"WESTWARD HO!\n\n\nby Charles Kingsley\n\n\n\nTO\n\nTHE RAJAH SIR JAMES BROOKE, K.C.B.\n\nAND\n\nGEORGE AUGUSTUS SELWYN, D.D.\n\nBISHOP OF NEW ZEALAND\n\n\nTHIS BOOK IS DEDICATED\n\n\nBy one who (unknown to them) has no other method of expressing his\nadmiration and reverence for their characters.\n\nThat type of English virtue, at once manful and godly, practical and\nenthusiastic, prudent and self-sacrificing, which he has tried to depict\nin these pages, they have exhibited in a form even purer and more\nheroic than that in which he has drest it, and than that in which it was\nexhibited by the worthies whom Elizabeth, without distinction of rank or\nage, gathered round her in the ever glorious wars of her great reign.\n\nC. K.\n\nFEBRUARY, 1855.\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nI.     HOW MR. OXENHAM SAW THE WHITE BIRD\n\nII.    HOW AMYAS CAME HOME THE FIRST TIME\n\nIII.   OF TWO GENTLEMEN OF WALES, AND HOW THEY HUNTED WITH THE HOUNDS, AND\n           YET RAN WITH THE DEER\n\nIV.    THE TWO WAYS OF BEING CROST IN LOVE\n\nV.     CLOVELLY COURT IN THE OLDEN TIME\n\nVI.    THE COMBES OF THE FAR WEST\n\nVII.   THE TRUE AND TRAGICAL HISTORY OF MR. JOHN OXENHAM OF PLYMOUTH\n\nVIII.  HOW THE NOBLE BROTHERHOOD OF THE ROSE WAS FOUNDED\n\nIX.    HOW AMYAS KEPT HIS CHRISTMAS DAY\n\nX.     HOW THE MAYOR OF BIDEFORD BAITED HIS HOOK WITH HIS OWN FLESH\n\nXI.    HOW EUSTACE LEIGH MET THE POPE'S LEGATE\n\nXII.   HOW BIDEFORD BRIDGE DINED AT ANNERY HOUSE\n\nXIII.  HOW THE GOLDEN HIND CAME HOME AGAIN\n\nXIV.   HOW SALVATION YEO SLEW THE KING OF THE GUBBINGS\n\nXV.    HOW MR. JOHN BRIMBLECOMBE UNDERSTOOD THE NATURE OF AN OATH\n\nXVI.   THE MOST CHIVALROUS ADVENTURE OF THE GOOD SHIP ROSE\n\nXVII.  HOW THEY CAME TO BARBADOS, AND FOUND NO MEN THEREIN\n\nXVIII. HOW THEY TOOK THE PEARLS AT MARGARITA\n\nXIX.   WHAT BEFELL AT LA GUAYRA\n\nXX.    SPANISH BLOODHOUNDS AND ENGLISH MASTIFFS\n\nXXI.   HOW THEY TOOK THE COMMUNION UNDER THE TREE AT HIGUEROTE\n\nXXII.  THE INQUISITION IN THE INDIES\n\nXXIII. THE BANKS OF THE META\n\nXXIV.  HOW AMYAS WAS TEMPTED OF THE DEVIL\n\nXXV.   HOW THEY TOOK THE GOLD-TRAIN\n\nXXVI.  HOW THEY TOOK THE GREAT GALLEON\n\nXXVII. HOW SALVATION YEO FOUND HIS LITTLE MAID AGAIN\n\nXXVIII.HOW AMYAS CAME HOME THE THIRD TIME\n\nXXIX.  HOW THE VIRGINIA FLEET WAS STOPPED BY THE QUEEN'S COMMAND\n\nXXX.   HOW THE ADMIRAL JOHN HAWKINS TESTIFIED AGAINST CROAKERS\n\nXXXI.  THE GREAT ARMADA\n\nXXXII. HOW AMYAS THREW HIS SWORD INTO THE SEA\n\nXXXIII. HOW AMYAS LET THE APPLE FALL\n\n\n\n\nWESTWARD HO!\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\nHOW MR. OXENHAM SAW THE WHITE BIRD\n\n     \"The hollow oak our palace is,\n        Our heritage the sea.\"\n\nAll who have travelled through the delicious scenery of North Devon must\nneeds know the little white town of Bideford, which slopes upwards from\nits broad tide-river paved with yellow sands, and many-arched old bridge\nwhere salmon wait for autumn floods, toward the pleasant upland on the\nwest. Above the town the hills close in, cushioned with deep oak woods,\nthrough which juts here and there a crag of fern-fringed slate; below\nthey lower, and open more and more in softly rounded knolls, and fertile\nsquares of red and green, till they sink into the wide expanse of hazy\nflats, rich salt-marshes, and rolling sand-hills, where Torridge joins\nher sister Taw, and both together flow quietly toward the broad surges\nof the bar, and the everlasting thunder of the long Atlantic swell.\nPleasantly the old town stands there, beneath its soft Italian sky,\nfanned day and night by the fresh ocean breeze, which forbids alike the\nkeen winter frosts, and the fierce thunder heats of the midland; and\npleasantly it has stood there for now, perhaps, eight hundred years\nsince the first Grenville, cousin of the Conqueror, returning from the\nconquest of South Wales, drew round him trusty Saxon serfs, and free\nNorse rovers with their golden curls, and dark Silurian Britons from\nthe Swansea shore, and all the mingled blood which still gives to the\nseaward folk of the next county their strength and intellect, and, even\nin these levelling days, their peculiar beauty of face and form.\n\nBut at the time whereof I write, Bideford was not merely a pleasant\ncountry town, whose quay was haunted by a few coasting craft. It was\none of the chief ports of England; it furnished seven ships to fight the\nArmada: even more than a century afterwards, say the chroniclers, \"it\nsent more vessels to the northern trade than any port in England, saving\n(strange juxtaposition!) London and Topsham,\" and was the centre of a\nlocal civilization and enterprise, small perhaps compared with the\nvast efforts of the present day: but who dare despise the day of small\nthings, if it has proved to be the dawn of mighty ones? And it is to the\nsea-life and labor of Bideford, and Dartmouth, and Topsham, and Plymouth\n(then a petty place), and many another little western town, that England\nowes the foundation of her naval and commercial glory. It was the men\nof Devon, the Drakes and Hawkins', Gilberts and Raleighs, Grenvilles and\nOxenhams, and a host more of \"forgotten worthies,\" whom we shall learn\none day to honor as they deserve, to whom she owes her commerce, her\ncolonies, her very existence. For had they not first crippled, by their\nWest Indian raids, the ill-gotten resources of the Spaniard, and then\ncrushed his last huge effort in Britain's Salamis, the glorious fight of\n1588, what had we been by now but a popish appanage of a world-tyranny\nas cruel as heathen Rome itself, and far more devilish?\n\nIt is in memory of these men, their voyages and their battles, their\nfaith and their valor, their heroic lives and no less heroic deaths,\nthat I write this book; and if now and then I shall seem to warm into\na style somewhat too stilted and pompous, let me be excused for my\nsubject's sake, fit rather to have been sung than said, and to have\nproclaimed to all true English hearts, not as a novel but as an epic\n(which some man may yet gird himself to write), the same great message\nwhich the songs of Troy, and the Persian wars, and the trophies of\nMarathon and Salamis, spoke to the hearts of all true Greeks of old.\n\n\nOne bright summer's afternoon, in the year of grace 1575, a tall and\nfair boy came lingering along Bideford quay, in his scholar's gown,\nwith satchel and slate in hand, watching wistfully the shipping and the\nsailors, till, just after he had passed the bottom of the High Street,\nhe came opposite to one of the many taverns which looked out upon the\nriver. In the open bay window sat merchants and gentlemen, discoursing\nover their afternoon's draught of sack; and outside the door was\ngathered a group of sailors, listening earnestly to some one who stood\nin the midst. The boy, all alive for any sea-news, must needs go up\nto them, and take his place among the sailor-lads who were peeping and\nwhispering under the elbows of the men; and so came in for the following\nspeech, delivered in a loud bold voice, with a strong Devonshire accent,\nand a fair sprinkling of oaths.\n\n\"If you don't believe me, go and see, or stay here and grow all over\nblue mould. I tell you, as I am a gentleman, I saw it with these eyes,\nand so did Salvation Yeo there, through a window in the lower room; and\nwe measured the heap, as I am a christened man, seventy foot long, ten\nfoot broad, and twelve foot high, of silver bars, and each bar between\na thirty and forty pound weight. And says Captain Drake: 'There, my lads\nof Devon, I've brought you to the mouth of the world's treasure-house,\nand it's your own fault now if you don't sweep it out as empty as a\nstock-fish.'\"\n\n\"Why didn't you bring some of they home, then, Mr. Oxenham?\"\n\n\"Why weren't you there to help to carry them? We would have brought\n'em away, safe enough, and young Drake and I had broke the door abroad\nalready, but Captain Drake goes off in a dead faint; and when we came\nto look, he had a wound in his leg you might have laid three fingers in,\nand his boots were full of blood, and had been for an hour or more; but\nthe heart of him was that, that he never knew it till he dropped,\nand then his brother and I got him away to the boats, he kicking and\nstruggling, and bidding us let him go on with the fight, though every\nstep he took in the sand was in a pool of blood; and so we got off. And\ntell me, ye sons of shotten herrings, wasn't it worth more to save him\nthan the dirty silver? for silver we can get again, brave boys: there's\nmore fish in the sea than ever came out of it, and more silver in Nombre\nde Dios than would pave all the streets in the west country: but of such\ncaptains as Franky Drake, Heaven never makes but one at a time; and if\nwe lose him, good-bye to England's luck, say I, and who don't agree, let\nhim choose his weapons, and I'm his man.\"\n\nHe who delivered this harangue was a tall and sturdy personage, with a\nflorid black-bearded face, and bold restless dark eyes, who leaned, with\ncrossed legs and arms akimbo, against the wall of the house; and seemed\nin the eyes of the schoolboy a very magnifico, some prince or duke at\nleast. He was dressed (contrary to all sumptuary laws of the time) in\na suit of crimson velvet, a little the worse, perhaps, for wear; by his\nside were a long Spanish rapier and a brace of daggers, gaudy enough\nabout the hilts; his fingers sparkled with rings; he had two or three\ngold chains about his neck, and large earrings in his ears, behind one\nof which a red rose was stuck jauntily enough among the glossy black\ncurls; on his head was a broad velvet Spanish hat, in which instead of a\nfeather was fastened with a great gold clasp a whole Quezal bird, whose\ngorgeous plumage of fretted golden green shone like one entire precious\nstone. As he finished his speech, he took off the said hat, and looking\nat the bird in it--\n\n\"Look ye, my lads, did you ever see such a fowl as that before? That's\nthe bird which the old Indian kings of Mexico let no one wear but their\nown selves; and therefore I wear it,--I, John Oxenham of South Tawton,\nfor a sign to all brave lads of Devon, that as the Spaniards are the\nmasters of the Indians, we're the masters of the Spaniards:\" and he\nreplaced his hat.\n\nA murmur of applause followed: but one hinted that he \"doubted the\nSpaniards were too many for them.