Voyages and Travels of Captain Basil Hall, etc

Preface

. THE young folks who may read this book will naturally be glad to know something about its author. By those who were boys in the second quarter of the present century, Captain Basil Hall is remembered as one of the most popular writers of his time ; ancl even more recently his works have been sought after by those who are fond of personal adventures by sea and land detailed in a lively style. He was acquainted with Sir Walter Scott, who admired his power of writing interesting narratives. When Scott was in his last illness, and it was thought that a residence abroad might prolong his life, it was on Captain Hall's suggestion that a ship of war was, by order of the king, placed at his service for a voyage to the Mediterranean ; ancl all the arrangements for the embarkation at Ports mouth were made by Hall, and were carried out under his eye.

Basil Hall was born on December 31st, 1788. He is usually said to have been born in Edinburgh ; but the opening sentences of this book are not consistent with that idea. His father was Sir James Hall of Dunglass, in the south-east of Haddingtonshire — an amiable country gentleman, and a distinguished man of science, who made important contributions both to geology and to chemistry. Basil received his education at the High School of Edinburgh. His attendance there seems to have been both irksome and unprofitable, and he was never so glad as when a holiday enabled him to go off post-haste to Dunglass, with its grand outlook over the North Sea, and to take sailing trips with his friends the seamen of the east coast. Through his father's influence he was enabled to enter the royal navy in 1802, when he became a midshipman on board of the Leander (fifty guns), the flag-ship of Admiral Sir Andrew Mitchell.

The present volume tells the story of his life during the next ten years, which were spent almost con tinuously at sea ; for he seems to have returned to England only twice in that long time. He served on the Halifax station for the first six years, but in 1806 he was transferred to the Leopard, the flag-ship of the new ad miral then appointed. In 1808 he returned to Plymouth, paid a flying visit to his friends in Scotland, and then passed his examination at Somerset House, and very soon got his commission as lieutenant of the Endymion, which was fitting out for service on the coast of Spain. He spent the next three years in that ship, visiting Madeira and cruising in the Atlantic in BLOGRAPHLCAL

PREFACE.

. search of French ships. In 1812 he sailed in the Volaeje. for the East; and with that the story of the present volume comes to an end. When Hall reached Trincomalee, in Ceylon, he was transferred to the Illustrious, the flag-ship of Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, then commanding in the East Indies. Hall served under Hood till the death of the latter in 1814. In the same year he was promoted to the rank of commander, and in 1817 to that of post-captain. In 1816, in command of the Lyra, he accompanied Lord Amherst's diplomatic mission to China. While the embassy was at Pekin, Hall visited Corea with his ship, and gathered material for his first book, which was published on his return to England in 1817 — " A Voyage of Discovery to the Western Coast of Corea, ancl the Great Loo-Choo Island in the Japan Sea."

The novelty of the scenes made the book very popular. Hall next visited the west coast of America ; which resulted some years later in the publication of " Extracts from a Journal written on the Coast of Chili, Peru, and Mexico, in the years 1820, 1821, and 1822." Captain Hall was now regarded as one of the popular authors of the day, and his remarkable facility in writing made the work of authorship a pleasure to him. At the Christmas of 1824 he visited Sir Walter Seott at Abbotsford, and he was welcomed on account both of his own reputation and of Scott's friendship for his father, Sir James Hall. The captain wrote voluminous diaries describing the life at Abbotsford, of which Lockhart afterwards made use in his life of the novelist ; but he rather annoyed Scott by adopting the practice of keeping a note-book on his knee while at table.

In the following year Hall married a daughter of Sir James Hunter, Consul-General for Spain, and retired from active service. He now made literature the business of his life. Having spent upwards of a year in Can ada and the United States, where he traversed nearly nine thousand miles by land and water, he published on his return " Travels in North America," in three volumes — a work which gave great offence in the States, on account of its severe strictures on American society. Hall's next publication was the work portions of which are reproduced in the present volume. It was designed chiefly for young readers, and was entitled "Fragments of Voyages ancl Travels." It was issued in three small volumes, and was so popular that the author was induced to publish two other series of three volumes each, making nine volumes in all (1831 1S40).

