of the brig. Ethelston fought with the courage of a lion; his voice was heard above the din of the fray, animating his men; and several of the boldest of the enemy had already felt the edge of his cutlass. Nor was young L’Estrange less gallant in his attack; and his followers being more numerous than their opponents, drove them back gradually by main force. It was at this moment that Cupid, who had hitherto remained unnoticed in his caboose, thought fit to commence his operations; which he did by throwing a great pan of greasy boiling water over three or four of the assailants, and then laying about him with his huge club, which felled a man almost at every blow. The excruciating pain occasioned by the hot liquid, together with the consternation produced by this unexpected attack in their rear, completed the dismay of the Frenchmen. At this crisis young L’Estrange slipped and fell on the deck: Gregson, bestriding him, was about to dispatch him; when Ethelston, who was already bleeding from a severe cutlass wound in the forehead, rushed forward to save him; but the infuriated youth, perhaps mistaking his intention, drew his last remaining pistol, and fired with so true an aim, that Ethelston’s left arm fell powerless at his side. A flush of anger came over his countenance; but seeing Gregson again raising his hand to dispatch the young officer, he again interposed, and desired the mate to spare him,—an order which the seaman reluctantly obeyed.Ethelston now entreated L’Estrange to give up his sword, and to save further bloodshed; and the young man, seeing that his followers were mostly overpowered and wounded, presented it with a countenance in which grief and shame were blended with indignation. “Stay,” said Ethelston; “before I receive your sword, the conditions on which I receive it are, that you give your parole, that neither you nor any one of your men shall bear arms against the United States during the continuance of this war, whether you and I are recaptured or not; and the launch becomes my prize.”To these terms the youth assented, and ordered such of his men as were not quite disabled, to lay down their arms. In a fewminutes, all who were unhurt were busily engaged in tending the dying and wounded. Fortunately an assistant–surgeon, who had volunteered on this service from the frigate, was among those unhurt, and he set about his professional duties with as much alacrity as if he had been in the ward of an hospital. Cupid retreated quietly to his caboose, and Ethelston continued giving his orders with the same clearness and decision that had marked his whole conduct. Young L’Estrange looked over the brig’s low sides into the water: his heart was too full for utterance; and his captor, with considerate kindness, abstained from addressing him. The surgeon, observing that the blood still flowed from the wound on Ethelston’s forehead, and that his left arm hung at his side, now came and offered his services. Thanking him courteously, he replied, smiling, “I took my chance of wounds on equal terms with those brave fellows, and I will take my chance of cure on equal terms also; when you have attended to all those who are more seriously hurt, I shall be happy to avail myself of your skill.”The surgeon bowed and withdrew. An audible groan burst from the unhappy L’Estrange; but still he spoke not; and Ethelston held a brief consultation with his mate and the carpenter, the result of which was, an order given to the former, in a low tone of voice, “to prepare immediately, and to send Cupid to him in the cabin.”As he was going down, L’Estrange came to him, and asked him, confusedly, and with an averted countenance, if he might speak to him alone for a minute. Ethelston begged him to follow him into his cabin, when, having shut the door, he said, “Mr. L’Estrange, we are alone, pray speak; is there any thing in which I can serve you?”The youth gazed on him for a moment, in an agony that could not yet find relief in words, and then falling on the floor, burst into a flood of tears. Ethelston was moved and surprised at this violent grief in one whom he had so lately seen under the influence of pride and passion. Taking him kindly by the hand, he said, “Pray compose yourself! these are misfortunes to which all brave men are liable. You did all that a gallant officer could do;—success is at the disposal of a higher power; you will meet it another day.”“Never, never!” said the young lieutenant, vehemently;“the loss of my boat is nothing; the failure of our attack is nothing; but I am a dishonoured coward, and Heaven itself cannot restore a tainted honour!”“Nay, nay,” replied Ethelston; “you must not say so. I maintain that you and your crew fought gallantly till every hope of success was gone—the bravest can do no more!”“You are blindly generous,” said the youth passionately; “youwillnot understand me! When every hope was gone—when I lay at the mercy of your mate’s cutlass—you sprang forward to save my life. I, like a savage—a monster—a coward, as I am,—fired and tried to kill you;—even then, without a word of anger or reproach, you, although wounded by my pistol, again interposed, and saved me from the death I deserved. Oh, would that I had died an hundred deaths rather than have lived to such disgrace!”And again the unhappy young officer buried his face in his hands, while his whole frame still trembled convulsively with grief. Ethelston used every exertion to soothe and allay his agitation. He assured him that the wound he had received was not serious, that the pistol was fired under a strong excitement, and in the turmoil of a bloody fray, when no man’s thoughts are sufficiently collected to regulate his conduct; and he forgave him so freely, and mingled his forgiveness with so many expressions of kindness and esteem, that he succeeded at length in restoring him to a certain degree of composure. Nothing, however, would satisfy L’Estrange but that he should have his wounds instantly dressed; and he ran himself and summoned the surgeon, resolving to be present at the operation.When Ethelston’s clothes were removed, it appeared that, besides a few flesh–cuts, of no great consequence, he had received two severe shot wounds: one from a musket–ball, which had sunk deep into the left shoulder; the other from L’Estrange’s pistol, by which the bone of the left arm was broken. The latter was soon set and bandaged; but the ball could not be extracted from the former, either because the surgeon’s skill was not equal to the task, or from his not having with him the instruments requisite for the operation. As soon as this was over, Ethelston dismissed the surgeon; and turning good–humouredly to L’Estrange he said, “Now, my young friend, I want your assistance. I must lose no time in putting all our men aboard the launch, and taking in as many stores andnecessaries as she will hold, for this brig is doomed; your swivel and the frigate’s guns have finished her; she is fast settling down, and in a couple of hours I expect her to sink.”“On my word, sir,” said L’Estrange, “you will pardon me if I say that you are the strangest gentleman that I ever yet knew to command a trading brig! You out–manœuvre a frigate, capture her boats, fight as if you had done nothing but fight all your life, sit as quiet under that surgeon’s probes and tortures as if you were eating your dinner, and now talk calmly of scuttling your brig, for which you have run all these risks!”“It is my philosophy, Monsieur L’Estrange. I tried first to get away without fighting; when that was impossible, I fought as well as I could. What has happened since, and what is yet to come, I bear as well as I can! All that I ask of you is, to keep your fellows in order, and make them assist mine in removing the wounded and the requisite stores on board the launch.” So saying, and again saluting his prisoner, he went on deck.Though he struggled thus manfully against his emotion, it was with a heavy heart that Ethelston prepared to bid a final adieu to his little vessel, which he loved much for her own sake,—more perhaps for the name she bore. While giving the necessary orders for this melancholy duty, his attention was called by Gregson to a sail that was coming up with the light evening breeze astern. One look through the glass sufficed to show him that she hoisted French colours; and L’Estrange, who now came on deck, immediately knew her to be The Hirondelle,—an armed cutter, that acted on this cruise as a tender to The Epervier. A momentary glow overspread the countenance of Ethelston, as he felt that resistance was hopeless, and that in another hour his brig would be sunk, and his brave crew prisoners. But being too proud to allow the French officer to see his emotion, he controlled it by a powerful effort, and continued to give his orders with his accustomed coolness and precision.Though young L’Estrange’s heart beat high at this sudden and unlooked–for deliverance, he could not forbear his admiration at his captor’s self–possession; and his own joy was damped by the remembrance of that portion of his own conduct which he had so deeply lamented, and also of the parole he hadgiven, not to bear arms again during the war. Meantime the removal of the men, the stores, the provisions, and papers from the brig went on with the greatest order and despatch.Ethelston was the last to leave her: previous to his doing so, he made the carpenter knock out the oakum and other temporary plugs with which he had stopped the leaks, being determined that she should not fall into the hands of the French. This being completed, the launch shoved off; and while pulling heavily for the shore, the crew looked in gloomy silence at their ill–fated brig. Ethelston was almost unmanned; for his heart and his thoughts were on Ohio’s banks, and he could not separate the recollections of Lucy from the untimely fate of her favourite vessel. He gazed until his sight and brain grew dizzy; he fancied that he saw Lucy’s form on the deck of the brig, and that she stretched her arms to him for aid. Even while he thus looked, the waters poured fast into their victim. She settled,—sunk; and in a few minutes scarce a bubble on their surface told where The Pride of Ohio had gone down! A groan burst from Ethelston’s bosom. Nature could no longer endure the accumulated weight of fatigue and intense pain occasioned by his wounds: he sunk down insensible in the boat, and when he recovered his senses, found himself a prisoner on board The Hirondelle.Great had been the surprise of the lieutenant who commanded her at the disappearance of the brig which he had been sent to secure; and greater still at the condition of the persons found on board the launch. His inquiries were answered by young L’Estrange with obvious reluctance: so having paid the last melancholy duties to the dead, and afforded all the assistance in his power to the wounded, he put about the cutter, and made sail for The Epervier.As soon as young L’Estrange found himself on the frigate’s deck, he asked for an immediate and private audience of his father, to whom he detailed without reserve all the circumstances of the late expedition. He concluded his narration with the warmest praises of Ethelston’s courage, conduct, and humanity, while he repeated that bitter censure of his own behaviour which he had before expressed on board The Pride of Ohio. The gallant old captain, though mortified at the failure of the enterprise and the loss of men that he had sustained, could not but appreciate the candour, and feel for themortification of his favourite son; and he readily promised that Ethelston should be treated with the greatest care and kindness, and that the most favourable terms, consistent with his duty, should be offered to the prisoners.Young L’Estrange gave up his own berth to Ethelston, whose severe sufferings had been succeeded by a weakness and lethargy, yet more dangerous. The surgeon was ordered to attend him; and his care was extended to all the wounded, without distinction of country.After a few days, Captain L’Estrange determined to exchange Gregson, the mate, and the remainder of the brig’s crew, for some French prisoners lately taken by an American privateer: they were accordingly placed for that purpose on board the cutter, and sent to New Orleans. Young L’Estrange having learned from the mate the address of Colonel Brandon, and his connection with Ethelston, wrote him a letter, in which he mentioned the latter in the highest and most affectionate terms, assuring the Colonel that he should be treated as if he were his own brother; and that, although the danger arising from his wounds rendered it absolutely necessary that he should return to Guadaloupe with the frigate, his friends might rely upon his being tended with the same care as if he had been at home. Cupid, at his own urgent entreaty, remained with his master, taking charge of all his private baggage and papers.We need not follow the fate of the cutter any further than to say that she reached her destination in safety; that the proposed exchange was effected, and the prisoners restored to their respective homes.The surgeon on board The Epervier succeeded at length in taking out the ball lodged in Ethelston’s shoulder; and when they arrived at Guadaloupe, he pronounced his patient out of danger, but enjoined the strictest quiet and confinement, till his recovery should be further advanced. The ardent young L’Estrange no sooner reached home than he prevailed on his father to receive Ethelston into his own house. He painted to his sister Nina, a girl of seventeen, the sufferings and the heroism of their guest in the most glowing colours; he made her prepare for him the most refreshing and restoring beverages; he watched for hours at the side of his couch; in short, he lavished upon him all those marks of affection with which ahasty and generous nature loves to make reparation for a wrong. In all these attentions and endeavours, he was warmly seconded by Nina, who made her brother repeat more than once the narrative of the defence and subsequent loss of the brig. How Ethelston’s recovery proceeded under the care of the brother and sister shall be told in another chapter.
