Chapter 19

From the morning of Sunday, the 23rd, till Wednesday, the 26th, the men were busied in saving whatever they could from the hull of the Alceste, and they were fortunate enough to obtain several casks of flour, a few cases of wine, and a cask of beer, besides between fifty and sixty boarding-pikes, and eighteen muskets, all of which proved most acceptable.

A second well had been sunk, which supplied clearer water, and in great abundance, so that they possessed one of the chief necessaries of life in plenty.

Everything now wore a more favourable aspect. The Malays had retired behind a little island (called Palo Chalacca, or Misfortune's Isle), about two miles distant; and although they were expected to return speedily with a reinforcement, the crew of the Alceste were better prepared for them. The gunner had been actively employed in forming musket cartridges; and, by melting down some pewter basons and jugs, with a small quantity of lead obtained from the wreck, balls had been cast, in clay moulds, which not a little increased their confidence and feeling of security.

Under the able command of Captain Maxwell, the greatest regularity and order prevailed amongst the people. Every man appeared happy and contented with his lot; for each man, from the highest to the lowest, encouraged his neighbour by his own good conduct, whilst he in turn received encouragement from the example of those above him. The provisions were served out with the strictest impartiality. 'The mode adopted by Captain Maxwell,' (writes Mr. M'Leod,) 'to make things go as far as possible, was to chop up the allowance for the day into small pieces, whether fowls, salt beef, pork, or flour, mixing the whole hotch-potch, boiling them together, and serving out a measure to each publicly and openly, and without any distinction. By these means no nourishment was lost: it could be more equally divided than by any other way; and although necessarily a scanty, it was by no means an unsavoury mess.'

Early on Wednesday morning, Lieutenant Hay, who had charge of the boats, observed two pirate proahs nearing the island, as if to reconnoitre; he immediately made a dash at them, with the barge, cutter, and gig. The barge closed with the Malays first, and a desperate conflict ensued. There was only one musket in the boat, which Mr. Hay used to some purpose, for he killed two of the savages with his own hand. In the meantime, the other two boats had come up to the assistance of their comrades. One more pirate was shot dead, and another knocked down with the butt-end of a musket; yet the rest continued to fight with savage ferocity, until, seeing that resistance was fruitless, they jumped into the sea and drowned themselves, choosing to perish rather than yield. During the engagement, an officer who was on the beach, observed a canoe, which had been cut away from one of the proahs, drifting not many yards from the spot where he stood; and as he thought the prize worth securing, he entered the water, and swam towards it. He had nearly attained his object, when those who watched him from the shore perceived an enormous shark hovering about. They were almost petrified with horror; anxious to make their friend aware of his danger, yet not daring to call out to warn him, lest a sudden perception of the perils of his situation, and of the proximity of his formidable enemy, should unnerve him, and thus deprive him of the slight chance of escape that remained. Breathless and silent then they stood, and marked the movements of the shark with trembling anxiety. He seemed to be so sure of his prey, that he was in no haste to seize it, but swam leisurely about, crossing and recrossing betwixt the doomed victim and the shore, as if gloating himself, and sharpening his appetite by gazing on the anticipated feast. The officer, too, seemed to be luxuriating in the refreshing coolness of the water, calmly approaching the canoe, happily unconscious of his danger; but the shark followed him closely: his life depended upon a swimmer's stroke, or the whim of a moment. The anxiety of the spectators became agony; but that moment was decisive--the swimmer struck out once more--the canoe was gained, and he was saved.

Then, and then only, did he become aware of the horrible fate that had threatened him, and of the merciful interposition of Providence in his behalf.

In the course of this day fourteen proahs and smaller boats were observed standing towards the island, from the Banca side, and every heart bounded with joy in the full anticipation that it was a party sent by Lord Amherst from Batavia, to their relief. Their joy, however, did not last long, for they soon found that the boats had come only to gather a kind of sea-weed much esteemed by Chinese epicures, who use it, as they do birds' nests, in their soup.

Consultations were held that night as to the policy of negotiating with these people, so as to induce them, by promises of reward, to convey part of the crew of the Alceste to Java--the four remaining boats would then be sufficient for the transport of the rest.

But the morning dawn put all such plans to flight, and revealed the true character of the Malays. No sooner did they perceive the wreck, than they started off to her and plundered the hull of everything they could carry away. No assistance was to be expected from these rapacious thieves; and as the time had elapsed which was required to bring succour from Batavia, measures were taken to repair the launch and to construct a raft to enable the people to leave the island before their provisions should be completely exhausted.

Matters now began to assume a more formidable aspect, for on Saturday, the 1st of March, the Malay force was increased by the arrival of several proahs, who joined in breaking up the remains of the wreck.

