place, as you find us today.
'Not quite as bad an area to cover as the squadron buried deep in the sack near Bayonne, where Spain and France meet, should a storm roll in from the West, as they usually do, hereabouts,' Lord Boxham said with a visible wince. 'Navigation is also tricky, I warn you now. From Rochefort Suth'rd to Biarritz and the Spanish border, this coast is very shoal, the land quite flat, with few notable headlands by which to estimate position. Should fog arise, one may cast ashore before one knows what has happened.'
'Aye, sir,' Lewrie said as they reached the aft end of the deck by the poop cabins, and turned to pace back towards the hammock netting overlooking Chatham % waist; that reply was usually safest. 'Though I have the latest London chartmakers' works, perhaps your Flag-Captain is in possession of more current soundings, and such, which I might obtain or copy, milord?' he went on, trying to sound energetic and thoughtful.
'Your senior in the Inshore Squadron will have better, no doubt, Captain Lewrie,' Lord Boxham said, rather dismissively, as if he resented having his lecture interrupted. 'Savage, so I note, is of the Fifth Rate, which means that she has a draught of seventeen or eighteen feet, Lewrie? Good. That will serve nicely.
'Now as I was saying,' the Rear-Admiral went on, and yes, he had felt interrupted, and was irked by such from a mere frigate captain. 'There is another squadron keeping an eye on Rochefort, the small ports of the Vendee region, Saint Nazaire, and the mouth of the Loire up North, whilst my duties principally encompass the river Gironde, and what the French possess in the way of warships built or building, fitting out, or readying for sea from the port of Bordeaux, up-river.'
'I see, milord,' Lewrie replied with his best stern phyz on.
'Once on-station, a perusal of the charts will shew you, Lewrie, that the Gironde, below the last of the aits, is actually a very wide ria, thirty miles or so long, and over six miles wide as it approaches its mouth. Rather a lot of places for French warships to find a safe mooring.'
'And, for French merchantmen as well, I should expect, milord.'
'You demm'd frigate captains!' Rear-Admiral Iredell, Lord Boxham, barked in disgust. 'All prize-money and loot, with not a thought for anything else!'
'Your pardons, milord,' Lewrie countered, 'but starvin' our foes o' food and naval stores, both, keeps 'em tied up alongside the piers, and eases our duties, I should think.'
' 'Thout the proper battle that stops their demm'd business for good an' all?' Lord Boxham said with an outraged snort. 'God forbid! Well, you'll be in good company, Captain Lewrie. All I may spare for the close blockade are light frigates, some over-aged sloops of war, some newer brig-sloops, and eight-gun cutters under mere Lieutenants… all of whom dream of money' he gravelled, in a huff.
'Very well, sir,' Lewrie flatly replied.
'You're to seek out and report to Commodore Ayscough, in HMS Chesterfield…,' Lord Boxham said.
'The one with the bagpipers, milord?' Lewrie could not help but blurt out, for then-Captain Ayscough had been his superior in the Far East 'tween the wars, in Telesto.
'Yess, him!' Lord Boxham barked, as if rowed beyond all temperance to be interrupted a third time, or that the sound of bagpipes set him howling mad.
'Delightful, milord!' Lewrie happily said, sure of a better welcome.
'Deserve each other, more-like,' the Admiral spat. 'Well, off with you, Captain Lewrie. Now your mail and despatches are aboard, I shall not keep you. Ayscough should lie to the Sou'east of the river mouth today.'
'Thank you for receiving me, milord. Adieu,' Lewrie said with a doff of his hat, and a sketchy bow in conge.
'Try not to drown yourself, sir!'
'Can't afford to, milord,' Lewrie rejoined. 'I've not yet been to France!'
Rias? Lewrie fumed on his way back down the battens to his boat; rias and aits? A ria 's a narrow estuary, and the Gironde's as broad as the Straits of Dover. And what's wrong with river islands, not aits/ Good old Ayscough a Commodore, though! Even if he still has his damned bagpipers!
Lewrie sat himself down on a thwart near the launch's tiller to contemplate whether Commodore Ayscough would go so far with his fondness for all things Scottish as to dine him aboard on a haggis, cock-a-leekie soup, and turnips! And, on a happier note, Lewrie also considered whether he should send Midshipman Carrington aloft to spend the night perched on the cross-trees, or hang him from the main-mast truck with a line round his balls!
HMS Chesterfield was an older two-decker 64, bluff and beamy, but, with a more pronounced tumblehome from waterline to her gangways and bulwarks, was much easier for Lewrie to board-this time with Midshipman Grace in charge of his launch. Savage had run across her in late afternoon, in company with one of the few large 44-gun Fifth Rate frigates, HMS Lyme. As soon as numbers and private signals had been exchanged, Chesterfield had made two more short hoists; 'First Dog,' followed by 'Captain(s) Repair Onboard,' as sure an invitation to supper as a hand-delivered note, or a butler's china bell. Still in full dress, Lewrie gladly paced 'til near Seven Bells of the Day Watch, then called his boat and crew away once more. Just at the last strokes of Chesterfield 's bell chiming Eight Bells, he was at the foot of her boarding battens, and scrambling up. As the dog's vane atop his cocked hat crested the lip of the entry- port, a drum rolled, Bosuns' calls began to shrill; Marine boots on oak decks, Marine palms on polished muskets stamped or slapped, and… God, there was the dreadful preliminary drone of single bagpipe, before the piper launched himself into a lively rendition of 'Campbell's Farewell to Red Castle,' one of Ayscough's very favourites, as Lewrie could attest after three long years serving under him; hearing it, and being told its title, every bloody day!
'Lewrie, you young scamp, sir!' Commodore Ayscough bellowed with glee as he came up to doff hats with him, then seize his paw and shake vigourously. 'Look at the laddie, will ye all… a Post-Captain on his own bottom, just clanking with medals for bravery, ha ha!'
' 'Tis good to see you again, too, sir,' Lewrie rejoined. 'And, you a Commodore. Had Admiralty a parcel o' wit, you should've hoisted a broad pendant years ago.'
'Aye, and if more cripples and wheezers meet their Maker, I'll make Rear-Admiral as they fall off Navy List,' Ayscough whooped. 'You are delivering orders, or are you to join my motley crowd, Lewrie?'
'To join, sir, and see if we may have a merry time with the foe over yonder,' Lewrie told him, vaguely pointing off to the East, where the French Biscay coast could almost be made out in the quickly dying sunset. 'As we did in the Far East.'
'Toppin news!' Ayscough exclaimed. 'The Frog shore is crawlin' with smugglers, spy boats, and all sorts of shippin', and too many of them still manage to get past us, thin as we are in these waters. How many guns is your Savage, and what's your weight of metal?'
When told that she mounted twenty-six 18-pounders, with a pair of 12-pounders for chase guns, and mounted eight 9-pounders and eight 32-pounder carronades, Ayscough was delighted.
' Chesterfield is a stout old barge, Lewrie, but a slow-coach,' Ayscough grumbled as the music died, the side-party and Marines were dismissed, and they paced the length of the gangway. 'Good for commanding a squadron, but not for helping at close inshore work, either. Rather have me a frigate like yours… keep me hand in, partake of a hot action now and then, but…,' he said with a resigned sigh. 'Now