\"\n\n\"Too many? How many men did we take Nombre de Dios with? Seventy-three\nwere we, and no more when we sailed out of Plymouth Sound; and before we\nsaw the Spanish Main, half were gastados, used up, as the Dons say, with\nthe scurvy; and in Port Pheasant Captain Rawse of Cowes fell in with us,\nand that gave us some thirty hands more; and with that handful, my lads,\nonly fifty-three in all, we picked the lock of the new world! And whom\ndid we lose but our trumpeter, who stood braying like an ass in\nthe middle of the square, instead of taking care of his neck like a\nChristian? I tell you, those Spaniards are rank cowards, as all bullies\nare. They pray to a woman, the idolatrous rascals! and no wonder they\nfight like women.\"\n\n\"You'm right, captain,\" sang out a tall gaunt fellow who stood close to\nhim; \"one westcountry-man can fight two easterlings, and an easterling\ncan beat three Dons any day. Eh! my lads of Devon?\n\n     \"For O! it's the herrings and the good brown beef,\n       And the cider and the cream so white;\n     O! they are the making of the jolly Devon lads,\n       For to play, and eke to fight.\"\n\n\"Come,\" said Oxenham, \"come along! Who lists? who lists? who'll make his\nfortune?\n\n     \"Oh, who will join, jolly mariners all?\n        And who will join, says he, O!\n     To fill his pockets with the good red goold,\n        By sailing on the sea, O!\"\n\n\"Who'll list?\" cried the gaunt man again; \"now's your time! We've got\nforty men to Plymouth now, ready to sail the minute we get back, and we\nwant a dozen out of you Bideford men, and just a boy or two, and then\nwe'm off and away, and make our fortunes, or go to heaven.\n\n     \"Our bodies in the sea so deep,\n        Our souls in heaven to rest!\n     Where valiant seamen, one and all,\n        Hereafter shall be blest!\"\n\n\"Now,\" said Oxenham, \"you won't let the Plymouth men say that the\nBideford men daren't follow them? North Devon against South, it is.\nWho'll join? who'll join? It is but a step of a way, after all, and\nsailing as smooth as a duck-pond as soon as you're past Cape Finisterre.\nI'll run a Clovelly herring-boat there and back for a wager of twenty\npound, and never ship a bucketful all the way. Who'll join? Don't think\nyou're buying a pig in a poke. I know the road, and Salvation Yeo, here,\ntoo, who was the gunner's mate, as well as I do the narrow seas, and\nbetter. You ask him to show you the chart of it, now, and see if he\ndon't tell you over the ruttier as well as Drake himself.\"\n\nOn which the gaunt man pulled from under his arm a great white buffalo\nhorn covered with rough etchings of land and sea, and held it up to the\nadmiring ring.\n\n\"See here, boys all, and behold the pictur of the place, dra'ed out\nso natural as ever was life. I got mun from a Portingal, down to the\nAzores; and he'd pricked mun out, and pricked mun out, wheresoever he'd\nsailed, and whatsoever he'd seen. Take mun in your hands now, Simon\nEvans, take mun in your hands; look mun over, and I'll warrant you'll\nknow the way in five minutes so well as ever a shark in the seas.\"\n\nAnd the horn was passed from hand to hand; while Oxenham, who saw that\nhis hearers were becoming moved, called through the open window for\na great tankard of sack, and passed that from hand to hand, after the\nhorn.\n\nThe school-boy, who had been devouring with eyes and ears all which\npassed, and had contrived by this time to edge himself into the inner\nring, now stood face to face with the hero of the emerald crest, and got\nas many peeps as he could at the wonder. But when he saw the sailors,\none after another, having turned it over a while, come forward and offer\nto join Mr. Oxenham, his soul burned within him for a nearer view of\nthat wondrous horn, as magical in its effects as that of Tristrem, or\nthe enchanter's in Ariosto; and when the group had somewhat broken up,\nand Oxenham was going into the tavern with his recruits, he asked boldly\nfor a nearer sight of the marvel, which was granted at once.\n\nAnd now to his astonished gaze displayed themselves cities and harbors,\ndragons and elephants, whales which fought with sharks, plate ships\nof Spain, islands with apes and palm-trees, each with its name\nover-written, and here and there, \"Here is gold;\" and again, \"Much gold\nand silver;\" inserted most probably, as the words were in English, by\nthe hands of Mr. Oxenham himself. Lingeringly and longingly the boy\nturned it round and round, and thought the owner of it more fortunate\nthan Khan or Kaiser. Oh, if he could but possess that horn, what needed\nhe on earth beside to make him blest!\n\n\"I say, will you sell this?\"\n\n\"Yea, marry, or my own soul, if I can get the worth of it.\"\n\n\"I want the horn,--I don't want your soul; it's somewhat of a stale\nsole, for aught I know; and there are plenty of fresh ones in the bay.\"\n\nAnd therewith, after much fumbling, he pulled out a tester (the only one\nhe had), and asked if that would buy it?\n\n\"That! no, nor twenty of them.\"\n\nThe boy thought over what a good knight-errant would do in such case,\nand then answered, \"Tell you what: I'll fight you for it.\"\n\n\"Thank 'ee, sir!\n\n\"Break the jackanapes's head for him, Yeo,\" said Oxenham.\n\n\"Call me jackanapes again, and I break yours, sir.\" And the boy lifted\nhis fist fiercely.\n\nOxenham looked at him a minute smilingly. \"Tut! tut! my man, hit one of\nyour own size, if you will, and spare little folk like me!\"\n\n\"If I have a boy's age, sir, I have a man's fist. I shall be fifteen\nyears old this month, and know how to answer any one who insults me.\"\n\n\"Fifteen, my young cockerel? you look liker twenty,\" said Oxenham, with\nan admiring glance at the lad's broad limbs, keen blue eyes, curling\ngolden locks, and round honest face. \"Fifteen? If I had half-a-dozen\nsuch lads as you, I would make knights of them before I died. Eh, Yeo?\"\n\n\"He'll do,\" said Yeo; \"he will make a brave gamecock in a year or\ntwo, if he dares ruffle up so early at a tough old hen-master like the\ncaptain.\"\n\nAt which there was a general laugh, in which Oxenham joined as loudly as\nany, and then bade the lad tell him why he was so keen after the horn.\n\n\"Because,\" said he, looking up boldly, \"I want to go to sea. I want to\nsee the Indies. I want to fight the Spaniards. Though I am a gentleman's\nson, I'd a deal liever be a cabin-boy on board your ship.\" And the lad,\nhaving hurried out his say fiercely enough, dropped his head again.\n\n\"And you shall,\" cried Oxenham, with a great oath; \"and take a galloon,\nand dine off carbonadoed Dons. Whose son are you, my gallant fellow?\"\n\n\"Mr. Leigh's, of Burrough Court.\"\n\n\"Bless his soul! I know him as well as I do the Eddystone, and his\nkitchen too. Who sups with him to-night?\"\n\n\"Sir Richard Grenville.\"\n\n\"Dick Grenville? I did not know he was in town. Go home and tell your\nfather John Oxenham will come and keep him company. There, off with you!\nI'll make all straight with the good gentleman, and you shall have your\nventure with me; and as for the horn, let him have the horn, Yeo, and\nI'll give you a noble for it.\"\n\n\"Not a penny, noble captain. If young master will take a poor mariner's\ngift, there it is, for the sake of his love to the calling, and\nHeaven send him luck therein.\" And the good fellow, with the impulsive\ngenerosity of a true sailor, thrust the horn into the boy's hands, and\nwalked away to escape thanks.\n\n\"And now,\" quoth Oxenham, \"my merry men all, make up your minds what\nmannered men you be minded to be before you take your bounties. I want\nnone of your rascally lurching longshore vermin, who get five pounds\nout of this captain, and ten out of that, and let him sail without them\nafter all, while they are stowed away under women's mufflers, and\nin tavern cellars. If any man is of that humor, he had better to cut\nhimself up, and salt himself down in a barrel for pork, before he meets\nme again; for by this light, let me catch him, be it seven years hence,\nand if I do not cut his throat upon the streets, it's a pity! But if any\nman will be true brother to me, true brother to him I'll be, come wreck\nor prize, storm or calm, salt water or fresh, victuals or none, share\nand fare alike; and here's my hand upon it, for every man and all! and\nso--\n\n     \"Westward ho! with a rumbelow,\n        And hurra for the Spanish Main, O!\"\n\nAfter which oration Mr. Oxenham swaggered into the tavern, followed by\nhis new men; and the boy took his way homewards, nursing his precious\nhorn, trembling between hope and fear, and blushing with maidenly\nshame, and a half-sense of wrong-doing at having revealed suddenly to a\nstranger the darling wish which he had hidden from his father and mother\never since he was ten years old.\n\nNow this young gentleman, Amyas Leigh, though come of as good blood as\nany in Devon, and having lived all his life in what we should even\nnow call the very best society, and being (on account of the valor,\ncourtesy, and truly noble qualities which he showed forth in his most\neventful life) chosen by me as the hero and centre of this story,\nwas not, saving for his good looks, by any means what would be called\nnow-a-days an \"interesting\" youth, still less a \"highly educated\" one;\nfor, with the exception of a little Latin, which had been driven into\nhim by repeated blows, as if it had been a nail, he knew no books\nwhatsoever, save his Bible, his Prayer-book, the old \"Mort d'Arthur\" of\nCaxton's edition, which lay in the great bay window in the hall, and the\ntranslation of \"Las Casas' History of the West Indies,\" which lay beside\nit, lately done into English under the title of \"The Cruelties of the\nSpaniards.\" He devoutly believed in fairies, whom he called pixies; and\nheld that they changed babies, and made the mushroom rings on the downs\nto dance in. When he had warts or burns, he went to the white witch\nat Northam to charm them away; he thought that the sun moved round the\nearth, and that the moon had some kindred with a Cheshire cheese.