His subsequent works were "Schloss Heinfield ; or, A Winter in Lower Styria" (1836), and "Patchwork," a collection of tales and sketches of travel (1S41). Constant literary exertion weakened his brain, and he lost his reason. He died in the Royal Hospital of Gosport, Sep tember 11, 1844. CONTENTS. I. EARLY PREDILECTIONS, .... ... .... 9 II. FIRST GOING AFLOAT, .... .... .... 19 III. COCK-PIT DISCIPLINE, .... .... .... 31 IV. BERMUDA IN THE PEACE, .... .... .... 4G V. MIDSHIPMEN'S PRANKS, .... .... .... Gl VI. DIVERSITIES IN DISCIPLINE, .... .... .... 72 VII. COCK-PIT SQUABBLES, .... .... .... 78 VIII. MAST-HEADING A YOUNG GENTLEMAN, .... .... 82 IX. KEEPING WATCH, .... .... .... .... 87 X. DANGERS OF A NOVA SCOTIA FOG — WRECK OF THE "ATALANTE," .... .... .... .... 102 XI. BLOCKADING A NEUTRAL PORT, .... ....

Ill XII. GOOD AND BAD COMMANDERS, .... .... .... 118 XIII. DUTIES OF A PRIZE-MASTER, .... .... .... 131 XIV. HEAVING THE LOG, .... .... .... ... 138 XV. THE GULF STREAM, .... .... .... .... 150 XVI. CHANGE OF SHIP, .... .... .... ... 155 XVII LAST VIEW OF BERMUDA, .... .... .... 160 XVIII. RETURN TO ENGLAND, .... .... .... 164 XIX. THE FIRST PROMOTION, .... .... .... 170 XX. EFFECTING AN EXCHANGE, .... .... .... 180 XXI. FIRST GLIMPSE OF SPAIN, .... .... .... 189 XXII. SPANISH THEATRICALS, .... .... .... 199 XXIII, SPANISH SOCIETY, .... .... .... .... CONTENTS. viii XXIV. SPANISH FALSEHOODS, 212 218 XXV. THE BATTLE OF CORUNNA, XXVI, THE EVENING AFTER THE BATTLE, CORCUBION, 234 XXVII. XXVIII. 244 255 A RISING IN GALICIA, 206 XXIX. DESTRUCTION OF CORCUBION, EFFECTS OF INVASION, xxx, 277 AN AWKWARD PREDICAMENT, A SEAMAN'S GRAVE, 283 XXXI, 292 XXXII XXXIII.

XXXIV XXXV. MADEIRA, 300 MADEIRA — TRIP TO THE MOUNTAIN, A STUPENDOUS FLOOD, 306 310 XXXVI XXXVII. XXXVIII THE CHASE, 320 A SHIPWRECKED CREW, ROCKALL, 337 342 349 XXXIX, EASTWARD BOUND, IN THE TROPICS, XL. 354 PROGRESS OF THE VOYAGE, SPORT AT SEA, 302 XLI. XLII, VOYAGES AND TRAVELS.

Chapter I. Early Predilections

VARIOUS circumstances conspired to give me, very early in life, what is called a taste for the sea. In the first place, I came into the world in the midst of a heavy gale of wind, when such was the violence of the storm, and the beating of the rain, that there were some thoughts of removing the whole party to a less rickety corner of the old family mansion,* which shook from top to bottom. So strong, indeed, was the impression made on the imagination of those present, by the roaring of the surf, close at hand, the whistling of the wind in the drenched forest, and the obvious rocking of the house under the heavy gusts of that memorable gale, that, as soon as I was old enough to understand anything at all, the association between the events of my future life ancl those of my birth-night began to be sown in my mind.

