Under Wolfe's Flag; or, The Fight for the Canadas. Rowland Walker
burst from his lips–
"A sail! A sail!"
"Where away?" called the first mate from the deck.
"On the starboard bow, sir, north-west by west."
"What do you make of her?"
"Can't raise her hull yet, sir, but she must be a big ship, for she carries a good head of canvas."
Almost instantly the mate was up in the fore-top, carefully examining the stranger. As he did so a grave look crossed his face.
"Anything wrong, sir?" queried Jamie.
"I don't like the look of her. I fear she's no friend. We may have to run." Again he examined her. Then, shutting up the glass with a bang, he said–
"Go down, Elliot, and call the captain."
"Aye, aye, sir."
While the captain was being called, eight bells sounded the end of the watch, and though Jack had been eagerly longing for that blessed sound before, he would now willingly have remained aloft to watch that distant speck, which seemed fraught with such danger.
As he reached the deck he met the captain coming up the companion ladder. The latter immediately called out to the first mate, who had remained aloft–
"Is she showing any colours, Mr. Rogers?"
"Not yet, sir!"
"What do you think she is?"
"She's a cruiser, sir. Of that I'm pretty certain, but whether English or French I can't yet say."
At this alarming news, the captain himself went aloft and keenly examined the movements of the stranger for a few minutes, and then said–
"She's a French cruiser, Mr. Rogers, and a fast one too. We must either fight her or show her a clean pair of heels."
In a few minutes the Duncan's course was altered. Every stitch of canvas that she could carry was flung out. Royals and stuns'ls were set, and with the foam surging under her bows she fairly bounded through the water, leaving a wake astern that was a mile long.
CHAPTER V
THE FIGHT WITH THE FRIGATE
There was no little excitement aboard when it became known that the distant sail, "hull down" upon the horizon, was probably a French frigate.
"Look at her white canvas, and her large, square yards!" exclaimed Jamie. "She must be a man-of-war, and even if she's only a frigate she'll carry thirty guns against our ten, and treble the number of men."
"If she is a Frenchman she'll sink us, that's certain, though I hope Captain Forbes will make a fight of it," replied Jack, who could not entirely suppress a feeling akin to dread, as he watched the approaching ship.
"There's just a chance that she may be a friend, after all, for even the English cruisers do not always show their colours to the quarry until all chance of escape is cut off."
"It's just possible, of course, for there should be plenty of them hereabouts. Mr. Rogers tells me that last year they brought no less than three hundred French ships and their crews into English ports."
Breakfast was served as soon as the excitement aboard the Duncan had abated somewhat, and afterwards the captain assembled the crew and addressed them as follows–
"Lads, we're now within two hundred leagues of the New England coast, and we're carrying a valuable cargo. 'Tis our duty to save it if we can, but yonder is a fast and powerful frigate in our wake, who won't show any colours, though mine have been flying at the mast-head this half-hour."
"Hurrah! hurrah!" burst from the men, as they saw the ensign they loved so well unfurled to the breeze.
"That's right, lads! I'm glad to see that you're not ashamed to fight for the old flag," exclaimed the captain.
"We'll die for it, captain, if need be!" shouted several of the men, and no wonder, for 'tis remarkable the courage that even a flag inspires in the presence of an enemy, especially when that enemy dares to insult it.
"The fact that he has not yet shown his colours," went on the captain, "means that we've an enemy in our wake. Still, if this breeze holds we may outsail him, but if we can't do that we've got to fight him."
"Aye! aye! sir! Let's fight him."
"No Frenchman shall ever take my ship while I live. I'll blow her up first. Mark my words, lads. I will!" This was spoken in such a fierce, but deliberate manner that the men all saw that Captain Forbes meant it, and they responded with a ringing cheer, which rent the air like a broadside, and filled each heart with courage and determination.
"So now, lads, let's clear the decks, and prepare for the worst."
"Aye! aye! sir!"
And the men went to work as only British tars can work. They cleared the decks of everything that was useless in an action. They cleaned and loaded the guns, but they did not as yet open the port-lids to run them out, lest the lower decks should be swamped, and the ship delayed. They ran out the boarding-nets, and brought up the powder, wads and shot. They got ready their cutlasses and boarding-pikes, and in every way possible prepared to meet a daring foe.
"Tell the men aloft to keep a sharp lookout. We may sight an English frigate at any moment, and then we shall see some fun, Mr. Rogers."
"Aye! aye! captain. That we shall," replied the mate.
Slowly the distant frigate gained upon the Duncan, and before noon it could be easily seen from the deck, though still some five leagues distant. Nearer and nearer she came, and every man aboard the Duncan had now made up his mind that a fight was the only possible ending, and the sooner it came, the better.
The second mate, Mr. Hudson, and Jamie were in the fore-top now, and just before dinner the captain hailed them, and said–
"Ho, there! Can you make out her armament yet?"
"Pretty well, sir."
"How many guns does she carry?"
"Twenty-six, I fancy, sir, for I can make out thirteen portholes on her starboard side."
The captain trod the deck impatiently, looking anxiously first at the approaching frigate, and then into the weather quarter, as though he anticipated a change.
"I fear the wind's dropping, Mr. Rogers," he said to the first mate, who paced the deck beside him. "We shall have a calm shortly," and within another half-hour the wind moderated, and shortly after that it blew spasmodically, and the frigate, now only two leagues away, was "laying on and off," trying to catch every breath of wind. The sails then flapped idly against the masts, and there followed a dead calm, when both ships lay helpless upon a mirrored sheet of glass.
A puff of blue smoke broke away from one of the starboard guns of the enemy, as she now lay broadside on towards the English ship, and then–
"Boom!" came a report, rumbling over the water.
At the same instant the French flag was broken at the mast-head.
"I thought as much, lads! Now we know who she is, and what she wants. That shot is a demand for surrender. What are those other flags he's hanging out, Mr. Hudson?"
"He's signalling, sir. Wants to know if we've struck. What shall I tell him, sir?"
"Tell him we haven't struck yet, but we'll do so as soon as he comes a little nearer, in the same way that Englishmen always strike."
At these words, which were heard all over the ship, a rousing cheer, which the Frenchman must have heard and wondered at, rang across the water, for it summed up the feelings of every man aboard. Shortly after this, the event which every one was expecting, from the captain down to the youngest cabin boy, happened.
"They're preparing to lower away the boats, sir. They mean to cut us out," came from the fore-top.
"Stand ready, my lads. Load every gun with grape-shot, lads, but don't fire till I give the order."
"Aye, aye, sir!"
One, two, three boats had been lowered, and