Page:A history of the military transactions of the British nation in Indostan.djvu/713

BOOK XIII Baleine; tho attack of the Compagnie des Indes was to depend on the success of these. To prevent deviation, the boats of each division moved in a line, holding to one another by ropes. The niches of the oars were covered with fresh sheep-skin, to prevent creaking. The watch-word by which the men were to know one another in the attack, was Cathchart, a sound which few Frenchmen can pronounce. It lightened continually, as usual in the nights before the change of the monsoon; nevertheless, the division to the Hermione got within pistol-shot of her stern, before they were discovered; when the boats separating, ranged up equally on each side of the ship, and two went forward to the bows to cut the cables. During this approach, all hands in the ships were up, and firing musketry on the boats and shot came from the guns of the Compagnie des Indes, which lay to command both the other ships. The Hermione was boarded in as many parts as there were boats round her. The crew, which were 70 Europeans, behaved well, defending themselves and the ship with pikes and pistols, when the attack came hand to hand. The man who first attempted to cut the cable had his head cut off by an officer standing to guard it in the bows; nevertheless numbers prevailed, and the crew were all driven or tumbled down the hatch-ways; for no concert of surrender could take place, or be trusted. As soon as they were all down, the hatches were closed and centinels fixed over them, and then the mizen topsail, the only sail bent, was set to carry off the ship, which several boats were likewise ready to tow: but by this time, the shore, which had waited until the firing of the attack had ceased in the ship, began a violent cannonade, of which the lightning directed the aim; and shot continually struck: one destroyed the wheel of the rudder, killed the two men who were steering, and cut the tiller rope. The prisoners confined below deterred every one from going down into the gun-room to fix another rope to the rudder, and the single sail was not sufficient to steer the ship; the boats remained the only means of carrying her off, and they tugged with such violence, that they continually snapt the towing-ropes. Mean while the fire continued from the shore. At length, some imagined