FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87  
88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   >>   >|  
from Dungeness to Selsey-Bill." "That will make it all the more delightful to land at your front door, my friend; and all the easier to do it. My own plan is to strike with all force at the head-quarters of the enemy, because the most likely to be unprepared. About a year ago, when I was down here, a little before my dear father's death, without your commission I took command of your fishing-craft coming home for their Sunday, and showed them how to take the beach, partly to confirm my own suspicions. There is no other landing on all the south coast, this side of Hayling Island, fit to be compared with it for the use of flat-bottomed craft, such as most of Boney's are. And remember the set of the tide, which makes the fortunes of your fishermen. To be sure, he knows nothing of that himself; but he has sharp rogues about him. If they once made good their landing here, it would be difficult to dislodge them. It must all be done from the land side then, for even a 42-gun frigate could scarcely come near enough to pepper them. They love shoal water, the skulks--and that has enabled them to baffle me so often. Not that they would conquer the country--all brag--but still it would be a nasty predicament, and scare the poor cockneys like the very devil." "But remember the distance from Boulogne, Hurry. If they cannot cross twenty-five miles of channel in the teeth of our ships, what chance would they have when the distance is nearer eighty?" "A much better chance, if they knew how to do it. All our cruisers would be to the eastward. One afternoon perhaps, when a haze is on, they make a feint with light craft toward the Scheldt--every British ship crowds sail after them. Then, at dusk, the main body of the expedition slips with the first of the ebb to the westward; they meet the flood tide in mid-channel, and using their long sweeps are in Springhaven, or at any rate the lightest of them, by the top of that tide, just when you are shaving. You laugh at such a thought of mine. I tell you, my dear friend, that with skill and good luck it is easy; and do it they should, if they were under my command." If anybody else had even talked of such a plan as within the bounds of likelihood, Admiral Darling would have been almost enraged. But now he looked doubtfully, first at the sea (as if it might be thick with prames already), and then at the land--which was his own--as if the rent might go into a Frenchman's pocket, and then at
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87  
88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
command
 
channel
 
distance
 

chance

 
remember
 

landing

 
friend
 
afternoon
 

doubtfully

 

looked


prames

 
cruisers
 

eastward

 

Scheldt

 

British

 
crowds
 

twenty

 

pocket

 

Frenchman

 

Boulogne


eighty

 

nearer

 

talked

 

shaving

 

lightest

 

thought

 

Springhaven

 

expedition

 
enraged
 
Darling

sweeps

 
Admiral
 

westward

 

likelihood

 

bounds

 

frigate

 

showed

 

Sunday

 

partly

 

coming


commission

 
fishing
 

confirm

 

suspicions

 

Island

 
Hayling
 
compared
 

father

 

delightful

 
easier