\nHe held that the swallows slept all the winter at the bottom of the\nhorse-pond; talked, like Raleigh, Grenville, and other low persons,\nwith a broad Devonshire accent; and was in many other respects so very\nignorant a youth, that any pert monitor in a national school might have\nhad a hearty laugh at him. Nevertheless, this ignorant young savage,\nvacant of the glorious gains of the nineteenth century, children's\nliterature and science made easy, and, worst of all, of those improved\nviews of English history now current among our railway essayists, which\nconsist in believing all persons, male and female, before the year 1688,\nand nearly all after it, to have been either hypocrites or fools, had\nlearnt certain things which he would hardly have been taught just now\nin any school in England; for his training had been that of the old\nPersians, \"to speak the truth and to draw the bow,\" both of which savage\nvirtues he had acquired to perfection, as well as the equally savage\nones of enduring pain cheerfully, and of believing it to be the finest\nthing in the world to be a gentleman; by which word he had been taught\nto understand the careful habit of causing needless pain to no human\nbeing, poor or rich, and of taking pride in giving up his own pleasure\nfor the sake of those who were weaker than himself. Moreover, having\nbeen entrusted for the last year with the breaking of a colt, and the\ncare of a cast of young hawks which his father had received from Lundy\nIsle, he had been profiting much, by the means of those coarse and\nfrivolous amusements, in perseverance, thoughtfulness, and the habit\nof keeping his temper; and though he had never had a single \"object\nlesson,\" or been taught to \"use his intellectual powers,\" he knew the\nnames and ways of every bird, and fish, and fly, and could read, as\ncunningly as the oldest sailor, the meaning of every drift of cloud\nwhich crossed the heavens. Lastly, he had been for some time past, on\naccount of his extraordinary size and strength, undisputed cock of the\nschool, and the most terrible fighter among all Bideford boys; in which\nbrutal habit he took much delight, and contrived, strange as it may\nseem, to extract from it good, not only for himself but for others,\ndoing justice among his school-fellows with a heavy hand, and succoring\nthe oppressed and afflicted; so that he was the terror of all the\nsailor-lads, and the pride and stay of all the town's boys and girls,\nand hardly considered that he had done his duty in his calling if he\nwent home without beating a big lad for bullying a little one. For the\nrest, he never thought about thinking, or felt about feeling; and had\nno ambition whatsoever beyond pleasing his father and mother, getting by\nhonest means the maximum of \"red quarrenders\" and mazard cherries,\nand going to sea when he was big enough. Neither was he what would be\nnow-a-days called by many a pious child; for though he said his Creed\nand Lord's Prayer night and morning, and went to the service at the\nchurch every forenoon, and read the day's Psalms with his mother every\nevening, and had learnt from her and from his father (as he proved well\nin after life) that it was infinitely noble to do right and infinitely\nbase to do wrong, yet (the age of children's religious books not having\nyet dawned on the world) he knew nothing more of theology, or of his\nown soul, than is contained in the Church Catechism. It is a question,\nhowever, on the whole, whether, though grossly ignorant (according to\nour modern notions) in science and religion, he was altogether untrained\nin manhood, virtue, and godliness; and whether the barbaric narrowness\nof his information was not somewhat counterbalanced both in him and in\nthe rest of his generation by the depth, and breadth, and healthiness of\nhis education.\n\nSo let us watch him up the hill as he goes hugging his horn, to tell all\nthat has passed to his mother, from whom he had never hidden anything\nin his life, save only that sea-fever; and that only because he foreknew\nthat it would give her pain; and because, moreover, being a prudent and\nsensible lad, he knew that he was not yet old enough to go, and that, as\nhe expressed it to her that afternoon, \"there was no use hollaing till\nhe was out of the wood.\"\n\nSo he goes up between the rich lane-banks, heavy with drooping ferns and\nhoneysuckle; out upon the windy down toward the old Court, nestled\namid its ring of wind-clipt oaks; through the gray gateway into the\nhomeclose; and then he pauses a moment to look around; first at the wide\nbay to the westward, with its southern wall of purple cliffs; then at\nthe dim Isle of Lundy far away at sea; then at the cliffs and downs of\nMorte and Braunton, right in front of him; then at the vast yellow sheet\nof rolling sand-hill, and green alluvial plain dotted with red cattle,\nat his feet, through which the silver estuary winds onward toward the\nsea. Beneath him, on his right, the Torridge, like a land-locked lake,\nsleeps broad and bright between the old park of Tapeley and the charmed\nrock of the Hubbastone, where, seven hundred years ago, the Norse rovers\nlanded to lay siege to Kenwith Castle, a mile away on his left hand; and\nnot three fields away, are the old stones of \"The Bloody Corner,\"\nwhere the retreating Danes, cut off from their ships, made their last\nfruitless stand against the Saxon sheriff and the valiant men of Devon.\nWithin that charmed rock, so Torridge boatmen tell, sleeps now the old\nNorse Viking in his leaden coffin, with all his fairy treasure and his\ncrown of gold; and as the boy looks at the spot, he fancies, and almost\nhopes, that the day may come when he shall have to do his duty against\nthe invader as boldly as the men of Devon did then. And past him, far\nbelow, upon the soft southeastern breeze, the stately ships go sliding\nout to sea. When shall he sail in them, and see the wonders of the deep?\nAnd as he stands there with beating heart and kindling eye, the cool\nbreeze whistling through his long fair curls, he is a symbol, though he\nknows it not, of brave young England longing to wing its way out of its\nisland prison, to discover and to traffic, to colonize and to civilize,\nuntil no wind can sweep the earth which does not bear the echoes of an\nEnglish voice. Patience, young Amyas! Thou too shalt forth, and westward\nho, beyond thy wildest dreams; and see brave sights, and do brave deeds,\nwhich no man has since the foundation of the world. Thou too shalt face\ninvaders stronger and more cruel far than Dane or Norman, and bear thy\npart in that great Titan strife before the renown of which the name of\nSalamis shall fade away!\n\nMr. Oxenham came that evening to supper as he had promised: but as\npeople supped in those days in much the same manner as they do now, we\nmay drop the thread of the story for a few hours, and take it up again\nafter supper is over.\n\n\"Come now, Dick Grenville, do thou talk the good man round, and I'll\nwarrant myself to talk round the good wife.\"\n\nThe personage whom Oxenham addressed thus familiarly answered by a\nsomewhat sarcastic smile, and, \"Mr. Oxenham gives Dick Grenville\" (with\njust enough emphasis on the \"Mr.\" and the \"Dick,\" to hint that a liberty\nhad been taken with him) \"overmuch credit with the men. Mr. Oxenham's\ncredit with fair ladies, none can doubt. Friend Leigh, is Heard's great\nship home yet from the Straits?\"\n\nThe speaker, known well in those days as Sir Richard Grenville,\nGranville, Greenvil, Greenfield, with two or three other variations, was\none of those truly heroical personages whom Providence, fitting always\nthe men to their age and their work, had sent upon the earth whereof it\ntakes right good care, not in England only, but in Spain and Italy, in\nGermany and the Netherlands, and wherever, in short, great men and great\ndeeds were needed to lift the mediaeval world into the modern.\n\nAnd, among all the heroic faces which the painters of that age have\npreserved, none, perhaps, hardly excepting Shakespeare's or Spenser's,\nAlva's or Farina's, is more heroic than that of Richard Grenville, as it\nstands in Prince's \"Worthies of Devon;\" of a Spanish type, perhaps\n(or more truly speaking, a Cornish), rather than an English, with just\nenough of the British element in it to give delicacy to its massiveness.\nThe forehead and whole brain are of extraordinary loftiness, and\nperfectly upright; the nose long, aquiline, and delicately pointed;\nthe mouth fringed with a short silky beard, small and ripe, yet firm\nas granite, with just pout enough of the lower lip to give hint of that\ncapacity of noble indignation which lay hid under its usual courtly calm\nand sweetness; if there be a defect in the face, it is that the eyes are\nsomewhat small, and close together, and the eyebrows, though delicately\narched, and, without a trace of peevishness, too closely pressed\ndown upon them, the complexion is dark, the figure tall and graceful;\naltogether the likeness of a wise and gallant gentleman, lovely to all\ngood men, awful to all bad men; in whose presence none dare say or do a\nmean or a ribald thing; whom brave men left, feeling themselves nerved\nto do their duty better, while cowards slipped away, as bats and\nowls before the sun. So he lived and moved, whether in the Court of\nElizabeth, giving his counsel among the wisest; or in the streets of\nBideford, capped alike by squire and merchant, shopkeeper and sailor; or\nriding along the moorland roads between his houses of Stow and Bideford,\nwhile every woman ran out to her door to look at the great Sir Richard,\nthe pride of North Devon; or, sitting there in the low mullioned window\nat Burrough, with his cup of malmsey before him, and the lute to which\nhe had just been singing laid across his knees, while the red western\nsun streamed in upon his high, bland forehead, and soft curling locks;\never the same steadfast, God-fearing, chivalrous man, conscious (as far\nas a soul so healthy could be conscious) of the pride of beauty, and\nstrength, and valor, and wisdom, and a race and name which claimed\ndirect descent from the grandfather of the Conqueror, and was tracked\ndown the centuries by valiant deeds and noble benefits to his native\nshire, himself the noblest of his race. Men said that he was proud; but\nhe could not look round him without having something to be proud of;\nthat he was stern and harsh to his sailors: but it was only when he saw\nin them any taint of cowardice or falsehood; that he was subject, at\nmoments, to such fearful fits of rage, that he had been seen to snatch\nthe glasses from the table, grind them to pieces in his teeth, and\nswallow them: but that was only when his indignation had been aroused by\nsome tale of cruelty or oppression, and, above all, by those West Indian\ndevilries of the Spaniards, whom he regarded (and in those days rightly\nenough) as the enemies of God and man. Of this last fact Oxenham was\nwell aware, and therefore felt somewhat puzzled and nettled, when, after\nhaving asked Mr. Leigh's leave to take young Amyas with him and set\nforth in glowing colors the purpose of his voyage, he found Sir Richard\nutterly unwilling to help him with his suit.