At daybreak on Sunday, the 2nd, the camp was alarmed, and all were called to arms by the yells of the savages, who, firing their partereroes, and beating their gongs, advanced with about twenty of their heaviest vessels towards the landing-place, and anchored within a cable's length of the shore.

After a short deliberation, a boat full of men armed with creeses approached the shore, and was met by a canoe containing an officer and party with a letter from Captain Maxwell, addressed to the chief authority at Minto, stating the situation of the Alceste's crew, and praying that assistance might be sent to them.

The officer placed this letter in the hands of the Malays, repeatedly pronounced the word Minto, and showed them a dollar, to intimate that they would be well rewarded if they returned with an answer. They appeared to understand the mission, and to be willing to execute it; but, as may be supposed, the service was never performed.

Meantime the Malay forces continued to increase; no less than fifty proahs and boats of different sizes were collected, and, on a moderate computation, they had 500 men on board. Their mischievous intentions were too evident; they drew closer and closer to the shore, prevented the escape of any of the ship's boats, and even had recourse to stratagem in order to gain possession of the much-desired booty. One party declared that all the Malays except themselves were hostile, and urged that they might be allowed to go to the camp to guard the crew of the Alceste. This kind offer was of course refused. 'We can trust to ourselves,' was the reply. The plot began to thicken; the odds seemed fearfully against the heroic little band, who, badly armed, and worse provisioned, had to make good their position against a multitude of foes--matchless amongst savages in cunning and cruelty. But in proportion to the imminence of the danger rose the courage of our countrymen.

Mr. M'Leod relates that, in the evening, when Captain Maxwell had assembled, as usual, the men under arms, for the purpose of inspecting them, he addressed them in these words: 'My lads, you must all have observed this day, as well as myself, the great increase of the enemy's force (for enemies we must now consider them), and the threatening position they have assumed. I have, on various grounds, strong reason to believe they will attack us this night. I do not wish to conceal our real state, because I think there is not a man here who is afraid to face any sort of danger. We are now strongly fenced in, and our position in all respects is so good, that armed as we are, we ought to make a formidable defence even against regular troops; what, then, would be thought of us, if we allowed ourselves to be surprised by a set of naked savages with their spears and their creeses?

'It is true they have swivels in their boats, but they cannot act here; I have not observed that they have any matchlocks or muskets; but if they have, so have we!

'I do not wish to deceive you as to the means of resistance in our power. When we were first thrown together on shore we were almost defenceless. Seventy-five ball-cartridges only could be mustered; we have now sixteen hundred. They cannot, I believe, send up more than five hundred men, but, with two hundred such as now stand around me, I do not fear a thousand--nay, fifteen hundred of them! I have the fullest confidence that we shall beat them. The pikemen standing firm, we can give them such a volley of musketry as they will be little prepared for, and when we find they are thrown into confusion, we'll sally out among them, chase them into the water, and ten to one but we secure their vessels. Let every man, therefore, be on the alert with his arms in his hands; and should these barbarians this night attempt our hill, I trust we shall convince them that they are dealing with Britons!'

This short but spirited appeal had its full effect upon the hearts to whom it was addressed. It was answered by three wild hurras, which were taken up by the piquets and outposts, and resounded through the woods. The British cheer struck the savages with terror; they no doubt thought it preceded an attack, and they were observed making signals with lights to some of their tribe behind the islet.

The night passed undisturbed, and daylight discovered the pirates in the same position, their force increased by ten proahs, making their number at least six hundred men. The situation of Captain Maxwell and his party became hourly more critical; the provisions could not last long--something must be done--some plan must be decided on. They had but little choice; they must either make a dash at the pirates, and seize their boats, with the certainty of being all butchered should they not succeed,--and the odds were fearfully against them,--or they must maintain their present position, in the hope that aid might be sent from Java, in time to save them from a scarcely less horrible fate--the lingering death of famine.

Under these depressing circumstances, the spirits of the men never for a moment seemed to flag. True 'hearts of oak,' their courage increased with their difficulties, and the prevailing desire amongst them was, to rush upon the enemy and get possession of their boats, or perish in the attempt.

But for this day, at least, they were ordered to remain passive; perhaps in coming to this decision, the wise and brave commander of the party may have remembered another captain who was 'in a great strait,' and who said, 'Let us fall now into the hands of the Lord, for His mercies are great, and let me not fall into the hand of man,' The decision, then, was to wait; and the hours rolled on till afternoon, when an officer ascended one of the loftiest trees, and thence he thought he descried a sail at a great distance. The joyful news seemed too good to be true.

A signal-man was sent up with a telescope, to sweep the horizon. The eager and intense anxiety that pervaded the little band, until he could report his observations, may be better imagined than described. At last, he announced that the object was indeed a brig, or a ship, standing towards the island under all sail. The joy was unbounded and overpowering. Men felt as if awaking from some horrible dream; and, doubtless, many an honest heart was uplifted in thankfulness to the Almighty, for the mercy vouchsafed in delivering them from what had appeared, a few minutes before, to be certain destruction.

