CHAPTER XX
The Indomitable Ego
The battle had been maintained with the utmost fury for nearly three quarters of an hour, and both ships had sustained severe injuries, the Richard being in much the worse condition. The heavy shot from the long eighteens of the Serapis had played havoc with her. Pearson naturally thought that it was about time for Jones to surrender, though the hour when Jones thought it time to surrender would never strike. The sudden silence which had fallen upon the conflict was broken by a voice from the British ship. In high interrogation it rang over the waters in the moonlight.
"Have you struck?" was the question of the Serapis. From the shattered Richard came Jones's immortal answer, -
"I have not yet begun to fight!"
A roar of wild exultation, a gigantic Homeric laugh, broke from the throats of the crew of the Richard, as the reply of the captain was passed from deck to deck, until the whole ship from truck to keelson quivered with responsive joy. It was a joke, the character of which those blood-stained ruffians could well appreciate; but the captain was in no mood for joking. He was serious, and in the simplicity of the answer lay its greatness. Strike! Not now, nor ever! Beaten! The fighting is but just begun! The preposterous possibility of surrender cannot even be considered. What manner of man this, with whom you battle in the moonlight, brave Pearson? An unfamiliar kind to you, and to most, such as has not been before, nor shall be again. Yet all the world shall see and understand at this time.
"I have not yet begun to fight!"
Surprising answer! On a ship shattered beyond repair, her best guns exploded and useless, her crew decimated, ringed about with dead and dying, the captain has not yet begun to fight! But there was no delay after the answer, no philosophizing, no heroics. The man of action was there. He meant business! Every moment when the guns were silent was a wasted one.
The helm was shifted to starboard, and the headsails shivered. The Richard slowly swung off to port and gathered headway again. The Serapis had lost an opportunity of tacking and raking. In order more quickly to bring his guns to bear and perhaps to prevent a raking by the enemy, Captain Pearson threw all aback; and the two ships, one backing, and the other reaching ahead, slowly drew abreast each other, the batteries speaking again as soon as the guns bore. The wind was very light, and the motion of both ships was sluggish in the extreme, so that they practically lay side by side, steerage way almost gone, slowly drifting in for long minutes, until there came a sudden, temporary breath of wind.
The position was most advantageous for the Serapis, as with her heavier and more numerous guns she could deliberately knock the Richard into a "cocked hat." She was much the speedier and handier ship, and might reasonably hope to choose her own distance, and, having selected a point of vantage, maintain it to the end. Pearson's game was to fight at long range until he had sunk his enemy; no difficult task that last, – she was half sinking now! But what the Richard lacked in mobility and direction, she made up in her captain. Jones did things instinctively; Pearson had to think about them. Jones's only hope was in getting to close quarters and making use of the disciplined French soldiery upon his decks.
They had done good service already in clearing the spar-deck of the English. Therefore, as the Richard, gathering way, gradually forged ahead, her helm was shifted to port and the vessel slowly swung across the bow of the Serapis, which had just begun to fill away again, as Pearson saw that he had nearly backed out of action. The bow of the Serapis struck the starboard quarter of the Richard, the jib-boom thrusting itself violently through the mizzen rigging. There was a terrific crash at the moment of impact; and a second later the English, cheering frantically, jumped upon the heel of the bowsprit and clambered upon the rail of their ship.
They were led by a tall distinguished-looking officer, who attracted double attention, as he wore the red uniform of the English army. As their heads appeared over the rail, the powerful voice of Jones could be heard shouting, "Boarders away!" Not waiting for the men who came springing up on the quarter-deck in obedience to his summons, the dauntless captain seized a pike from the rack and hurled it through the air at the leader of the Englishmen. Good fortune guided his hand, and the steel head of the lance struck fair in the bosom of the soldier. The British wavered a moment as their officer fell, and Jones discharged his pistols full among them. Then De Chamillard and those of his marines left alive upon the deck, by a well-directed point-blank volley, drove back the boarding party of the English.
The two ships were grinding against each other, and the wind on the after-sail of the Serapis slowly forced her around until she swung parallel to the Richard. The jib-boom snapped off short under the strain, and her starboard anchor caught in the tangled rigging of the American frigate; and Stacey, the sailing-master, sprang to lash the ships together. Stacey snatched a rope from the raffle on the deck and strove to overhaul it. It was tangled, and he found great difficulty in clearing it. An impatient man at best, and now greatly excited, he swore roundly as he tugged at the vexatious rope.
"Don't swear, Mr. Stacey," said Jones, calmly, coming to his assistance "In another moment we may all be in eternity, but let us do our duty."
With his own hands Jones passed the lashing.
