With Moore at Corunna by G. A. Henty (red queen ebook TXT) 📕

As soon as the vessels were under way again it was found that the lugger was obliged to lower her main-sail to keep in her position astern of the Sea-horse, while the brig was forced to take in sail after sail until the whole of the upper sails had been furled.

"It is tedious work going along like this," O'Driscol said; "but it does not so much matter, because as yet we do not know where we are going to land. Sir Arthur has gone on in a fast ship to Corunna to see the Spanish Junta there, and find out what assistance we are likely to get from Northern Spain. That will be little enough. I expect they will take our money and arms and give us plenty of fine promises in return, and do nothing; that is the game they have been playing in the south, and if there were a grain of sense among our ministers they would see that it is not of the slightest use to reckon on Spain. As to Portugal, we know very little at present, but I expect there is not a pin to choose between them and the Spaniards."

"Then we are not going to Lisbon?" Terence said, in surprise.

"I expect not. Sir Arthur won't determine anything until he joins us after his visit to Corunna, but I don't think that it will be at Lisbon, anyhow. There are strong forts guarding the mouth of the river, and ten or twelve thousand troops in the city, and a Russian fleet anchored in the port. I don't know where it will be, but I don't think that it will be Lisbon. I expect that we shall slip into some little port, land, and wait for Junot to attack us; we shall be joined, I expect, by Stewart's force, that have been fooling about for two or three months waiting for the Spaniards to make up their minds whether they will admit them into Cadiz or not. You see, at present there are only 9,000 of us, and they say that Junot has at least 50,000 in Portugal; but of course they are scattered about, and it is hardly likely that he would venture to withdraw all his garrisons from the large towns, so that the odds may not be as heavy as they look, when we meet him in the field. And I suppose that at any rate some of the Portuguese will join us. From what I hear, the peasantry are brave enough, only they have never had a chance yet of making a fight for it, owing to their miserable government, which never can make up its mind to do anything. I hope that Sir Arthur has orders, as soon as he takes Lisbon, to assume the entire control of the country and ignore the native government altogether. Even if they are worth anything, which they are sure not to be, it is better to have one head than two, and as we shall have to do all the fighting, it's just as well that we should have the whole control of things too."

For four days they sailed along quietly. On the morning of the fifth the signal was run up from the Sea-horse for the prizes to close up to her. Mr. Woods, the mate on board the brig, at once sent a sailor up to the mast-head.

"There is a large ship away to the south-west, sir," he shouted down.

"What does she look like?"

"I can only see her royals and top-sails yet, but by their square cut I think that she is a ship-of-war."

"Do you think she is French or English?"

"I cannot say for certain yet, sir, but it looks to me as if she is French. I don't think that the sails are English cut anyhow."

Such was evidently the opinion on board the Sea-horse, for as the prizes came up within a hundred yards of her they were hailed by the major through a speaking-trumpet, and ordered to keep at a distance for the present, but to be in readiness to come up alongside directly orders were given to that effect.

In another half-hour the look-out reported that he could now see the lower sails of the stranger, and had very little doubt but that it was a large French frigate. Scarcely had he done so before the two prizes were ordered to close up to the Sea-horse. The sea was very calm and they were able to lie alongside, and as soon as they did so the troops began to be transferred to them. In a quarter of an hour the operation was completed, Major Harrison taking his place on board the lugger; half the men were ordered below, and the prize sheered off from the Sea-horse.

"The Frenchman is bearing down straight for us," he said to O'Driscol; "she is bringing a breeze down with her, and in an hour she will be alongside. I shall wait another half-hour, and then we must leave the Sea-horse to her fate; except for our stores she is worthless. Well, Terence, have you any suggestion to offer? You got us out of the last scrape, and though this is not quite so bad as that, it is unpleasant enough. The frigate when she comes near will see that the Sea-horse is a slow sailer, and will probably leave her to be picked up at her leisure, and will go off in chase either of the brig or us. The brig is to make for the north-west and we shall steer south-east, so that she will have to make a choice between us. When we get the breeze we shall either of us give her a good dance before she catches us--that is, if the breeze is not too strong; if it is, her weight would soon bring her up to us."

"Yes, Major, but perhaps she may not trouble about us at all. She would see at once that the lugger and brig are French, and if they were both to hoist French colours, and the Sea-horse were to fly French colours over English, she would naturally suppose that she had been captured by us, and would go straight on her course without troubling herself further about it."

