Caught in a gale of wind, the vessel was blown down Channel, and afterwards chasing some vessels--she could never catch them--into the Shannon, Du Guay Trouin landed his men in the night, burnt a couple of vessels on the beach, did a little pillaging, and alarmed the whole district. Messages were sent hot-foot to Limerick for the soldiers--it was a French fleet, an invasion in force! Du Guay Trouin embarked his men just as the soldiers came in sight, up anchor, and got away cleverly. This was the only fun he had in the _Danycan_, for every vessel she encountered could "wrong" her, as they used to say in those days; that is to say, could sail round her; so there was not much honour and glory to be got out of her. On his return to St. Malo Du Guay Trouin was given a better craft--the _Coëtquen_, of 18 guns. It is said that he held his commission from James II., the ex-king of England--it is certain that James did issue such commissions after his abdication, and indeed his consort, the _Saint Aaron_, commanded by one Welch, of Irish extraction, was thus commissioned. Du Guay Trouin soon had some exciting adventures. Falling in with a fleet of English merchant vessels, under convoy of a couple of sloops, the two privateers captured five ships and the two men-of-war; but, as they were taking their prizes into St. Malo, an English squadron gave chase; then they had to get in where they could. Welch got safely into St. Malo with some of the vessels; Du Guay Trouin, being cornered, made a dash for the Isle of Brehat, behind which the navigation is of the most intricate and perilous description, with dozens of half-submerged rocks and a swishing tide. He managed to get in, and some of the English vessels which tried to follow him very nearly came to grief. He had been under fire for some time, and unluckily his pilot was killed, and also some others who were familiar with the locality; so he contrived to find his way out without them, thus displaying that sort of intuitive skill in navigation and the handling of a ship which has almost always distinguished great seamen. He was not an accomplished navigator, having neglected his studies; he was accustomed to trust entirely to "dead reckoning." Certainly, the means of observing the altitude, etc., of the sun and stars were very rude in those days; but Du Guay Trouin was not expert even with these. However, he got out of this trap, was presently blown into the Bristol Channel, and found an English 60-gun ship arriving about the same time. "Luckily," says one of his biographers, "there is an island in the middle of this estuary; while the enemy came in on one side of it Du Guay Trouin went out on the other." This, of course, is Lundy Island; and, getting a good start, Du Guay Trouin escaped cleverly--going out, so to speak, by the back door as his opponent came in by the front.