At Aboukir and Acre: A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt

A few further questions were asked, and then Wilkinson was congratulated upon having passed successfully. He then went to the prize court, saw the President, and presented Sir Sidney Smith's note to him. He read it through, and then glanced at a copy of the bill of lading which had been taken when the cargo was transferred.

"You do not know the contents of all those bales and casks, Mr. Wilkinson?"

"No, sir. The greater portion of them have never been opened. Some, of course, one could recognize from the nature of the packing, and I put them down as nearly as I could guess—Manchester goods, woollen, hardware, and so on; but, as we wanted to be off, and it was better that the things should remain in their original packing, we did not trouble to open them, and they were received as cargo consigned to you."

"The Eastern goods you know nothing about, I suppose?"

"Nothing whatever."

"Well, when the brig arrives in the river the captain will, of course, call here, and I will give him instructions where to land them."

"I understand," he went on, looking again at the letter, "that Mr. Blagrove, to whom Sir Sidney asks me to intrust the sale of these goods, is an expert in this special line?"

"Yes, sir; he has been for many years established as a merchant in Alexandria, and Sir Sidney thought that he would not only be able to estimate accurately the value of the goods, but would know exactly where to place them, and would, by bringing them gradually forward, get far larger sums for them than if they were thrown all at once upon the market."

"I see the vessel is his property, Mr. Wilkinson?"

"It is so, sir, his son purchased it in his name. He is a fellow-midshipman of mine in the Tigre, and was with me in the craft with which we captured all these goods and the vessels that have been sold for twelve thousand five hundred. This I have brought up with me in gold, and will pay into the hands of anybody you may appoint, to be added to the proceeds of the sales, for division by the court."

"Have you any idea of the value of these Eastern goods?"

"Not in the slightest, sir; only a few of the bales were opened in the presence of Sir Sidney Smith. He himself said that it would be better not to open more, as there were no facilities for repacking."

"I think that it was a very good idea of Sir Sidney's to suggest that it would be for the advantage of all concerned to vary the usual course, and to place these goods in the hands of an expert instead of selling them by auction. I should like to see Mr. Blagrove. I suppose you know his address. Is he in town?"

"He is living in Dulwich, sir."

"Well, will you let him know that if he calls upon me to-morrow morning I will give him full authority to act in the matter, and then we can settle whether to stow that portion of the cargo in our warehouses or whether to make other arrangements. I will myself write to Sir Sidney Smith to thank him for his suggestion with respect to the sale of these goods, and to say that I have so arranged it. The question of freight is, of course, a matter altogether separate, and I shall give Mr. Blagrove a cheque for the amount arranged between his representative and Sir Sidney Smith at the rate of three pounds per ton when he brings me the receipt of the officer in charge of the warehouse of his having received the stores in good order from the ship."

Edgar had, on reaching London, stopped at the Golden Cross for the night, and the first thing in the morning taken a hackney-coach and driven at once to Dulwich, where his father had taken a house close to that of his brother. It was now the first week in December. Edgar drove up to the entrance to the garden in which the house stood, paid the coachman, and then rang the bell. The servant opened it, and looked somewhat surprised at seeing a young naval officer standing there.

"Are Mr. and Mrs. Blagrove in?" he asked.

"Yes, sir, they are both in."

"All right!" he said; "show me to the room where they are. You need not announce me; I am their son."

The girl at once led the way into the house, and Edgar walked into the room, where the party were seated at breakfast. Mr. Blagrove was sitting with his back to the door, and did not see him come in. His mother and sisters looked up in surprise as he entered unannounced. It was two years since they had seen him, and they scarcely recognized in the tall young officer the lad whom they had last seen at Alexandria on their departure for England. Mr. Blagrove, on seeing their eyes fixed on the door, turned round, and leapt to his feet.

"My dear Edgar," he exclaimed as he warmly embraced him, "where have you sprung from? Your last letter was from Smyrna three months ago. Mother," he went on, turning round, "let me introduce your boy to you."

For some minutes there was little coherent conversation.

"Now, sit down, Edgar," Mr. Blagrove said at last, "and let us hear what unexpected chance has brought you home. I suppose, as you are in uniform, that you have not left the service."

"Not at all, sir; I am home on three months' leave, having come home in the Suzanne, a brig belonging to yourself."