"So she might, Terence. At any rate the scheme is worth trying. If they have anything like good glasses on board they could make out our colours miles away. If she held on towards us after that, there would be plenty of time for us to run, but if we saw her change her course we should know that we were safe. Your head is good for other things besides mischief, lad."

The lugger sailed up near the ship again, and the major gave the captain instructions to hoist a French ensign over an English one, and then, sailing near the brig, told them to hoist French colours.

"Keep all your men down below the line of the bulwarks, O'Grady. Mr. Woods, you had better get your boat down and row alongside of the ship, and ask the captain to get the slings at work and hoist some of our stores into her; we will do the same on the other side. Tell the captain to lower a couple of his boats; also take twenty soldiers on board with you without their jackets; we will do the same, so that it may be seen that we have a strong party on board getting out the cargo."

In a few minutes the orders were carried out, and forty soldiers were at work on the deck of the Sea-horse, slinging up tents from below, and lowering them into the boats alongside. The approach of the frigate was anxiously watched from the decks of the prizes. The upper sails of the Sea-horse had been furled, and the privateers, under the smallest possible canvas, kept abreast of her at a distance of a couple of lengths. The hull of the French frigate was now visible. "She is very fast," the mate said to the major, "and she is safe to catch one of us if the breeze she has got holds."

As she came nearer the feeling of anxiety heightened.

"They ought to make out our colours now, sir."

Almost immediately afterwards the frigate was seen to change her course. Her head was turned more to the east. A suppressed cheer broke from the troops.

"It is all right now, sir," the mate said; "she is making for Brest. We have fooled her nicely."

The boats passed and repassed between the Sea-horse and the prizes, and the frigate crossed a little more than a mile ahead.

"Five-and-twenty guns a-side," the major said. "By Jove! she would have made short work of us."

As it was not advisable to make any change in the position until the frigate was far on her way, the boats continued to pass to and fro, carrying back to the Sea-horse the stores that had just been removed, until the Frenchman was five or six miles away.

"Don't you think that we might make sail again, Captain?" the major then hailed.

"I think that we had better give him another hour, sir. Were she to see us making sail with the prize to the south it would excite suspicion at once, and the captain might take it into his head to come back again to inquire into it."

"Half an hour will surely be sufficient," the major said. "She is travelling at eight or nine knots an hour, and she is evidently bound for port. It would be unlikely in the extreme that her commander would beat back ten miles on what, after all, might be a fool's errand."

"That is true enough, sir. Then in half an hour we shall be ready to sail again."

The major was rowed to the Sea-horse. "We may as well transfer the men at once," he said. "We have had a very narrow escape of it, Captain, and there is no doubt that we owe our safety entirely to the sharpness of that young ensign. We should have been sunk or taken if he had not suggested our manning the lugger in the first place, and of pretending that the ship had been captured by French privateers in the second."

"You are right, Major. Another half-hour and the craft would have foundered under us; and the frigate would certainly have captured the Sea-horse and one of the prizes if the Frenchman had not, as he thought, seen two privateers at work emptying our hold. He is a sharp young fellow, that."

"That he is," the major agreed. "He has been brought up with the regiment, and has always been up to pranks of all kinds; but he has used his wits to good purpose this time, and I have no doubt will turn out an excellent officer."

Before sail was made the major summoned the officers on board the Sea-horse. The troops from the lugger and brig were drawn up on deck, and the major, standing on the poop, said in a voice that could be heard from end to end of the ship:

"Officers and men, we have had a narrow escape from a French prison, and as it is possible that before we arrive at our destination we may fall in with an enemy again and not be so lucky, I think it right to take this occasion at once of thanking Mr. O' Connor, before you all, in my own name, and in yours, for to his intelligence and quickness of wit it is entirely due that we escaped being captured when the brig was pounding us with its shot, without our being able to make any return, and it was certain that in a short time we should have had to haul down our flag or be sunk. It was he who suggested that we should take possession of the lugger, and with her guns drive off the brig. As the result of that suggestion this craft was saved from being sunk, and the brig was also captured.

"In the second place, when that French frigate was bearing down upon us and our capture seemed certain, it was he who suggested to me, that by hoisting the French flag and appearing to be engaged in transferring the cargo of the ship to the privateers, we might throw dust into the eyes of the Frenchmen. As you saw, the ruse succeeded perfectly. I therefore, Mr. O'Connor, thank you most heartily in my own name, and in that of your fellow-officers, also in the name of the four hundred men of the regiment, and of the ship's company, for the manner in which you have, by your quickness and good sense, saved us all from a French prison, and saved his Majesty from the loss of the wing of a fine regiment."

As he concluded the