Thus, long before I shipped a pair of trousers, I felt that a salt water destiny was to be mine ; and as everybody encouraged me to cherish these early predilections for the sea, I grew up with something of the same kind of certainty of becoming a sailor that an elder brother does of becoming a country gentleman, from his knowing — " for quickly comes such knowledge " — that the estate is entailed upon him. The holidays, also, which released me from the irksome con- * Dunglass Castle, East- Lothian, December 31, 1788. EARLY PREDILECTIONS. 10 finement of the High School of Edinburgh were passed in the country, on a part of the rugged sea-coast of Scotland peculiarly calculated to foster nautical propensities. During the weary months whicli preceded and followed these six delicious weeks of liberty, my thoughts, instead of being devoted to the compre hension of abstract rules of grammar, which it was our worthy preceptor's sole object in life to drive into us, invariably strayed back to the picturesque and iron-bound shore, as it is happily termed in naval language, along which I was wont to ramble in full enjoyment during the six weeks' vacation.

I never lost a minute in hurrying away from school the instant our examinations were ended. At these periodical trials, it may be well supposed, I never cut any great figure ; for I contented myself with trying to keep a little above the middle of the class, partly because some boys sat thereabouts to whom I was attached, and partly because the particular bench alluded to stood near the fire. As soon as the term of imprisonment was over, I flew to the coach-office, and never felt perfectly satisfied that all was right and safe till fairly seated on the top by the side of my friend the guard, ancl bowling along the highroad. On reaching the country, my first object always was to hunt out some of the fishermen on the shore, who readily engaged to give me a row next morning. After a sleepless night of antici pated delights, I commonly found myself at sunrise in a fishing boat, half a league from the coast, surrounded by congenial spirits — fellows who had no idea of grammar, and who were willing, for a very small bribe, or from motives of professional sympathy, to consider me as somebody, and not to reckon me as a mere zero, serving no other purpose but to augment the numbers of a school, without having any value in myself.

At all events, these hardy boatmen became so much amused with my juvenile enthusiasm about their art, that they took great pleasure in feeding my fancy with tales of nautical dangers and hardships, the joyous excitement of which placed the dull drudgery of syntax in sad contrast. On these expeditions, however, I was always wofully sea-sick ; for the boats, or cobbles, as Scotch fishing-boats are called, were not altogether so tidy as a man-of war's gig ; besides which, they generally enclosed a due allowance EARIY PREDIIECTIONS. 11 of bilge water, mixed up with decayed remnants of forgotten fish. So that my taste for the sea had often tough work to hold its ground against the deranged action of my stomach ; ancl I must frankly own that I often leaped on shore again, to the enjoyment of steady footing and an atmosphere less fishified, with a half uttered vow at my lips that I would never tempt the ocean more.

This slight infidelity to my beloved element, however, was always very transient, for it seldom lasted longer than the time it cost to climb the high steep bank which guards the east coast of Scotland. From this elevation, the view extends far up the Firth of Forth on the left hand, with many a mountain lying beyond it ; in front, to the north, stretches the wide German Ocean ; while the scene is bounded on the right, or eastern side, by one of the noblest promontories in the world, called Fast Castle,* better known as the Wolf's Crag of the "Bride of Lammermoor." To my young fancy this scene appeared, not unnaturally, the grandest of all landscapes ; ancl still, after I have rambled for more than a quarter of a century over the earth's surface, and have become ac quainted with some of the sublimest works of nature, my opinion of the scenery in question is not changed otherwise than by in creased admiration.

In the meantime, my nautical operations were necessarily limited to the undignified navigation of my father's horse-pond, upon which, with the assistance of an obliging carpenter lad, I managed to make the first fair trial of that element with which, in after life, it was my happy lot to become so familiar. Our vessel consisted of two or three rough logs, filched from the farmyard, and sundry planks nailed or lashed across them. A mast was readily obtained by the abstraction of a bar from the nearest paling. Considerable difficulty arose as to the sail, for canvas was a material much beyond our finances or influence, till at length my ingenious companion (who, by the way, distinguished himself after wards as a ship-builder) suggested the idea of employing one of the mats used by the gardener to protect his plants from the frost.