There remains little more to be told; the vessel proved to be the Ternate, which Lord Amherst had sent to their assistance. The pirates took to flight as soon as they discovered the ship, but not before they had received a volley from the Alceste's people, unfortunately without effect.

It was not till Friday, the 7th of March, that all were embarked on board the Ternate. They arrived safely at Batavia on the 9th, and were most kindly received by Lord Amherst, who converted his table into a general mess for the officers, as well as the embassy; comfortable quarters were also provided for the men; and in their present enjoyment they all soon forgot the hardships they had suffered.

In conclusion, we will quote the following passage from the pen of Mr. M'Leod:--'It is a tribute due to Captain Maxwell to state (and it is a tribute which all will most cheerfully pay) that, by his judicious arrangements, we were preserved from all the horrors of anarchy and confusion. His measures inspired confidence and hope, while his personal example in the hour of danger gave courage and animation to all around him.' Nor ought we to omit the high and well deserved praise which Captain Maxwell bestowed upon the ship's company in his examination before the court martial.

'I should be trespassing far too long upon the time of this court,' said Captain Maxwell, 'were I to bring all before them whose conduct merited applause; but I can with great veracity assure the court, that from the captain to the smallest boy, all were animated by the spirit of Britons; and, whatever the cause was, I ought not to regret having been placed in a position to witness all the noble traits of character this extraordinary occasion called forth; and having seen all my companions in distress fairly embarked, I felt in walking off to the boat that my heart was lifted up with gratitude to a kind Providence that had watched over us.'

Captain Murray Maxwell commenced his naval career under the auspices of Vice-Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, and obtained his first commission as lieutenant in 1796, and was subsequently promoted to the command of the Cyane, in December, 1802.

In the following year he was appointed to the Centaur, and received his post commission on the 4th of August, in the same year. In 1804, Captain Maxwell distinguished himself at the capture of Surinam, and for his conduct on that occasion was highly mentioned in the dispatches.

This officer was constantly employed in the late war, and distinguished himself on so many occasions, that we can only briefly allude to one or two instances where his gallantry was most conspicuous. In 1806, he was appointed to the Alceste, and on the 4th of April, 1808, whilst that vessel, in company with the Mercury, Captain James Alexander Gordon, and the Grasshopper, 18-gun sloop, lay at anchor near Cadiz, a large convoy under the protection of several gun-boats, was seen coming close in shore from the northward.

Captain Maxwell determined to attempt their capture, and accordingly, the Alceste and Mercury attacked the gun-boats, whilst the Grasshopper, stationed close to the batteries of Rota, by a well directed fire, succeeded in driving the Spaniards from their guns. The gun-boats being thrown into confusion, the first-lieutenant of the Alceste, Mr. Allen Stewart, and Lieutenant Watkin Owen Pell of the Mercury, volunteered to board the enemy in the boats. They accordingly dashed in among the convoy, boarded and brought out seven tartans from under the very muzzles of the enemy's guns, though supported by several armed boats sent from Cadiz to their assistance.

Captain Maxwell was actively employed on the coast of Italy until 1811, when we find him cruizing in the Adriatic, in company with the Active, Captain James Alexander Gordon, and a 36-gun frigate, the Unité, Captain Edward Henry Chamberlain. On the morning of the 28th of November, the little squadron was lying in Port St. George, Island of Lissa, when signals were made that there were three suspicious sail south. The three frigates immediately got under weigh, and on the morning of the 29th came within sight of the strange vessels, which proved to be the Pauline, a 40-gun frigate, the Pomone, frigate, and 26-gun ship, Persanne. The French commodore, finding the English force greater than he expected, bore up to the north-west, and the Persanne separated, and stood to the north-east. The Unité was then despatched in chase of the Persanne, and the Alceste and Active continued in pursuit of the French frigates.

In the course of a couple of hours the Alceste commenced action with the Pomone, but an unlucky shot soon afterwards brought down the main-topmast of the Alceste, and she was compelled to drop astern. The Active speedily ranged alongside of the Pomone, and after a spirited conflict, the latter ship was compelled to haul down her colours and surrender.

The Pauline, in the meantime, tacked, and poured her fire into the Alceste, no doubt anticipating an easy victory from her disabled state; but in this she was disappointed, for the fire was returned with such effect, that after a warm conflict of two hours and twenty minutes, the commodore made off to the westward, which, from the crippled state of the Alceste, Captain Maxwell was unable to prevent. In this action the Alceste lost twenty killed and wounded, the Active thirty-five, and Pomone fifty. The gallant captain of the Active had the misfortune to lose his leg, and his first lieutenant, William Bateman Dashwood, had his right arm shot away: the command therefore fell upon the second lieutenant, George Haye, who fought the action, until her opponent surrendered.

