Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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On the morning of the 5th of July the signal was given to put to sea, and at first some of the boats towed the raft, which had no one to command it but a midshipman named Coudin, who, having a painful wound on his leg, was utterly useless. The other officers consulted their own personal safety only, and, with a few exceptions, this was the case with every one else. When the lieutenant of the long-boat, fearing that he could not keep the sea with eighty-eight men on board, and no oars, entreated three of the other boats, one after the other, to relieve him of a part of his living cargo, they refused utterly; and the officer of the third, in his hurry to run away, loosed from the raft. This was the signal for a general desertion. The word was passed from one boat to another to leave them to their fate, and the captain had not the manliness to protest. The purser of the Medusa, with a few others, opposed such a dastardly proceeding, but in vain; and the raft, without means of propulsion, was abandoned. As it proved afterwards, the boats, which all reached the land safely, sighted the coast the same evening; and the raft could have been towed to it in a day or two, or at all events sufficiently near for the purpose. The people on it could not at first believe in this treacherous desertion, and once and again buoyed themselves up with the hope that the boats would return or send relief. The lieutenant on the long-boat seems to have been one of the few officers possessing any spark of humanity and manliness. He kept his own boat near the raft for a time, in the hope that the others might be induced to return, but at length had to yield to the clamour of some eighty men on board with him, who insisted on his proceeding in search of land.