1814	Light Squadrons and Single Ships	342

delayed by nothing but the state of the wind." The effect of this upon a spirit like that of the gallant first lieutenant of the Seahorse in July, 1808, * may be partly conceived. On the 8th the wind proved fair ; and immediately the Confiance and her consorts moved from Isle-aux-Noirs into Lake Champlain, and anchored abreast of the main body of the British army, to wait until the whole of her crew had arrived from Quebec, and until the carpenters had fitted the ring-bolts for her guns, and the joiners completed the magazine for the reception of the powder, without which those guns could be of no use. On the 9th Captain Downie received a draught of marines, numbering, with a few artillerymen and soldiers, 86 men ; and, in the course of that and the following day, the whole of the petty officers and seamen intended for the ship came on board ; forming a total of 270 officers, seamen, marines, and boys. The seamen, among whom were 19 foreigners, were men of inferior quality and bad character ; who, as the term is, had " volunteered " from their respective ships, or, in plain words, had been dismissed from them in disgrace. Some, indeed, had been liberated from irons, for the very purpose of manning Captain Downie's ship. Ten ships of war at Quebec had furnished 118 of these " volunteers ; " and some transports had lent 25 of their men. The men of the Confiance, therefore, were all strangers to each other and to their officers ; and Captain Downie was acquainted with no officer on board his ship but his first lieutenant, and the latter with none of the other officers.

On the 10th, just as the last draught of the motley crew we have described was ascending the side of the Confiance, while the loud clank of the builder's hammer was still sounding in all parts of the ship, while the guns were being breeched and pointed through the ports, and while the powder, for the want of a place fitted for its reception, was lying in a boat alongside, an officer from Sir George Prevost came to solicit the instant co-operation of the British squadron. Relying upon the assurance now given by the commander-in-chief, that the army should attack the works of Plattsburg, while the squadron was attacking the American ships lying in front of them, Captain Downie in spite of the unprepared state of the Confiance, consented to go into action on the following morning., It was then agreed, that the Confiance, when rounding Cumberland head, which forms the northernmost point of Plattsburg bay, should scale her guns ; and that, at that instant, the column of attack should advance to storm the American works. As it could not well be said, that the Confiance mounted any guns at all, until they were placed upon her broadside, and as that had only just been done when the ship was thus on the eve of going into action with a greatly superior force, we have deferred until now giving any

* See vol. iv., p. 60.

^ back to top ^