c109CHAPTER IX.HOW REGINALD BRANDON RETURNED TO MOOSHANNE WITH HIS SISTER, ACCOMPANIED BY WINGENUND; AND WHAT BEFELL THEM ON THE ROAD.Lucy Brandon was not a little surprised at the chief’s sudden departure; and, with the frankness natural to her character, inquired of her brother whether he could explain its cause. Reginald appeared either unable or unwilling to do so; and an appeal to the guide produced only the following unsatisfactory reply:“War–Eagle is like the bird after which he’s called—it ain’t easy to explain or to follow his flight.”Wingenund remained silent, but every now and then he fixed his bright and speaking eyes upon Lucy, as if he would divine her thoughts. That young lady, though at a loss to account for her embarrassment, entertained a fear that all was not right, and proposed to her brother to return to Mooshanne.Snowdrop was soon caught, and the little party moved leisurely homeward, Reginald and the guide leading the way, and Wingenund walking by the side of Lucy’s pony; after riding a few minutes, she recovered her spirits, and remembering that there was no foundation for any surmises of evil, she resumed the conversation with her young companion, which the chief’s departure had interrupted. “Tell me, Wingenund, who is the ‘Black Father,’ of whom you speak?”“He is very good,” said the boy, seriously; “He talks with the Great Spirit; and he tells us all that the Great Spirit has done; how He made the earth, and the water; and how He punishes bad men, and makes good men happy.”“He is a white man, then?” said Lucy.“He is,” replied the lad; “but though he is a white man, he always speaks truth, and does good, and drinks no fire–water, and is never angry.”What a humiliating reflection is it, thought Lucy to herself, that in the mind of this young savage the idea of white men is naturally associated with drunkenness and strife! “Tell me, Wingenund,” she continued, “is the ‘Black Father’ old?”“Many winters have passed over his head, and their snow rests upon his hair.”“Does he live with you always?”“He comes and he goes, like the sunshine and the rain; he is always welcome; and the Lenapé love him.”“Can he speak your tongue well?”“He speaks many tongues, and tries to make peace between the tribes; but he loves the Lenapé, and he teaches ‘the Prairie–bird’ to talk with the Great Spirit.”“Does your sister speak to the Black Father in her own tongue?”“Sometimes, and sometimes in the English; but often in a strange tongue, written on a great book. The Black Father reads it, and the Prairie–bird opens her ears, and looks on his face, and loves his words; and then she tells them all to me. But Wingenund is a child of the Lenapé—he cannot understand these things!”“You will understand them,” said Lucy, kindly, “if you only have patience: you know,” she added, smiling, “your sister understands them, and she is a Lenapé too!”“Yes,” said the boy; “but nobody is like Prairie–bird.”“She must, indeed, be a remarkable person,” said Lucy, humouring her young companion’s fancy; “still, as you have the same father and mother, and the same blood, whatever she learns, you can learn too.”“I have no father or mother,” said Wingenund, sadly, and he added, in a mysterious whisper, drawing near to Lucy, “Prairie–bird never had a father or mother.”“Never had a father or mother!” repeated Lucy, as the painful thought occurred to her, that poor Wingenund was deranged.“Never,” said the boy, in the same tone; “she came fromthere,” pointing, as he spoke, towards the north–west quarter of the heaven.“How melancholy is it,” said Lucy to herself, “to think that this brave, amiable boy should be so afflicted! that so intelligent and quick a mind should be like a lyre with a broken string! Still,” thought she, “I will endeavour to understand his meaning, and to undeceive him.”“Dear Wingenund, you are mistaken—your sister had the same father and mother as yourself; she may have learnt much, and may understand things strange to you, but you might learn them too.”“Wingenund’s father and mother are dead,” said the boy, in a voice of deep and suppressed emotion; “he will not tell youhowthey died, for it makes his heart throb and his eyes burn; but you are good to him, and shall not see his anger. Prairie–bird never had a father; the Great Spirit gave her to the Lenapé.”While Lucy was musing how she should endeavour to dispel this strange delusion, which seemed to have taken such firm hold of her young companion’s mind, Reginald and Baptiste halted, and the latter said, “You see that party approaching; they may put some troublesome questions, leave me to answer them. Wingenund, you know what I mean?”“Wingenund does not understand English,” said the boy, a slight smile of irony lurking in the corner of his mouth.The approaching party consisted of eight or ten men, all armed with rifles, excepting two, who were mounted, and who carried cutlasses and large horse–pistols; among the pedestrians towered the gigantic form of young Mike Smith, who has already been presented to the reader before the store of David Muir in Marietta; and among the horsemen was the younger Hervey, leading his friends to scour the whole country in search of the slayer of his brother: they were all in a high state of excitement; and despite the cool and unmoved demeanour of the guide, he was not without apprehension that they might desire to wreak their vengeance on Wingenund.“Ha! Baptiste,” said Hervey, grasping the guide’s hand;“you are the very man we are in search of; we have already been to the Colonel’s, and he told us we should find you with his son, and with Miss Brandon, in this quarter. We want your assistance, man, and that speedily too.”“How can I serve you?” said the guide; “what is the matter? you seem bent on a hunt.”“A hunt?” exclaimed Hervey, “yes, a hunt of a red–skin devil! Harkee, Baptiste!” and stooping from his horse, he repeated to the guide, in a low voice, but clear enough to be heard by all present, the circumstances attending his brother’s death.“A daring act, indeed,” said the guide musing: “but could not you follow the trail while it was fresh, yesterday?”“We followed it to a creek leading to the Muskingum, and there we lost it.”“Can you describe the appearance of the Indian?” inquired the guide.“A tall, handsome fellow, as straight as a poplar, and with a leap like a painter, so he seemed; but d—n him, he gave me such a knock on the head, that my eyes swam for five minutes.”A cold shudder ran through Lucy’s limbs as, comparing this slight sketch of War–Eagle with his sudden departure and the guide’s caution to Wingenund, she recognised in the chief the object of their search: glancing her eye timidly at Wingenund, she could read on his countenance no traces of uneasiness; he was playing with Snowdrop’s mane; his gun resting on the ground, and he himself apparently unconscious of what was passing.After a minute’s reflection, the guide continued: “You say that the Indian’s rifle was broken in half; did you notice anything about it?”“Nothing: it was a strong coarse piece; we have brought the stock with us; here it is,” he added, calling up one of his party to whom it had been entrusted.The guide took it in his hand, and at the first glance detected the imitation of a feather, roughly but distinctly cut with a knife: his own suspicions were at once confirmed, although his countenance betrayed no change of expression; but Mike Smith, who had been looking over his shoulder, had also observed the marks of the feather, and noticed it immediately aloud, adding, “Come, Baptiste, you know all the Ingianmarks between Alleghany and the Missouri; what red–skin has this belonged to?”“Mike,” said the guide coolly, “a man’s tongue must shoot far and true to hit such a mark as that.”“And yet, Baptiste, if I’d been as long at the guiding and trapping as you, I think I’d a’ know’d something about it.”“Ay, that’s the way of it,” replied Baptiste; “you young ‘uns always think you can shave a hog with a horn spoon! I’spose, Master Mike, you can tell a buzzard from a mockingbird; but if I was to show you a feather, and ask youwhatbuzzard it belonged to, the answer might not be easy to find.”“You’re an old fool,” growled Mike, angrily; and he added, as his eye rested suddenly upon Wingenund, “What cub is that standing by Miss’s white pony? we’ll see if he knows this mark. Come here, you devil’s brat.”Not a muscle in the boy’s face betrayed his consciousness that he was addressed.“Come here, you young red–skin!” shouted Mike yet more angrily, “or I’ll sharpen your movements with the point of my knife.”Reginald’s fiery temper was ill calculated to brook the young backwoods–man’s coarse and violent language: placing himself directly between him and Wingenund, he said to the former in a stern and determined tone, “Master Smith, you forget yourself; that boy is one of my company, and is not to be exposed either to insult or injury.”“Here’s a pretty coil about a young red–skin,” said Mike, trying to conceal his anger under a forced laugh; “how do we know that he ain’t a brother or a son of the Ingian we’re in search of? s’ blood, if we could find out that he was, we’d tar him, and burn him over a slow fire!”“I tell you again,” said Reginald, “that he is guilty of no crime; that he saved my life, yesterday, at the risk of his own; and that, while I live, neither you nor any of your party shall touch a hair of his head.”Baptiste fearing the result of more angry words, and moved by an appealing look from Miss Brandon, now interposed, and laying his hand on Smith’s shoulder, said, “Come, Master Mike, there is no use in threatening the young red–skin, when you see that he does not understand a word that you say:tell me what you wish to inquire of him, and I will ask him in his own tongue.”“His tongue be d——d,” said Mike; “I’ll wager a hat against a gallon of David Muir’s best, that the brat knows English as well as you or I, although he seems to have nothing to do but to count the tassels on the edge of his shirt. I’ll show you, without hurting him,” he added in a lower tone, “that I’m not far wrong.”“You swear not to injure him?” said Reginald, who overheard what passed.“I do,” said Mike; “I only want to show you that he can’t make a fool of Mike Smith.” Here he called up one of the men from the rear; and having whispered something in his ear, he said, in a loud and distinct tone of voice, “Jack, we have found out that this Indian cub belongs to the party, one of whom murdered poor Hervey. Life for life is the law of the backwoods: do you step a little on one side; I will count four, and when I come to the four, split me the young rascal’s head, either with a bullet or with your axe.”“For Heaven’s sake, as you are men,” exclaimed Lucy, in an agony, “spare him!”“Peace, Miss Brandon,” said Mike; “your brother will explain to you that it must be so.”The guide would fain have whispered a word to the boy, but he was too closely watched by Smith, and he was obliged to trust to Wingenund’s nerves and intelligence.“Are you ready, Jack?” said Mike, audibly.“Yes!” and he counted slowly, pausing between each number, “one—two—three!” At the pronunciation of this last word, Wingenund, whose countenance had not betrayed, by the movement of a muscle, or by the expression of a single feature, the slightest interest in what was passing, amused himself by patting the great rough head which Wolf rubbed against his hand as if totally unconscious that the deadly weapon was raised, and that the next word from the hunter’s lips was to be his death warrant.“D—n it, you are right, after all, Baptiste,” said Mike Smith; “the brat certainly does not understand us, or he’d have pricked his ears when I came to number three; so, do you ask him, in his own lingo, if he knows that mark on the rifle–butt, and can tell us to what red–skin tribe it belongs?”The guide now addressed a few words to Wingenund in the Delaware tongue, while Reginald and Lucy interchanged a glance of wonder and admiration at the boy’s sagacity and courage.“He tells me that he has seen this mark before,” said the guide.“Has he?” replied Mike; “ask him whether it is that of a Shawnee or a Wyandot, of an Iroquois or of a Delaware?”After again conferring with Wingenund, the guide muttered to himself, “This youngster won’t tell a lie to keep a bullet from his brain or a halter from his neck; I must act for him.” He added, in a louder tone, “Mike, a word with you: it is not unlikely that the Ingian you’re in search of, is the same who gave the boy that wound, and who tried to kill Master Reginald yesterday: if it is so, he wants no more punishing; he has his allowance already.”“How so?” said Mike.“He is dead, man,—killed on the spot. Do you and Hervey meet me here to–morrow, an hour before noon; I will take you to the place where the body is buried, and you shall judge for yourselves whether it is that of the man you seek.”“It’s a bargain,” said Mike; “we’ll come to the time. Now, lads, forward to Hervey’s clearing. Let’s have a merry supper to–night; and to–morrow, if the guide shows us the carcase of this rascal, why we can’t hurt that much; but we’ll pay off a long score, one day or other, with some of the red–skins. Sorry to have kept you waitin’, Miss; and hope we haven’t scared you,” said the rough fellow, making, as he drew off his party, an awkward attempt at a parting bow to Lucy.“That was a clever turn of Baptiste’s,” said Reginald in a low voice to his sister; “he has made them believe that the cowardly knave who tried to stab me was the perpetrator of the daring outrage which they seek to avenge!”“And was it really War–Eagle?” said Lucy, with a slight shudder,—“he who looks so noble and so gentle,—was it he who did it?”“I believe so,” said Reginald.“But is it not wrong in us to be friends with him, and to aid his escape?”“Indeed,” replied her brother, “it admits of doubt; let usask the guide, he will speak now without reserve;” and accordingly Reginald repeated to Baptiste the question and his sister’s scruples.“Why you see, Miss,” said the wary hunter, “there is no proof that War–Eagle did it; though I confess it was too bold a deed to have been done by that dog of a Wyandot: but I will tell you, Miss,” he added, with increasing energy and vehemence, “ifthe War–Eagle did it, you will yourself, when you know all, confess that he did it nobly, and that he deserves no punishment from man. That elder Hervey was one of the bloodthirsty band by whom the harmless Christian Indians[21]were murdered; and it is believed that it was by Hervey’s own hand that Wingenund’s father fell;ifWar–Eagle revenged this cruel murder, and yet spared the life of the younger brother, when lying helpless at his feet, who shall dare to blame him, or move a foot in his pursuit?”“He speaks the truth, Lucy,” said her brother; “according to the rules by which retaliation is practised by mankind, War–Eagle would have been justified in punishing with death such an act of unprovoked atrocity: but it is a dangerous subject to discuss; you had better forgetallyou have heard about it; and in case of further inquiries being made in your presence, imitate the happy unconsciousness lately displayed by Wingenund.”“Come here, my dear young brother,” he added in a kindly tone, “and tell us,—did you really think that hot–headed chap was going to shoot you when he counted number three?”“No,” said the boy with a scornful smile.“And why not? for he’s a violent and angry man.”“He dared not,” was the reply.“How so?”“He is a fool!” said the boy, in the same scornful tone; “a fool scarcely fit to frighten the fawn of an antelope! If he had touched me or attempted to shoot me, Netis and Grande–Hâche would have killed him immediately.”“You are right, my young brave,” said Reginald, “he dared not hurt you. See, dear Lucy,” he added apart to his sister, “what a ripe judgment, what an heroic spirit, what nerves of iron, are found in the slender frame of this wounded boy, exhausted by fatigue and suffering!”“We will at least give him a hearty supper,” said Lucy, “and an affectionate welcome to our home.”Wingenund thanked her with his dark eyes, and the little party proceeded leisurely, without incident or interruption, to Mooshanne.
c109
HOW REGINALD BRANDON RETURNED TO MOOSHANNE WITH HIS SISTER, ACCOMPANIED BY WINGENUND; AND WHAT BEFELL THEM ON THE ROAD.
Lucy Brandon was not a little surprised at the chief’s sudden departure; and, with the frankness natural to her character, inquired of her brother whether he could explain its cause. Reginald appeared either unable or unwilling to do so; and an appeal to the guide produced only the following unsatisfactory reply:
“War–Eagle is like the bird after which he’s called—it ain’t easy to explain or to follow his flight.”
Wingenund remained silent, but every now and then he fixed his bright and speaking eyes upon Lucy, as if he would divine her thoughts. That young lady, though at a loss to account for her embarrassment, entertained a fear that all was not right, and proposed to her brother to return to Mooshanne.