\n\n\"Heyday, Sir Richard! You are not surely gone over to the side of those\ncanting fellows (Spanish Jesuits in disguise, every one of them, they\nare), who pretended to turn up their noses at Franky Drake, as a pirate,\nand be hanged to them?\"\n\n\"My friend Oxenham,\" answered he, in the sententious and measured style\nof the day, \"I have always held, as you should know by this, that Mr.\nDrake's booty, as well as my good friend Captain Hawkins's, is lawful\nprize, as being taken from the Spaniard, who is not only hostis humani\ngeneris, but has no right to the same, having robbed it violently, by\ntorture and extreme iniquity, from the poor Indian, whom God avenge, as\nHe surely will.\"\n\n\"Amen,\" said Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"I say Amen, too,\" quoth Oxenham, \"especially if it please Him to avenge\nthem by English hands.\"\n\n\"And I also,\" went on Sir Richard; \"for the rightful owners of the said\ngoods being either miserably dead, or incapable, by reason of their\nservitude, of ever recovering any share thereof, the treasure, falsely\ncalled Spanish, cannot be better bestowed than in building up the state\nof England against them, our natural enemies; and thereby, in building\nup the weal of the Reformed Churches throughout the world, and the\nliberties of all nations, against a tyranny more foul and rapacious than\nthat of Nero or Caligula; which, if it be not the cause of God, I, for\none, know not what God's cause is!\" And, as he warmed in his speech, his\neyes flashed very fire.\n\n\"Hark now!\" said Oxenham, \"who can speak more boldly than he? and yet he\nwill not help this lad to so noble an adventure.\"\n\n\"You have asked his father and mother; what is their answer?\"\n\n\"Mine is this,\" said Mr. Leigh; \"if it be God's will that my boy should\nbecome, hereafter, such a mariner as Sir Richard Grenville, let him go,\nand God be with him; but let him first bide here at home and be\ntrained, if God give me grace, to become such a gentleman as Sir Richard\nGrenville.\"\n\nSir Richard bowed low, and Mrs. Leigh catching up the last word--\n\n\"There, Mr. Oxenham, you cannot gainsay that, unless you will be\ndiscourteous to his worship. And for me--though it be a weak woman's\nreason, yet it is a mother's: he is my only child. His elder brother is\nfar away. God only knows whether I shall see him again; and what are all\nreports of his virtues and his learning to me, compared to that sweet\npresence which I daily miss? Ah! Mr. Oxenham, my beautiful Joseph is\ngone; and though he be lord of Pharaoh's household, yet he is far away\nin Egypt; and you will take Benjamm also! Ah! Mr. Oxenham, you have no\nchild, or you would not ask for mine!\"\n\n\"And how do you know that, my sweet madam!\" said the adventurer, turning\nfirst deadly pale, and then glowing red. Her last words had touched him\nto the quick in some unexpected place; and rising, he courteously laid\nher hand to his lips, and said--\"I say no more. Farewell, sweet madam,\nand God send all men such wives as you.\"\n\n\"And all wives,\" said she, smiling, \"such husbands as mine.\"\n\n\"Nay, I will not say that,\" answered he, with a half sneer--and then,\n\"Farewell, friend Leigh--farewell, gallant Dick Grenville. God send I\nsee thee Lord High Admiral when I come home. And yet, why should I come\nhome? Will you pray for poor Jack, gentles?\"\n\n\"Tut, tut, man! good words,\" said Leigh; \"let us drink to our merry\nmeeting before you go.\" And rising, and putting the tankard of malmsey\nto his lips, he passed it to Sir Richard, who rose, and saying, \"To the\nfortune of a bold mariner and a gallant gentleman,\" drank, and put the\ncup into Oxenham's hand.\n\nThe adventurer's face was flushed, and his eye wild. Whether from the\nliquor he had drunk during the day, or whether from Mrs. Leigh's last\nspeech, he had not been himself for a few minutes. He lifted the cup,\nand was in act to pledge them, when he suddenly dropped it on the table,\nand pointed, staring and trembling, up and down, and round the room, as\nif following some fluttering object.\n\n\"There! Do you see it? The bird!--the bird with the white breast!\"\n\nEach looked at the other; but Leigh, who was a quick-witted man and an\nold courtier, forced a laugh instantly, and cried--\"Nonsense, brave Jack\nOxenham! Leave white birds for men who will show the white feather. Mrs.\nLeigh waits to pledge you.\"\n\nOxenham recovered himself in a moment, pledged them all round, drinking\ndeep and fiercely; and after hearty farewells, departed, never hinting\nagain at his strange exclamation.\n\nAfter he was gone, and while Leigh was attending him to the door, Mrs.\nLeigh and Grenville kept a few minutes' dead silence. At last--\"God help\nhim!\" said she.\n\n\"Amen!\" said Grenville, \"for he never needed it more. But, indeed,\nmadam, I put no faith in such omens.\"\n\n\"But, Sir Richard, that bird has been seen for generations before the\ndeath of any of his family. I know those who were at South Tawton when\nhis mother died, and his brother also; and they both saw it. God help\nhim! for, after all, he is a proper man.\"\n\n\"So many a lady has thought before now, Mrs. Leigh, and well for him if\nthey had not. But, indeed, I make no account of omens. When God is ready\nfor each man, then he must go; and when can he go better?\"\n\n\"But,\" said Mr. Leigh, who entered, \"I have seen, and especially when\nI was in Italy, omens and prophecies before now beget their own\nfulfilment, by driving men into recklessness, and making them run\nheadlong upon that very ruin which, as they fancied, was running upon\nthem.\"\n\n\"And which,\" said Sir Richard, \"they might have avoided, if, instead of\ntrusting in I know not what dumb and dark destiny, they had trusted in\nthe living God, by faith in whom men may remove mountains, and quench\nthe fire, and put to flight the armies of the alien. I too know, and\nknow not how I know, that I shall never die in my bed.\"\n\n\"God forfend!\" cried Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"And why, fair madam, if I die doing my duty to my God and my queen? The\nthought never moves me: nay, to tell the truth, I pray often enough that\nI may be spared the miseries of imbecile old age, and that end which\nthe old Northmen rightly called 'a cow's death' rather than a man's. But\nenough of this. Mr. Leigh, you have done wisely to-night. Poor Oxenham\ndoes not go on his voyage with a single eye. I have talked about him\nwith Drake and Hawkins; and I guess why Mrs. Leigh touched him so home\nwhen she told him that he had no child.\"\n\n\"Has he one, then, in the West Indies?\" cried the good lady.\n\n\"God knows; and God grant we may not hear of shame and sorrow fallen\nupon an ancient and honorable house of Devon. My brother Stukely is woe\nenough to North Devon for this generation.\"\n\n\"Poor braggadocio!\" said Mr. Leigh; \"and yet not altogether that too,\nfor he can fight at least.\"\n\n\"So can every mastiff and boar, much more an Englishman. And now come\nhither to me, my adventurous godson, and don't look in such doleful\ndumps. I hear you have broken all the sailor-boys' heads already.\"\n\n\"Nearly all,\" said young Amyas, with due modesty.. \"But am I not to go\nto sea?\"\n\n\"All things in their time, my boy, and God forbid that either I or your\nworthy parents should keep you from that noble calling which is the\nsafeguard of this England and her queen. But you do not wish to live and\ndie the master of a trawler?\"\n\n\"I should like to be a brave adventurer, like Mr. Oxenham.\"\n\n\"God grant you become a braver man than he! for, as I think, to be bold\nagainst the enemy is common to the brutes; but the prerogative of a man\nis to be bold against himself.\"\n\n\"How, sir?\"\n\n\"To conquer our own fancies, Amyas, and our own lusts, and our ambition,\nin the sacred name of duty; this it is to be truly brave, and truly\nstrong; for he who cannot rule himself, how can he rule his crew or his\nfortunes? Come, now, I will make you a promise. If you will bide quietly\nat home, and learn from your father and mother all which befits a\ngentleman and a Christian, as well as a seaman, the day shall come when\nyou shall sail with Richard Grenville himself, or with better men than\nhe, on a nobler errand than gold-hunting on the Spanish Main.\"\n\n\"O my boy, my boy!\" said Mrs. Leigh, \"hear what the good Sir Richard\npromises you. Many an earl's son would be glad to be in your place.\"\n\n\"And many an earl's son will be glad to be in his place a score years\nhence, if he will but learn what I know you two can teach him. And now,\nAmyas, my lad, I will tell you for a warning the history of that Sir\nThomas Stukely of whom I spoke just now, and who was, as all men know,\na gallant and courtly knight, of an ancient and worshipful family in\nIlfracombe, well practised in the wars, and well beloved at first by our\nincomparable queen, the friend of all true virtue, as I trust she will\nbe of yours some day; who wanted but one step to greatness, and that\nwas this, that in his hurry to rule all the world, he forgot to rule\nhimself. At first, he wasted his estate in show and luxury, always\nintending to be famous, and destroying his own fame all the while by\nhis vainglory and haste. Then, to retrieve his losses, he hit upon the\npeopling of Florida, which thou and I will see done some day, by God's\nblessing; for I and some good friends of mine have an errand there as\nwell as he. But he did not go about it as a loyal man, to advance the\nhonor of his queen, but his own honor only, dreaming that he too should\nbe a king; and was not ashamed to tell her majesty that he had rather be\nsovereign of a molehill than the highest subject of an emperor.\"\n\n\"They say,\" said Mr. Leigh, \"that he told her plainly he should be a\nprince before he died, and that she gave him one of her pretty quips in\nreturn.\"\n\n\"I don't know that her majesty had the best of it. A fool is many times\ntoo strong for a wise man, by virtue of his thick hide. For when she\nsaid that she hoped she should hear from him in his new principality,\n'Yes, sooth,' says he, graciously enough. 'And in what style?' asks she.\n'To our dear sister,' says Stukely: to which her clemency had nothing to\nreply, but turned away, as Mr. Burleigh told me, laughing.\"\n\n\"Alas for him!\" said gentle Mrs. Leigh. \"Such self-conceit--and Heaven\nknows we have the root of it in ourselves also--is the very daughter of\nself-will, and of that loud crying out about I, and me, and mine, which\nis the very bird-call for all devils, and the broad road which leads to\ndeath.