"Belonging to me!" Mr. Blagrove said in astonishment. "What on earth do you mean?"

"I bought her in your name, father, and you will have a bill presented in the course of a couple of months or so for eight hundred and fifty pounds. At any rate you will not be a loser by her. There will be from six to seven hundred pounds, I cannot say how much exactly, for the cargo was not weighed, but it is somewhat over two hundred tons at three pounds a ton, and there is, besides, a hundred pounds for the passage-money of twenty invalid sailors, so you see you get the ship for practically about a hundred pounds, to which there will have to be added the payment of a captain, mate, and ten Italian sailors. She was valued by a court of naval officers at eight hundred and fifty pounds, that being the price they considered that she might fetch if sold there. I should say that she is worth quite double that. She is about three hundred tons, and carried six guns, so at any rate you are likely to make a thousand by the transaction.

"Then I have to inform you that, at Sir Sidney Smith's request, which I have no doubt will be complied with, you will be appointed, by the president of the prize court, agent for the sale of what Eastern goods there are on board her. The cargo is made up of European goods, dried fruits, and Eastern goods. They are what we captured from the pirates, and Sir Sidney Smith suggested that it would be as well to intrust to one who knew the value of the Eastern goods the work of selling them privately, instead of putting them up to auction, and he requested that the agency should be given to you. Wilkinson, who has come home with me, is going to see the president of the prize court this morning, and he is to come up here afterwards. Of course Sir Sidney did it chiefly to oblige me, but he thought that the goods would really fetch more if sold in that way. He said, of course, that you would get a commission on the sale, and as you said in the last letter that I received that you were getting very sick of having nothing to do, I thought you might like the job."

"Certainly I should like it, Edgar, and that purchase of the ship seems a very satisfactory one, though, of course, the profit will be yours and not mine, as I had nothing to do with it."

"Oh, yes, it is your business, father; she is bought with your money, and I am glad that I have been able to do something for the firm. I shall soon be getting my prize money, which will keep me in cash for a very long time."

"We won't argue about that now, Edgar. At any rate I shall be glad to see to the sale of these Eastern goods, though, of course, it will be but a small thing."

"I don't know, father. I think that it will be rather a large thing. At any rate there is something between eighty and a hundred tons of them."

"Between eighty and a hundred tons!" his father replied. "You mean with the dried fruits, of course."

"Not at all, father! The fruits will be sold in the ordinary way in the prize court."

"Then, what can these things be?"

"I should say the great proportion of them are carpets—Turkish, Persian, and Syrian."

"A hundred tons of such carpets as those, Edgar, would be worth a very large sum, indeed; surely you must be mistaken?"

"It's the accumulation of years of piracy, father; perhaps from hundreds of ships captured by those scoundrels. But, of course, they are not all carpets. There are silks, muslins, embroidered robes, Egyptian scarves and manufactures, and other sorts of things. We have not opened above a dozen bales out of some twelve hundred, and have, therefore, no idea of the relative value of the others. We were a tender of the Tigre's, our craft being a prize taken by her, and all of us, officers and men, being borne on her books, the whole ship divides. Still, if the things are worth as much as we think, it will bring us in a handsome sum. And there is, besides, twelve thousand five hundred in cash, the proceeds of the sale of the vessels we captured; and we also share with the other ships under Sir Sidney Smith's command in the value of the vessels and cargoes they have captured as they tried to reach an Egyptian port. They say they were worth something like forty thousand, of which the Tigre's share will be about half."

"Well, Edgar, if there are a hundred tons of such goods as you describe, your cargo must be a valuable one indeed. Of course I can tell nothing about it until I see them opened. At any rate it will give me occupation, and I should say a good paying occupation, for some time."

"I suppose you got that letter, father, that I sent from Constantinople, from Mr. Muller?"

"Yes, and a very satisfactory one it was. It reconciled me to some extent to staying here. It was not pleasant to think that one was living upon one's capital, but I found from his statement that my share of the business he was doing would fully cover my expenses here. And now, let us hear something more about your doings. Your letter from Constantinople told us about your adventures in Egypt; then we had one written the day after the French had retreated from before Acre, and the one that we received from Smyrna two months since; but that was a short one, and beyond saying that you had been very lucky in capturing and destroying a number of pirates, and that you were enjoying your cruise very much, you did not give us any detail. You may as well tell us that part first."