Snowdrop was soon caught, and the little party moved leisurely homeward, Reginald and the guide leading the way, and Wingenund walking by the side of Lucy’s pony; after riding a few minutes, she recovered her spirits, and remembering that there was no foundation for any surmises of evil, she resumed the conversation with her young companion, which the chief’s departure had interrupted. “Tell me, Wingenund, who is the ‘Black Father,’ of whom you speak?”
“He is very good,” said the boy, seriously; “He talks with the Great Spirit; and he tells us all that the Great Spirit has done; how He made the earth, and the water; and how He punishes bad men, and makes good men happy.”
“He is a white man, then?” said Lucy.
“He is,” replied the lad; “but though he is a white man, he always speaks truth, and does good, and drinks no fire–water, and is never angry.”
What a humiliating reflection is it, thought Lucy to herself, that in the mind of this young savage the idea of white men is naturally associated with drunkenness and strife! “Tell me, Wingenund,” she continued, “is the ‘Black Father’ old?”
“Many winters have passed over his head, and their snow rests upon his hair.”
“Does he live with you always?”
“He comes and he goes, like the sunshine and the rain; he is always welcome; and the Lenapé love him.”
“Can he speak your tongue well?”
“He speaks many tongues, and tries to make peace between the tribes; but he loves the Lenapé, and he teaches ‘the Prairie–bird’ to talk with the Great Spirit.”
“Does your sister speak to the Black Father in her own tongue?”
“Sometimes, and sometimes in the English; but often in a strange tongue, written on a great book. The Black Father reads it, and the Prairie–bird opens her ears, and looks on his face, and loves his words; and then she tells them all to me. But Wingenund is a child of the Lenapé—he cannot understand these things!”
“You will understand them,” said Lucy, kindly, “if you only have patience: you know,” she added, smiling, “your sister understands them, and she is a Lenapé too!”
“Yes,” said the boy; “but nobody is like Prairie–bird.”
“She must, indeed, be a remarkable person,” said Lucy, humouring her young companion’s fancy; “still, as you have the same father and mother, and the same blood, whatever she learns, you can learn too.”
“I have no father or mother,” said Wingenund, sadly, and he added, in a mysterious whisper, drawing near to Lucy, “Prairie–bird never had a father or mother.”
“Never had a father or mother!” repeated Lucy, as the painful thought occurred to her, that poor Wingenund was deranged.
“Never,” said the boy, in the same tone; “she came fromthere,” pointing, as he spoke, towards the north–west quarter of the heaven.
“How melancholy is it,” said Lucy to herself, “to think that this brave, amiable boy should be so afflicted! that so intelligent and quick a mind should be like a lyre with a broken string! Still,” thought she, “I will endeavour to understand his meaning, and to undeceive him.”
“Dear Wingenund, you are mistaken—your sister had the same father and mother as yourself; she may have learnt much, and may understand things strange to you, but you might learn them too.”
“Wingenund’s father and mother are dead,” said the boy, in a voice of deep and suppressed emotion; “he will not tell youhowthey died, for it makes his heart throb and his eyes burn; but you are good to him, and shall not see his anger. Prairie–bird never had a father; the Great Spirit gave her to the Lenapé.”
While Lucy was musing how she should endeavour to dispel this strange delusion, which seemed to have taken such firm hold of her young companion’s mind, Reginald and Baptiste halted, and the latter said, “You see that party approaching; they may put some troublesome questions, leave me to answer them. Wingenund, you know what I mean?”
“Wingenund does not understand English,” said the boy, a slight smile of irony lurking in the corner of his mouth.
The approaching party consisted of eight or ten men, all armed with rifles, excepting two, who were mounted, and who carried cutlasses and large horse–pistols; among the pedestrians towered the gigantic form of young Mike Smith, who has already been presented to the reader before the store of David Muir in Marietta; and among the horsemen was the younger Hervey, leading his friends to scour the whole country in search of the slayer of his brother: they were all in a high state of excitement; and despite the cool and unmoved demeanour of the guide, he was not without apprehension that they might desire to wreak their vengeance on Wingenund.
“Ha! Baptiste,” said Hervey, grasping the guide’s hand;“you are the very man we are in search of; we have already been to the Colonel’s, and he told us we should find you with his son, and with Miss Brandon, in this quarter. We want your assistance, man, and that speedily too.”
“How can I serve you?” said the guide; “what is the matter? you seem bent on a hunt.”
“A hunt?” exclaimed Hervey, “yes, a hunt of a red–skin devil! Harkee, Baptiste!” and stooping from his horse, he repeated to the guide, in a low voice, but clear enough to be heard by all present, the circumstances attending his brother’s death.
“A daring act, indeed,” said the guide musing: “but could not you follow the trail while it was fresh, yesterday?”
“We followed it to a creek leading to the Muskingum, and there we lost it.”
“Can you describe the appearance of the Indian?” inquired the guide.
“A tall, handsome fellow, as straight as a poplar, and with a leap like a painter, so he seemed; but d—n him, he gave me such a knock on the head, that my eyes swam for five minutes.”
A cold shudder ran through Lucy’s limbs as, comparing this slight sketch of War–Eagle with his sudden departure and the guide’s caution to Wingenund, she recognised in the chief the object of their search: glancing her eye timidly at Wingenund, she could read on his countenance no traces of uneasiness; he was playing with Snowdrop’s mane; his gun resting on the ground, and he himself apparently unconscious of what was passing.
After a minute’s reflection, the guide continued: “You say that the Indian’s rifle was broken in half; did you notice anything about it?”
“Nothing: it was a strong coarse piece; we have brought the stock with us; here it is,” he added, calling up one of his party to whom it had been entrusted.
The guide took it in his hand, and at the first glance detected the imitation of a feather, roughly but distinctly cut with a knife: his own suspicions were at once confirmed, although his countenance betrayed no change of expression; but Mike Smith, who had been looking over his shoulder, had also observed the marks of the feather, and noticed it immediately aloud, adding, “Come, Baptiste, you know all the Ingianmarks between Alleghany and the Missouri; what red–skin has this belonged to?”
“Mike,” said the guide coolly, “a man’s tongue must shoot far and true to hit such a mark as that.”
“And yet, Baptiste, if I’d been as long at the guiding and trapping as you, I think I’d a’ know’d something about it.”
“Ay, that’s the way of it,” replied Baptiste; “you young ‘uns always think you can shave a hog with a horn spoon! I’spose, Master Mike, you can tell a buzzard from a mockingbird; but if I was to show you a feather, and ask youwhatbuzzard it belonged to, the answer might not be easy to find.”
“You’re an old fool,” growled Mike, angrily; and he added, as his eye rested suddenly upon Wingenund, “What cub is that standing by Miss’s white pony? we’ll see if he knows this mark. Come here, you devil’s brat.”
Not a muscle in the boy’s face betrayed his consciousness that he was addressed.
“Come here, you young red–skin!” shouted Mike yet more angrily, “or I’ll sharpen your movements with the point of my knife.”
Reginald’s fiery temper was ill calculated to brook the young backwoods–man’s coarse and violent language: placing himself directly between him and Wingenund, he said to the former in a stern and determined tone, “Master Smith, you forget yourself; that boy is one of my company, and is not to be exposed either to insult or injury.”
“Here’s a pretty coil about a young red–skin,” said Mike, trying to conceal his anger under a forced laugh; “how do we know that he ain’t a brother or a son of the Ingian we’re in search of? s’ blood, if we could find out that he was, we’d tar him, and burn him over a slow fire!”
“I tell you again,” said Reginald, “that he is guilty of no crime; that he saved my life, yesterday, at the risk of his own; and that, while I live, neither you nor any of your party shall touch a hair of his head.”
Baptiste fearing the result of more angry words, and moved by an appealing look from Miss Brandon, now interposed, and laying his hand on Smith’s shoulder, said, “Come, Master Mike, there is no use in threatening the young red–skin, when you see that he does not understand a word that you say:tell me what you wish to inquire of him, and I will ask him in his own tongue.”
“His tongue be d——d,” said Mike; “I’ll wager a hat against a gallon of David Muir’s best, that the brat knows English as well as you or I, although he seems to have nothing to do but to count the tassels on the edge of his shirt. I’ll show you, without hurting him,” he added in a lower tone, “that I’m not far wrong.”
“You swear not to injure him?” said Reginald, who overheard what passed.
“I do,” said Mike; “I only want to show you that he can’t make a fool of Mike Smith.” Here he called up one of the men from the rear; and having whispered something in his ear, he said, in a loud and distinct tone of voice, “Jack, we have found out that this Indian cub belongs to the party, one of whom murdered poor Hervey. Life for life is the law of the backwoods: do you step a little on one side; I will count four, and when I come to the four, split me the young rascal’s head, either with a bullet or with your axe.”
“For Heaven’s sake, as you are men,” exclaimed Lucy, in an agony, “spare him!”
“Peace, Miss Brandon,” said Mike; “your brother will explain to you that it must be so.”
The guide would fain have whispered a word to the boy, but he was too closely watched by Smith, and he was obliged to trust to Wingenund’s nerves and intelligence.
“Are you ready, Jack?” said Mike, audibly.
“Yes!” and he counted slowly, pausing between each number, “one—two—three!” At the pronunciation of this last word, Wingenund, whose countenance had not betrayed, by the movement of a muscle, or by the expression of a single feature, the slightest interest in what was passing, amused himself by patting the great rough head which Wolf rubbed against his hand as if totally unconscious that the deadly weapon was raised, and that the next word from the hunter’s lips was to be his death warrant.
“D—n it, you are right, after all, Baptiste,” said Mike Smith; “the brat certainly does not understand us, or he’d have pricked his ears when I came to number three; so, do you ask him, in his own lingo, if he knows that mark on the rifle–butt, and can tell us to what red–skin tribe it belongs?”
The guide now addressed a few words to Wingenund in the Delaware tongue, while Reginald and Lucy interchanged a glance of wonder and admiration at the boy’s sagacity and courage.
“He tells me that he has seen this mark before,” said the guide.
“Has he?” replied Mike; “ask him whether it is that of a Shawnee or a Wyandot, of an Iroquois or of a Delaware?”
After again conferring with Wingenund, the guide muttered to himself, “This youngster won’t tell a lie to keep a bullet from his brain or a halter from his neck; I must act for him.” He added, in a louder tone, “Mike, a word with you: it is not unlikely that the Ingian you’re in search of, is the same who gave the boy that wound, and who tried to kill Master Reginald yesterday: if it is so, he wants no more punishing; he has his allowance already.”
“How so?” said Mike.
“He is dead, man,—killed on the spot. Do you and Hervey meet me here to–morrow, an hour before noon; I will take you to the place where the body is buried, and you shall judge for yourselves whether it is that of the man you seek.”
“It’s a bargain,” said Mike; “we’ll come to the time. Now, lads, forward to Hervey’s clearing. Let’s have a merry supper to–night; and to–morrow, if the guide shows us the carcase of this rascal, why we can’t hurt that much; but we’ll pay off a long score, one day or other, with some of the red–skins. Sorry to have kept you waitin’, Miss; and hope we haven’t scared you,” said the rough fellow, making, as he drew off his party, an awkward attempt at a parting bow to Lucy.
“That was a clever turn of Baptiste’s,” said Reginald in a low voice to his sister; “he has made them believe that the cowardly knave who tried to stab me was the perpetrator of the daring outrage which they seek to avenge!”
“And was it really War–Eagle?” said Lucy, with a slight shudder,—“he who looks so noble and so gentle,—was it he who did it?”
“I believe so,” said Reginald.
“But is it not wrong in us to be friends with him, and to aid his escape?”
“Indeed,” replied her brother, “it admits of doubt; let usask the guide, he will speak now without reserve;” and accordingly Reginald repeated to Baptiste the question and his sister’s scruples.
“Why you see, Miss,” said the wary hunter, “there is no proof that War–Eagle did it; though I confess it was too bold a deed to have been done by that dog of a Wyandot: but I will tell you, Miss,” he added, with increasing energy and vehemence, “ifthe War–Eagle did it, you will yourself, when you know all, confess that he did it nobly, and that he deserves no punishment from man. That elder Hervey was one of the bloodthirsty band by whom the harmless Christian Indians[21]were murdered; and it is believed that it was by Hervey’s own hand that Wingenund’s father fell;ifWar–Eagle revenged this cruel murder, and yet spared the life of the younger brother, when lying helpless at his feet, who shall dare to blame him, or move a foot in his pursuit?”
“He speaks the truth, Lucy,” said her brother; “according to the rules by which retaliation is practised by mankind, War–Eagle would have been justified in punishing with death such an act of unprovoked atrocity: but it is a dangerous subject to discuss; you had better forgetallyou have heard about it; and in case of further inquiries being made in your presence, imitate the happy unconsciousness lately displayed by Wingenund.”
“Come here, my dear young brother,” he added in a kindly tone, “and tell us,—did you really think that hot–headed chap was going to shoot you when he counted number three?”
“No,” said the boy with a scornful smile.
“And why not? for he’s a violent and angry man.”
“He dared not,” was the reply.
“How so?”
“He is a fool!” said the boy, in the same scornful tone; “a fool scarcely fit to frighten the fawn of an antelope! If he had touched me or attempted to shoot me, Netis and Grande–Hâche would have killed him immediately.”
