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aside, a little wondering at not hearing the felucca's carronades, but
perceiving her people busy with their fire-arms, he believed all right.
The first discharge, in such an affair, is usually the most destructive.
On the present occasion, the firing was not without serious effects. The
English, much the most exposed, suffered in proportion. Four men were
hurt in Winchester's boat, two in Griffin's, six or eight men in the
other launches and cutters: and one of Sir Frederick's gig-men was shot
through the heart--a circumstance which induced that officer to drop
alongside of a cutter, and exchange the dead body for a living man.
On the rocks, but one man was injured. A round-shot had hit a stone,
shivered it in fragments, and struck down a valuable seaman, just as he
was advancing, with a gallant mien, to sponge one of the guns.
"Poor Josef!" said Raoul, as he witnessed the man's fall; "carry him to
the surgeon, _mes braves_."
"_Mon capitaine_, Josef is dead."
This decided the matter, and the body was laid aside, while another
stepped forward and sponged the gun. At that moment Raoul found leisure
to walk a yard or two toward the rear, in order to ascertain if the
cover of Ghita were sufficient. The girl was on her knees, lost to all
around her; though, could he have read her heart, he would have found it
divided between entreaties to the Deity and love for himself.
The lugger sustained no harm. O'Leary had overshot her, in his desire
to make his missiles reach. Not even a canister had lodged in her spars,
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or torn her sails. The usual luck appeared to attend her, and the people
on board fought with renewed confidence and zeal. Not so with the
felucca, however. Here the fire of the English had been the most
destructive. The wary and calculating McBean had given his attention to
this portion of the French defences, and the consequences partook of the
sagacity and discretion of the man. A charge of canister had swept
across the felucca's decks, more than decimating Ithuel's small force;
for it actually killed one, and wounded three of his party.
But, the din once commenced, there was no leisure to pause. The fire was
kept up with animation on both sides, and men fell rapidly. The boats
cheered and pressed ahead, the water becoming covered with a wide
sheet of smoke.
In moments like this, the safest course for the assailants is to push
on. This the English did, firing and cheering at every fathom they
advanced, but suffering also. The constant discharge of the carronades,
and the total absence of wind, soon caused a body of smoke to collect in
front of the rock, while the English brought on with them another,
trailing along the water, the effect of their own fire. The two shrouds
soon united, and then there was a minute when the boats could only be
seen with indistinctness. This was Ithuel's moment. Perceiving that the
ten or twelve men who remained to him were engrossed with their muskets,
he pointed the two carronades himself, and primed them from the horns
which he had never quitted. For the felucca he felt no present concern.
Winchester and all the boats in the centre of the English line were most
in advance, the fire of the ruins urging them to the greatest exertion.
Then McBean, besides being more distant, could not cross the rock in
front of the felucca without making a circuit, and he must, as yet, be
ignorant of the existence of the impediment. Ithuel was cool and
calculating by nature, as well as by habit; but this immunity from
present risk probably increased the immediate possession of qualities so
important in battle. His carronades were loaded to their muzzles with
bags of bullets, and he beckoned to the best seaman of his party to take
one of the matches, while he used the other himself, each holding a
monkey's-tail in one hand, in readiness to train the light gun, as
circumstances required. The pieces had been depressed by Ithuel himself,
in the midst of the fray, and nothing remained but to wait the moment
for using them.
This moment was now near. The object of the English was to land on the
principal islet, and to carry the ruin by storm. In order to do this,
all the boats of their centre converged in their courses to the same
point; and the smoke being driven off by each concussion of the guns, a
dark cluster of the enemy diverged from the ragged outline of the vapor,
within fifty yards of the intended point of landing. Ithuel and his
companion were ready. Together they sighted, and together they fired.
This unexpected discharge from a quarter that had been so comparatively
silent, surprised both friends and foes, and it drove a fresh mantle of
smoke momentarily athwart the rock and the open space in its front.
A cry arose from the dense shroud of battle that differed from the
shouts of success and courage. Physical agony had extorted shrieks from
the stoutest hearts, and even the French in the ruins paused to look for
the next act of the desperate drama. Raoul seized the opportunity to
prepare for the expected hand-to-hand struggle; but it was unnecessary.
The cessation in the firing was common in both parties, and it gave the
vapor a minute in which to lift the curtain from the water.
When the late obstacle was raised high enough to admit of a view, the
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result became evident. All the English boats but one had scattered, and
were pulling swiftly, in different directions, from the scene of
slaughter. By taking this course, they diverted and divided the fire of
the enemies; an expedient of which it would have been happier had they
bethought them earlier. The remaining boat was a cutter of the
Terpsichore. It had received the weight of canister from Ithuel's own
gun, and of sixteen men it had contained when it left the frigate's
side, but two escaped. These fellows had thrown themselves into the sea,
and were picked up by passing boats. The cutter itself came drifting
slowly in toward the rock, announcing the nature of its fearful cargo by
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