Thus, step by step, our gallant vessel was at length rigged out ; and on the second day of our labours, everything being ready, and the wind fair, we started from one end of this inland sea, and, * On the coast of Berwickshire, near St. Abb's Head. EARLY PREDILECTLONS. 12 after a prosperous voyage of about ten minutes, by "God's grace" — to use the quaint language still printed in bills of lading — more than by any skill of our own, we reached the other extremity without any serious disaster. The pleasure which this primitive voyage inspired has never since been much exceeded. It was the first unalloyed happiness I had ever known, and at once opened up a new prospect of hope ancl resolution, which rendered the weary load of school existence somewhat less intolerable than it had been before.

It also gave me a foretaste of the joys of enterprise and independent command, which, in their turn, called up innumerable visions of successful resource, surmounted difficulties, and all the semi-savage delights of such a life as that of Robinson Crusoe, with the additional ad vantage of that great adventurer's example. Little did I then think, and, in fact, it was nearly impossible I should reasonably think, that the realities of life could ever come up to these imaginary conceptions. Ancl yet I have lived to ex perience that, sanguine as I then was, the anticipation fell much short of the glorious reality which I met with almost everywhere. Indeed, I can declare, with perfect truth, that in all my voyages and travels I have generally found things more curious ancl more interesting, in all respects, than I had previously looked for; or, if the career of gratified curiosity has at any time been checked, it has only been followed by a more ardent pursuit, crowned ulti mately by still higher rewards.

This process of feeding the curiosity was well enough exem plified by a series of very exciting, though often painful and seemingly discouraging, incidents that occurred every year on the coast already mentioned, where I passed the holidays. Ten leagues, or thirty geographical miles, due north of our ancient Castle of Dunglass (once the headquarters of Oliver Cromwell's army) lies the Bell Rock,* just off the mouth of the Tay. Up to the commencement of the present century, this rock was justly considered one of the most formidable clangers that the navigators of those seas had to encounter. Its head, merged under the sur face during the greater part of the tide, at no time made much show above water. There was nothing for it, therefore, but to See Southey's poem " The Inchcape Rock. EARL Y PREDIIEC TIONS. 13 keep well clear of the mischief, or, as seamen express themselves, to give the rock a wide berth.

Ships, accordingly, bound for the Forth, in their constant terror of this ugly reef, not content with giving it ten or even twenty miles of elbow-room, must needs edge off a little more to the south, so as to hug the shore, in such a way that, when the wind chopped round to the northward, as it often did, these over-cautious navigators became embayed in a deep bight to the westward of Fast Castle. If the breeze freshened before they had time to work out, they paid dearly for their apprehensions of the Bell Rock, by driving upon ledges fully as sharp, and far more extensive and inevitable. The consequence was, that from three to four vessels, ancl sometimes half-a-dozen, used to be wrecked each winter within a mile or two of our very door. Perhaps there are few more exciting spectacles than a vessel stranded on a lee-shore, and especially such a shore, when it is fringed with reefs extending far out, and offering no spot for shelter.

The hapless ship lies dismasted, bilged, ancl beat about by the waves, with her despairing crew clinging to the wreck or to the shrouds, ancl uttering cries totally inaudible in the roar of the sea ; while at each successive dash of the breakers the number of the survivors is thinned, till at length they all disappear, ancl the gallant bark goes to pieces. It is, however, the greatest of all mistakes to suppose that the contemplation of such disasters has any tendency to divert a young mind from following its original bent towards a profession of such varied and high excitement as that of the sea. At all events, the effect of each succeeding shipwreck I witnessed was only to stimu late me more ancl more to pursue the sole object of all my thoughts waking or dreaming. I can recollect, indeed, being conscious of a feeling of awe, approaching at times to dread, as I saw the waves curling over these devoted vessels, which, as the tide advanced, they were gradually tearing to pieces.

But still there was always more of confidence ancl pleasure than of alarm in the prospect which my mind's eye conjured up to itself beyond these stirring adventures. To this clay there is told a traditional story amongst our fishermen of my having once contributed to save a ship's crew by engaging EARLY PREDIIECTIONS. 14 some country people to transport a boat from a distance across the edge of Lammermoor in a cart. The account further sets forth that I had only a few halfpence in my pocket, and that when these proved insufficient to induce the driver of the vehicle to go out of his way, I stoutly asserted I had authority from my father to offer five pounds for any such assistance. Upon this pledge it appears the cart was freighted with its unwonted cargo, ancl the boat reached the spot in good time.