“You are right, my young brave,” said Reginald, “he dared not hurt you. See, dear Lucy,” he added apart to his sister, “what a ripe judgment, what an heroic spirit, what nerves of iron, are found in the slender frame of this wounded boy, exhausted by fatigue and suffering!”
“We will at least give him a hearty supper,” said Lucy, “and an affectionate welcome to our home.”
Wingenund thanked her with his dark eyes, and the little party proceeded leisurely, without incident or interruption, to Mooshanne.
c110CHAPTER X.IN WHICH THE READER IS UNCEREMONIOUSLY TRANSPORTED TO ANOTHER ELEMENT IN COMPANY WITH ETHELSTON; THE LATTER IS LEFT IN A DISAGREEABLE PREDICAMENT.It is time that we should now turn our attention to Ethelston, who is much too important a personage in our narrative to be so long neglected, and respecting whose safety Lucy began to feel the jealous anxiety of love; for The Pride of Ohio had been long expected in Marietta, and several French frigates and corvettes were reported to be cruising among the West Indian Islands, actively engaged in revenging upon American commerce the loss which they had sustained in The Insurgente. We shall soon see that Lucy’s alarm was not altogether groundless, and that her lover’s prolonged absence was not without sufficient cause. About a month preceding the occurrences detailed in the last chapter, Ethelston, having landed his merchandise in safety at Port Royal, and having taken on board a small cargo of sugar and coffee, prepared to return to New Orleans. He had heard of the French men–of–war cruising in the neighbourhood, and prudently resolved to risk as little as possible on this trip: he took therefore securities for a great portion of the amount due to him, which he left in the charge of the vessel’s consignees, and conveyed on board only a sufficient cargo to put The Pride of Ohio in perfect sailing trim, and to give her a fair chance of escape in case she were chased by an enemy. His little brig was well rigged and manned, and he felt confident that few, if any, of the French cruisers would match her for speed. His mate, or sailing–master, was Gregson, a hardy weather–beaten old sailor, who had served on board of every kind of craft, from a man–of–war to a fishing–cobble,and knew every headland, reef, and current in that dangerous sea, as well as a Liverpool pilot knows the banks and shoals in the mouth of the Mersey. The Pride of Ohio mounted three guns; two eighteen–pound carronades, and one long nine–pounder: ten stout fellows and a black cook completed her complement: the last–mentioned person deserves special notice, as he was a character strangely formed by the alternations of fortune which he had seen. A native of the interior of western Africa, he had in early life been chosen, on account of his extraordinary strength and courage, a chief of the Lucumi tribe, to which he belonged; but having been unfortunately made a prisoner, he was taken down to the coast and sold to a slaver: thence he had been conveyed to some of the Spanish Islands, and afterwards to Virginia, where he had come into possession of Colonel Brandon, who finding him possessed of many good qualities, and of a sagacity very rare among his countrymen, had offered him his liberty when he moved to Ohio; but Cupid (for so was the negro called) had grown so much attached to his master, that he begged to be allowed to remain in his service, and, from one employment to another, had now become cook and steward on board The Pride of Ohio. In frame he was Herculean; and though he rarely exerted his strength, he had shown on various occasions that it was nearly if not quite equal to that of any other two men in the vessel. He spoke but little, and was sullen and reserved in his manners; but as he never disobeyed orders, and never was guilty of aggression or violence, Cupid was, upon the whole, a favourite with the crew.To Ethelston he was invaluable; for he was always at his post, was scrupulously honest with respect to money or stores placed under his charge, and on more than one occasion his shrewdness and readiness had surprised his young commander. The captain (for so was Ethelston called on board) always treated Cupid kindly, and never allowed him to be made the subject of those jeers and insults to which free negroes in the States are usually exposed. On this account the cook, who never forgot that hehadbeen a warrior, entertained towards him the warmest feelings of attachment and gratitude.How or where he had obtained the name he bore, none seemed to know; and Ethelston remembered having heard that when first he came into Colonel Brandon’s possession, and wasasked his name, he had sullenly replied, “The name I once had is at home: a slave has neither name nor home!” A terrible gash across his forehead and left cheek (received, probably, in the war when he was captured,) had disfigured a countenance that had been originally expressive of haughtiness and determination, and had, perhaps, led the slave–dealer to bestow upon him in irony the name by which he was now called.The Pride of Ohio had made good two days of her homeward passage, when, in endeavouring to round a point on the southern coast of Cuba, Ethelston descried a ship some miles to windward, and a–head, which a careful examination through his glass convinced him was a French frigate. His mate being below at the time, he sent for him on deck, anxious to see whether the experienced sailor’s observation would confirm his opinion. As soon as he appeared, handing him the glass, he said, “Gregson, see what you make of that fellow on our larboard bow.”“Make of her!” said the mate; “the devil take him that made her, and him that brought her athwart us, say I, captain! She’s a Frenchman; and though we can’t well see her hull yet, I doubt it won’t be long before we see her row of teeth.”“I thought so myself,” said Ethelston. “We must hold our course steady; and if we can round the point, we may then bear away, and show her a pair of heels. Turn the hands up, Gregson; trim the sails, and stand by for a run. Put Harrison at the helm; he can keep her a point nearer than that youngster.”“Ay, ay, sir!” was the reply; and having executed the order, he returned to Ethelston, who was still sweeping the southern horizon with his glass, and examining the strange ship, whose hull was now distinctly visible.The young man’s countenance wore a grave expression, as, returning the glass to his mate, he said, “Gregson, it is, as we supposed, a French frigate. We may, perhaps, creep along under the shore without his noticing our small craft.”The old seaman riveted the glass upon the stranger, as if he wished to count every sail and plank. During the examination, he grunted two or three inarticulate ejaculations, in unison with which his hard features underwent various contortions;and his young commander waited with no little impatience for what he called his “overhauling.”“She’s neither more nor less than that infernal Epervier, commanded by L’Estrange. She’s one of the fastest sailers in their navy; and as for our creeping past her without being seen, he’s the wrong sort o’ man for that fun: herring or whale, all’s fish for his net!”“I have often heard of him,” said Ethelston: “they say he’s a fine fellow.”“That he is, to give the devil his due, as jolly an old dog as ever lived, and much too good a seaman for a mounseer. Look’ee there, captain,” added he, after another squint through the glass; “he’s altering his course already—two or three points free, and the reefs shaken out o’ the tops’ls. We shall hear from him soon.”“Can we give him the slip by bearing up for the eastern passage?—We should then show him our tail; and a stern chase is a long one.”“We might try if you wish it, captain; but it blows fresh, and she won’t be very fond of this lee shore. I think, if you allow me to advise, we’d better hug it; take the chance of a long shot in rounding that headland, and then run for the inner channel behind the Isle of Pines. He’ll not be after following us there; or, if he does, the frigate’s keel will chance to scrape acquaintance with a reef.”“You are right, Gregson,” said Ethelston. “The Pride may fetch that point on this tack. Keep a close luff, Harrison.”“Luff it is, sir,” was the reply, as Ethelston went below to consult his chart, and to prepare himself for entering the intricate channel between the Isle de Pinos and the main island.The gallant little brig well sustained her high character as a sailer, and dashed her bows fearlessly through the foaming waves, under a press of canvasss such as few vessels of her tonnage could have borne. The breeze was freshening, and the frigate now shaped her course with the evident intention of cutting off the chase from rounding the headland before mentioned.The men on board the brig were now clustered forward, anxiously debating the probable issue; while Cupid steamedaway in his caboose, preparing the dinner as quietly as if there had been no frigate to windward, nor a rock–bound shore to leeward; but though he seemed thus busied in his usual avocations, he cast every now and then his dark eye upon The Epervier; and few on board could estimate better than himself the danger of their situation.Ethelston, having finished a careful examination of his chart, now came on deck, and a single glance sufficed to show him that he could not round the point a–head without coming within range of the frigate’s guns: but the brig had kept her offing, and he had little doubt of her making good her escape, unless she were crippled by a shot from the enemy.The Epervier now hoisted her colours for the brig to heave–to; and that being disregarded, she fired a shot, which fell short of her bows. Finding that no notice was taken of this, L’Estrange ordered his first lieutenant to fire at the saucy brig in good earnest, to bring her to her senses. Fortunately for the latter, there was a short angry sea running, and the distance being considerable, the first shot did not take effect. Several of the hands on board the brig had served in men–of–war; these were now oracles among their messmates, and they looked with some anxiety at their young captain, curious to see how he would behave under fire, for they believed he had never smelt powder: and although strict and firm in his command, he was usually so gentle and quiet in his manner, that they considered him rather a studious than a fighting character. Their curiosity was not, however, much gratified; for Ethelston, without appearing to notice the frigate, kept his eye steadfastly fixed upon the cape a–head; and, after a brief silence, he said, “Gregson, there is a strong current which sets in shore here, The Pride cannot weather that point on this tack.”“You are right, sir,” said the mate; “L’Estrange has got his bristles up, he is nearing us every minute, and if we carry on this course, in another half–hour, both will go ashore.”“Ha!” exclaimed the young captain, the colour rising in his cheek, as a sudden thought flashed across him. “If we could ensure that both would go to pieces among those breakers, it would be a glorious death for the little brig to die!”He spoke these words in an under tone, and rather musing to himself than addressing his officer. The latter, however,overheard them, and looked at him with an astonishment which he could not repress; for he also knew as little as the crew of the determined courage that reposed under the calm and quiet demeanour of his young commander. Again a wreath of smoke issued from the bows of the frigate, and a round shot passed through the rigging of the chase, doing fortunately no material damage, but proving that they were now within easy range.“I fear it will not do, sir,” said the mate, in reply to Ethelston’s last words; “she can pepper away at us, and yet make her offing good.”“Then there remains but one chance for us,” said the captain; “answer her signal, show your colours, ‘bout ship, and stand for the frigate.”The mate was, if possible, more surprised at this order than he had been before at the proposal to try and cast both vessels ashore; but he was too good a seaman to hesitate or to ask any questions; and in a few minutes the gallant little brig had answered the signal, and was standing out towards the frigate on the starboard tack.We will now transport the reader for a few minutes on board The Epervier, and make him acquainted with the captain, into whose clutches the poor little brig seemed destined to fall. L’Estrange was a fine–looking, middle–aged man, who had spent the greater part of his life at sea, and had married, when very young, a Spanish creole, whose beauty was her only dower; he had several children by this marriage, the eldest of whom was now a lieutenant on board his ship; the remainder of the family resided at Point à Pitre, in Guadaloupe, for the captain was in truth rather of the “ancien régime;” he loved his country, but he hated the Directory and other fruits of the French revolution; so that he never went to Europe, and would have been but rarely employed, had he not been known to be one of the most skilful and experienced officers in the French navy. Such was the man who now stood on the frigate’s quarter–deck; and after examining The Pride again through his glass, turned to his first lieutenant and desired him to cease firing. “That obstinate trader,” added he, “seemed very anxious to escape, and thought but little of the risk she ran of going ashore, or of being riddled by our shot!”“She’s one of those saucy Americans,” said the lieutenant, “that think nothing afloat can match ‘em; however, she’s made a mistake this time; and I hope, sir, when she’s overhauled, she’ll prove worth the trouble she’s given.”The frigate, by this time, finding herself too close in on a lee shore, hauled to the wind; and, disliking the broken and rugged appearance of the coast, determined not to lie–to for the brig until she had made sufficient offing. This was precisely the calculation that Ethelston had made; and he now paced his deck with a calm and satisfied countenance; whilst his men, grouped on the forecastle, were quite at a loss to discover his intentions: the mate, however, was clearer sighted, and could not withhold his admiration from the decision and boldness of a manœuvre, the success of which must soon be tested.The captain of the frigate went below to dinner, having given orders to the lieutenant to stand out on the same tack for another half–hour, then to lie–to, until the brig should come alongside.Meantime, Ethelston, who had kept his eye fixed upon the headland so often mentioned, muttering to himself, “she will fetch it now,” desired the man at the helm to yaw the brig about, to throw her up now and then in the wind, so as to fall astern of the frigate as much as possible, yet not apparently varying the course. Having done so as long as he judged it practicable without awakening the enemy’s suspicion, he saw, to his inexpressible delight, the frigate shorten sail to enable him to come up; instantly seizing this advantage, he ordered his mate to put the brig about, and run for the Isle of Pines. It may well be imagined that this bold manœuvre was not many moments unperceived on board the frigate; and L’Estrange’s astonishment was great, when, from the noise overhead, and from the heeling of the ship, he found that her course was being altered. Springing on deck, he saw that he had been outwitted by the saucy brig, which was crowding all sail, and seemed not unlikely to effect her escape. The old captain chafed, and stormed, and swore that the obstinate little trader should pay dearly for her insolence.The Epervier was a fast sailer, and, as she now dashed the spray from her bows under a press of canvass, it was soonevident that the brig could not yet round the point without coming within range of her guns.Ethelston’s mind was now made up; and finding his men cheerful and inspirited by the success of his manœuvre, he yet hoped to bring his vessel into the intricate channel behind the island, where the frigate would not venture to follow: it was not long before she again saluted him; and one of the shot passing through the brig’s bulwarks, close to him, shivered the binnacle into a hundred pieces. Observing symptoms of uneasiness in the man at the helm, and that he swerved from the course, Ethelston gave him a stern reproof, and again desired Harrison to come to the helm. The frigate, which still held the weather–gage, seemed now resolved to cut off the brig from the headland, and to sink her if she attempted to weather it. Ethelston saw his full danger, and was prepared to meet it; had he commanded a vessel of war, however small, he would not have shrunk from the responsibility he was about to incur; but, remembering that his little brig was but a trader, and that the crew ought not to be exposed, without their own consent, to danger so imminent as that before them, he desired Gregson to call them aft, when he addressed them as follows:“My lads,—you see the scrape we are in: if we can round that point, we may yet escape; but to do so, we must run within a few hundred yards of the frigate’s broadside. What say you, my lads, shall we strike, or stand the chance?—a French prison, or hurrah for the Belise?”“Hurrah for the Belise,” shouted the men, animated by their young commander’s words, and by his fearless bearing; so the little brig held on her way.A few minutes proved that he had neither magnified nor underrated the danger: his chart gave him deep water round the headland; and he now ordered Harrison to keep her away, and let her run close in shore, thereby increasing her speed, and the distance from the enemy.The surprise and wrath of L’Estrange, at the impudent daring of a craft which he now perceived to be really nothing but an insignificant trader, are not to be described. He bore up after her, and having desired the men to stand to their guns, generously determined to give the saucy chase one more chance; but finding his repeated signal for her to heave–to,disregarded, he reluctantly gave the order to fire. Fortunately for The Pride, the sea was running high, and naval gunnery had not then reached the perfection which it has since attained; and though her rigging was cut up from stem to stern, and her fore–topmast was shot away, and though she received several shot in her hull, she still answered her helm, and gallantly rounding the point, ran in shore, and was in a few minutes among shoals which, to her light draught, were not dangerous, but where it would have been madness in the frigate to follow.
c110
IN WHICH THE READER IS UNCEREMONIOUSLY TRANSPORTED TO ANOTHER ELEMENT IN COMPANY WITH ETHELSTON; THE LATTER IS LEFT IN A DISAGREEABLE PREDICAMENT.