In 1813, Captain Maxwell had the misfortune to be wrecked in the Dædalus, and in 1815 was again reappointed to the Alceste. On his passage home, after the loss of that vessel, he touched at St. Helena, and had an interview with Napoleon Buonaparte, who, reminding him of the capture of the Pomone, said 'Vous étiez très méchant. Eh bien! your government must not blame you for the loss of the Alceste, for you have taken one of my frigates.'[16]

Captain Maxwell was nominated a C.B. in 1815, and received the honour of knighthood in 1818.

He died in June, 1831.

THE DRAKE.

The Drake, a small schooner, under the command of Captain Charles Baker, had been despatched by the commander-in-chief on the Newfoundland station, upon special duty to Halifax.

Having accomplished the object of her mission there, she set sail again to return to St. John's, on the morning of Thursday, the 20th of June, 1822. The weather was unusually fine, the wind favourable, and everything promised a short and prosperous voyage.

Nothing occurred to retard the progress of the vessel until Sunday morning, when the increasing thickness of the atmosphere betokened the approach of one of those heavy fogs which so frequently hover over the coast of Newfoundland.

There are few things more perplexing to the mariner than to find himself suddenly enveloped in one of these thick mists: it is impenetrable gloom; night and day are both alike; the sails, saturated with the watery vapour, hang heavily, and flap against the masts with a sad foreboding sound, whilst every heart on board feels more or less oppressed by the atmospheric influence, and every countenance expresses languor or discontent. But these discomforts are minor evils compared with other attendants upon a Newfoundland fog. It often happens that, in spite of every precaution on the part of the men on the look-out, the bows of the vessel run across some unfortunate fishing boat; and before a single voice can be raised in warning, a sudden shock, a smothered cry, a gurgling of the waves, tell the sad tale! One moment, and all is silent; the ship pursues her course, and no trace is left of the little vessel and her crew, for whom many days and nights will anxious love keep watch; but those objects of a mother's tenderness and of a wife's affection will never more gladden the eyes of the watchers, till 'the sea shall give up her dead.'

Would that such calamities were of less frequent occurrence. There is one curious characteristic of these fogs, which in some degree mitigates the evil of them: they sometimes do not extend beyond a few miles, having the appearance of a huge wall of dense cloud or mist. A vessel, after beating about for hours, will suddenly emerge from almost total darkness, the clouds break away, and all hearts are gladdened by finding themselves once more beneath the rays of the glorious sun.

Captain Basil Hall gives an amusing instance of such an occurrence. The Cambrian 'had run in from sea towards the coast, enveloped in one of these dense fogs. Of course they took it for granted that the light-house and the adjacent land--Halifax included--were likewise covered with an impenetrable cloud of mist; but it so chanced, by what freak of Dame Nature I know not, that the fog on that day was confined to the deep water, so that we who were in the port could see it at the distance of several miles from the coast, lying on the ocean like a huge stratum of snow, with an abrupt face fronting the shore.

'The Cambrian, lost in the midst of this fog-bank, supposing herself to be near land, fired a gun. To this the light-house replied; and so the ship and the light-house went on pelting away gun for gun during half the day, without seeing one another.

'The people at the light-house had no means of communicating to the frigate, that if she would only stand on a little further, she would disentangle herself from the cloud, in which, like Jupiter Olympus of old, she was wasting her thunder. At last, the captain, hopeless of its clearing up, gave orders to pipe to dinner; but as the weather, in all respects except this abominable haze, was quite fine, and the ship was still in deep water, he directed her to be steered towards the shore, and the lead kept constantly going. As one o'clock approached, he began to feel uneasy, from the water shoaling, and the light-house guns sounding closer and closer; but being unwilling to disturb the men at their dinner, he resolved to stand on for the remaining ten minutes of the hour. Lo and behold! however, they had not sailed half a mile further before the flying gib-boom end emerged from the wall of mist, then the bowsprit shot into daylight, and lastly, the ship herself glided out of the cloud into the full blaze of a bright and 'sunshine holiday.' All hands were instantly turned up to make sail: and the men, as they flew on deck, could scarcely believe their senses when they saw behind them the fog-bank--right ahead the harbour's mouth, with the bold cliffs of Cape Sambro on the left--and further still, the ships at their moorings, with their ensigns and pendants blowing out light and dry in the breeze.'

But to return to our sad tale. Towards noon, the weather cleared up for about a quarter of an hour, allowing just sufficient time to get a good observation of the latitude, which, according to Captain Baker's reckoning, made their position to be about ninety-one miles from Cape Race, and fifty-one from Cape St. Mary's.

They continued to steer east till about six o'clock in the evening, when the breeze rather freshening, and the ship having run sixty miles since noon, she was hauled off to south-east.