The Cruise of the Frolic

“No, he was not going to marry her!” exclaimed the captain, with unusual vehemence. “Her father, perhaps, wished it, but she would never have consented. Collins, you are my friend, and I will tell you the truth. That lady, Blanche D’Aubigné, was engaged to me, and never would have broken her faith to me while she believed me alive. By a series of forgeries, Daggerfeldt endeavoured to persuade her that I was false to her, though she would not believe him. On my return home she is to become my wife. We were to have married directly I got my promotion, but I was so immediately sent out here that I was able to spend but one day in her society. I wished to have secured her a pension in case this delightful climate should knock me on the head, but she would not hear of it. Poor girl, I have left her what little fortune I possess, Collins; I could not do less. Those who live on shore at ease can’t say we enjoy too much of the pleasures of home, or don’t earn the Queen’s biscuit. Bless her Majesty!”

“I don’t know that, sir. There are, I hear, though I never fell in with any of them, a set of lying traitors at home, who say we are no better than pirates, and want to do away with the navy altogether. If they were to succeed in their roguish projects, there would be an end of Old England altogether, say I.”

“They never will succeed, Collins, depend upon that. There is still too much sense left in the country; but if her Majesty’s government were to employ her cruisers in any other part of the world than on this pestiferous coast, the cause of humanity would benefit by the change. For every prize we capture, ten escape, and our being here scarcely raises the price of slaves in the Cuban and Brazilian markets five dollars a head; while the Spaniards and Portuguese, notwithstanding their treaties, do all they can to favour the traffic. Do we gain on the chase, do you think, Collins?”

“Not a foot, I fear, sir,” answered the lieutenant. “That brig is a fast craft, and though I don’t believe, as some of the people do, that the skipper has signed a contract with Davy Jones, she is rightly called by them the ‘Black Slaver.’”

“If the breeze freshens, we may overhaul her, but if not, she may double on us in the dark, and again get away,” observed the captain. “Take care a bright look-out is kept for’ard.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the lieutenant, repeating the order and adjusting his night-glass; “she hasn’t altered her course, at all events.”

By this time daylight had totally disappeared, although a pale crescent moon in the clear sky afforded light sufficient for objects to be distinguished at some distance. Few of the officers turned in, but the watch below were ordered to their hammocks to recruit their strength for the services they might be required to perform on the morrow, as Captain Staunton had determined, should the wind fail, to attack the chase in his boats. When the enemy is well-armed and determined, this a very dangerous operation, and in the present instance there could be no doubt that he who commanded the “Black Slaver” would not yield without a desperate resistance. Lookouts were stationed at the mastheads as well as forward, and every eye was employed in endeavouring to keep her in sight – no easy task with the increasing darkness – for a light mist was gradually filling the atmosphere, and the moon itself was sinking into the ocean. The breeze, however, appeared to be increasing; the brig felt its force, and heeled gracefully over to it as the water bubbled and frothed against her bows.

“What are the odds we don’t catch her after all?” said young Wildgrave to his messmate; “I hate these long chases, when one never comes up with the enemy.”

“So do I,” answered his companion. “But to tell you the truth, I have a presentiment that we shall come up with her this time, and bring her to action too. She has escaped us twice before, and the third time will, I think, be fatal to her. By-the-by, where is she though?”

“Fore-yard, there!” sang out the first lieutenant, “can you see the chase?”

“I did a moment ago, sir; – no, sir, I can see her nowhere.”

A similar answer was returned from the other lookouts. She was nowhere visible.

The Slaver

The “Black Slaver” well deserved her name. Her hull was black, without the usual relief of a coloured ribbon; her masts and spars were of the same ebon hue, her cargo was black, and surely her decks were dark as the darkest night. She was a very large vessel, certainly upwards of three hundred tons, and also heavily armed with a long brass gun amidships, and ten long nines in battery, besides small brass swivel-guns mounted on her quarter, to aid in defending her against an attack in boats.