It is time that we should now turn our attention to Ethelston, who is much too important a personage in our narrative to be so long neglected, and respecting whose safety Lucy began to feel the jealous anxiety of love; for The Pride of Ohio had been long expected in Marietta, and several French frigates and corvettes were reported to be cruising among the West Indian Islands, actively engaged in revenging upon American commerce the loss which they had sustained in The Insurgente. We shall soon see that Lucy’s alarm was not altogether groundless, and that her lover’s prolonged absence was not without sufficient cause. About a month preceding the occurrences detailed in the last chapter, Ethelston, having landed his merchandise in safety at Port Royal, and having taken on board a small cargo of sugar and coffee, prepared to return to New Orleans. He had heard of the French men–of–war cruising in the neighbourhood, and prudently resolved to risk as little as possible on this trip: he took therefore securities for a great portion of the amount due to him, which he left in the charge of the vessel’s consignees, and conveyed on board only a sufficient cargo to put The Pride of Ohio in perfect sailing trim, and to give her a fair chance of escape in case she were chased by an enemy. His little brig was well rigged and manned, and he felt confident that few, if any, of the French cruisers would match her for speed. His mate, or sailing–master, was Gregson, a hardy weather–beaten old sailor, who had served on board of every kind of craft, from a man–of–war to a fishing–cobble,and knew every headland, reef, and current in that dangerous sea, as well as a Liverpool pilot knows the banks and shoals in the mouth of the Mersey. The Pride of Ohio mounted three guns; two eighteen–pound carronades, and one long nine–pounder: ten stout fellows and a black cook completed her complement: the last–mentioned person deserves special notice, as he was a character strangely formed by the alternations of fortune which he had seen. A native of the interior of western Africa, he had in early life been chosen, on account of his extraordinary strength and courage, a chief of the Lucumi tribe, to which he belonged; but having been unfortunately made a prisoner, he was taken down to the coast and sold to a slaver: thence he had been conveyed to some of the Spanish Islands, and afterwards to Virginia, where he had come into possession of Colonel Brandon, who finding him possessed of many good qualities, and of a sagacity very rare among his countrymen, had offered him his liberty when he moved to Ohio; but Cupid (for so was the negro called) had grown so much attached to his master, that he begged to be allowed to remain in his service, and, from one employment to another, had now become cook and steward on board The Pride of Ohio. In frame he was Herculean; and though he rarely exerted his strength, he had shown on various occasions that it was nearly if not quite equal to that of any other two men in the vessel. He spoke but little, and was sullen and reserved in his manners; but as he never disobeyed orders, and never was guilty of aggression or violence, Cupid was, upon the whole, a favourite with the crew.
To Ethelston he was invaluable; for he was always at his post, was scrupulously honest with respect to money or stores placed under his charge, and on more than one occasion his shrewdness and readiness had surprised his young commander. The captain (for so was Ethelston called on board) always treated Cupid kindly, and never allowed him to be made the subject of those jeers and insults to which free negroes in the States are usually exposed. On this account the cook, who never forgot that hehadbeen a warrior, entertained towards him the warmest feelings of attachment and gratitude.
How or where he had obtained the name he bore, none seemed to know; and Ethelston remembered having heard that when first he came into Colonel Brandon’s possession, and wasasked his name, he had sullenly replied, “The name I once had is at home: a slave has neither name nor home!” A terrible gash across his forehead and left cheek (received, probably, in the war when he was captured,) had disfigured a countenance that had been originally expressive of haughtiness and determination, and had, perhaps, led the slave–dealer to bestow upon him in irony the name by which he was now called.
The Pride of Ohio had made good two days of her homeward passage, when, in endeavouring to round a point on the southern coast of Cuba, Ethelston descried a ship some miles to windward, and a–head, which a careful examination through his glass convinced him was a French frigate. His mate being below at the time, he sent for him on deck, anxious to see whether the experienced sailor’s observation would confirm his opinion. As soon as he appeared, handing him the glass, he said, “Gregson, see what you make of that fellow on our larboard bow.”
“Make of her!” said the mate; “the devil take him that made her, and him that brought her athwart us, say I, captain! She’s a Frenchman; and though we can’t well see her hull yet, I doubt it won’t be long before we see her row of teeth.”
“I thought so myself,” said Ethelston. “We must hold our course steady; and if we can round the point, we may then bear away, and show her a pair of heels. Turn the hands up, Gregson; trim the sails, and stand by for a run. Put Harrison at the helm; he can keep her a point nearer than that youngster.”
“Ay, ay, sir!” was the reply; and having executed the order, he returned to Ethelston, who was still sweeping the southern horizon with his glass, and examining the strange ship, whose hull was now distinctly visible.
The young man’s countenance wore a grave expression, as, returning the glass to his mate, he said, “Gregson, it is, as we supposed, a French frigate. We may, perhaps, creep along under the shore without his noticing our small craft.”
The old seaman riveted the glass upon the stranger, as if he wished to count every sail and plank. During the examination, he grunted two or three inarticulate ejaculations, in unison with which his hard features underwent various contortions;and his young commander waited with no little impatience for what he called his “overhauling.”
“She’s neither more nor less than that infernal Epervier, commanded by L’Estrange. She’s one of the fastest sailers in their navy; and as for our creeping past her without being seen, he’s the wrong sort o’ man for that fun: herring or whale, all’s fish for his net!”
“I have often heard of him,” said Ethelston: “they say he’s a fine fellow.”
“That he is, to give the devil his due, as jolly an old dog as ever lived, and much too good a seaman for a mounseer. Look’ee there, captain,” added he, after another squint through the glass; “he’s altering his course already—two or three points free, and the reefs shaken out o’ the tops’ls. We shall hear from him soon.”
“Can we give him the slip by bearing up for the eastern passage?—We should then show him our tail; and a stern chase is a long one.”
“We might try if you wish it, captain; but it blows fresh, and she won’t be very fond of this lee shore. I think, if you allow me to advise, we’d better hug it; take the chance of a long shot in rounding that headland, and then run for the inner channel behind the Isle of Pines. He’ll not be after following us there; or, if he does, the frigate’s keel will chance to scrape acquaintance with a reef.”
“You are right, Gregson,” said Ethelston. “The Pride may fetch that point on this tack. Keep a close luff, Harrison.”
“Luff it is, sir,” was the reply, as Ethelston went below to consult his chart, and to prepare himself for entering the intricate channel between the Isle de Pinos and the main island.
The gallant little brig well sustained her high character as a sailer, and dashed her bows fearlessly through the foaming waves, under a press of canvasss such as few vessels of her tonnage could have borne. The breeze was freshening, and the frigate now shaped her course with the evident intention of cutting off the chase from rounding the headland before mentioned.
The men on board the brig were now clustered forward, anxiously debating the probable issue; while Cupid steamedaway in his caboose, preparing the dinner as quietly as if there had been no frigate to windward, nor a rock–bound shore to leeward; but though he seemed thus busied in his usual avocations, he cast every now and then his dark eye upon The Epervier; and few on board could estimate better than himself the danger of their situation.
Ethelston, having finished a careful examination of his chart, now came on deck, and a single glance sufficed to show him that he could not round the point a–head without coming within range of the frigate’s guns: but the brig had kept her offing, and he had little doubt of her making good her escape, unless she were crippled by a shot from the enemy.
The Epervier now hoisted her colours for the brig to heave–to; and that being disregarded, she fired a shot, which fell short of her bows. Finding that no notice was taken of this, L’Estrange ordered his first lieutenant to fire at the saucy brig in good earnest, to bring her to her senses. Fortunately for the latter, there was a short angry sea running, and the distance being considerable, the first shot did not take effect. Several of the hands on board the brig had served in men–of–war; these were now oracles among their messmates, and they looked with some anxiety at their young captain, curious to see how he would behave under fire, for they believed he had never smelt powder: and although strict and firm in his command, he was usually so gentle and quiet in his manner, that they considered him rather a studious than a fighting character. Their curiosity was not, however, much gratified; for Ethelston, without appearing to notice the frigate, kept his eye steadfastly fixed upon the cape a–head; and, after a brief silence, he said, “Gregson, there is a strong current which sets in shore here, The Pride cannot weather that point on this tack.”
“You are right, sir,” said the mate; “L’Estrange has got his bristles up, he is nearing us every minute, and if we carry on this course, in another half–hour, both will go ashore.”
“Ha!” exclaimed the young captain, the colour rising in his cheek, as a sudden thought flashed across him. “If we could ensure that both would go to pieces among those breakers, it would be a glorious death for the little brig to die!”
He spoke these words in an under tone, and rather musing to himself than addressing his officer. The latter, however,overheard them, and looked at him with an astonishment which he could not repress; for he also knew as little as the crew of the determined courage that reposed under the calm and quiet demeanour of his young commander. Again a wreath of smoke issued from the bows of the frigate, and a round shot passed through the rigging of the chase, doing fortunately no material damage, but proving that they were now within easy range.
“I fear it will not do, sir,” said the mate, in reply to Ethelston’s last words; “she can pepper away at us, and yet make her offing good.”
“Then there remains but one chance for us,” said the captain; “answer her signal, show your colours, ‘bout ship, and stand for the frigate.”
The mate was, if possible, more surprised at this order than he had been before at the proposal to try and cast both vessels ashore; but he was too good a seaman to hesitate or to ask any questions; and in a few minutes the gallant little brig had answered the signal, and was standing out towards the frigate on the starboard tack.
We will now transport the reader for a few minutes on board The Epervier, and make him acquainted with the captain, into whose clutches the poor little brig seemed destined to fall. L’Estrange was a fine–looking, middle–aged man, who had spent the greater part of his life at sea, and had married, when very young, a Spanish creole, whose beauty was her only dower; he had several children by this marriage, the eldest of whom was now a lieutenant on board his ship; the remainder of the family resided at Point à Pitre, in Guadaloupe, for the captain was in truth rather of the “ancien régime;” he loved his country, but he hated the Directory and other fruits of the French revolution; so that he never went to Europe, and would have been but rarely employed, had he not been known to be one of the most skilful and experienced officers in the French navy. Such was the man who now stood on the frigate’s quarter–deck; and after examining The Pride again through his glass, turned to his first lieutenant and desired him to cease firing. “That obstinate trader,” added he, “seemed very anxious to escape, and thought but little of the risk she ran of going ashore, or of being riddled by our shot!”
“She’s one of those saucy Americans,” said the lieutenant, “that think nothing afloat can match ‘em; however, she’s made a mistake this time; and I hope, sir, when she’s overhauled, she’ll prove worth the trouble she’s given.”
The frigate, by this time, finding herself too close in on a lee shore, hauled to the wind; and, disliking the broken and rugged appearance of the coast, determined not to lie–to for the brig until she had made sufficient offing. This was precisely the calculation that Ethelston had made; and he now paced his deck with a calm and satisfied countenance; whilst his men, grouped on the forecastle, were quite at a loss to discover his intentions: the mate, however, was clearer sighted, and could not withhold his admiration from the decision and boldness of a manœuvre, the success of which must soon be tested.
The captain of the frigate went below to dinner, having given orders to the lieutenant to stand out on the same tack for another half–hour, then to lie–to, until the brig should come alongside.
