While cruising along the coast, we one night perceived a large ship lying at anchor near the shore. We could not decide whether she was a large merchantman or a man of war; so we approached her with the utmost caution. Our doubts were soon removed, for she suddenly loosed all her sails and made chase after us. By the help of their glasses, our officers ascertained her to be an English frigate. Of course, it was folly to engage her; so we made all the sail we could carry, beat to quarters, lighted our matches, and lay down at our guns, expecting to be prisoners of war before morning. During the night we hung out false lights, and altered our course; this baffled our pursuer; in the morning she was no more to be seen.
The next sail we made was not so formidable. She was an English vessel at anchor in the Senegal river. We approached her and hailed. Her officer returned an insolent reply, which so exasperated our captain that he passed the word to fire into her, but recalled it almost immediately. The countermand was too late; for in a moment, everything being ready for action, we poured a whole broadside into our unfortunate foe. The current carried us away from the stranger. We attempted to beat up again, but our guns had roused the garrison in a fort which commanded the river; they began to blaze away at us in so expressive a manner, that we found it prudent to get a little beyond the reach of their shot, and patiently wait for daylight.
The next morning we saw our enemy hauled close in shore, under the protection of the fort, and filled with soldiers. At first, it was resolved to man the boats and cut her out; but this, after weighing the subject maturely, was pronounced to be too hazardous an experiment, and, notwithstanding our men begged to make the attempt, it was wisely abandoned. How many were killed by our hasty broadside, we never learned, but doubtless several poor fellows were hurried to a watery and unexpected grave, affording another illustration of the _beauty_ of war. This affair our men humorously styled “the battle of Senegal.”
After visiting Cape Three Points, we shaped our course for St. Thomas. On our way, we lost a prize through a display of Yankee cunning in her commander. We had hoisted English colors; the officer in command of the stranger was pretty well versed in the secrets of false colors, and in return he ran up the American flag. The bait took: supposing her to be American, we showed the stars and stripes. This was all the merchantman desired. It told him what we were, and he made all possible sail for St. Thomas. We followed, crowding every stitch of canvas our brig could carry; we also got out our sweeps and swept her along, but in vain. The merchantman was the better sailer, and succeeded in reaching St. Thomas, which, being a neutral port, secured her safety. Her name was the _Jane_, of Liverpool. The next morning, another Liverpool merchantman got into the harbor, unseen by our look-out until she was under the protection of the laws of neutrality.