Her crew was composed of every nation under the sun, for crime makes all men brothers, but brothers who, Cainlike, were ready any moment to imbrue their hands in each other’s blood; and their costume was as varied as their language – a mixture of that of many nations. A mongrel Spanish, however, was the language in which all orders were issued, as being that spoken by the greater number of the people. She was a very beautiful and powerful vessel, and all the arrangements on board betokened strict attention to nautical discipline. For more than two years she had run her evil career with undeserved success, and her captain and owner was reputed to be a wealthy man, already in possession of several estates in Cuba. Slaving was his most profitable and safe occupation, mixed up with a little piracy, as occasion offered, without fear of detection. Several slavers had unaccountably disappeared, which had certainly not been taken by English cruisers, and others had returned to the coast complaining that they had been robbed of their slaves by a large armed schooner, which had put on board a few bales of coloured cottons, with an order to them to go back and take in a fresh cargo of human beings. The “Espanto” was more than suspected of being the culprit; but she was always so disguised that it was difficult to bring the accusation home to her, while they themselves being illegally employed, could obtain no redress in a court of law.

She had for some time been cruising, as usual, in the hopes of picking up a cargo without taking the trouble of looking into the coast for it, when, weary of waiting, and being short of water and provisions, the captain determined to run the risk of procuring one by the usual method.

From the ruse practised by the “Sylph,” she was not seen by his lookouts till he was nearly close up to her. He was in no way alarmed, however, for he recognised the British man-of-war, and knowing the respective rate of sailing of the two vessels, felt certain, if the wind held, to be able to walk away from her. To make certain what she was, he had stood on some time after he had first seen her, a circumstance which had, as we mentioned, somewhat surprised Captain Staunton and his officers. Having ascertained that the sail inside of him was the “Sylph,” he hauled his wind, and making all sail, before an hour of the first watch had passed, aided by the darkness, he had completely run her out of sight. When he stood in he had been making for the Pongos River; but being prevented from getting in there, he determined to run for the Coanza River, some forty miles further to the south, before daybreak, and as the mouth is narrow, and entirely concealed by trees, he had many chances in his favour of remaining concealed there while the British man-of-war passed by. A slave-agent, also, of his resided in the neighbourhood, who would be able to supply him at the shortest notice, and at moderate prices, with a cargo of his fellow-beings. At this rendezvous he knew there would be a look-out for him, and that there were pilots ready to assist him in entering the river.

“Square the yards and keep her away, Antonio,” he sung out to his first mate, a ferocious-looking mulatto, who was conning the vessel. “We are just abreast of – Point, and Diogo, if he has his eyes open, ought to see us.”

The helm was kept up, the yards were squared, and the vessel stood stem on towards the shore.

Before long the dark line of a tree-fringed coast was visible, when she was again brought to the wind; her lower sails were furled, and she was hove-to under her topsails.

“We must make a signal, or the lazy blacks will never find us out, señor captain,” observed Antonio to his chief.

“Yes, we must run the risk: we shall not be in before daylight if we do not, and the enemy will scarcely distinguish from what direction the report of the gun comes. Be smart about it though.”

A gun from the lee quarter was accordingly discharged, the dull echoes from which were heard rebounding along the shore, and directly afterwards a blue-light was fired, the bright flame giving a spectre-like appearance to the slaver and her evil-doing crew. They might well have been taken for one of those phantom barks said to cruise about the ocean either to warn mariners of coming danger or to lure them to destruction.

Soon afterwards a small light was seen to burst out, as it seemed, from the dark line, and to glide slowly over the water towards them. Gradually it increased, and as it approached nearer, it was seen to proceed from a fire burning in the bow of a large canoe pulled by a dozen black fellows. When it came alongside, two of them scrambled on board, and recognising the captain, welcomed him to the coast. Their language was a curious mixture of Spanish, Portuguese, English, and African.

“Ah, señor captain, berry glad you et Espanto, come esta nocha, viento es favoravel, for run up de river Diogo – me vos on the look-out you, sabe.”

Having thus delivered himself, the chief pilot went aft to the helm with much the same air as one of his European brethren, habited in Flushing coat and tarpaulin hat, although the only garment he boasted was a blue shirt, secured at the waist by a piece of spun-yarn, and a red handkerchief bound round his head.