On the gun-deck below, the batteries were being fought fiercely. The two ships were lying side by side, one heading in, the other out, the bow of one by the stern of the other, the starboard side of the Serapis closely touching the starboard side of the Richard. In the hope that the Richard would drift clear, Captain Pearson now dropped his port anchor; in vain, no bull-dogs ever clung to foes with more tenacity of grip than did those two ships in deadly grapple joined together. The Richard and the Serapis were fast locked for good, and the two ships swung to the tidal current, the wind being again almost entirely killed. In that position they lay for the next two hours, or until the battle was over.
As the Englishman had not hitherto engaged on the starboard side, the port shutters had not been opened, and the close contact of the two ships rendered it impossible to open them then. The Serapis' men were therefore compelled to fire through them, blowing off the port-lids. It was necessary for the men on both ships to extend the long handles of the rammers and sponges of the guns through the ports into the other ship in order to properly load their own cannon. Badinage of a character easily to be imagined passed back and forth between the two crews, though nothing interrupted the steady and persistent discharge of the batteries. The battle below was literally a hand-to-hand conflict with great guns, all the advantages in number and size being with the English.
At this juncture a new note was added to the conflict. Jones, whose eyes were everywhere in the battle, observed a black shadow come darting athwart the two fighting ships, shutting off the moonlight It was the Alliance.
"Ah!" he said to himself, "Landais has seen the folly of his disobedience and has come to our assistance."
As the American ship, with her French captain and half-English crew, loomed up between him and the bright moon, he thought of course that she would range down upon the unengaged side of the Serapis, and with a few broadsides compel her to strike at once. But no, the Alliance under full sail stood on. Her men were at quarters, ports triced up, lanterns lighted. She was passing the bow of the Serapis now. Why did she not fire? The insane and treacherous Landais held steadily on until he was standing squarely across the stern of the Richard. Now she was drawing past them as well. A command rang out. Good God! What was that?
Jones was well-nigh petrified with astonishment when at short range the Alliance poured in a raking broadside, of which the Richard received the brunt, though it was apparently discharged impartially at the two ships. As Landais drew past the stern, the helm of the Alliance was shifted. She swung parallel to the Richard, poured in another broadside, circled the Richard forward, and raked her again! The last discharge was a frightful one. The shot at close range swept the crowded decks of the American ship, which seemed actually to quiver and flinch at this treacherous blow. This broadside did much damage, killing and wounding many on the forecastle, among them Midshipman Caswell, mortally. Shrieks, groans, and cries of startled surprise and dismay rose with increasing volume from the ship.
"The Alliance, the Alliance-"
"We are betrayed! We are betrayed!"
"The English have got the ship!" came from every side in wild confusion.
"This is the Richard," shouted Jones at the top of his voice at the first fire. "Hold your fire! Show the private signals there!" he cried hastily to the faithful Brooks; but the Alliance paid no attention to these and other warning cries. As the three broadsides were delivered by the American frigate, the men, in their perfectly excusable terror at this treacherous blow in the back, actually began to break from their quarters and leave the guns. That was never to be thought of under any circumstances.
"Back!" shouted Jones, promptly. "Back to your quarters, every mother's son of you! Shoot the first man that flinches from the guns!" Dale and De Weibert and the midshipman gallantly seconded his orders; and the Alliance, sailing away toward the Pallas and delivering no more shot upon them, the conflict was resumed. That the men could be got to the guns again after this frightfully unsettling attack, was a supreme testimony to the quality of their officers, and to their own as well.
Indeed, upon the part of the Serapis the battle had never been intermitted. The long eighteens of her main battery had simply silenced and dismounted, knocked to pieces, and put out of action nearly all the twelves on the main-deck of the Richard. The starboard side of the American had been beaten in, and the port side beaten out by the heavy fire at close range until the British were literally firing through a hole; the shot hurtling through the air and falling harmlessly in the water far on the farther side. The underpinning of the upper decks of the ship was of course nearly knocked to pieces. Why the decks did not fall in and the whole thing collapse was a mystery.
There had been no fighting at all on the berth-deck since the bursting of the three guns, but poor little Payne had hung grimly to his post. One by one the men of the guarding squad had been picked off by stray shot until there were none left but he and the master-at-arms. Several shot from the British had entered below the water-line of the Richard, and she was making water fast. There was nearly four feet of water in the hold then, and it was rising. The prisoners below were in a wild state of terror. Imprecations, curses, appeals, had come up through the gratings over the hatchway, to which the young man had turned a deaf year.
To the other dangers of the battle, fire now added its devastating touch. In fact, both ships were aflame in several places. The burning gun-wads had lodged in the chains and other inflammable positions, and writhing, tossing, serpent-like torches threw their hot light over the scene of terror. As the smoke drifted down the hatchway, the prisoners in the hold could stand it no longer. There was a sudden rush below toward the opening; the gratings were splintered and broken by the thrust of a piece of timber; a head or two appeared in the clear; hands clutched at the combings.
"Back!" shouted Payne, trying to steady his boyish voice.
