The Major waved farewell to them from the deck. Though once again
approached by Mr. Sturge, he had repelled all persuasions. In his
breast there welled up an increasing bitterness against his fate, but
on the point of dignity he could not be shaken. He would, on the
first fit occasion, have Captain Crang's blood; but he was obdurate,
though it cost him liberty for a while and compelled him to
disgusting hardship, to stand on the strictest terms of quarrel.
He turned to find the boatswain at his elbow, eyeing him with
sympathy and even a touch of respect.
"You done well," said Mr. Jope. "You don't look it, but you done
well, and I'll see you don't get put upon."
The _Vesuvius's_ destination, as the Major learnt, was to join a
squadron watching the Gallo-Batavian flotilla off the ports of
Boulogne, Ambleteuse and Calais; and the occasion of her dropping
anchor off Portsmouth on the way was a special and somewhat singular
one; yet no more singular than the crisis with which Great Britain
had then to cope.
Behind the sandhills from Ostend around to Etaples lay a French army
of 130,000 men, ready to invade us if for a few hours it could catch
our fleets napping. To transport them Napoleon had collected in the
ports of Ostend, Dunkirk, Calais, Ambleteuse, Vimereux, Boulogne and
Etaples, 954 transports and 1339 armed vessels--gun-brigs, schooners,
luggers, schuyts and prames; and all these light vessels lay snug in
their harbours, protected by shoals and sandbanks which our heavier
ships of war, by reason of their draught, could not approach.
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