He was a boy of fifteen when, in November, 1756, he entered the Marine
service as a royal cadet. He had not long to wait before tasting
"delight of battle," for the expected war was declared in May, and
before he was much older he was in the thick of it.
Chapter II.
THE FRENCH NAVAL OFFICER.
Laperouse first obtained employment in the French navy in the CELEBRE,
from March to November, 1757. From this date until his death,
thirty-one years later, he was almost continuously engaged, during
peace and war, in the maritime service of his country. The official
list of his appointments contains only one blank year, 1764. He had
then experienced close upon seven years of continuous sea fighting and
had served in as many ships: the CELEBRE, the POMONE, the ZEPHIR, the
CERF, the FORMIDABLE, the ROBUSTE, and the SIX CORPS. But the peace of
Paris was signed in the early part of 1763. After that, having been
promoted to the rank of ensign, he had a rest.
It was not a popular peace on either side. In Paris there was a current
phrase, "BETE COMME LA PAIX," stupid as the peace. In England, the
great Pitt was so indignant on account of its conditions that, all
swollen and pinched with gout as he was, he had himself carried to the
House of Commons, his limbs blanketted in bandages and his face
contorted with pain, and, leaning upon a crutch, denounced it in a
speech lasting three hours and forty minutes. The people cheered him to
the echo when he came out to his carriage, and the vote favourable to
the terms of the treaty was carried by wholesale corruption. But
all the same, Great Britain did very well out of it, and both countries
- though neither was satisfied - were for the time being tired of war.
For Laperouse the seven years had been full of excitement. The most
memorable engagement in which he took part was a very celebrated one,
in November, 1759. A stirring ballad has been written about it by Henry
Newbolt: -
"In seventeen hundred and fifty-nine
When Hawke came swooping from the West,
The French King's admiral with twenty of the line
Came sailing forth to sack us out of Brest."
Laperouse's ship, the FORMIDABLE, was one of the French fleet of
twenty-one sail. What happened was this. The French foreign minister,
Choiseul, had hatched a crafty plan for the invasion of England, but
before it could be executed the British fleet had to be cleared out of
the way. There was always that tough wooden wall with the hearts of oak
behind it, standing solidly in the path. It baffled Napoleon in the
same fashion when he thought out an invasion plan in the next century.
The French Admiral, Conflans, schemed to lure Sir Edward Hawke into
Quiberon Bay, on the coast of Brittany. A strong westerly gale was
blowing and was rapidly swelling into a raging tempest. Conflans,
piloted by a reliable guide who knew the Bay thoroughly, intended to
take up a fairly safe, sheltered position on the lee side, and hoped
that the wind would force Hawke, who was not familiar with the
ground, on to the reefs and shoals, where his fleet would be destroyed
by the storm and the French guns together. But Hawke, whose name
signally represents the bold, swift, sure character of the man,
understood the design, took the risk, avoided the danger, and clutched
the prey. Following the French as rapidly as wind and canvas could take
him, he caught their rearmost vessels, smashed them up, battered the
whole fleet successively into flight or splinters, and himself lost
only two vessels, which ran upon a shoal. Plodding prose does scant
justice to the extraordinary brilliancy of Hawke's victory, described
by Admiral Mahan as "the Trafalgar of this war." We cannot pass on
without quoting one of Mr. Newbolt's graphic verses: -
"'Twas long past the noon of a wild November day
When Hawke came swooping from the west;
He heard the breakers thundering in Quiberon Bay,
But he flew the flag for battle, line abreast.
Down upon the quicksands, roaring out of sight,
Fiercely blew the storm wind, darkly fell the night,
For they took the foe for pilot and the cannon's glare for light,
When Hawke came swooping from the West."
"They took the foe for pilot:" that is a most excellent touch, both
poetical and true.
The FORMIDABLE was the first to be disposed of in the fight. She was an
80-gun line-of-battle ship, carrying the flag of Admiral du
Verger. Her position being in the rear of the squadron, she was early
engaged by the RESOLUTION, and in addition received the full broadside
of every other British ship that passed her. The Admiral fell mortally
wounded, and two hundred on board were killed. She struck her colours
at four o'clock after receiving a terrible battering, and was the only
French ship captured by Hawke's fleet. All the others were sunk, burnt,
or beached, or else escaped. The young Laperouse was amongst the
wounded, though his hurts were not dangerous; and, after a brief period
spent in England as a prisoner of war, he returned to service.
An amusing rhyme in connection with this engagement is worth recalling.
Supplies for Hawke's fleet did not come to hand for a considerable time
after they were due, and in consequence the victorious crews had to be
put on "short commons." Some wag - it is the way of the British sailor
to do his grumbling with a spice of humour - put the case thus: -
"Ere Hawke did bang
Monsieur Conflans,
You sent us beef and beer;
Now Monsieur's beat
We've nought to eat,
Since you have nought to fear."
An interesting coincidence must also be noted.