“Up with the helm, then square away the yards!” sung out the captain, and the vessel, under the direction of the negro, was standing dead on to the apparently unbroken line of dark shore.

It required great confidence in the honesty and knowledge of the pilot for the crew not to believe that he was running the schooner on shore, for such a thing had been more than once before done.

“Remember,” whispered Antonio, as he passed him, “if the vessel touches, my pistol sends a ball through your head.”

“No tien duvida, señor, contremestre,” answered Quacko, quite unmoved by the threat, as being one to which he was well accustomed.

“Viento favoravel, rio fundo. Have de anchor pronto to let go.”

The bowsprit of the schooner was now almost among the mangrove bushes.

“Stivordo!” sung out the pilot.

A yellow line of sand was seen over her quarter. This seemed to spring up from the sea on either side, like dark, shapeless phantoms, eager to destroy the slaver’s crew, the spirits of those their cruelty had sent from this world. Taller and taller they grew, for so calmly did the vessel glide on, that she appeared not to move, yet the broad open sea was completely shut out from the view of those on board; a narrow dark line, in which the reflection of a star was here and there visible, was the only water seen as still, on the schooner moved.

“Bombordo!” sung out the pilot.

The helm was put to port, and the schooner glided into another passage, her yards, as they were squared away or braced up to meet the alterations in her course, almost brushing the branches of the lofty trees. For some minutes more she ran on, till the stream grew suddenly wider, and a little bay, formed by a bend of the shore, appeared on the starboard hand, into which she glided. The anchor was let go, the topsails were furled, and so entirely was she concealed by the overhanging boughs, that a boat might have passed down the centre of the stream without seeing her.

At dawn the next morning a busy scene was going on on board and round the slaver. Her crew, aided by a number of negroes, were employed in setting up her rigging and fitting slave-decks, while several canoes were assisting her boats in bringing water and provisions alongside. Thus they were employed without cessation for two days. There was no play, it was all hard, earnest work. It is a pity they were not labouring in a good cause instead of a bad one.

In the mean time the King of – , as he was called, in reality the principal slave-dealer and greatest rogue in the district, was collecting the negroes who had been kidnapped by him or his allies, from whom he had bought them in the neighbouring provinces – some as they were quietly fishing in their canoes on the coast, others as they were seated beneath the shade of the palm-tree in their native forest, or were coming from the far interior with a load of oil or ivory, to sell to the nearest trader – untutored savages, who perhaps had never before seen the face of a white man, or the blue dancing ocean. It is no wonder that they paint the Devil white, and believe the sea is the passage to his realms. Eight hundred human beings were thus collected to be conveyed in that fell bark to the Far West, there to wear out their lives in hopeless slavery.

The greater part of the fourth day was spent in receiving half the number on board, and stowing them below. This operation was performed by men whose especial trade it is. The unhappy wretches are compelled to sit down with their legs bent under them, so closely packed that they cover but little more space than the length of their feet, between-decks, little more than a yard high; and thus they remain, bolted down to the decks, the whole voyage, a few only being allowed to come up at a time to be aired, while the smallest quantity of water possible is afforded them to quench their burning thirst.

The Capture

The work for the day was nearly concluded, and the captain of the slaver was walking by himself beneath the awning spread over the after-part of the deck, when he observed a canoe suddenly dart out of the main stream into the bay where the schooner lay concealed. It was soon alongside, when a black jumped on board.

“Señor capitan, you must be pronto,” he said. “Big man-of-war come, big canoe, mucho hombres, come up river.”

“Ah, have they found me out?” muttered the captain to himself. “I’ll give them a warm reception if they do come. Very well, Queebo,” he said aloud, “now pull back and watch them narrowly. Take care they don’t see you, and come and report their movements to me.”

At a signal all the crew were summoned on board, the awning was handed, boarding-nettings were triced up, the guns were double-shotted and run out, and a thick screen of boughs was carried across the part of the bay so as still further to conceal the schooner from the eye of any stranger. Two guns were also sent on shore and planted in battery, so as to command the entrance of the bay. Every other precaution was likewise taken to avoid discovery; all fires were extinguished, and the blacks were ordered to remove from the neighbourhood.