I have no recollection whatsoever of this incident ; but something of the kind may possibly have occurred, or more probably may have been merely talked of amongst the fishermen, my great patrons ancl admirers. At all events, these sayings and doings, by making me feel not so utterly useless in the world as I was made to appear at school, may have united me by still stronger ties to the animating pro fession for which I was brought up, apparently as a matter of course. Future generations of the Dunglass family, however, will not have this costly ancl melancholy source of encouragement for their children to go to sea ; the shipwrecks which so paradoxically helped to do me this good turn being now, fortunately for com merce and humanity, hardly ever known at that part of the coast. The fatal Bell Rock, the direct and indirect cause of so many losses, has recently been converted into one of the greatest sources of security that navigation is capable of receiving.

By means of scientific skill, aided by well-managed perseverance, with the ex ample of the Eddystone to copy from, a lighthouse * one hundred and twenty feet high has been raised upon this formidable reef. ISTow the mariner, instead of doing all he can to avoid the spot, once so much dreaded, eagerly runs for it, ancl counts himself happy when he gets sight of the revolving star on the top, which, from its being variously coloured, he can distinguish from every other light in that quarter. He is then enabled to steer directly for his port in perfect security, though the night be ever so dark. On returning from these scenes of real life and activity to that most picturesque of cities, the Old Town of Edinburgh, I was plunged into tenfold gloom, ancl really clo not know what I should have done had I not lighted accidentally upon Shakespeare's cle- * Built in 1S06-10.

ADMIRAL DUNCAN. VISCOUNT DUNCAN OF CAMPERDOWN. Pag-s 15. EARIY PREDILECTIONS. 15 scription of the ship-boy reposing on the high and giddy mast. This idea was so congenial to the fancy of a sailor elect, and withal so exquisitely poetical, that I could not rest till possessed of a copy of the whole of his plays, which I forthwith read over from beginning to end — to the total destruction, I am half ashamed to say, of all the little respect I then had for the ancient classics. The Tempest was soon learned almost by heart, in particular the nautical parts of it, and I swore an eternal friendship with the boatswain, whose seamanship, by the way, though wild ancl strange, is upon the whole wonderfully correct. One would like to know how and where Shakespeare picked up his technical knowledge ! About this period also, when my thoughts presented a strange jumble of real and imaginary shipwrecks, mixed up with the intricate niceties of Latin grammar, I met my father one day in the streets close to the great Lord Duncan's house.* " Well met !

" he cried. " Come along, master sailor, and you shall see the hero of Camperdown." I was accordingly introduced as a future brother-seaman to this distinguished officer, whose noble appearance was in such good keeping with his renown that I felt my respect for him rise at every moment of the interview. " You are a youngster of some taste," observed his lordship good-naturedly, on hearing that I liked the sea ; " and if you will come this way I can show you something to encourage you to stick to your business." So saying, the admiral led me \o another room, where a flag he had taken from Admiral de Winter on the llth of October 1797 was hanging up. Although this sight in such company was well calculated to make an impression-, I remember being still more enchanted with the frankness and kindliness of the veteran's manner.

I could not help saying to myself that if such a man saw reason to treat a boy with attention, I was surely entitled to something less disrespectful than I met with daily at school. Not long afterwards, I happened to meet Professor John Play fair of Edinburgh College at a house in the country. It was the singular fortune of this amiable and accomplished philosopher to be a favourite equally with the young and with the old. He * No. 5 George Square, Edinburgh. EARLY PREDILECTLONS. 16 won the regard and the confidence of children, not only by the matchless sweetness of his disposition, but by the generous en couragement he delighted to give to their opening thoughts ; while, among men of science or of letters, he was not more admired for the extent and variety of his scientific and literary attainments, than for the clear, popular, and even eloquent facility with which he gave expression to the most abstruse branches of knowledge.

