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The enemy proved to be the Hebe, mounting 28 18-pounders, and 12 8-pounders, 40 guns in all, and measuring 1063 tons, with 363 men on board, commanded by the Chevalier de Vigney. At 7 a.m. the Rainbow commenced firing her bow-chasers, which were returned by the frigate, and, as it proved, several shot falling on board, the enemy discovered their size.
Except where shells had fallen on them or trenches been dug through, the roads, when once the mud had been removed, were found virtually intact. Soon G.S. wagons and limbers and 18-pounders were passing forward. The war was on the move. To explore the former German trenches was a pleasing novelty. The front line was deep and fairly dry.
The Pomone was at that time by much the largest frigate ever built, being only one hundred tons smaller than a 64-gun ship, and carrying long 24-pounders on her main deck. The Flora, being only a 36, with 18-pounders, was a very unequal match for this powerful ship, which soon cut her sails and rigging to pieces, shot away her fore-topmast, and left her astern.
A party was set to work to hoist up the barrels of stores, according to the list handed in by Wilkinson, while Edgar was sent on shore with forty men, with an order to the Turkish commander of artillery, to hand over to him two 18-pounders and as much ammunition for them and the 14-pounder guns as could be provided.
Then the three carronades peppered him hotly; and he hurled an iron shower back with fatal effect. Then at last the long 18-pounders on the gun-deck got a word in. The old Niler was not the man to miss a vessel alongside in a quiet sea; he sent two round shot clean through him; the third splintered his bulwark, and swept across his deck.
Fortunately for the merchant-vessels, Commodore Rogers discovered the British frigate Belvidera, of 36 guns, 18-pounders, commanded by Captain Byron, standing towards him. Captain Byron, having ascertained the character of the American squadron, tacked and made sail, not so much to escape as to lead the enemy to a distance from their expected prey.
As has already been mentioned, the Psyche was a British man-o'-war. She was a sloop, armed with fourteen long 18-pounders; and carried a crew which had originally consisted of one hundred and thirty men, but which had now been reduced by sickness and casualties to one hundred and four, all told.
One of the Infantry brigadiers, a tall, tireless, fighting soldier, who started the war as a captain, had come round to discuss with the colonel artillery support for the fresh attack his Brigade were to make at 5.45 P.M. This brigadier was rather apt to regard 18-pounders as machine-guns; and it was sometimes instructive to note the cool good-humoured way in which the colonel guided his enthusiasm into other channels.
The Loire, however, was now exposed to a hot fire from a fort of 12 long 18-pounders, from which, as she was less than a quarter-of-a-mile off, nearly every shot struck her hull. Finding that by standing on he should be exposed to a still hotter fire, Captain Maitland ran as close in as he could venture, and anchoring the frigate with a spring on her cable, opened her broadside.
We were supposed to be in reserve to meet a possible counter-attack from the woods to the east of Outpost Hill, but at 10 o'clock word arrived that we were no longer needed, and we recrossed the valley to the familiar Mansura hollow. This we found to be a noisy spot. Several batteries of 18-pounders were cracking away and the Turks were returning the compliment with heavier stuff.
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