By the time these arrangements had been made, the scout returned to give notice that two boats had entered the river, and were exploring one of the numerous passages of the stream. The captain on this ordered the scout to remain on board, lest he might betray their whereabouts to the enemy. He had no wish to destroy the boats, as so doing would not benefit him; concealment, not fighting, was his object. When night, however, came on, he sent out the scout to gain further intelligence. Scarcely had the man gone, when he returned, and noiselessly stepped on deck.

“Hist, señor, hist!” he whispered. “They are close at hand, little dreaming we are near them.”

“Whereabouts?” inquired the captain.

“On the other side of the long island which divides the middle from the southern stream,” was the substance of the reply.

“We’ll attack them then, and either kill or make them all prisoners. They may be useful as hostages,” muttered the captain, and calling Antonio to him, he ordered him to man two boats with the most trustworthy of their people, and carefully to muffle the oars. This done, both boats left the schooner, under his command, in the direction indicated by the scout.

They pulled across the channel to a thickly-wooded island indicated by the scout. The negro landed, and in a few minutes came back.

“Dere dey are, señor,” he whispered; “you may kill all fast asleep; berry good time now; no make noise.”

On hearing this, the slavers, all of whom were armed to the teeth, advanced cautiously across the island, by a path with which Queebo seemed well acquainted. The black pointed between the trees, and there was seen the head of a man, fast asleep in the stern-sheets of a boat. Just then a light rustling noise was heard, and a figure was seen advancing close up to where the slavers were crouching down, ready for the command of their officer to fire.

He advanced slowly, looking out for the very path apparently by which they had gained the spot. He reached within almost an arm’s length of the captain. The impulse was irresistible; and before the stranger was aware any one was near him, he was felled to the ground, and a handkerchief was passed over his mouth, so that he could not utter a cry for help. Two other men, who were doing duty as sentinels on shore, were in like manner surprised and gagged, without uttering a sound to alarm the rest. The slavers then advanced close up to the nearest boat, and pouring a volley from their deadly trabucos into her, killed or wounded nearly all her crew. A larger boat was moored at some little distance farther on, and her people being aroused by the firing, they at once shoved off into the stream, which the survivors of the other also succeeded in doing. They then opened a fire on the slavers, but sheltered as they were among the trees, it was ineffectual.

The contest was kept up for some time; but reduced in strength as the crews of the boats were, they were at last obliged to retreat, while the slavers returned with their prisoners to the schooner. As the slavers’ boats were left on the other side of the island, which extended for more than a mile towards the sea, they were unable to follow their retreating enemy had they been so inclined; but in fact they did not relish the thought of coming in actual contact with British seamen, as they had good reason in believing the enemy to be, although weakened and dispirited by defeat.

When the prisoners, who had not uttered a word, were handed up on deck, the captain ordered lights to be brought, for he had no longer any fear of being discovered. One evidently, by his uniform, was an officer; the other two were seamen. The captain paced the deck in the interval before lights were brought, grinding his teeth and clinching his fists with rage, as he muttered to himself, —

“He shall die – he wears that hated uniform: it reminds me of what I once was. Oh, this hell within me! blood must quench its fire.”

A seaman now brought aft a lantern; its glare fell as well on the features of the prisoner as on that of the slave captain. Both started.

“Staunton!” ejaculated the latter.

“Daggerfeldt!” exclaimed the prisoner.

“You know me, then?” said the captain of the slaver, bitterly; “it will avail you little, though. I had wished it had been another man; but no matter – you must take your chance.”

The slaver’s crew were now thronging aft.

“Well, meos amigos,” he continued, in a fierce tone, “what is to be done with these spies? You are the judges, and must decide the case.”

“Enforca-los – hang them, hang them – at least the officer. The other two may possibly enter, and they may be of service: we want good seamen to work the vessel, and these English generally are so.”

