shipwreck; Lieutenant Fowler was therefore directed to take all that were saved belonging to the officers embarked with him in the Rolla; and lest any accident should happen to the Cumberland, I committed to his charge a copy of four charts, being all of the east and north coasts which there had been time to get ready; with these he took a short letter to the Secretary of the Admiralty, and one to the Victualling Board, inclosing such vouchers as had been saved from the wreck. * * * * * At noon (Oct. 11) we parted company with three cheers, the Rolla steering northeastward for China, whilst my course was directed for Torres’ Strait[1].”
At Canton, Lieutenant Fowler embarked as a passenger on board the Hon.E.I.C. ship Earl Camden, commanded by Captain Nathaniel Dance, the senior officer of a most valuable homeward bound China fleet, consisting of sixteen sail of what are commonly denominated “1200-ton ships,” the registered tonnage of most of which exceeds 1300, and in some cases amounts to 1500 tons.
On the 31st Jan. 1804, this fleet sailed from Canton, accompanied by eleven country ships and two other merchantmen, which Captain Dance had been ordered by the Select Committee to convoy as far as their courses lay in the same direction. The Ganges, a fast sailing armed-brig, in the Hon. Company’s service, likewise sailed with him, to be employed in any manner that might tend to the safety or convenience of his charge.
Captain Dance’s celebrated rencontre with the French Rear-Admiral Linois is described in an official letter from him to the Hon. Court of Directors^i of which the following are extracts:–
“On the 14th Feb., at day-break, we saw Pulo Auro, W.S.W. and at 8 A.M. the Royal George made the signal for seeing four strange sail in the S.W. I made the signal for the four ships named in the margin[2] to go down and examine them; and Lieutenant Fowler, R.N. late commander of the Porpoise, having handsomely offered to go in the Ganges and inspect them nearly, I afterwards sent her down likewise; and from their signals I perceived it was an enemy’s squadron, consisting of a line-of-battle ship, three frigates, and a brig. At 1 P.M., I recalled the look-out ships, and formed the line of battle in close order.
“As soon as the enemy could fetch our wake, they put about; we kept