Kings and Emperors

“Aha!” Lewrie shouted as he spotted the Sailing Master, Mister Yelland, coming up from the wardroom below, still chewing on a last bite of bacon. “Mister Yelland, fetch yer sextant and come up!”

Yelland had to duck into his starboard-side sea cabin for his sextant, and a slate and chalk, before he ponderously mounted the ladderway to join them on the poop deck. “Aye, sir?” he asked.

“Where we intended to go yesterday and fire on the French if they gained the Monte Mero,” Lewrie impatiently pressed, “if we go there this morning, can we elevate our guns high enough to engage that damned Frog battery?”

For a seasoned sea-captain, Lewrie would be the last to claim that he was a dab-hand at mathematics, not like his past Sailing Masters during his career. He was forced to wait while Yelland hefted his sextant to his eye, took the measure of the hill’s height, then scribbled on his slate with many a cock of his head and some “Ah hums” thrown in for good measure. At last, he a

“Good enough, then,” Lewrie said, slamming a fist on the cap-rails of the bulwarks. “Mister Westcott, pipe All Hands to hoist the anchor and make sail. We’ll beat to Quarters once we’re under way!”

“Aye aye, sir!” Westcott said, looking positively wolf-evil as he bared his teeth in a wide, brief grin.

*   *   *

“Bless me, are they actually aiming at any ship?” Captain Chalmers observed from the quarterdeck of his Undaunted frigate, as French shot rumbled into the harbour waters, raising great pillars and feathers of spray and foam. “Why, they’re all over the place!”

“That will most-like change, sir,” his First Officer opined. “Cold barrels and ranging shots, what? Oops, oh my!” he added, as the French artillery scored a hit on a departing transport, splitting the ship’s main tops’l and leaving a large hole in the canvas. A second or so later, and that transport was struck, again, this hit just a bit wide of the mark and scoring down her larboard side, and raising a great cloud of dust and engrained dirt from her timbers.

“Damned plunging fire!” the Third Lieutenant exclaimed.

“I will thank you to mind your tongue, sir!” Chalmers snapped. “You know my views on curses, and blasphemy.”

“Sorry, sir.”

“There’s Sapphire getting under way, sir!” the First Officer pointed out.

“Mister Lewrie?” Captain Chalmers called out. “Has there been a signal from the flag for our group to make sail that you missed?”

“No, sir,” Midshipman Hugh Lewrie quickly answered. “The last signals to that effect showed the numbers for other ships. She is getting under way on her own, it appears, sir!”

HMS Sapphire was ringing up her best bower, even as she began to make sail; spanker, stays’ls, tops’ls, and jibs. She was turning slowly, wheeling away as if to make for the lower end of the harbour and the French battery. Undaunted was near enough to her former anchorage for everyone aboard to hear her Marine drummers beating out the Long Roll, and her fiddlers and fifers starting to play “The Bowld Soldier Boy.”

“And just what does he intend, I wonder?” Chalmers asked the aether. “Should we join him? Any signal to us?”

“That’s my grandfather’s favourite tune, sir,” Midshipman Hugh Lewrie said with a wistful note to his voice. “My father’s, too. He is going to fight!” he said with pride. “Sapphire makes no signal, sir.”

“Do you imagine, sir,” Undaunted’s First Officer asked, “that Captain Lewrie intends to draw the French battery’s fire upon his ship? She’s stouter than us. She can take their eight- and twelve-pounder shot better than we could, perhaps even the plunging fire from their howitzers.”

“Spare the transports?” Captain Chalmers wondered aloud, even as the French found the range upon another departing transport ship and scored several damaging hits. “I must say that Captain Lewrie has ‘bottom,’ in spades!”

“Yes, he does!” Midshipman Lewrie seconded that impression, if only under his breath.

*   *   *

“The ship is at Quarters, sir,” Lt. Westcott reported in his most formal and grave ma

“Soon, Mister Yelland?” Lewrie called to them.

“Soon, sir,” Mr. Yelland assured him, sounding anxious.

“There’s not enough room for us to go about,” Lewrie said to Lt. Westcott, waving an arm round the harbour. “We can’t stand close to the quays, wear about, and engage with the off-side battery. We would spend all our time at it. We’ll have to anchor, with the best bower and kedge, with springs on the cables.”

That drew a wince from Westcott, and a sucking of breath over his teeth. “Play target, to spare the other ships? Aye, nothing for it, then. Let go the kedge, first, and hope it finds good grounding, as rocky as the harbour is.”

“And use the best bower at a very short scope t’keep us from swinging, aye,” Lewrie grimly agreed. “Stand by to let go the kedge when Yelland decides we’re at the best place, then send topmen aloft as we free the bower.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Westcott said, doffing his hat most formally, again, sure that this would be a very hot business. He turned away to begin issuing Lewrie’s orders.

The French battery atop the hill had been busy during their slow approach, sending roundshot chasing after departing transports, but, after finally taking notice of such a big and tempting target, they began to shift the aim of their guns, even before Sapphire got to her optimum firing position.

“I think this will do, sir,” Yelland said at last.

“Very well, Mister Yelland. Let go the kedge, springs on the cable!” Lewrie cried. “Topmen aloft, trice up and lay out t’take in sail! Open the gun-ports and run out!”

Shot keened overhead, and the main tops’l puckered as a shot punched clean through it. Another roundshot snapped the halliards of the middle stays’l between the main and foremast, bringing it down to drape the waist.

Sapphire rumbled and groaned as the kedge anchor cable paid out the stern hawsehole, squealed as the sheaves of the gun-port blocks lowered the ports, roared and drummed as the larboard guns were run out to thud against the bulwarks and hull. She snubbed as the kedge bit into the rock and sand of Coru

“Seize, and bring to!” Lt. Westcott could be heard yelling to snub the kedge cable. “Breast to the aft capstan bars! Mister Ward!” he called to the forecastle with a brass speaking trumpet. “Let go the bower!”

A 12-pounder shot passed close over the poop deck, clearing the larboard bulwarks by inches, but smashing the cap-rails of the starboard bulwarks as it caromed off. The Sailing Master and his Mates came tumbling down from where they had been making their calculations in a trice.

“Pass word to the gun-decks,” Lewrie ordered, “quoin blocks all the way out, load, and lay the guns!”

The first serge cartridge bags were being rammed down muzzles, followed by wadding, then roundshot. Lewrie leaned over the side to see the 12-pounders and lower deck 24-pounders jutting from the side, barrels jerking upwards as the wooden elevating quoin blocks were withdrawn, allowing the breeches to rest on the truck carriage beds.

Westcott was back at Lewrie’s side, speaking trumpet still in his hand, and they shared a look in the moment it took for Mids to dash up from below and report the guns ready. Lewrie gave him a nod.