“You hear what your fate is to be,” said Daggerfeldt, turning to Captain Staunton. “You had better prepare for it. You may have some at home to regret your loss. If you have any messages, I will take care to transmit them. It is the only favour I can do you.”

While he spoke, a bitter sneer curled his lip, and his voice assumed a taunting tone, which he could not repress.

The gallant officer, proud in his consciousness of virtue, confronted the villain boldly.

“I would receive no favour, even my life, from one whose very name is a disgrace to humanity. Even if the message I were to send was conveyed correctly, it would be polluted by the bearer. It would be little satisfaction for my friends to know that I was murdered in an African creek by the hands of a rascally slaver.”

While Staunton was uttering these words, which he did in very bitterness of spirit, for, knowing the character of the wretch with whom he had to deal, he had not the remotest hope of saving either his own life or that of his people, the rage of Daggerfeldt was rising till it surpassed his control.

“Silence!” he thundered, “or I will brain you on the spot!”

But Staunton stood unmoved.

“Madman, would you thus repay me for the life I saved?” he asked, calmly.

“A curse on you for having saved it,” answered the pirate, fiercely, returning his sword, which he had half drawn from its scabbard. “My hand, however, shall not do the deed. Here, Antonio Diogo, here are the spies who wish to interfere in our trade, and would send us all to prison, or to the gallows, if they could catch us.”

“The end of a rope and a dance on nothing for the officer, say I,” answered the mulatto mate. “See what his followers will do; speak to them in their own lingo, captain, and ask them whether they choose to walk overboard or join us.”

While he was speaking, some of the crew brought aft the two British seamen, with their hands lashed behind them. Others, headed by Antonio, immediately seized Captain Staunton, and led him to the gangway, one of the men running aloft to reeve a rope through the studding-sail sheet-block on the main-yard. Staunton well knew what the preparations meant, but he trembled not; his whole anxiety was for the boats’ crews he had led in the expedition which had ended so unfortunately, and for the two poor fellows whose lives, he feared, were about also to be sacrificed by the miscreants.

The British seamen watched what was going forward, and by the convulsive workings of their features, and the exertions they were making to free their arms, were evidently longing to strike a blow to rescue him. Daggerfeldt was better able to confront them than he had been to face Staunton.

“You are seamen belonging to a man-of-war outside this river, and you came here to interfere with our affairs?”

“You’ve hit it to an affigraphy, my bo’,” answered one of the men, glad, at all events, to get the use of his tongue. “We belongs to her Majesty’s brig ‘Sylph,’ and we came into this here cursed hole to take you or any other slaver we could fall in with; and now you knows what I am, I’ll just tell you what you are – a runaway scoundrel of a piccarooning villain, whom no honest man would consort with, or even speak to, for that matter, except to give him a bit of his mind; and if you’re not drowned, or blown up sky high, you’ll be hung, as you deserve, as sure as you’re as big a rascal as ever breathed. Now, put that in your pipe, my bo’, and smoke it.”

While he was thus running on, to the evident satisfaction of his shipmate, who, indifferent to their danger, seemed mightily to enjoy the joke, Daggerfeldt in vain endeavoured to stop him.

“Silence!” he shouted, “or you go overboard this moment!”

“You must bawl louder than that, my bo’, if you wants to frighten Jack Hopkins, let me tell you,” answered the undaunted seaman. “What is it you want of us? Come, out with it; some villainy, I’ll warrant.”

The captain of the slaver ground his teeth with fury, but he dared not kill the man who was bearding him, for he could not explain to his crew the nature of the offence, a very venial one in their eyes, and he wanted some good seamen.

“I overlook your insolence,” he answered, restraining his passion. “My crew are your judges. You have been convicted of endeavouring to capture us, and they give you your choice of joining us, or of going overboard; the dark stream alongside swarms with alligators. That fate is too good for your captain: he is to be hung.”

“Why, what a cursed idiot you must be to suppose we’d ship with such a pretty set of scoundrels as you and your men are,” answered Jack Hopkins, with a laugh. “I speak for myself and for Bob Short, too. It’s all right, Bob, I suppose?” he said, turning to his companion. “There’s no use shilly-shallying with these blackguards.”