But the tale should be told in Marryat’s words, and not in his captain’s: “The _Impérieuse_ sailed; the Admiral of the port was one who _would_ be obeyed, but _would not_ listen always to reason or common sense. The signal for sailing was enforced by gun after gun; the anchor was hove up, and, with all her stores on deck, her guns not even mounted, in a state of confusion unparalleled from her being obliged to hoist in faster than it was possible she could stow away, she was driven out of harbour to encounter a heavy gale. A few hours more would have enabled her to proceed to sea with security, but they were denied; the consequences were appalling, they might have been fatal. In the general confusion some iron too near the binnacles had attracted the needle of the compasses; the ship was steered out of her course. At midnight, in a heavy gale at the close of November, so dark that you could not distinguish any object, however close, the _Impérieuse_ dashed upon the rocks between Ushant and the Main. The cry of terror which ran through the lower decks; the grating of the keel as she was forced in; the violence of the shocks which convulsed the frame of the vessel; the hurrying up of the ship’s company without their clothes; and then the enormous waves which again bore her up, and carried her clean over the reef, will never be effaced from my memory.” The frigate had been carried into a deep pool, and rode the gale out at anchor. When daylight came she was found to be inside instead of outside of Ushant--and was got off with no greater damage than the loss of her false keel. But the escape was a narrow one--the adventure must have shaken Marryat rudely into the life of the sea--and have impressed him deeply with the possible consequence of pig-headedness in pig-headed Port Admirals.