King, Ship, and Sword

CHAPTER FORTY

0nce Modestes squadron was alone on the Atlantic, free and able to manoeuvre, without being flanked by those other columns of warships, Captain Blanding began to act more like a Rear-Admiral. Even as they made their way to a point mid-way 'twixt Ushant, the northwestern most tip of France, and the Scilly Isles and Land's End, he worked his four ships like one of those massive columns.

They wore in succession off the wind, they tacked in succession to windward; he signalled for them all to tack to form a line-abreast, then come about as one to form a line of battle. They sailed Nor'west to the Scillys in-line-ahead, then reversed course by wearing in succession at one instance, or wore or tacked together to re-form line on the reciprocal heading.

For the most part, Captain Blanding preferred that HMS Reliant be the lead ship in-column, with his flagship, HMS Modeste, the second, and the lighter frigates, Cockerel and Pylades, astern of him, obviously planning for the wished-for combat to come and placing the heaviest weight of metal, and the largest artillery, at the forefront where his initial broadsides would do the most damage, cause the most consternation. He would, though, alter their order to give Captains Parham and Stroud experience at leading.

He also worked the signalmen half to death. Blanding had gotten copies of Adm. Home Popham's revised signals book of 1803 for all ships and was so delighted with how many thousands of words, how many phrases and orders could be expressed by one-to-four numeral flags, that Mids and men of the Afterguards aboard all four warships could swear that the fellow had "flux of the flags" from dawn to dusk, ordering up any idle thought that rose in his head, to be transmitted to one and all!

Night signals, thank the Good Lord, were so rudimentary and simple that they were more like the inarticulate bellows of a village idiot desirous of a bowl of pudding. Lanthorn frames, false flares, all of them announced by the discharge of a cannon; several cannon for some of them, with the lanthorns hoisted aloft in the frames arranged in diamonds, squares, or other shapes. A row of three lights meant "Tack," with four guns the signal for execution, and a further gun for each point of of the compass to be crossed. Capt. Blanding was mostly mute during the night, especially when it came to manoeuvring ships in the dark… though he did issue rather a lot of invitations to supper!

The good weather on their day of departure did not last long, of course, though that did not deter the fellow from continuing their working-up in the occasional half a gale of wind, or rain, and with no consideration of the sea-state. "By Jingo, it won't be all 'cruising and claret' 'til we meet up with the Frogs, haw haw!" Blanding would declare with a fierce scowl, and a meaty palm slammed on his dining table, just before breaking out in a hearty belly-laugh.

After a fortnight of such training, with no sign of the French squadron in the offing, Blanding broke them up into pairs to scout a line from Nor'west to Sou'east, Lewrie and Reliant paired with one of the Fifth Rate 32s, with ten or twelve miles between them, depending on the weather and the limit of visibility, and no more than ten or twelve sea-miles between the two pairs, resulting in a scouting line fourty or fifty miles in length cross the hundred miles 'twixt Ushant and the Scillys, through which the French must pass-if they were indeed coming.

Except for Sundays. Then Blanding would order all ships into two short columns abreast and send his Chaplain to each ship in turn for Divine Services. Chaplain Brundish was a much younger fellow than Lewrie had expected, almost as stout as his patron, but agile and energetic. He was well read and a charming, erudite supper-table guest, as full of bonhomie as Blanding and, like many gentlemanly members of the Church of England, spoke glowingly of steeplechasing and the fox hunt, of how he missed his hounds and his favourite hunters. He had a wealth of decent amusing tales and japes, played the flute, recorder, and the violin, and was possessed of a loud, deep baritone voice. His homilies were marvels, too. Oh, he'd rail against the common sailors' sins of giving in to boredom and ennui, of petty theft and drunk on duty, nodding off on watch, but they were mostly short, pithy, and very nautical, full of animus against their foes, "mateyness" between their own, of upholding God, King, and Country as a moral, religious calling, as a Good Work that would lead them all to Salvation and the Eternal Glory… all of it bracketed by well-known, beloved hymns of the up-lifting, muscular sort that left even the leery men with grins on their faces, and humming the tunes as Chaplain Brundish departed in Captain Blanding's cutter to minister to the next ship and crew.

He, surprisingly for a man of the cloth, knew his way with the cutlass and small-sword, and had a keen eye with a musket.

After the third Sunday at sea, though, Modeste put up a signal for Reliant to come close alongside. With both ships loafing along under reduced sail, both rolling, heaving, and snuffling foam, about fifty yards apart, Blanding took up a speaking-trumpet and bellowed, "This is looking to be a rum go, Lewrie! The only Frogs we've seen are prizes took by other people!"

Wars could be declared, but merchantmen on-passage had no way of learning of it; warships returning from overseas or cruising on an innocent patrol beyond the reach of coastal semaphore towers could not be informed either, and the first they would know of it would be the pugnacious approach of an enemy warship or privateer with gun-ports open and artillery run out. Such surprises would happen to ships of both sides. Frustratingly, whilst their squadron had scouted round the approaches to the English Channel, other, luckier, British warships had sailed past them with French prizes in tow, or the odd enemy merchantman sent in under a prize-crew, with the Union Flag flying above the French Tricolour to mark the new possessor.

At several of their suppers aboard Modeste, Blanding had wrung his hands, or gnawed his napkins to nubbins, to be bound by specific orders which denied them the chance to hare off in search of prizes, too, and was forced to watch other captains send in fresh fortunes to be made in the Admiralty Prize-Courts.

"If they didn't sail before the war was declared, they may not have come out at all, sir!" Lewrie had shouted back to him. "This could be a wild goose chase!"

"And, did they put to sea a day or two before, then they are weeks ahead of us by now!" Blanding had roared back, despair in his voice. "It just ain't on, dash my eyes! We will go the West Indies and the mouth of the Mississippi, Lewrie! Our orders demand we do no less… whether they are really there or not! 'Bring to battle, or pursue,' we're ordered. Then pursuit it will be! Order of sailing… Pylades, your Reliant, then me, with Cockerel the hind-most! Two miles' separation 'tween ships, and shape course West-Sou'west, half West, cross the Bay of Biscay!"

"Aye aye, sir!" Lewrie had bawled back, wondering if his whisky, mustard, and store of jerked meat and sausages for the cats would last that long. More disturbingly, would he have to sift, rinse, and dry their litter for re-use, should the level of sand in the barrel run low?

"The Indies, sir?" Lt. Westcott asked after coming up to the windward side of the quarterdeck, with a brief tap of two fingers upon the brim of his hat for a salute.

"It appears so, Mister Westcott," Lewrie said with a sigh. "The hands… damned few of 'em have had a chance to go there. Damned few have ever been exposed to Yellow Jack and the other fevers, 'cept for some of our older hands, our Blacks, and such. We'll be arriving right at the height of summer, when it's the sickliest. If we don't have to spend too much time close to shore, we might escape the worst of it, but… perhaps our Surgeon, Mister Mainwaring, has some fresh insights about Yellow Jack and malaria?"

"A long passage to get there, sir," Westcott said, shrugging in a fatalistic way. "Do we not run across any foes on the way, at least we will have Captain Blanding's hoped-for skills imparted to them… before we start to lose some of them."

That made Lewrie cock a brow and peer closely. "Rather, let us hope, must we lose some of our people, it comes in battle, and not the fevers first, Mister Westcott," he told him.