Meantime, Ethelston, who had kept his eye fixed upon the headland so often mentioned, muttering to himself, “she will fetch it now,” desired the man at the helm to yaw the brig about, to throw her up now and then in the wind, so as to fall astern of the frigate as much as possible, yet not apparently varying the course. Having done so as long as he judged it practicable without awakening the enemy’s suspicion, he saw, to his inexpressible delight, the frigate shorten sail to enable him to come up; instantly seizing this advantage, he ordered his mate to put the brig about, and run for the Isle of Pines. It may well be imagined that this bold manœuvre was not many moments unperceived on board the frigate; and L’Estrange’s astonishment was great, when, from the noise overhead, and from the heeling of the ship, he found that her course was being altered. Springing on deck, he saw that he had been outwitted by the saucy brig, which was crowding all sail, and seemed not unlikely to effect her escape. The old captain chafed, and stormed, and swore that the obstinate little trader should pay dearly for her insolence.
The Epervier was a fast sailer, and, as she now dashed the spray from her bows under a press of canvass, it was soonevident that the brig could not yet round the point without coming within range of her guns.
Ethelston’s mind was now made up; and finding his men cheerful and inspirited by the success of his manœuvre, he yet hoped to bring his vessel into the intricate channel behind the island, where the frigate would not venture to follow: it was not long before she again saluted him; and one of the shot passing through the brig’s bulwarks, close to him, shivered the binnacle into a hundred pieces. Observing symptoms of uneasiness in the man at the helm, and that he swerved from the course, Ethelston gave him a stern reproof, and again desired Harrison to come to the helm. The frigate, which still held the weather–gage, seemed now resolved to cut off the brig from the headland, and to sink her if she attempted to weather it. Ethelston saw his full danger, and was prepared to meet it; had he commanded a vessel of war, however small, he would not have shrunk from the responsibility he was about to incur; but, remembering that his little brig was but a trader, and that the crew ought not to be exposed, without their own consent, to danger so imminent as that before them, he desired Gregson to call them aft, when he addressed them as follows:
“My lads,—you see the scrape we are in: if we can round that point, we may yet escape; but to do so, we must run within a few hundred yards of the frigate’s broadside. What say you, my lads, shall we strike, or stand the chance?—a French prison, or hurrah for the Belise?”
“Hurrah for the Belise,” shouted the men, animated by their young commander’s words, and by his fearless bearing; so the little brig held on her way.
A few minutes proved that he had neither magnified nor underrated the danger: his chart gave him deep water round the headland; and he now ordered Harrison to keep her away, and let her run close in shore, thereby increasing her speed, and the distance from the enemy.
The surprise and wrath of L’Estrange, at the impudent daring of a craft which he now perceived to be really nothing but an insignificant trader, are not to be described. He bore up after her, and having desired the men to stand to their guns, generously determined to give the saucy chase one more chance; but finding his repeated signal for her to heave–to,disregarded, he reluctantly gave the order to fire. Fortunately for The Pride, the sea was running high, and naval gunnery had not then reached the perfection which it has since attained; and though her rigging was cut up from stem to stern, and her fore–topmast was shot away, and though she received several shot in her hull, she still answered her helm, and gallantly rounding the point, ran in shore, and was in a few minutes among shoals which, to her light draught, were not dangerous, but where it would have been madness in the frigate to follow.
c111CHAPTER XI.ETHELSTON’S FURTHER ADVENTURES AT SEA, AND HOW HE BECAME CAPTOR AND CAPTIVE IN A VERY SHORT SPACE OF TIME.It seemed almost miraculous that not a man on The Pride of the Ohio was killed by the frigate’s broadside; nor was one wounded, excepting Ethelston, who received a slight hurt in the left arm from a splinter; but he paid no attention to it, and calmly gave all the requisite orders for repairing the damaged spars and rigging.As soon as all was made snug, he let the men go below to dinner; and leaning over the shivered bulwarks of his little craft, seemed busily employed in counting the shot that had struck her; but his eyes were for a time fixed upon the water, through which she was cutting her easy way, and his thoughts were afar off, as he whispered almost audibly to himself, “Dear, dear Lucy—your namesake is wounded and disfigured, but she is not disgraced. Thank Heaven, no Frenchman’s foot has yet trodden her deck, and—“Here he was interrupted by Gregson, who having been carefully observing the frigate through his glass, came up to him, and said, “Beg pardon, sir; but she is getting ready her boats, and the breeze is failing fast; in another hour we shall have scarce a cat’s paw.”Ethelston started from his short reverie, and immediately convinced himself that the mate spoke the truth: “You areright,” said he, “but we have a good hour to spare, for the frigate is nearly becalmed. Let the men have their dinner quietly, say nothing to them about the matter, and give ‘em an extra glass of grog; but no drunkenness, Gregson; they may want the full use of their heads and hands to–night; send Cupid to my cabin, and tell him to bring me a slice of cold meat and a glass of Madeira.”So saying, he went below: the mate looked after him, and turning his quid three or four times in his cheek, he muttered, “Damme if he makes any more count of the frigate’s guns or boats than a bear does of a bee–hive! They spoilt as good a commodore as ever stept a deck when they made a trading–skipper of him!” Having vented this characteristic encomium on his young commander, the old seaman went forward to execute his orders.Meanwhile Ethelston, consulting his chart, found that the reefs and shoals, as laid down, rendered the navigation of the coast extremely dangerous, even for the light draught of his brig; having only allowed himself a few minutes for refreshment, he again went on deck, and observing the frigate still becalmed, he ordered the mate to shorten sail, take soundings, and to desire the carpenter to make a report of the leakage, or any other serious injury sustained by the frigate’s shot.During this time L’Estrange was not idle on board The Epervier. Nettled at the successful trick played upon him, he resolved as the breeze gradually died away to capture the chase with his boats: for this duty the launch and the pinnace were assigned: the former had a carronade and twenty–five hands, and was commanded by his son; the latter had a swivel, and thirteen hands, commanded by a junior lieutenant. The object of L’Estrange being to prevent an unnecessary effusion of blood, by sending a force strong enough to render resistance hopeless on the part of what he called a dirty little sugar–boat. The crew of The Pride of Ohio, elated by the success of their captain’s manœuvre, and exhilarated by the extra grog served out, were in high good humour, and laughing over the events of the morning with reckless merriment, when they received an order from Ethelston to come aft. On their obeying the summons, he again addressed them as follows:—“My lads, you have thus far done your duty like men; butour work is not yet over. The Epervier is determined to sink or capture our little craft; she is now getting out her boats for that service: if we resist, we shall have warm work of it; if we strike without a fight, we may rot in a French dungeon. Again I ask you, my lads, will you stick by The Pride, and hurrah for home, or a sailor’s grave?”A hearty and simultaneous cheer from the crew was the only reply.“I knew it, my lads,” continued Ethelston, his countenance, usually so calm, now glowing with enthusiasm; “I knew that you would not desert her while she could float! It is now my duty to tell you that she has received two awkward shots just between wind and water line, and that she leaks apace. We must stop them as well as we may; but be prepared for the boats from The Epervier;—they shall at least buy us a dear bargain!”Ethelston now called the mate, and gave him full instructions for the plan of defence from the expected attack. The long gun and the carronades were got ready and loaded, the former with round shot, the latter with grape; small arms and cutlasses were served out to the men, and the deck cleared of every thing that might impede them in the approaching struggle. Meantime Ethelston ordered to be hoisted a new ensign, given to the brig by Lucy, and said to be partly worked by her own fair fingers. As soon as it was run up, he sent aloft a boy, with orders to nail it to the mast–head, which was done amid the repeated cheers of the crew. They were not long kept in suspense: the breeze had died away; the flapping sails and creaking yards gave the usual sullen indications of a calm, when the boats from The Epervier advanced at a steady and measured stroke towards the brig. Ethelston gave the long gun to the charge of Gregson, reserving to himself that of the carronades; he issued also special orders not to fire, under any circumstances, until he gave the word, or, in case he fell, until they received the order from Gregson, who would succeed him in the command.During all these preparations, Cupid appeared indifferent to what was passing, and continued busily occupied with his pots and pans in the caboose. This conduct caused some little surprise in Ethelston, who knew that the black was not the stupid, phlegmatic character that he now seemed; and he accordinglysent Gregson to inquire whether, in the event of an attack from the frigate’s boats, he meant to fight?—desiring the mate at the same time to offer him a cutlass. The African grinned when he received this message, and replied that he meant to do his best. He declined, however, the proffered cutlass, informing the mate, that he had got a toasting–fork of his own, ready for the mounseers; as he said this, he showed him the fragment of a capstan–bar, the end of which he had sharpened and burnt hard in the hot cinders: it was an unwieldy kind of club, and in the hands of an ordinary man, could have been but of little service; but his gigantic strength enabled him to wield it like a common cudgel. The truth is, that Cupid would have preferred being armed with cutlass and pistol, both of which he could use as well as any man on board; but he had tact enough to know that the prejudice against his colour forbad his taking his place on deck among the other defenders of the vessel.The boats being now within hail, Lieutenant L’Estrange stood up in the launch and ordered the brig to strike her colours and receive him on board. Finding this order unheeded, he repeated it through the trumpet in a sterner tone, adding that, if not immediately obeyed, he should fire upon her. Not a man stirred on board the brig, neither was any reply made to the lieutenant, who forthwith discharged the contents of his carronade into her hull, by which one man was killed dead, and two were wounded by splinters; he then desired his men to pull hard for the brig to board her, while others had orders to fire small arms at all whom they could see above the bulwarks. The boats had approached within fifty yards before Ethelston gave the word to fire. Gregson pointed the long gun upon the smaller boat with so true an aim that the heavy shot went clean through her, and she filled and went down in a few minutes, the survivors of her crew being picked up by the launch. Meanwhile, Ethelston fired a volley of grape into the latter with terrible effect, several being killed on the spot, and many of the remainder severely wounded. Nothing daunted by this murderous fire, the gallant young lieutenant held on his way to the brig, and again discharging his carronade at the distance of only a few yards, her timbers were fearfully rent, and amidst the smoke and confusion thereby created, he and his crew scrambled up her sides to board. Thecombat was now hand to hand; nor was it very unequal, so many of the Frenchmen having been killed and wounded in the boats; they were strong enough, however, to make good their footing on deck, and inch by inch they forced back the crew of the brig. Ethelston fought with the courage of a lion; his voice was heard above the din of the fray, animating his men; and several of the boldest of the enemy had already felt the edge of his cutlass. Nor was young L’Estrange less gallant in his attack; and his followers being more numerous than their opponents, drove them back gradually by main force. It was at this moment that Cupid, who had hitherto remained unnoticed in his caboose, thought fit to commence his operations; which he did by throwing a great pan of greasy boiling water over three or four of the assailants, and then laying about him with his huge club, which felled a man almost at every blow. The excruciating pain occasioned by the hot liquid, together with the consternation produced by this unexpected attack in their rear, completed the dismay of the Frenchmen. At this crisis young L’Estrange slipped and fell on the deck: Gregson, bestriding him, was about to dispatch him; when Ethelston, who was already bleeding from a severe cutlass wound in the forehead, rushed forward to save him; but the infuriated youth, perhaps mistaking his intention, drew his last remaining pistol, and fired with so true an aim, that Ethelston’s left arm fell powerless at his side. A flush of anger came over his countenance; but seeing Gregson again raising his hand to dispatch the young officer, he again interposed, and desired the mate to spare him,—an order which the seaman reluctantly obeyed.Ethelston now entreated L’Estrange to give up his sword, and to save further bloodshed; and the young man, seeing that his followers were mostly overpowered and wounded, presented it with a countenance in which grief and shame were blended with indignation. “Stay,” said Ethelston; “before I receive your sword, the conditions on which I receive it are, that you give your parole, that neither you nor any one of your men shall bear arms against the United States during the continuance of this war, whether you and I are recaptured or not; and the launch becomes my prize.”To these terms the youth assented, and ordered such of his men as were not quite disabled, to lay down their arms. In a fewminutes, all who were unhurt were busily engaged in tending the dying and wounded. Fortunately an assistant–surgeon, who had volunteered on this service from the frigate, was among those unhurt, and he set about his professional duties with as much alacrity as if he had been in the ward of an hospital. Cupid retreated quietly to his caboose, and Ethelston continued giving his orders with the same clearness and decision that had marked his whole conduct. Young L’Estrange looked over the brig’s low sides into the water: his heart was too full for utterance; and his captor, with considerate kindness, abstained from addressing him. The surgeon, observing that the blood still flowed from the wound on Ethelston’s forehead, and that his left arm hung at his side, now came and offered his services. Thanking him courteously, he replied, smiling, “I took my chance of wounds on equal terms with those brave fellows, and I will take my chance of cure on equal terms also; when you have attended to all those who are more seriously hurt, I shall be happy to avail myself of your skill.”The surgeon bowed and withdrew. An audible groan burst from the unhappy L’Estrange; but still he spoke not; and Ethelston held a brief consultation with his mate and the carpenter, the result of which was, an order given to the former, in a low tone of voice, “to prepare immediately, and to send Cupid to him in the cabin.”As he was going down, L’Estrange came to him, and asked him, confusedly, and with an averted countenance, if he might speak to him alone for a minute. Ethelston begged him to follow him into his cabin, when, having shut the door, he said, “Mr. L’Estrange, we are alone, pray speak; is there any thing in which I can serve you?”The youth gazed on him for a moment, in an agony that could not yet find relief in words, and then falling on the floor, burst into a flood of tears. Ethelston was moved and surprised at this violent grief in one whom he had so lately seen under the influence of pride and passion. Taking him kindly by the hand, he said, “Pray compose yourself! these are misfortunes to which all brave men are liable. You did all that a gallant officer could do;—success is at the disposal of a higher power; you will meet it another day.”