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That night the troops were landed, and a brig of war, the "Curieux," was despatched to England with word of his intentions. At the same time, while believing the allies were bound back to the Mediterranean, he recognized that it was possible they might be going farther north, to one of the Biscay ports, and consequently took measures to notify the commanding officer off Ferrol to be on his guard.
Monsieur Bonnet was to say a mass to implore the blessing of heaven on the works that were then beginning. All the laborers with their wives and children were present. "Here is your protegee," said the old gentleman, presenting to Veronique a feeble, suffering woman, apparently about thirty years of age. "Are you Catherine Curieux?" asked Madame Graslin. "Yes, madame."
Nelson followed four days later, on June 13, steering for his old post in the Mediterranean, but at the same time despatching the fast brig Curieux to England with news of the French fleet's return. This vessel by great good fortune sighted Villeneuve in mid-ocean, inferred from his northerly position that he was bound for Ferrol, and reached Portsmouth on July 8.
Meantime, at the very moment they were exchanging letters, pregnant movements were taking place, unknown to either. The brig "Curieux," despatched to England by Nelson the night before he left Antigua, had fallen in with the allied squadrons, nine hundred miles north-northeast from Antigua, on the 19th of June just a week after she sailed.
From there he obtained help and returned to the wreck, arriving at the Abrolhos in the middle of September; but during the absence of the commander the castaways had gone through a terrible experience, which is related in Therenot's Recueil de Voyages Curieux, and translated into English in Major's book, from which the following is extracted:
In fact, a short while after, we had a visit from this curieux, who, after he had said all manner of impertinences to us, went to hunt in our plantation, where he killed the only duck which we had left, and which he had the audacity to carry away in spite of our entreaties.
J'étois curieux de savoir comment les Grecs célébroient le service divin, et en conséquence je me rendis
My dear sir, Je regrette Charles Greville. C'etait l'un des spectateurs politiques les plus clairvoyants, les plus fins et les plus equitables que j'aie rencontres en ma vie; et un ami fidele sans se donner tout entier a personne. Vous devez regretter beaucoup son amitie et sa societe. Ses memoires seront bien curieux. Je suis charme qu'il vous les ait legues.
Her father and mother are farmers to the Messieurs Brezac. Catherine Curieux was about seventeen when Farrabesche was sent to the galleys. The Farrabesches were an old family from the same region, who settled in the commune of Montegnac; they hired their farm from the village.
To this request she added information about Catherine Curieux, begging Grossetete to interest the procureur-general in the good work she wished to do, and persuade him to write to the prefecture of police in Paris to recover traces of the girl. The circumstance of Catherine's having sent money to Farrabesche at the galleys ought to be clew enough to furnish information.
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