\"\n\n\"It will lead him to his,\" said Sir Richard; \"God grant it be not upon\nTower-hill! for since that Florida plot, and after that his hopes of\nIrish preferment came to naught, he who could not help himself by fair\nmeans has taken to foul ones, and gone over to Italy to the Pope, whose\ninfallibility has not been proof against Stukely's wit; for he was soon\nhis Holiness's closet counsellor, and, they say, his bosom friend; and\nmade him give credit to his boasts that, with three thousand soldiers he\nwould beat the English out of Ireland, and make the Pope's son king of\nit.\"\n\n\"Ay, but,\" said Mr. Leigh, \"I suppose the Italians have the same fetch\nnow as they had when I was there, to explain such ugly cases; namely,\nthat the Pope is infallible only in doctrine, and quoad Pope; while\nquoad hominem, he is even as others, or indeed, in general, a deal\nworse, so that the office, and not the man, may be glorified thereby.\nBut where is Stukely now?\"\n\n\"At Rome when last I heard of him, ruffling it up and down the Vatican\nas Baron Ross, Viscount Murrough, Earl Wexford, Marquis Leinster, and\na title or two more, which have cost the Pope little, seeing that\nthey never were his to give; and plotting, they say, some hare-brained\nexpedition against Ireland by the help of the Spanish king, which must\nend in nothing but his shame and ruin. And now, my sweet hosts, I must\ncall for serving-boy and lantern, and home to my bed in Bideford.\"\n\nAnd so Amyas Leigh went back to school, and Mr. Oxenham went his way to\nPlymouth again, and sailed for the Spanish Main.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nHOW AMYAS CAME HOME THE FIRST TIME\n\n     \"Si taceant homines, facient te sidera notum,\n         Sol nescit comitis immemor esse sui.\"\n\n                             Old Epigram on Drake.\n\nFive years are past and gone. It is nine of the clock on a still, bright\nNovember morning; but the bells of Bideford church are still ringing for\nthe daily service two hours after the usual time; and instead of going\nsoberly according to wont, cannot help breaking forth every five minutes\ninto a jocund peal, and tumbling head over heels in ecstasies of joy.\nBideford streets are a very flower-garden of all the colors, swarming\nwith seamen and burghers, and burghers' wives and daughters, all\nin their holiday attire. Garlands are hung across the streets, and\ntapestries from every window. The ships in the pool are dressed in all\ntheir flags, and give tumultuous vent to their feelings by peals of\nordnance of every size. Every stable is crammed with horses; and\nSir Richard Grenville's house is like a very tavern, with eating\nand drinking, and unsaddling, and running to and fro of grooms and\nserving-men. Along the little churchyard, packed full with women,\nstreams all the gentle blood of North Devon,--tall and stately men, and\nfair ladies, worthy of the days when the gentry of England were by due\nright the leaders of the people, by personal prowess and beauty, as well\nas by intellect and education. And first, there is my lady Countess of\nBath, whom Sir Richard Grenville is escorting, cap in hand (for her good\nEarl Bourchier is in London with the queen); and there are Bassets\nfrom beautiful Umberleigh, and Carys from more beautiful Clovelly, and\nFortescues of Wear, and Fortescues of Buckland, and Fortescues from all\nquarters, and Coles from Slade, and Stukelys from Affton, and St. Legers\nfrom Annery, and Coffins from Portledge, and even Coplestones from\nEggesford, thirty miles away: and last, but not least (for almost all\nstop to give them place), Sir John Chichester of Ralegh, followed\nin single file, after the good old patriarchal fashion, by his eight\ndaughters, and three of his five famous sons (one, to avenge his\nmurdered brother, is fighting valiantly in Ireland, hereafter to rule\nthere wisely also, as Lord Deputy and Baron of Belfast); and he meets\nat the gate his cousin of Arlington, and behind him a train of four\ndaughters and nineteen sons, the last of whom has not yet passed the\ntown-hall, while the first is at the Lychgate, who, laughing, make way\nfor the elder though shorter branch of that most fruitful tree; and so\non into the church, where all are placed according to their degrees, or\nat least as near as may be, not without a few sour looks, and shovings,\nand whisperings, from one high-born matron and another; till the\nchurchwardens and sidesmen, who never had before so goodly a company to\narrange, have bustled themselves hot, and red, and frantic, and end by\nimploring abjectly the help of the great Sir Richard himself to tell\nthem who everybody is, and which is the elder branch, and which is the\nyounger, and who carries eight quarterings in their arms, and who only\nfour, and so prevent their setting at deadly feud half the fine\nladies of North Devon; for the old men are all safe packed away in the\ncorporation pews, and the young ones care only to get a place whence\nthey may eye the ladies. And at last there is a silence, and a looking\ntoward the door, and then distant music, flutes and hautboys, drums and\ntrumpets, which come braying, and screaming, and thundering merrily\nup to the very church doors, and then cease; and the churchwardens\nand sidesmen bustle down to the entrance, rods in hand, and there is a\ngeneral whisper and rustle, not without glad tears and blessings from\nmany a woman, and from some men also, as the wonder of the day enters,\nand the rector begins, not the morning service, but the good old\nthanksgiving after a victory at sea.\n\nAnd what is it which has thus sent old Bideford wild with that \"goodly\njoy and pious mirth,\" of which we now only retain traditions in\nour translation of the Psalms? Why are all eyes fixed, with greedy\nadmiration, on those four weather-beaten mariners, decked out with knots\nand ribbons by loving hands; and yet more on that gigantic figure who\nwalks before them, a beardless boy, and yet with the frame and stature\nof a Hercules, towering, like Saul of old, a head and shoulders above\nall the congregation, with his golden locks flowing down over his\nshoulders? And why, as the five go instinctively up to the altar, and\nthere fall on their knees before the rails, are all eyes turned to the\npew where Mrs. Leigh of Burrough has hid her face between her hands,\nand her hood rustles and shakes to her joyful sobs? Because there was\nfellow-feeling of old in merry England, in county and in town; and\nthese are Devon men, and men of Bideford, whose names are Amyas Leigh of\nBurrough, John Staveley, Michael Heard, and Jonas Marshall of Bideford,\nand Thomas Braund of Clovelly: and they, the first of all English\nmariners, have sailed round the world with Francis Drake, and are come\nhither to give God thanks.\n\nIt is a long story. To explain how it happened we must go back for a\npage or two, almost to the point from whence we started in the last\nchapter.\n\nFor somewhat more than a twelvemonth after Mr. Oxenham's departure,\nyoung Amyas had gone on quietly enough, according to promise, with the\nexception of certain occasional outbursts of fierceness common to all\nyoung male animals, and especially to boys of any strength of character.\nHis scholarship, indeed, progressed no better than before; but his home\neducation went on healthily enough; and he was fast becoming, young as\nhe was, a right good archer, and rider, and swordsman (after the old\nschool of buckler practice), when his father, having gone down on\nbusiness to the Exeter Assizes, caught (as was too common in those days)\nthe gaol-fever from the prisoners; sickened in the very court; and died\nwithin a week.\n\nAnd now Mrs. Leigh was left to God and her own soul, with this young\nlion-cub in leash, to tame and train for this life and the life to\ncome. She had loved her husband fervently and holily. He had been often\npeevish, often melancholy; for he was a disappointed man, with an estate\nimpoverished by his father's folly, and his own youthful ambition, which\nhad led him up to Court, and made him waste his heart and his purse in\nfollowing a vain shadow. He was one of those men, moreover, who possess\nalmost every gift except the gift of the power to use them; and though\na scholar, a courtier, and a soldier, he had found himself, when he was\npast forty, without settled employment or aim in life, by reason of\na certain shyness, pride, or delicate honor (call it which you will),\nwhich had always kept him from playing a winning game in that very world\nafter whose prizes he hankered to the last, and on which he revenged\nhimself by continual grumbling. At last, by his good luck, he met with\na fair young Miss Foljambe, of Derbyshire, then about Queen Elizabeth's\nCourt, who was as tired as he of the sins of the world, though she had\nseen less of them; and the two contrived to please each other so well,\nthat though the queen grumbled a little, as usual, at the lady for\nmarrying, and at the gentleman for adoring any one but her royal self,\nthey got leave to vanish from the little Babylon at Whitehall, and\nsettle in peace at Burrough. In her he found a treasure, and he knew\nwhat he had found.\n\nMrs. Leigh was, and had been from her youth, one of those noble old\nEnglish churchwomen, without superstition, and without severity, who\nare among the fairest features of that heroic time. There was a certain\nmelancholy about her, nevertheless; for the recollections of her\nchildhood carried her back to times when it was an awful thing to be a\nProtestant. She could remember among them, five-and-twenty years ago,\nthe burning of poor blind Joan Waste at Derby, and of Mistress Joyce\nLewis, too, like herself, a lady born; and sometimes even now, in her\nnightly dreams, rang in her ears her mother's bitter cries to God,\neither to spare her that fiery torment, or to give her strength to bear\nit, as she whom she loved had borne it before her. For her mother, who\nwas of a good family in Yorkshire, had been one of Queen Catherine's\nbedchamber women, and the bosom friend and disciple of Anne Askew. And\nshe had sat in Smithfield, with blood curdled by horror, to see the\nhapless Court beauty, a month before the paragon of Henry's Court,\ncarried in a chair (so crippled was she by the rack) to her fiery doom\nat the stake, beside her fellow-courtier, Mr. Lascelles, while the very\nheavens seemed to the shuddering mob around to speak their wrath and\ngrief in solemn thunder peals, and heavy drops which hissed upon the\ncrackling pile.