This was signed by Surcouf and his officers and by some of the leading hands. No doubt it made him feel happier; but he had quite made up his mind as to his future conduct.
They got in a cyclone south of the Bay of Bengal, and then steered for Rangoon, off which place they sighted an English vessel steering for them. She came steadily on, and, when within close range, fired a shot--the "summoning shot," for the _Emilie_ to display her colours. It was not an attack, and Surcouf had no right so to consider it; but that is what he chose to do. Hoisting his colours, he replied with three shots. The Englishman attempted to escape; but the _Emilie_ was the faster, and, running alongside, delivered her broadside, upon which the other struck his colours.
"This was the first time," says his biographer, "that our Malouin had seen the British flag lowered to him, and though he had had only the commencement of a fight, his heart swelled with patriotic pride and beat with hope. The first shot has been fired; the captain of an armed ship in time of war gives place to the privateer commander. Surcouf arrives at a decision as to his future--he has passed the Rubicon!"
All very fine; but it was an act of piracy, for which he could have been hanged at the yardarm. He repeated it shortly afterwards, capturing three vessels laden with rice, and appropriating one, a pilot brig, in place of the _Emilie_, which was losing her speed on account of a foul bottom. A few days later, having now thrown away all hesitation, he seized a large ship, the _Diana_, also laden with rice, and started to take her, in company with his stolen brig, the _Cartier_, to Mauritius.
On the voyage, however, Surcouf improved upon his former captures. A large sail was reported one morning, and it was presently apparent that she was an East Indiaman. The two French ships had not made much progress down the Bay of Bengal, and the English vessel was obviously standing into Balasore Roads, there to await a pilot for the river Hooghly, unless she picked up one earlier. The account given in _The Gentleman's Magazine_ for June 1796 states that the Indiaman--the _Triton_--was at anchor in Balasore Roads when she was sighted. In the latest life of Surcouf, however, written by his great-nephew and namesake, it is said that she was standing towards the Orissa coast, on the starboard tack--Balasore being, of course, in the province of Orissa, and the open anchorage a convenient place for picking up the Calcutta pilot. The difference is of some importance with regard to Surcouf's attack: it is one thing to board and carry a vessel at anchor, on a hot afternoon, when every one who is not required to be moving about is having a siesta, and quite another thing to board her when she is standing in to her anchorage, with the captain and officers on deck, and the crew standing by to handle the sails; and this latter feat is what M. Robert Surcouf claims to have been performed by his great-uncle. It is possible, however, that both accounts may, in a measure, be correct; that is to say, the _Triton_, when first sighted from aloft on board the _Cartier_, may have been standing in towards the anchorage, which she may have reached, and dropped anchor, before the Frenchman came alongside.