Kings and Emperors by Dewey Lambdin

Author:Dewey Lambdin
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781250030078
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Mondego Bay was aswarm with troop transports and supply ships when the convoy bearing General Spencer’s five thousand men arrived, and the few piers in Figueira da Foz had been claimed by the first arrivals, the army under General Sir Arthur Wellesley. Most of his troops and supplies were ashore and encamped, so their convoy vessels could go close to the shore and ferry everything to a broad, deep hard-packed beach. All of Sapphire’s boats, and the larger cutters or launches from Newcastle, Assurance, and Tiger were put to the task.

“Hmpfh!” Lieutenant Geoffrey Westcott said with a snort after looking the scene over with his telescope. “Are we landing an army, or a parcel of visitors to Brighton? Look there, sir, at those soldiers skylarking.”

Lewrie raised his own glass to one eye and beheld what looked to be utter chaos. Dozens of ship’s boats were stroking shoreward to the beaches, soaring as they met the moderate waves of surf, and all crammed with piles of crates, kegs and barrels of rations, and infantrymen sitting upright between the oarsmen with their muskets held vertically ’twixt their tight-squeezed knees. But in the surf, pale and naked men were splashing, swimming, floating, or standing in thigh-deep water to let the incoming waves break over them. Further up the beach, barely dressed and bare-chested men were basking or footballing as if the entire army was having a Make and Mend day of idleness.

“One can only hope that French soldiers are as thin and spindly as ours,” Lewrie said with a sigh. “They look as pale as spooks.”

“They’re in the boats’ way!” Westcott groused.

“Uhm, no, I don’t think so,” Lewrie disagreed after a longer look. “Someone’s planted posts and flags along the beaches to clear a long stretch where the boats can land. The swimming areas are outside of that. Damme! Someone in our army half knows what he’s doing, for a change! The whole affair looks … organised.”

“Oh, now that you point it out, I see it,” Westcott said in a much milder voice, sounding as if he was disappointed that he could not have himself a good rant.

“Ye know, I’ve never been to Brighton,” Lewrie admitted. “I’ve taken the waters at Bath, but they say that saltwater bathing is good for you. Half-freezin’ your arse in the Channel, well. The seas here surely are warmer. I’m tempted t’take a dip, myself.”

“As I recall, though, sir, you cannot swim,” Westcott reminded him.

“I said ‘dip,’” Lewrie replied, “not ‘plunge.’ Wade, perhaps, and let the surf have its way with me, with my feet firmly planted in the sand. On such a warm day, well, it looks refreshin’.”

He swung his telescope back to the boats as they hobby-horsed the last fifty yards or so to ground their bows in the sand, rising on the incoming wave, surging onward as it broke and foamed round them. Sailors leapt out to walk the boats over the last incoming surge and steady them as the soldiers began to debark over the bows.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.