\n\nTherefore a sadness hung upon her all her life, and deepened in the days\nof Queen Mary, when, as a notorious Protestant and heretic, she had had\nto hide for her life among the hills and caverns of the Peak, and was\nonly saved, by the love which her husband's tenants bore her, and by his\nbold declaration that, good Catholic as he was, he would run through\nthe body any constable, justice, or priest, yea, bishop or cardinal, who\ndared to serve the queen's warrant upon his wife.\n\nSo she escaped: but, as I said, a sadness hung upon her all her life;\nand the skirt of that dark mantle fell upon the young girl who had been\nthe partner of her wanderings and hidings among the lonely hills; and\nwho, after she was married, gave herself utterly up to God.\n\nAnd yet in giving herself to God, Mrs. Leigh gave herself to her\nhusband, her children, and the poor of Northam Town, and was none the\nless welcome to the Grenvilles, and Fortescues, and Chichesters, and\nall the gentle families round, who honored her husband's talents, and\nenjoyed his wit. She accustomed herself to austerities, which often\ncalled forth the kindly rebukes of her husband; and yet she did so\nwithout one superstitious thought of appeasing the fancied wrath of God,\nor of giving Him pleasure (base thought) by any pain of hers; for her\nspirit had been trained in the freest and loftiest doctrines of Luther's\nschool; and that little mystic \"Alt-Deutsch Theologie\" (to which the\ngreat Reformer said that he owed more than to any book, save the Bible,\nand St. Augustine) was her counsellor and comforter by day and night.\n\nAnd now, at little past forty, she was left a widow: lovely still\nin face and figure; and still more lovely from the divine calm which\nbrooded, like the dove of peace and the Holy Spirit of God (which indeed\nit was), over every look, and word, and gesture; a sweetness which had\nbeen ripened by storm, as well as by sunshine; which this world had\nnot given, and could not take away. No wonder that Sir Richard and Lady\nGrenville loved her; no wonder that her children worshipped her; no\nwonder that the young Amyas, when the first burst of grief was over, and\nhe knew again where he stood, felt that a new life had begun for him;\nthat his mother was no more to think and act for him only, but that he\nmust think and act for his mother. And so it was, that on the very day\nafter his father's funeral, when school-hours were over, instead of\ncoming straight home, he walked boldly into Sir Richard Grenville's\nhouse, and asked to see his godfather.\n\n\"You must be my father now, sir,\" said he, firmly.\n\nAnd Sir Richard looked at the boy's broad strong face, and swore a great\nand holy oath, like Glasgerion's, \"by oak, and ash, and thorn,\" that\nhe would be a father to him, and a brother to his mother, for Christ's\nsake. And Lady Grenville took the boy by the hand, and walked home\nwith him to Burrough; and there the two fair women fell on each other's\nnecks, and wept together; the one for the loss which had been, the\nother, as by a prophetic instinct, for the like loss which was to come\nto her also. For the sweet St. Leger knew well that her husband's fiery\nspirit would never leave his body on a peaceful bed; but that death (as\nhe prayed almost nightly that it might) would find him sword in\nhand, upon the field of duty and of fame. And there those two vowed\neverlasting sisterhood, and kept their vow; and after that all things\nwent on at Burrough as before; and Amyas rode, and shot, and boxed, and\nwandered on the quay at Sir Richard's side; for Mrs. Leigh was too\nwise a woman to alter one tittle of the training which her husband had\nthought best for his younger boy. It was enough that her elder son had\nof his own accord taken to that form of life in which she in her secret\nheart would fain have moulded both her children. For Frank, God's\nwedding gift to that pure love of hers, had won himself honor at home\nand abroad; first at the school at Bideford; then at Exeter College,\nwhere he had become a friend of Sir Philip Sidney's, and many another\nyoung man of rank and promise; and next, in the summer of 1572, on his\nway to the University of Heidelberg, he had gone to Paris, with (luckily\nfor him) letters of recommendation to Walsingham, at the English\nEmbassy: by which letters he not only fell in a second time with Philip\nSidney, but saved his own life (as Sidney did his) in the Massacre of\nSt. Bartholomew's Day. At Heidelberg he had stayed two years, winning\nfresh honor from all who knew him, and resisting all Sidney's entreaties\nto follow him into Italy. For, scorning to be a burden to his parents,\nhe had become at Heidelberg tutor to two young German princes, whom,\nafter living with them at their father's house for a year or more, he at\nlast, to his own great delight, took with him down to Padua, \"to\nperfect them,\" as he wrote home, \"according to his insufficiency, in all\nprincely studies.\" Sidney was now returned to England; but Frank found\nfriends enough without him, such letters of recommendation and diplomas\ndid he carry from I know not how many princes, magnificos, and learned\ndoctors, who had fallen in love with the learning, modesty, and virtue\nof the fair young Englishman. And ere Frank returned to Germany he had\nsatiated his soul with all the wonders of that wondrous land. He had\ntalked over the art of sonneteering with Tasso, the art of history\nwith Sarpi; he had listened, between awe and incredulity, to the daring\ntheories of Galileo; he had taken his pupils to Venice, that their\nportraits might be painted by Paul Veronese; he had seen the palaces of\nPalladio, and the merchant princes on the Rialto, and the argosies of\nRagusa, and all the wonders of that meeting-point of east and west; he\nhad watched Tintoretto's mighty hand \"hurling tempestuous glories o'er\nthe scene;\" and even, by dint of private intercession in high places,\nhad been admitted to that sacred room where, with long silver beard and\nundimmed eye, amid a pantheon of his own creations, the ancient Titian,\npatriarch of art, still lingered upon earth, and told old tales of the\nBellinis, and Raffaelle, and Michael Angelo, and the building of St.\nPeter's, and the fire at Venice, and the sack of Rome, and of kings and\nwarriors, statesmen and poets, long since gone to their account, and\nshowed the sacred brush which Francis the First had stooped to pick up\nfor him. And (license forbidden to Sidney by his friend Languet) he had\nbeen to Rome, and seen (much to the scandal of good Protestants at home)\nthat \"right good fellow,\" as Sidney calls him, who had not yet eaten\nhimself to death, the Pope for the time being. And he had seen the\nfrescos of the Vatican, and heard Palestrina preside as chapel-master\nover the performance of his own music beneath the dome of St. Peter's,\nand fallen half in love with those luscious strains, till he was\nawakened from his dream by the recollection that beneath that same dome\nhad gone up thanksgivings to the God of heaven for those blood-stained\nstreets, and shrieking women, and heaps of insulted corpses, which he\nhad beheld in Paris on the night of St. Bartholomew. At last, a few\nmonths before his father died, he had taken back his pupils to their\nhome in Germany, from whence he was dismissed, as he wrote, with rich\ngifts; and then Mrs. Leigh's heart beat high, at the thought that the\nwanderer would return: but, alas! within a month after his father's\ndeath, came a long letter from Frank, describing the Alps, and the\nvalleys of the Waldenses (with whose Barbes he had had much talk about\nthe late horrible persecutions), and setting forth how at Padua he had\nmade the acquaintance of that illustrious scholar and light of the age,\nStephanus Parmenius (commonly called from his native place, Budaeus),\nwho had visited Geneva with him, and heard the disputations of their\nmost learned doctors, which both he and Budaeus disliked for their hard\njudgments both of God and man, as much as they admired them for their\nsubtlety, being themselves, as became Italian students, Platonists of\nthe school of Ficinus and Picus Mirandolensis. So wrote Master Frank,\nin a long sententious letter, full of Latin quotations: but the letter\nnever reached the eyes of him for whose delight it had been penned: and\nthe widow had to weep over it alone, and to weep more bitterly than ever\nat the conclusion, in which, with many excuses, Frank said that he had,\nat the special entreaty of the said Budaeus, set out with him down the\nDanube stream to Buda, that he might, before finishing his travels,\nmake experience of that learning for which the Hungarians were famous\nthroughout Europe. And after that, though he wrote again and again to\nthe father whom he fancied living, no letter in return reached him from\nhome for nearly two years; till, fearing some mishap, he hurried back to\nEngland, to find his mother a widow, and his brother Amyas gone to the\nSouth Seas with Captain Drake of Plymouth. And yet, even then, after\nyears of absence, he was not allowed to remain at home. For Sir Richard,\nto whom idleness was a thing horrible and unrighteous, would have him up\nand doing again before six months were over, and sent him off to Court\nto Lord Hunsdon.\n\nThere, being as delicately beautiful as his brother was huge and strong,\nhe had speedily, by Carew's interest and that of Sidney and his Uncle\nLeicester, found entrance into some office in the queen's household; and\nhe was now basking in the full sunshine of Court favor, and fair ladies'\neyes, and all the chivalries and euphuisms of Gloriana's fairyland, and\nthe fast friendship of that bright meteor Sidney, who had returned with\nhonor in 1577, from the delicate mission on behalf of the German and\nBelgian Protestants, on which he had been sent to the Court of Vienna,\nunder color of condoling with the new Emperor Rodolph on his father's\ndeath. Frank found him when he himself came to Court in 1579 as lovely\nand loving as ever; and, at the early age of twenty-five, acknowledged\nas one of the most remarkable men of Europe, the patron of all men of\nletters, the counsellor of warriors and statesmen, and the confidant and\nadvocate of William of Orange, Languet, Plessis du Mornay, and all the\nProtestant leaders on the Continent; and found, moreover, that the son\nof the poor Devon squire was as welcome as ever to the friendship of\nnature's and fortune's most favored, yet most unspoilt, minion.\n\nPoor Mrs. Leigh, as one who had long since learned to have no self,\nand to live not only for her children but in them, submitted without a\nmurmur, and only said, smiling, to her stern friend--\"You took away my\nmastiff-pup, and now you must needs have my fair greyhound also.