I found him one morning seated on the ground taking the sun's altitude with a pocket sextant, from an artificial horizon made by pouring some treacle into a bowl. Upon my expressing great curiosity to know what magical operation he could be about, he at once explained, or rather endeavoured to explain, that he wished to know the exact time of clay that he might set his watch. In stead of cutting me short with some idle reply about the thing being above my comprehension, he intermitted his work, and sought earnestly to make me perceive how closely such observations were connected with the duties of a naval life. Next day he gave me a copy of " Bonnycastle's Astronomy," which I possess to this hour ; and I think I may date from the conversation above alluded to the growth of a taste for that branch of professional pursuits called nautical astronomy, which has not only proved at all times a source of the highest enjoyment, but, as may be seen in the sequel, was of great use in helping me on in the world.

I shall be sorry if what I have here said dispose any idle youth who may not find himself happy at school to try so rugged a pro fession as that of the sea, unless he have many other and more substantial reasons for giving it the preference. Indeed, the whole system of school discipline has, I understand, been so much changed since the present century commenced, that boys have probably much less excuse than I had for not sticking to their lessons. After all, however, truth forces me to confess that the fault lay fully more with the scholar than with the school — with the pupil more than with the pedagogue, and my head had got so filled with notions of voyaging and travelling, that even if I had been at Eton or at Harrow I dare say I should have sighed to flee away. It is clear enough that no boy, instruct him as we will, can form correct ideas of what he is likely to meet with in any pro- E.ARL y predilectlons. 17 session.

Still, if his mind be ardently bent upon one particular pursuit, ancl his parents decide upon indulging this fancy, he will be bound in honour, if he have the spirit of a gentleman within him, to persevere in following up the line he has been allowed to choose for himself. In many other professions it is possible to calculate before hand, with more or less precision, the degree ancl kind of work which a young man is likely to be called upon to perform ; but there is peculiar difficulty in coming to any just conclusion upon these points, even in a vague way, in the life of a sailor. His range of duties includes the whole world ; he may be lost in the wilderness of a three-decker, or be wedged into a cock-boat of a cutter ; he may be half fried in Jamaica, or wholly frozen in Spitzbergen ; he may be cruising during six days of the week in the midst of a fleet of a hundred sail, and flounder in solitude on the seventh ; he may be peaceably riding at anchor in the morning, and in hot action before sunset.

He may waste his years in idle ness, the most fatal contingency of all to subordination ; or he may be worn out by sheer fatigue. If employed on the home station, he may hear from his friends every clay ; or if serving abroad, he may be fifteen months at a time, as I have been, without receiving a single letter or a newspaper. He may serve under a soft or easy-going commander, which is a great evil ; or be ground down by one of those tight hands who, to use the slang of the cock-pit, keep every one on board " under the fear of the Lord ancl a broom-stick." In short, a man may go to sea for twenty years and find no two commanding officers, and hardly two days, alike. All this, which is delightful to some minds, and productive in them of every kind of resource, is utterly distracting, and often ruinous, to others.

Weak frames generally sink under its severity, while weak minds become confused with its complication ancl the intensity of its action. On the other hand, the variety of objects in a sea-life is so boundless, that if a young man have only strength of body to endure the wear and tear of watching ancl other inevitable fatigues, and have also strength of character enough to persevere, in the certainty of openings occurring sooner or later by which his talents or his industry may find profitable (485) EARLY PREDLLECTIONS. employment, there can be little doubt that the profession of a sailor, to a person who is suited to it, is one of the most delightful in the world. Supposing that this ticklish question of the choice of a profession has been conceded to a boy, there remains the still more perplexing problem, what is the fittest method of training him beforehand, so that he may enter his new life with best effect 1 No two boys, perhaps, out of a dozen, intended for the sea, may require exactly the same kind of training ; but still there appears no reason why the whole number should not be equally well fitted, by previous education, to advance themselves in the service according to their respective talents, though some of them, at starting, may be altogether ignorant of those subjects generally supposed to be of the most indispensable utility at sea.