A month later, Boone received intelligence of a serious loss to the
Company's trade from the Madagascar pirates. On the 7th August, the
_Greenwich_, Captain Kirby, and the _Cassandra_, Captain James Macrae,
bringing the usual yearly investment for Bombay and Surat, were in Johanna
roads, engaged in watering. At anchor, near them, was an Ostend ship that
had called for the same purpose. A few days before, they had received
intelligence that a French pirate, Oliver la Bouche,[2] had run on a reef
off Mayotta, and lost his ship, and was engaged in building a new one.
Thinking that the opportunity of catching the pirates at a disadvantage
should not be lost, Macrae and Kirby agreed to go in search of them and
attack them. They had just completed their arrangements when two strange
sails hove in sight. They proved to be the _Victory_, a French-built ship
of forty-six guns, commanded by the well-known pirate, Edward England, and
the _Fancy_, a Dutch-built ship of twenty-four guns, commanded by Taylor.
Macrae and Kirby prepared to give them a hot reception, the Ostend ship
promising to stand by them. So far were they from simply trying to make
their escape, that they looked forward to the handsome reward the Company
would give them for the capture of the pirates. From what followed it is
easy to see that Macrae's was the guiding spirit in this. Cables were cut,
and they stood out to sea, but, owing to the light baffling winds, made
little way. By next morning the pirates had closed, and bore down with a
black flag (skull and crossbones) at the main, a red flag at the fore, and
the cross of St. George at the ensign staff. The _Greenwich_ and the
Ostender, having a better wind than the _Cassandra_, had got some distance
away. In vain Macrae fired gun after gun at the _Greenwich_ to make Kirby
heave to. In a most dastardly way the captain of the _Greenwich_ pursued
his course, taking the Ostender with him, till he had got well to windward;
when, at a distance of two or three miles, he hove to and watched the fate
of the _Cassandra_.