“Never, never!” said the young lieutenant, vehemently;“the loss of my boat is nothing; the failure of our attack is nothing; but I am a dishonoured coward, and Heaven itself cannot restore a tainted honour!”“Nay, nay,” replied Ethelston; “you must not say so. I maintain that you and your crew fought gallantly till every hope of success was gone—the bravest can do no more!”“You are blindly generous,” said the youth passionately; “youwillnot understand me! When every hope was gone—when I lay at the mercy of your mate’s cutlass—you sprang forward to save my life. I, like a savage—a monster—a coward, as I am,—fired and tried to kill you;—even then, without a word of anger or reproach, you, although wounded by my pistol, again interposed, and saved me from the death I deserved. Oh, would that I had died an hundred deaths rather than have lived to such disgrace!”And again the unhappy young officer buried his face in his hands, while his whole frame still trembled convulsively with grief. Ethelston used every exertion to soothe and allay his agitation. He assured him that the wound he had received was not serious, that the pistol was fired under a strong excitement, and in the turmoil of a bloody fray, when no man’s thoughts are sufficiently collected to regulate his conduct; and he forgave him so freely, and mingled his forgiveness with so many expressions of kindness and esteem, that he succeeded at length in restoring him to a certain degree of composure. Nothing, however, would satisfy L’Estrange but that he should have his wounds instantly dressed; and he ran himself and summoned the surgeon, resolving to be present at the operation.When Ethelston’s clothes were removed, it appeared that, besides a few flesh–cuts, of no great consequence, he had received two severe shot wounds: one from a musket–ball, which had sunk deep into the left shoulder; the other from L’Estrange’s pistol, by which the bone of the left arm was broken. The latter was soon set and bandaged; but the ball could not be extracted from the former, either because the surgeon’s skill was not equal to the task, or from his not having with him the instruments requisite for the operation. As soon as this was over, Ethelston dismissed the surgeon; and turning good–humouredly to L’Estrange he said, “Now, my young friend, I want your assistance. I must lose no time in putting all our men aboard the launch, and taking in as many stores andnecessaries as she will hold, for this brig is doomed; your swivel and the frigate’s guns have finished her; she is fast settling down, and in a couple of hours I expect her to sink.”“On my word, sir,” said L’Estrange, “you will pardon me if I say that you are the strangest gentleman that I ever yet knew to command a trading brig! You out–manœuvre a frigate, capture her boats, fight as if you had done nothing but fight all your life, sit as quiet under that surgeon’s probes and tortures as if you were eating your dinner, and now talk calmly of scuttling your brig, for which you have run all these risks!”“It is my philosophy, Monsieur L’Estrange. I tried first to get away without fighting; when that was impossible, I fought as well as I could. What has happened since, and what is yet to come, I bear as well as I can! All that I ask of you is, to keep your fellows in order, and make them assist mine in removing the wounded and the requisite stores on board the launch.” So saying, and again saluting his prisoner, he went on deck.Though he struggled thus manfully against his emotion, it was with a heavy heart that Ethelston prepared to bid a final adieu to his little vessel, which he loved much for her own sake,—more perhaps for the name she bore. While giving the necessary orders for this melancholy duty, his attention was called by Gregson to a sail that was coming up with the light evening breeze astern. One look through the glass sufficed to show him that she hoisted French colours; and L’Estrange, who now came on deck, immediately knew her to be The Hirondelle,—an armed cutter, that acted on this cruise as a tender to The Epervier. A momentary glow overspread the countenance of Ethelston, as he felt that resistance was hopeless, and that in another hour his brig would be sunk, and his brave crew prisoners. But being too proud to allow the French officer to see his emotion, he controlled it by a powerful effort, and continued to give his orders with his accustomed coolness and precision.Though young L’Estrange’s heart beat high at this sudden and unlooked–for deliverance, he could not forbear his admiration at his captor’s self–possession; and his own joy was damped by the remembrance of that portion of his own conduct which he had so deeply lamented, and also of the parole he hadgiven, not to bear arms again during the war. Meantime the removal of the men, the stores, the provisions, and papers from the brig went on with the greatest order and despatch.Ethelston was the last to leave her: previous to his doing so, he made the carpenter knock out the oakum and other temporary plugs with which he had stopped the leaks, being determined that she should not fall into the hands of the French. This being completed, the launch shoved off; and while pulling heavily for the shore, the crew looked in gloomy silence at their ill–fated brig. Ethelston was almost unmanned; for his heart and his thoughts were on Ohio’s banks, and he could not separate the recollections of Lucy from the untimely fate of her favourite vessel. He gazed until his sight and brain grew dizzy; he fancied that he saw Lucy’s form on the deck of the brig, and that she stretched her arms to him for aid. Even while he thus looked, the waters poured fast into their victim. She settled,—sunk; and in a few minutes scarce a bubble on their surface told where The Pride of Ohio had gone down! A groan burst from Ethelston’s bosom. Nature could no longer endure the accumulated weight of fatigue and intense pain occasioned by his wounds: he sunk down insensible in the boat, and when he recovered his senses, found himself a prisoner on board The Hirondelle.Great had been the surprise of the lieutenant who commanded her at the disappearance of the brig which he had been sent to secure; and greater still at the condition of the persons found on board the launch. His inquiries were answered by young L’Estrange with obvious reluctance: so having paid the last melancholy duties to the dead, and afforded all the assistance in his power to the wounded, he put about the cutter, and made sail for The Epervier.As soon as young L’Estrange found himself on the frigate’s deck, he asked for an immediate and private audience of his father, to whom he detailed without reserve all the circumstances of the late expedition. He concluded his narration with the warmest praises of Ethelston’s courage, conduct, and humanity, while he repeated that bitter censure of his own behaviour which he had before expressed on board The Pride of Ohio. The gallant old captain, though mortified at the failure of the enterprise and the loss of men that he had sustained, could not but appreciate the candour, and feel for themortification of his favourite son; and he readily promised that Ethelston should be treated with the greatest care and kindness, and that the most favourable terms, consistent with his duty, should be offered to the prisoners.Young L’Estrange gave up his own berth to Ethelston, whose severe sufferings had been succeeded by a weakness and lethargy, yet more dangerous. The surgeon was ordered to attend him; and his care was extended to all the wounded, without distinction of country.After a few days, Captain L’Estrange determined to exchange Gregson, the mate, and the remainder of the brig’s crew, for some French prisoners lately taken by an American privateer: they were accordingly placed for that purpose on board the cutter, and sent to New Orleans. Young L’Estrange having learned from the mate the address of Colonel Brandon, and his connection with Ethelston, wrote him a letter, in which he mentioned the latter in the highest and most affectionate terms, assuring the Colonel that he should be treated as if he were his own brother; and that, although the danger arising from his wounds rendered it absolutely necessary that he should return to Guadaloupe with the frigate, his friends might rely upon his being tended with the same care as if he had been at home. Cupid, at his own urgent entreaty, remained with his master, taking charge of all his private baggage and papers.We need not follow the fate of the cutter any further than to say that she reached her destination in safety; that the proposed exchange was effected, and the prisoners restored to their respective homes.The surgeon on board The Epervier succeeded at length in taking out the ball lodged in Ethelston’s shoulder; and when they arrived at Guadaloupe, he pronounced his patient out of danger, but enjoined the strictest quiet and confinement, till his recovery should be further advanced. The ardent young L’Estrange no sooner reached home than he prevailed on his father to receive Ethelston into his own house. He painted to his sister Nina, a girl of seventeen, the sufferings and the heroism of their guest in the most glowing colours; he made her prepare for him the most refreshing and restoring beverages; he watched for hours at the side of his couch; in short, he lavished upon him all those marks of affection with which ahasty and generous nature loves to make reparation for a wrong. In all these attentions and endeavours, he was warmly seconded by Nina, who made her brother repeat more than once the narrative of the defence and subsequent loss of the brig. How Ethelston’s recovery proceeded under the care of the brother and sister shall be told in another chapter.
c111
ETHELSTON’S FURTHER ADVENTURES AT SEA, AND HOW HE BECAME CAPTOR AND CAPTIVE IN A VERY SHORT SPACE OF TIME.
It seemed almost miraculous that not a man on The Pride of the Ohio was killed by the frigate’s broadside; nor was one wounded, excepting Ethelston, who received a slight hurt in the left arm from a splinter; but he paid no attention to it, and calmly gave all the requisite orders for repairing the damaged spars and rigging.
As soon as all was made snug, he let the men go below to dinner; and leaning over the shivered bulwarks of his little craft, seemed busily employed in counting the shot that had struck her; but his eyes were for a time fixed upon the water, through which she was cutting her easy way, and his thoughts were afar off, as he whispered almost audibly to himself, “Dear, dear Lucy—your namesake is wounded and disfigured, but she is not disgraced. Thank Heaven, no Frenchman’s foot has yet trodden her deck, and—“
Here he was interrupted by Gregson, who having been carefully observing the frigate through his glass, came up to him, and said, “Beg pardon, sir; but she is getting ready her boats, and the breeze is failing fast; in another hour we shall have scarce a cat’s paw.”
Ethelston started from his short reverie, and immediately convinced himself that the mate spoke the truth: “You areright,” said he, “but we have a good hour to spare, for the frigate is nearly becalmed. Let the men have their dinner quietly, say nothing to them about the matter, and give ‘em an extra glass of grog; but no drunkenness, Gregson; they may want the full use of their heads and hands to–night; send Cupid to my cabin, and tell him to bring me a slice of cold meat and a glass of Madeira.”
So saying, he went below: the mate looked after him, and turning his quid three or four times in his cheek, he muttered, “Damme if he makes any more count of the frigate’s guns or boats than a bear does of a bee–hive! They spoilt as good a commodore as ever stept a deck when they made a trading–skipper of him!” Having vented this characteristic encomium on his young commander, the old seaman went forward to execute his orders.
Meanwhile Ethelston, consulting his chart, found that the reefs and shoals, as laid down, rendered the navigation of the coast extremely dangerous, even for the light draught of his brig; having only allowed himself a few minutes for refreshment, he again went on deck, and observing the frigate still becalmed, he ordered the mate to shorten sail, take soundings, and to desire the carpenter to make a report of the leakage, or any other serious injury sustained by the frigate’s shot.
During this time L’Estrange was not idle on board The Epervier. Nettled at the successful trick played upon him, he resolved as the breeze gradually died away to capture the chase with his boats: for this duty the launch and the pinnace were assigned: the former had a carronade and twenty–five hands, and was commanded by his son; the latter had a swivel, and thirteen hands, commanded by a junior lieutenant. The object of L’Estrange being to prevent an unnecessary effusion of blood, by sending a force strong enough to render resistance hopeless on the part of what he called a dirty little sugar–boat. The crew of The Pride of Ohio, elated by the success of their captain’s manœuvre, and exhilarated by the extra grog served out, were in high good humour, and laughing over the events of the morning with reckless merriment, when they received an order from Ethelston to come aft. On their obeying the summons, he again addressed them as follows:—
“My lads, you have thus far done your duty like men; butour work is not yet over. The Epervier is determined to sink or capture our little craft; she is now getting out her boats for that service: if we resist, we shall have warm work of it; if we strike without a fight, we may rot in a French dungeon. Again I ask you, my lads, will you stick by The Pride, and hurrah for home, or a sailor’s grave?”
A hearty and simultaneous cheer from the crew was the only reply.
“I knew it, my lads,” continued Ethelston, his countenance, usually so calm, now glowing with enthusiasm; “I knew that you would not desert her while she could float! It is now my duty to tell you that she has received two awkward shots just between wind and water line, and that she leaks apace. We must stop them as well as we may; but be prepared for the boats from The Epervier;—they shall at least buy us a dear bargain!”
Ethelston now called the mate, and gave him full instructions for the plan of defence from the expected attack. The long gun and the carronades were got ready and loaded, the former with round shot, the latter with grape; small arms and cutlasses were served out to the men, and the deck cleared of every thing that might impede them in the approaching struggle. Meantime Ethelston ordered to be hoisted a new ensign, given to the brig by Lucy, and said to be partly worked by her own fair fingers. As soon as it was run up, he sent aloft a boy, with orders to nail it to the mast–head, which was done amid the repeated cheers of the crew. They were not long kept in suspense: the breeze had died away; the flapping sails and creaking yards gave the usual sullen indications of a calm, when the boats from The Epervier advanced at a steady and measured stroke towards the brig. Ethelston gave the long gun to the charge of Gregson, reserving to himself that of the carronades; he issued also special orders not to fire, under any circumstances, until he gave the word, or, in case he fell, until they received the order from Gregson, who would succeed him in the command.