"No! D-n your baby face!" shouted the first prisoner, furiously, clutching desperately at the combing, while he was being lifted up in the arms of the men below. "D'ye think we'll stay here and be drowned like bloody rats in a hole!"
With white lips and a sinking heart the boy thrust his pistol full into the man's face, and with a trembling finger pulled the trigger. He did the like to the next man with a second pistol. To seize the musket of a dead marine and point it at the third, was the work of a second. Awed by this resolution and the promptitude of his action, the other prisoners fell back for the time. The sweat stood out on the forehead of the young midshipman. He had shot a man-two men-in cold blood! It seemed like murder. But he had done his duty. The words of the captain rang in his ear: "Keep them down!"
It was hot-hot as hell-on the berth-deck. The smoke poured in thick, suffocating clouds between decks. The wavering reflections from the flames on every side accentuated the horror. Bands of men flitted by ghost-like, here and there, with buckets of water, striving to fight the flames; lances of light leaped across the deck from the protruding muzzles of the guns on the Serapis, piercing the gloomy darkness with angry flashes. Bullets, grape, splinters of timber, solid shot, bits of torn humanity, whistled past his head. He was wild, crazy; the hugeness of the tragedy about him oppressed him direfully. There was a weight in his bosom, a choking in his throat; the bitter, acrid taste of the burned powder was in his mouth; the sickening smell of reeking blood pervaded his being; he longed to throw down his weapon and fly, anywhere, to get a respite from the infernal demand upon him. But he was a sailor, the son of a race of fighters. He held on. The deep roar of the guns above him told him that the battle was still going on. Suddenly out of the smoke appeared the burly form of the carpenter, wounded, blotched with red and gray, leaping forward, crying in terror-stricken accents, -
"We're sinking! we're sinking! Four feet of water in the hold!"
The gunner and his mates, apparently equally terrified, came running from the magazines as they caught the contagion of the moment. They sprang to the gun-deck and thence to the spar-deck, repeating the carpenter's cry, "We're sinking! we're sinking! Quarter! Quarter!"
"We must release the prisoners!" cried the master-at-arms, turning toward the little officer.
"Not while I live!" said Payne, resolutely, all his courage coming back to him in a moment.
"The ship is sinking; the battle is lost; make way!" returned the burly master-at-arms, springing toward the hatchway.
"Back!" cried the midshipman, fiercely, pointing his musket at him; the boy's blood was up now. "Here they stay, and here we stay! The orders of the captain-"
He never finished his words; a grape-shot struck him fair in the forehead. The master-at-arms tore open the hatch-cover.
"On deck!" he cried; "the ship is sinking!"
In panic terror, crowding and trampling upon each other like a mob of wild beasts, the maddened prisoners scrambled up the hatchway, and, yelling like animals, ran pell-mell for the gun-deck. The body of the brave midshipman was spurned, crushed, and broken beneath their feet as they ran.
CHAPTER XXI
The Audacity of Despair
On the spar-deck things had gone better. Though De Chamillard and his marines had been driven from the poop by the fire of the English, the men in the tops had more than evened that reverse. As the two ships lay side by side, the interlocking yards made a convenient bridge from one to the other, over which a bold man might pass. It happened that some of the choicest spirits on the Richard were stationed in the maintop. Fanning, who had been busily engaged with small arms, saw his opportunity. As the little parties in the two tops exchanged volleys, the midshipman threw his men on the yard; and as the smoke cleared away, the astonished British saw the Americans rushing toward them.
The first and second men were shot down and fell to the deck of the Serapis; the third, a gigantic man, by a desperate leap gained a foothold in the top. Before he was cut down, Fanning and another had joined him over the futtock shrouds; two men took the defenders in the rear by way of the lubber's hole; the rest came swarming. The force of their rush carried everything before it. The English, unable to stand the irresistible onset, were shot down or thrown out of the top. No quarter was asked or given. The Americans, having effected this lodgement in the maintop of the Serapis, now turned their fire upon the fore and mizzen tops, and enabled boarding parties from their own ship to gain possession of all the upper works of the enemy.
It was at this moment that the gunner and the carpenter reached the deck, crying that the ship was sinking and proffering surrender. The gunner ran aft shrieking, "Quarter! Quarter!" intending to lower the flag. Jones, who had been superintending the working of the quarter-deck guns, which were without an officer since Mease, who had been fighting heroically, had been severely wounded, of course heard the noise, and turning about saw the gunner running for the flag. Fortunately the flag had been shot away; and as the gunner was seeking it, fumbling over the halliards in the darkness, Pearson, hearing the cries, called out again, -
"Do you ask for quarter?"
Jones had taken two long leaps across the deck to the side of the gunner. Seizing his discharged pistol, he brought the butt of it heavily down upon the forehead of the man, cracking his skull and silencing him forever.