\"\n\n\"Would you have your fair greyhound, dear lady, grow up a tall and\ntrue Cotswold dog, that can pull down a stag of ten, or one of those\nsmooth-skinned poppets which the Florence ladies lead about with a ring\nof bells round its neck, and a flannel farthingale over its loins?\"\n\nMrs. Leigh submitted; and was rewarded after a few months by a letter,\nsent through Sir Richard, from none other than Gloriana herself, in\nwhich she thanked her for \"the loan of that most delicate and flawless\ncrystal, the soul of her excellent son,\" with more praises of him than I\nhave room to insert, and finished by exalting the poor mother above the\nfamed Cornelia; \"for those sons, whom she called her jewels, she\nonly showed, yet kept them to herself: but you, madam, having two as\nprecious, I doubt not, as were ever that Roman dame's, have, beyond her\ncourage, lent them both to your country and to your queen, who therein\nholds herself indebted to you for that which, if God give her grace, she\nwill repay as becomes both her and you.\" Which epistle the sweet mother\nbedewed with holy tears, and laid by in the cedar-box which held her\nhousehold gods, by the side of Frank's innumerable diplomas and letters\nof recommendation, the Latin whereof she was always spelling over\n(although she understood not a word of it), in hopes of finding, here\nand there, that precious excellentissimus Noster Franciscus Leighius\nAnglus, which was all in all to the mother's heart.\n\nBut why did Amyas go to the South Seas? Amyas went to the South Seas for\ntwo causes, each of which has, before now, sent many a lad to far worse\nplaces: first, because of an old schoolmaster; secondly, because of a\nyoung beauty. I will take them in order and explain.\n\nVindex Brimblecombe, whilom servitor of Exeter College, Oxford (commonly\ncalled Sir Vindex, after the fashion of the times), was, in those days,\nmaster of the grammar-school of Bideford. He was, at root, a godly and\nkind-hearted pedant enough; but, like most schoolmasters in the old\nflogging days, had his heart pretty well hardened by long, baneful\nlicense to inflict pain at will on those weaker than himself; a power\nhealthful enough for the victim (for, doubtless, flogging is the best of\nall punishments, being not only the shortest, but also a mere bodily and\nanimal, and not, like most of our new-fangled \"humane\" punishments, a\nspiritual and fiendish torture), but for the executioner pretty certain\nto eradicate, from all but the noblest spirits, every trace of chivalry\nand tenderness for the weak, as well, often, as all self-control and\ncommand of temper. Be that as it may, old Sir Vindex had heart enough\nto feel that it was now his duty to take especial care of the fatherless\nboy to whom he tried to teach his qui, quae, quod: but the only outcome\nof that new sense of responsibility was a rapid increase in the number\nof floggings, which rose from about two a week to one per diem, not\nwithout consequences to the pedagogue himself.\n\nFor all this while, Amyas had never for a moment lost sight of his\ndarling desire for a sea-life; and when he could not wander on the quay\nand stare at the shipping, or go down to the pebble-ridge at Northam,\nand there sit, devouring, with hungry eyes, the great expanse of ocean,\nwhich seemed to woo him outward into boundless space, he used to console\nhimself, in school-hours, by drawing ships and imaginary charts upon his\nslate, instead of minding his \"humanities.\"\n\nNow it befell, upon an afternoon, that he was very busy at a map, or\nbird's-eye view of an island, whereon was a great castle, and at the\ngate thereof a dragon, terrible to see; while in the foreground came\nthat which was meant for a gallant ship, with a great flag aloft, but\nwhich, by reason of the forest of lances with which it was crowded,\nlooked much more like a porcupine carrying a sign-post; and, at the\nroots of those lances, many little round o's, whereby was signified\nthe heads of Amyas and his schoolfellows, who were about to slay that\ndragon, and rescue the beautiful princess who dwelt in that enchanted\ntower. To behold which marvel of art, all the other boys at the same\ndesk must needs club their heads together, and with the more security,\nbecause Sir Vindex, as was his custom after dinner, was lying back in\nhis chair, and slept the sleep of the just.\n\nBut when Amyas, by special instigation of the evil spirit who haunts\nsuccessful artists, proceeded further to introduce, heedless of\nperspective, a rock, on which stood the lively portraiture of Sir\nVindex--nose, spectacles, gown, and all; and in his hand a brandished\nrod, while out of his mouth a label shrieked after the runaways,\n\"You come back!\" while a similar label replied from the gallant bark,\n\"Good-bye, master!\" the shoving and tittering rose to such a pitch that\nCerberus awoke, and demanded sternly what the noise was about. To which,\nof course, there was no answer.\n\n\"You, of course, Leigh! Come up, sir, and show me your exercitation.\"\n\nNow of Amyas's exercitation not a word was written; and, moreover,\nhe was in the very article of putting the last touches to Mr.\nBrimblecombe's portrait. Whereon, to the astonishment of all hearers, he\nmade answer--\n\n\"All in good time, sir!\" and went on drawing.\n\n\"In good time, sir! Insolent, veni et vapula!\"\n\nBut Amyas went on drawing.\n\n\"Come hither, sirrah, or I'll flay you alive!\"\n\n\"Wait a bit!\" answered Amyas.\n\nThe old gentleman jumped up, ferula in hand, and darted across the\nschool, and saw himself upon the fatal slate.\n\n\"Proh flagitium! what have we here, villain?\" and clutching at his\nvictim, he raised the cane. Whereupon, with a serene and cheerful\ncountenance, up rose the mighty form of Amyas Leigh, a head and\nshoulders above his tormentor, and that slate descended on the bald\ncoxcomb of Sir Vindex Brimblecombe, with so shrewd a blow that slate and\npate cracked at the same instant, and the poor pedagogue dropped to the\nfloor, and lay for dead.\n\nAfter which Amyas arose, and walked out of the school, and so quietly\nhome; and having taken counsel with himself, went to his mother, and\nsaid, \"Please, mother, I've broken schoolmaster's head.\"\n\n\"Broken his head, thou wicked boy!\" shrieked the poor widow; \"what didst\ndo that for?\"\n\n\"I can't tell,\" said Amyas, penitently; \"I couldn't help it. It looked\nso smooth, and bald, and round, and--you know?\"\n\n\"I know? Oh, wicked boy! thou hast given place to the devil; and now,\nperhaps, thou hast killed him.\"\n\n\"Killed the devil?\" asked Amyas, hopefully but doubtfully.\n\n\"No, killed the schoolmaster, sirrah! Is he dead?\"\n\n\"I don't think he's dead; his coxcomb sounded too hard for that. But had\nnot I better go and tell Sir Richard?\"\n\nThe poor mother could hardly help laughing, in spite of her terror,\nat Amyas's perfect coolness (which was not in the least meant for\ninsolence), and being at her wits' end, sent him, as usual, to his\ngodfather.\n\nAmyas rehearsed his story again, with pretty nearly the same\nexclamations, to which he gave pretty nearly the same answers; and\nthen--\"What was he going to do to you, then, sirrah?\"\n\n\"Flog me, because I could not write my exercise, and so drew a picture\nof him instead.\"\n\n\"What! art afraid of being flogged?\"\n\n\"Not a bit; besides, I'm too much accustomed to it; but I was busy, and\nhe was in such a desperate hurry; and, oh, sir, if you had but seen his\nbald head, you would have broken it yourself!\"\n\nNow Sir Richard had, twenty years ago, in like place, and very much\nin like manner, broken the head of Vindex Brimblecombe's father,\nschoolmaster in his day, and therefore had a precedent to direct him;\nand he answered--\"Amyas, sirrah! those who cannot obey will never be fit\nto rule. If thou canst not keep discipline now, thou wilt never make a\ncompany or a crew keep it when thou art grown. Dost mind that, sirrah?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Then go back to school this moment, sir, and be flogged.\"\n\n\"Very well,\" said Amyas, considering that he had got off very cheaply;\nwhile Sir Richard, as soon as he was out of the room, lay back in his\nchair, and laughed till he cried again.\n\nSo Amyas went back, and said that he was come to be flogged; whereon the\nold schoolmaster, whose pate had been plastered meanwhile, wept tears of\njoy over the returning prodigal, and then gave him such a switching as\nhe did not forget for eight-and-forty hours.\n\nBut that evening Sir Richard sent for old Vindex, who entered,\ntrembling, cap in hand; and having primed him with a cup of sack,\nsaid--\"Well, Mr. Schoolmaster! My godson has been somewhat too much for\nyou to-day. There are a couple of nobles to pay the doctor.\"\n\n\"O Sir Richard, gratias tibi et Domino! but the boy hits shrewdly\nhard. Nevertheless I have repaid him in inverse kind, and set him an\nimposition, to learn me one of Phaedrus his fables, Sir Richard, if you\ndo not think it too much.\"\n\n\"Which, then? The one about the man who brought up a lion's cub, and was\neaten by him in play at last?\"\n\n\"Ah, Sir Richard! you have always a merry wit. But, indeed, the boy is a\nbrave boy, and a quick boy, Sir Richard, but more forgetful than Lethe;\nand--sapienti loquor--it were well if he were away, for I shall never\nsee him again without my head aching. Moreover, he put my son Jack upon\nthe fire last Wednesday, as you would put a football, though he is a\nyear older, your worship, because, he said, he looked so like a roasting\npig, Sir Richard.\"\n\n\"Alas, poor Jack!\"\n\n\"And what's more, your worship, he is pugnax, bellicosus, gladiator,\na fire-eater and swash-buckler, beyond all Christian measure; a\nvery sucking Entellus, Sir Richard, and will do to death some of her\nmajesty's lieges erelong, if he be not wisely curbed. It was but a month\nagone that he bemoaned himself, I hear, as Alexander did, because there\nwere no more worlds to conquer, saying that it was a pity he was so\nstrong; for, now he had thrashed all the Bideford lads, he had no sport\nleft; and so, as my Jack tells me, last Tuesday week he fell upon a\nyoung man of Barnstaple, Sir Richard, a hosier's man, sir, and plebeius\n(which I consider unfit for one of his blood), and, moreover, a man full\ngrown, and as big as either of us (Vindex stood five feet four in his\nhigh-heeled shoes), and smote him clean over the quay into the mud,\nbecause he said that there was a prettier maid in Barnstaple (your\nworship will forgive my speaking of such toys, to which my fidelity\ncompels me) than ever Bideford could show; and then offered to do the\nsame to any man who dare say that Mistress Rose Salterne, his worship\nthe mayor's daughter, was not the fairest lass in all Devon.