During all these preparations, Cupid appeared indifferent to what was passing, and continued busily occupied with his pots and pans in the caboose. This conduct caused some little surprise in Ethelston, who knew that the black was not the stupid, phlegmatic character that he now seemed; and he accordinglysent Gregson to inquire whether, in the event of an attack from the frigate’s boats, he meant to fight?—desiring the mate at the same time to offer him a cutlass. The African grinned when he received this message, and replied that he meant to do his best. He declined, however, the proffered cutlass, informing the mate, that he had got a toasting–fork of his own, ready for the mounseers; as he said this, he showed him the fragment of a capstan–bar, the end of which he had sharpened and burnt hard in the hot cinders: it was an unwieldy kind of club, and in the hands of an ordinary man, could have been but of little service; but his gigantic strength enabled him to wield it like a common cudgel. The truth is, that Cupid would have preferred being armed with cutlass and pistol, both of which he could use as well as any man on board; but he had tact enough to know that the prejudice against his colour forbad his taking his place on deck among the other defenders of the vessel.
The boats being now within hail, Lieutenant L’Estrange stood up in the launch and ordered the brig to strike her colours and receive him on board. Finding this order unheeded, he repeated it through the trumpet in a sterner tone, adding that, if not immediately obeyed, he should fire upon her. Not a man stirred on board the brig, neither was any reply made to the lieutenant, who forthwith discharged the contents of his carronade into her hull, by which one man was killed dead, and two were wounded by splinters; he then desired his men to pull hard for the brig to board her, while others had orders to fire small arms at all whom they could see above the bulwarks. The boats had approached within fifty yards before Ethelston gave the word to fire. Gregson pointed the long gun upon the smaller boat with so true an aim that the heavy shot went clean through her, and she filled and went down in a few minutes, the survivors of her crew being picked up by the launch. Meanwhile, Ethelston fired a volley of grape into the latter with terrible effect, several being killed on the spot, and many of the remainder severely wounded. Nothing daunted by this murderous fire, the gallant young lieutenant held on his way to the brig, and again discharging his carronade at the distance of only a few yards, her timbers were fearfully rent, and amidst the smoke and confusion thereby created, he and his crew scrambled up her sides to board. Thecombat was now hand to hand; nor was it very unequal, so many of the Frenchmen having been killed and wounded in the boats; they were strong enough, however, to make good their footing on deck, and inch by inch they forced back the crew of the brig. Ethelston fought with the courage of a lion; his voice was heard above the din of the fray, animating his men; and several of the boldest of the enemy had already felt the edge of his cutlass. Nor was young L’Estrange less gallant in his attack; and his followers being more numerous than their opponents, drove them back gradually by main force. It was at this moment that Cupid, who had hitherto remained unnoticed in his caboose, thought fit to commence his operations; which he did by throwing a great pan of greasy boiling water over three or four of the assailants, and then laying about him with his huge club, which felled a man almost at every blow. The excruciating pain occasioned by the hot liquid, together with the consternation produced by this unexpected attack in their rear, completed the dismay of the Frenchmen. At this crisis young L’Estrange slipped and fell on the deck: Gregson, bestriding him, was about to dispatch him; when Ethelston, who was already bleeding from a severe cutlass wound in the forehead, rushed forward to save him; but the infuriated youth, perhaps mistaking his intention, drew his last remaining pistol, and fired with so true an aim, that Ethelston’s left arm fell powerless at his side. A flush of anger came over his countenance; but seeing Gregson again raising his hand to dispatch the young officer, he again interposed, and desired the mate to spare him,—an order which the seaman reluctantly obeyed.
Ethelston now entreated L’Estrange to give up his sword, and to save further bloodshed; and the young man, seeing that his followers were mostly overpowered and wounded, presented it with a countenance in which grief and shame were blended with indignation. “Stay,” said Ethelston; “before I receive your sword, the conditions on which I receive it are, that you give your parole, that neither you nor any one of your men shall bear arms against the United States during the continuance of this war, whether you and I are recaptured or not; and the launch becomes my prize.”
To these terms the youth assented, and ordered such of his men as were not quite disabled, to lay down their arms. In a fewminutes, all who were unhurt were busily engaged in tending the dying and wounded. Fortunately an assistant–surgeon, who had volunteered on this service from the frigate, was among those unhurt, and he set about his professional duties with as much alacrity as if he had been in the ward of an hospital. Cupid retreated quietly to his caboose, and Ethelston continued giving his orders with the same clearness and decision that had marked his whole conduct. Young L’Estrange looked over the brig’s low sides into the water: his heart was too full for utterance; and his captor, with considerate kindness, abstained from addressing him. The surgeon, observing that the blood still flowed from the wound on Ethelston’s forehead, and that his left arm hung at his side, now came and offered his services. Thanking him courteously, he replied, smiling, “I took my chance of wounds on equal terms with those brave fellows, and I will take my chance of cure on equal terms also; when you have attended to all those who are more seriously hurt, I shall be happy to avail myself of your skill.”
The surgeon bowed and withdrew. An audible groan burst from the unhappy L’Estrange; but still he spoke not; and Ethelston held a brief consultation with his mate and the carpenter, the result of which was, an order given to the former, in a low tone of voice, “to prepare immediately, and to send Cupid to him in the cabin.”
As he was going down, L’Estrange came to him, and asked him, confusedly, and with an averted countenance, if he might speak to him alone for a minute. Ethelston begged him to follow him into his cabin, when, having shut the door, he said, “Mr. L’Estrange, we are alone, pray speak; is there any thing in which I can serve you?”
The youth gazed on him for a moment, in an agony that could not yet find relief in words, and then falling on the floor, burst into a flood of tears. Ethelston was moved and surprised at this violent grief in one whom he had so lately seen under the influence of pride and passion. Taking him kindly by the hand, he said, “Pray compose yourself! these are misfortunes to which all brave men are liable. You did all that a gallant officer could do;—success is at the disposal of a higher power; you will meet it another day.”
“Never, never!” said the young lieutenant, vehemently;“the loss of my boat is nothing; the failure of our attack is nothing; but I am a dishonoured coward, and Heaven itself cannot restore a tainted honour!”
“Nay, nay,” replied Ethelston; “you must not say so. I maintain that you and your crew fought gallantly till every hope of success was gone—the bravest can do no more!”
“You are blindly generous,” said the youth passionately; “youwillnot understand me! When every hope was gone—when I lay at the mercy of your mate’s cutlass—you sprang forward to save my life. I, like a savage—a monster—a coward, as I am,—fired and tried to kill you;—even then, without a word of anger or reproach, you, although wounded by my pistol, again interposed, and saved me from the death I deserved. Oh, would that I had died an hundred deaths rather than have lived to such disgrace!”
And again the unhappy young officer buried his face in his hands, while his whole frame still trembled convulsively with grief. Ethelston used every exertion to soothe and allay his agitation. He assured him that the wound he had received was not serious, that the pistol was fired under a strong excitement, and in the turmoil of a bloody fray, when no man’s thoughts are sufficiently collected to regulate his conduct; and he forgave him so freely, and mingled his forgiveness with so many expressions of kindness and esteem, that he succeeded at length in restoring him to a certain degree of composure. Nothing, however, would satisfy L’Estrange but that he should have his wounds instantly dressed; and he ran himself and summoned the surgeon, resolving to be present at the operation.
When Ethelston’s clothes were removed, it appeared that, besides a few flesh–cuts, of no great consequence, he had received two severe shot wounds: one from a musket–ball, which had sunk deep into the left shoulder; the other from L’Estrange’s pistol, by which the bone of the left arm was broken. The latter was soon set and bandaged; but the ball could not be extracted from the former, either because the surgeon’s skill was not equal to the task, or from his not having with him the instruments requisite for the operation. As soon as this was over, Ethelston dismissed the surgeon; and turning good–humouredly to L’Estrange he said, “Now, my young friend, I want your assistance. I must lose no time in putting all our men aboard the launch, and taking in as many stores andnecessaries as she will hold, for this brig is doomed; your swivel and the frigate’s guns have finished her; she is fast settling down, and in a couple of hours I expect her to sink.”
“On my word, sir,” said L’Estrange, “you will pardon me if I say that you are the strangest gentleman that I ever yet knew to command a trading brig! You out–manœuvre a frigate, capture her boats, fight as if you had done nothing but fight all your life, sit as quiet under that surgeon’s probes and tortures as if you were eating your dinner, and now talk calmly of scuttling your brig, for which you have run all these risks!”
“It is my philosophy, Monsieur L’Estrange. I tried first to get away without fighting; when that was impossible, I fought as well as I could. What has happened since, and what is yet to come, I bear as well as I can! All that I ask of you is, to keep your fellows in order, and make them assist mine in removing the wounded and the requisite stores on board the launch.” So saying, and again saluting his prisoner, he went on deck.
Though he struggled thus manfully against his emotion, it was with a heavy heart that Ethelston prepared to bid a final adieu to his little vessel, which he loved much for her own sake,—more perhaps for the name she bore. While giving the necessary orders for this melancholy duty, his attention was called by Gregson to a sail that was coming up with the light evening breeze astern. One look through the glass sufficed to show him that she hoisted French colours; and L’Estrange, who now came on deck, immediately knew her to be The Hirondelle,—an armed cutter, that acted on this cruise as a tender to The Epervier. A momentary glow overspread the countenance of Ethelston, as he felt that resistance was hopeless, and that in another hour his brig would be sunk, and his brave crew prisoners. But being too proud to allow the French officer to see his emotion, he controlled it by a powerful effort, and continued to give his orders with his accustomed coolness and precision.
Though young L’Estrange’s heart beat high at this sudden and unlooked–for deliverance, he could not forbear his admiration at his captor’s self–possession; and his own joy was damped by the remembrance of that portion of his own conduct which he had so deeply lamented, and also of the parole he hadgiven, not to bear arms again during the war. Meantime the removal of the men, the stores, the provisions, and papers from the brig went on with the greatest order and despatch.
Ethelston was the last to leave her: previous to his doing so, he made the carpenter knock out the oakum and other temporary plugs with which he had stopped the leaks, being determined that she should not fall into the hands of the French. This being completed, the launch shoved off; and while pulling heavily for the shore, the crew looked in gloomy silence at their ill–fated brig. Ethelston was almost unmanned; for his heart and his thoughts were on Ohio’s banks, and he could not separate the recollections of Lucy from the untimely fate of her favourite vessel. He gazed until his sight and brain grew dizzy; he fancied that he saw Lucy’s form on the deck of the brig, and that she stretched her arms to him for aid. Even while he thus looked, the waters poured fast into their victim. She settled,—sunk; and in a few minutes scarce a bubble on their surface told where The Pride of Ohio had gone down! A groan burst from Ethelston’s bosom. Nature could no longer endure the accumulated weight of fatigue and intense pain occasioned by his wounds: he sunk down insensible in the boat, and when he recovered his senses, found himself a prisoner on board The Hirondelle.
Great had been the surprise of the lieutenant who commanded her at the disappearance of the brig which he had been sent to secure; and greater still at the condition of the persons found on board the launch. His inquiries were answered by young L’Estrange with obvious reluctance: so having paid the last melancholy duties to the dead, and afforded all the assistance in his power to the wounded, he put about the cutter, and made sail for The Epervier.
As soon as young L’Estrange found himself on the frigate’s deck, he asked for an immediate and private audience of his father, to whom he detailed without reserve all the circumstances of the late expedition. He concluded his narration with the warmest praises of Ethelston’s courage, conduct, and humanity, while he repeated that bitter censure of his own behaviour which he had before expressed on board The Pride of Ohio. The gallant old captain, though mortified at the failure of the enterprise and the loss of men that he had sustained, could not but appreciate the candour, and feel for themortification of his favourite son; and he readily promised that Ethelston should be treated with the greatest care and kindness, and that the most favourable terms, consistent with his duty, should be offered to the prisoners.
Young L’Estrange gave up his own berth to Ethelston, whose severe sufferings had been succeeded by a weakness and lethargy, yet more dangerous. The surgeon was ordered to attend him; and his care was extended to all the wounded, without distinction of country.
After a few days, Captain L’Estrange determined to exchange Gregson, the mate, and the remainder of the brig’s crew, for some French prisoners lately taken by an American privateer: they were accordingly placed for that purpose on board the cutter, and sent to New Orleans. Young L’Estrange having learned from the mate the address of Colonel Brandon, and his connection with Ethelston, wrote him a letter, in which he mentioned the latter in the highest and most affectionate terms, assuring the Colonel that he should be treated as if he were his own brother; and that, although the danger arising from his wounds rendered it absolutely necessary that he should return to Guadaloupe with the frigate, his friends might rely upon his being tended with the same care as if he had been at home. Cupid, at his own urgent entreaty, remained with his master, taking charge of all his private baggage and papers.
We need not follow the fate of the cutter any further than to say that she reached her destination in safety; that the proposed exchange was effected, and the prisoners restored to their respective homes.
The surgeon on board The Epervier succeeded at length in taking out the ball lodged in Ethelston’s shoulder; and when they arrived at Guadaloupe, he pronounced his patient out of danger, but enjoined the strictest quiet and confinement, till his recovery should be further advanced. The ardent young L’Estrange no sooner reached home than he prevailed on his father to receive Ethelston into his own house. He painted to his sister Nina, a girl of seventeen, the sufferings and the heroism of their guest in the most glowing colours; he made her prepare for him the most refreshing and restoring beverages; he watched for hours at the side of his couch; in short, he lavished upon him all those marks of affection with which ahasty and generous nature loves to make reparation for a wrong. In all these attentions and endeavours, he was warmly seconded by Nina, who made her brother repeat more than once the narrative of the defence and subsequent loss of the brig. How Ethelston’s recovery proceeded under the care of the brother and sister shall be told in another chapter.