"Never!" he shouted in reply to the Englishman.
"Then I will give none!" said Pearson, – an entirely superfluous remark, by the way.
It was at this juncture that the "Alliance" was seen coming down again as before. Jones had time but for one glance of apprehension when he heard the noise of the leaping prisoners below. He sprang to the main hatch.
"The prisoners have been released," cried De Weibert, meeting him; the Frenchman had been toiling like a hero on the gun-deck. "The battery is silenced, we have not a single gun to work, the ship is afire! We must yield!" he exclaimed.
As the frightened men came crowding up the hatchways, Dale, who had just fired the only remaining gun on the deck that was left fit for action, took in the situation at once. He stayed the rush in the nick of time by voice and action. He sprang into the midst of them, threatening them, striking them, beating them down, driving them back with his sword. It was a magnificent display of hardihood and courage, presence of mind and resource.
"To the pumps!" he cried with prompt decision. "For your lives, men! The English ship is sinking, and we'll go down with her unless you can keep us afloat!" he shouted in thunder tones with superb audacity. The battle lost was won again in that minute.
"Well done, Richard!" shouted Jones, leaping through the hatchway and seconding the daring ruse of his noble lieutenant by his own mighty voice and herculean efforts, crying masterfully, "Get to the pumps, men! Lively! for God's sake! The ship is sinking under your feet! The English ship is going!"
It was unparalleled assurance, but it won. The two officers actually succeeded in forcing the English prisoners to man the pumps, where they worked with a frantic energy born of their persistent daze of terror. This left the regular crew of the ship free to fight the fires and to do what they could with the remaining guns. As Jones sprang back to the quarter-deck, the surgeon, covered with blood, and appalled at the carnage, came running toward him, crying, -
"The ship is sinking, sir! The cock-pit is under water! I have no place to stow the wounded. We must surrender!"
"Strike! Strike!" cried De Chamillard, who was wounded. "We can do no more!"
"What, gentlemen!" cried Jones, "would you have me strike to a drop of water and a bit of fire? Up, De Chamillard! Here, doctor, help me get this gun over."
The surgeon hesitated, looked around again, and, not liking the appearance of things about him, turned and ran below. Not to his station, for that was under water. His mates had been killed. He wandered up and down the decks, doing what he could-which was but little-for the wounded where they lay. Assisted by two or three of the seamen, with his own hands Jones dragged one of the nine-pounders from the disengaged side of the deck across to the starboard side to take the place of a dismounted one; and, while the heavy battery of the Serapis continued its unavailing fire below, these three small guns under his personal direction concentrated their fire upon the mainmast of the Serapis.
The fortuitous position of the Americans in the enemy's tops enabled them to pour a perfect rain of small-arm fire upon the spar-deck of the Serapis with little possibility of effective return. Man after man was shot down by the side of the intrepid Pearson, who, whatever his other lack of qualifications, showed that he possessed magnificent personal courage, until he remained practically alone upon the deck, – alone, and as yet undaunted.
It is impossible to describe the scene. It is not within the power of words to portray the situation, after over two hours of the most frightful and determined combat. No two ships were ever in such condition; no battle that was ever fought was like it. The decks were covered with dead and dying; bands of men in different directions were fighting the fires; the smoke in lowering clouds hung heavily over the ships, for the wind had died and there was scarcely enough to blow it away. The pale moonlight mingled with the red glare from the flames and threw an added touch of lurid ghastliness trembling over the smoke-wrapt sea. From below came the steady roar of the Serapis' guns, from above the continuous crackling of the Richard's small arms. The noises blended in a hideous diapason of destruction, which rose to an offended Heaven in the horrid discord of an infernal region. The prisoners, still under the influence of their terror, toiled at the clanking pumps. The water gushed redly from the bleeding scuppers. Order, tactics, discipline, had been forgotten. Men glared with blood-shot eyes, set their teeth beneath foam-flaked lips, and fought where they stood, – fought in frenzy against whatever came to hand, whether it was the English ship, or the roaring flames, or the rushing waters. They recked nothing of consequences. In their frantic battle-lust they beat upon the sides of the other ship with their bare hands and bloody knuckles, and knew not what they did. Their breath came quick and short; the red of battle was before their vision; they had but one thought. Slay! Kill! One would have said that the brute instinct was uppermost in every heart. But in scenes of this kind it is not the greatest brute that wins, but the greatest soul; and the one man who still preserved his calmness in this orgy of war was the man to win the battle-Jones.
The Alliance had repeated her previous performance, but the men had been worked to such a pitch that they never heeded her; many of them did not know of it. Both ships were thoroughly beaten. It was only a question as to which would realize it first, who would first surrender. Nay, there was no question whatever of Jones' surrender under any circumstances whatsoever. Pearson would give up under some conditions, and those had at last arrived. That was the essential difference between the two men; it was radical.