82 AUDUBON, THE NATURALIST 
On the twenty-fifth of June, 1793, while engaged in 
duties to which we have just referred, Jean Audubon 
was appointed, with rank of ensign, to command the 
Republican lugger named the Cerberus.’ During this 
charge, which lasted until the twenty-second of Novem- 
ber of the following year, he fought one of the stiffest 
engagements of his career. On the twelfth of July he 
encountered the Brilliant, an English privateer of four- 
teen cannon which had captured an American ship laden 
with flour; and after a desperate battle which lasted three 
hours, in the course of which Jean was wounded in the 
left thigh, the Englishman, beaten and obliged to sur- 
render his prize, was glad to escape under cover of night. 
Jean towed the American into the port of La Rochelle, 
and afterwards sent to the Administration a full account 
of the engagement.’? Ensign Audubon’s next command 
was a dispatch boat called L’Eveillé (“The Awak- 
ened’’), on which he served for nearly nine months, from 
November 23, 1794, to August 14, 1795. He was then 
detailed for port duty at La Rochelle from August 15, 
1795, to January 24, 1797. His last ship was L’Insti- 
tuteur (“The Institutor”’), which he commanded with 
the rank of liewtenant de vaisseawu, January 25 to 
October 3, 1797, while he was engaged in govern- 
mental business between the ports of La _ Ro- 
chelle and Brest. 
The financial losses which Lieutenant Audubon sus- 
tained at Les Cayes in consequence of the revolution 
in Santo Domingo were a crushing blow to him; he never 
recovered his fortune, later estimated by his son-in-law 
® Jean was actually in command of this war vessel in March of that 
year, as shown by a document given in full in Chapter IV (p. 59). 
* These records are on file in the archives of the Department of 
Marine at Paris, but access to them will doubtless be denied until peace 
is restored in Europe. 