Early in the afternoon Wilkinson arrived. As Edgar had spoken warmly of his kindness to him when he had first joined the Tigre, and of the friendship that had sprung up between them, he was very cordially received by Mr. and Mrs. Blagrove. The former was well pleased when he heard the details of the interview with the president of the prize court, and said that he would go up and see him in the morning.

"I will hire a warehouse for a month or two," he said. "It will be much more satisfactory than working in a place where a lot of other business is being transacted. The bales will all have to be opened and examined, the goods classed and assorted, and I shall have to bring people down there to examine them. The expense will be nothing in comparison to the advantage of having a quiet place to one's self."

On the following morning Mr. Blagrove went up and had a very satisfactory talk with the president of the prize court. The Suzanne arrived four days later, having made a fast run from Portsmouth. By that time Mr. Blagrove had engaged a warehouse, where, in a short time, the whole of the goods of which he was to dispose were safely stored. Wilkinson went down on the day after his arrival to his people in Devonshire, and Edgar established himself as assistant to his father. As bale after bale was opened, the latter was astonished at the beauty and value of some of the contents. A few only of the bales contained common country cloths, and it was evident that such goods of this sort as had fallen into the hands of the pirates had been sold at once, as there was a ready market for them at the towns and villages of the islands and the mainland. Many of the carpets were of great size. Some of the very large ones Mr. Blagrove valued at fully £500, and there were scores worth from £50 to £100. Some of the silks and embroideries he pronounced to be almost priceless.

"They must," he said, "have been specially woven and worked for the ladies of the Sultan's harem."

When, after a month's stay, Edgar prepared to rejoin with his friend Wilkinson, not more than one-third of the contents of the warehouse had been sold, but these had fetched over £40,000, and his father had no doubt that he should obtain a proportionate sum for the remainder. The Italian sailors who had aided to bring the Suzanne home had been sent off a week after her arrival by a vessel bound for Naples, and the brig herself had, as soon as the cargo was all cleared out, fetched £1800 by auction, being almost a new vessel.

"I have no doubt," Mr. Blagrove said, "that ere long a British army will be sent out, and the French compelled to leave Egypt. If I thought that the war was likely to go on for some time as at present, I should say that you had better leave the service. As it is, you would not be doing much good if you stayed here, and so may as well hold on."

It was the first day of March, 1800, when the vessel with supplies for the troops, in which Wilkinson and Edgar had taken their passage, joined the fleet off Alexandria, and until the beginning of December they took part in the somewhat tedious work of blockading the Egyptian coast. In spite of their efforts the fleet were not always successful, for from time to time one or other of the ships was forced to sail to Cyprus to obtain fresh supplies, although quite a fleet of small vessels was employed in bringing water, fresh meat, and vegetables for the use of the fleet, as the health of the seamen would have suffered much from living for so long a period upon salt meat.

In November news was received that the army under Sir Ralph Abercrombie, which had for so long been engaged in watching Cadiz, was to sail upon an expedition for the reconquest of Egypt. It was stated that the expedition would, in the first place, sail for Syria, there to join the army that the Sultan assured the English government was in readiness to advance. Sir Sidney Smith was ordered to sail at once for that coast, to ascertain the real state of things, and to decide upon the spot where the fleet had best assemble, for, from its long absence from England, there were many repairs needed, and it was desirable that the situation should be such that the ships could be careened, and a portion at least of the weeds that had accumulated be scraped off.

His absence was in one respect unfortunate, for some of the other blockading ships were, after a very heavy gale, obliged to go to Cyprus to repair damages; and two French men-of-war heavily laden with troops and ammunition managed to run safely in to Alexandria, thereby increasing the strength of the French army by four thousand seasoned soldiers, and by an ample supply of ammunition. It was a great disappointment to the crews when, on their return to their stations off the coast, they found that the French had taken advantage of their absence, and that the result of their eighteen months of incessant vigil had been wasted.

Wilkinson had by this time served his full time, and Condor having been appointed to the Theseus, Sir Sidney Smith again gave the command of the Tigress to him, with the rank of acting lieutenant, which would, he was sure, be confirmed.