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Updated: May 22, 2025
Below, Jean Touzel had eyes only for this sea-fight before him, for, despite the enormous difference, the Englishmen were now fighting their little craft for all that she was capable. But the odds were terribly against her, though she had the windward side, and the firing of the privateer was bad. The carronades on her flush decks were replying valiantly to the twelve-pounders of the brig.
Gad'rabotin respe d'la compagnie if dere is a ship of de King coum to de Ecrehoses, and de hofficier say to me" he tapped his breast "'Jean Touzel, tak de ships of de King trough de rocks, ah bah, I would rememb' mon onc' 'Lias. I would say, 'A bi'tot-good-bye.... Slowlee slowlee! We are at de place. Bear wif de land, ma'm'selle! Steadee! As you go! V'la! hitch now, Maitre Ranulph."
Had she been a sloop she might have attracted the attention of a French frigate or privateer wandering the seas in the interests of Vive la Nation! The business of the yawl was quite unimportant. Jean Touzel was going to Sark with kegs of wine and tobacco for the seigneur, and to bring over whatever small cargo might be waiting for Jersey.
The yacht Dorset had aboard her the Reverend Lorenzo Dow, an old friend of her commander. He was to be dropped at Sark, and was to come back with Jean Touzel in the Hardi Biaou, the matter having been arranged the evening before in the Vier Marchi. The saucy yawl had aboard Maitresse Aimable, Guida, and a lad to assist Jean in working the sails.
"How to remember she, ma fuifre!" said Jean Touzel. "But go on to the news of her." Maitresse Aimable spread the letter out and looked at it lovingly. Her voice rose slowly up like a bubble from the bottom of a well, and she spoke. "Ah man pethe benin, when it come, you are not here, my Jean. I take it to the Greffier to read for me.
"I went out to their ship last night." The chevalier looked with surprise and satisfaction at the seal on the letter, and, breaking it, spread open the paper, fumbled for the eye-glass which he always carried in his waistcoat, and began reading diligently. Meanwhile Ranulph turned to Guida. "To-morrow Jean Touzel and his wife and I go to the Ecrehos Rocks in Jean's boat," said he.
If he landed at Havre Gosselin and crossed the island on foot, whatever was to happen would be over and done, and that did not suit the book of Jean Touzel. More than once he had seen a little fighting, and more than once shared in it. If there was to be a fight he looked affectionately at his carronades then he wanted to be within seeing or striking distance.
His head was rather big for his body; he had a large mouth which laughed easily, a noble forehead, and big, short-sighted eyes. He knew French well, but could speak almost no Jersey patois, so, in compliment to him, Jean Touzel, Ranulph, and Guida spoke in English. This ability to speak English his own English was the pride of Jean's life.
To go to sea with Jean Touzel, folk said, was safer than living on land. Guida loved the sea; and she could sail a boat, and knew the tides and currents of the south coast as well as most fishermen. M. de Mauprat met her inquiring glance and nodded assent. She then said gaily to Ranulph: "I shall sail her, shall I not?" "Every foot of the way," he answered. She laughed and clapped her hands.
These, however, they filled again and again, and handed to Touzel, who thus extinguished all the fire he could see; but the smoke was so dense, that he worked in horrible doubt and obscurity, almost suffocated, and with his face and hands already scorched.
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