\"\n\n\"Eh? Say that over again, my good sir,\" quoth Sir Richard, who had thus\narrived, as we have seen, at the second count of the indictment. \"I say,\ngood sir, whence dost thou hear all these pretty stories?\"\n\n\"My son Jack, Sir Richard, my son Jack, ingenui vultus puer.\"\n\n\"But not, it seems, ingenui pudoris. Tell thee what, Mr. Schoolmaster,\nno wonder if thy son gets put on the fire, if thou employ him as a\ntale-bearer. But that is the way of all pedagogues and their sons,\nby which they train the lads up eavesdroppers and favor-curriers, and\nprepare them--sirrah, do you hear?--for a much more lasting and hotter\nfire than that which has scorched thy son Jack's nether-tackle. Do you\nmark me, sir?\"\n\nThe poor pedagogue, thus cunningly caught in his own trap, stood\ntrembling before his patron, who, as hereditary head of the Bridge\nTrust, which endowed the school and the rest of the Bideford charities,\ncould, by a turn of his finger, sweep him forth with the besom\nof destruction; and he gasped with terror as Sir Richard went\non--\"Therefore, mind you, Sir Schoolmaster, unless you shall promise me\nnever to hint word of what has passed between us two, and that neither\nyou nor yours shall henceforth carry tales of my godson, or speak his\nname within a day's march of Mistress Salterne's, look to it, if I do\nnot--\"\n\nWhat was to be done in default was not spoken; for down went poor old\nVindex on his knees:--\n\n\"Oh, Sir Richard! Excellentissime, immo praecelsissime Domine et\nSenator, I promise! O sir, Miles et Eques of the Garter, Bath, and\nGolden Fleece, consider your dignities, and my old age--and my great\nfamily--nine children--oh, Sir Richard, and eight of them girls!--Do\neagles war with mice? says the ancient!\"\n\n\"Thy large family, eh? How old is that fat-witted son of thine?\"\n\n\"Sixteen, Sir Richard; but that is not his fault, indeed!\"\n\n\"Nay, I suppose he would be still sucking his thumb if he dared--get up,\nman--get up and seat yourself.\"\n\n\"Heaven forbid!\" murmured poor Vindex, with deep humility.\n\n\"Why is not the rogue at Oxford, with a murrain on him, instead of\nlurching about here carrying tales and ogling the maidens?\"\n\n\"I had hoped, Sir Richard--and therefore I said it was not his\nfault--but there was never a servitorship at Exeter open.\"\n\n\"Go to, man--go to! I will speak to my brethren of the Trust, and to\nOxford he shall go this autumn, or else to Exeter gaol, for a strong\nrogue, and a masterless man. Do you hear?\"\n\n\"Hear?--oh, sir, yes! and return thanks. Jack shall go, Sir Richard,\ndoubt it not--I were mad else; and, Sir Richard, may I go too?\"\n\nAnd therewith Vindex vanished, and Sir Richard enjoyed a second mighty\nlaugh, which brought in Lady Grenville, who possibly had overheard the\nwhole; for the first words she said were--\n\n\"I think, my sweet life, we had better go up to Burrough.\"\n\nSo to Burrough they went; and after much talk, and many tears, matters\nwere so concluded that Amyas Leigh found himself riding joyfully towards\nPlymouth, by the side of Sir Richard, and being handed over to Captain\nDrake, vanished for three years from the good town of Bideford.\n\nAnd now he is returned in triumph, and the observed of all observers;\nand looks round and round, and sees all faces whom he expects, except\none; and that the one which he had rather see than his mother's? He is\nnot quite sure. Shame on himself!\n\nAnd now the prayers being ended, the rector ascends the pulpit, and\nbegins his sermon on the text:--\n\n\"The heaven and the heaven of heavens are the Lord's; the whole earth\nhath he given to the children of men;\" deducing therefrom craftily, to\nthe exceeding pleasure of his hearers, the iniquity of the Spaniards\nin dispossessing the Indians, and in arrogating to themselves the\nsovereignty of the tropic seas; the vanity of the Pope of Rome in\npretending to bestow on them the new countries of America; and the\njustice, valor, and glory of Mr. Drake and his expedition, as testified\nby God's miraculous protection of him and his, both in the Straits of\nMagellan, and in his battle with the Galleon; and last, but not least,\nupon the rock by Celebes, when the Pelican lay for hours firmly fixed,\nand was floated off unhurt, as it were by miracle, by a sudden shift of\nwind.\n\nAy, smile, reader, if you will; and, perhaps, there was matter for a\nsmile in that honest sermon, interlarded, as it was, with scraps of\nGreek and Hebrew, which no one understood, but every one expected as\ntheir right (for a preacher was nothing then who could not prove himself\n\"a good Latiner\"); and graced, moreover, by a somewhat pedantic and\nlengthy refutation from Scripture of Dan Horace's cockney horror of the\nsea--\n\n     \"Illi robur et aes triplex,\" etc.\n\nand his infidel and ungodly slander against the impias rates, and their\ncrews.\n\nSmile, if you will: but those were days (and there were never less\nsuperstitious ones) in which Englishmen believed in the living God, and\nwere not ashamed to acknowledge, as a matter of course, His help and\nprovidence, and calling, in the matters of daily life, which we now\nin our covert atheism term \"secular and carnal;\" and when, the sermon\nended, the communion service had begun, and the bread and the wine were\ngiven to those five mariners, every gallant gentleman who stood near\nthem (for the press would not allow of more) knelt and received the\nelements with them as a thing of course, and then rose to join with\nheart and voice not merely in the Gloria in Excelsis, but in the Te\nDeum, which was the closing act of all. And no sooner had the clerk\ngiven out the first verse of that great hymn, than it was taken up by\nfive hundred voices within the church, in bass and tenor, treble and\nalto (for every one could sing in those days, and the west-country folk,\nas now, were fuller than any of music), the chant was caught up by the\ncrowd outside, and rang away over roof and river, up to the woods of\nAnnery, and down to the marshes of the Taw, in wave on wave of harmony.\nAnd as it died away, the shipping in the river made answer with their\nthunder, and the crowd streamed out again toward the Bridge Head,\nwhither Sir Richard Grenville, and Sir John Chichester, and Mr.\nSalterne, the Mayor, led the five heroes of the day to await the pageant\nwhich had been prepared in honor of them. And as they went by, there\nwere few in the crowd who did not press forward to shake them by the\nhand, and not only them, but their parents and kinsfolk who walked\nbehind, till Mrs. Leigh, her stately joy quite broken down at last,\ncould only answer between her sobs, \"Go along, good people--God a mercy,\ngo along--and God send you all such sons!\"\n\n\"God give me back mine!\" cried an old red-cloaked dame in the crowd; and\nthen, struck by some hidden impulse, she sprang forward, and catching\nhold of young Amyas's sleeve--\n\n\"Kind sir! dear sir! For Christ his sake answer a poor old widow woman!\"\n\n\"What is it, dame?\" quoth Amyas, gently enough.\n\n\"Did you see my son to the Indies?--my son Salvation?\"\n\n\"Salvation?\" replied he, with the air of one who recollected the name.\n\n\"Yes, sure, Salvation Yeo, of Clovelly. A tall man and black, and\nsweareth awfully in his talk, the Lord forgive him!\"\n\nAmyas recollected now. It was the name of the sailor who had given him\nthe wondrous horn five years ago.\n\n\"My good dame,\" said he, \"the Indies are a very large place, and your\nson may be safe and sound enough there, without my having seen him.\nI knew one Salvation Yeo. But he must have come with--By the by,\ngodfather, has Mr. Oxenham come home?\"\n\nThere was a dead silence for a moment among the gentlemen round; and\nthen Sir Richard said solemnly, and in a low voice, turning away from\nthe old dame,--\n\n\"Amyas, Mr. Oxenham has not come home; and from the day he sailed, no\nword has been heard of him and all his crew.\"\n\n\"Oh, Sir Richard! and you kept me from sailing with him! Had I known\nthis before I went into church, I had had one mercy more to thank God\nfor.\"\n\n\"Thank Him all the more in thy life, my child!\" whispered his mother.\n\n\"And no news of him whatsoever?\"\n\n\"None; but that the year after he sailed, a ship belonging to Andrew\nBarker, of Bristol, took out of a Spanish caravel, somewhere off the\nHonduras, his two brass guns; but whence they came the Spaniard knew\nnot, having bought them at Nombre de Dios.\"\n\n\"Yes!\" cried the old woman; \"they brought home the guns, and never\nbrought home my boy!\"\n\n\"They never saw your boy, mother,\" said Sir Richard.\n\n\"But I've seen him! I saw him in a dream four years last Whitsuntide, as\nplain as I see you now, gentles, a-lying upon a rock, calling for a drop\nof water to cool his tongue, like Dives to the torment! Oh! dear me!\"\nand the old dame wept bitterly.\n\n\"There is a rose noble for you!\" said Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"And there another!\" said Sir Richard. And in a few minutes four or five\ngold coins were in her hand. But the old dame did but look wonderingly\nat the gold a moment, and then--\n\n\"Ah! dear gentles, God's blessing on you, and Mr. Cary's mighty good to\nme already; but gold won't buy back childer! O! young gentleman! young\ngentleman! make me a promise; if you want God's blessing on you this\nday, bring me back my boy, if you find him sailing on the seas! Bring\nhim back, and an old widow's blessing be on you!\"\n\nAmyas promised--what else could he do?--and the group hurried on; but\nthe lad's heart was heavy in the midst of joy, with the thought of John\nOxenham, as he walked through the churchyard, and down the short street\nwhich led between the ancient school and still more ancient town-house,\nto the head of the long bridge, across which the pageant, having\narranged \"east-the-water,\" was to defile, and then turn to the right\nalong the quay.\n\nHowever, he was bound in all courtesy to turn his attention now to the\nshow which had been prepared in his honor, and which was really well\nenough worth seeing and hearing. The English were, in those days, an\naltogether dramatic people; ready and able, as in Bideford that day, to\nextemporize a pageant, a masque, or any effort of the Thespian art short\nof the regular drama. For they were, in the first place, even down to\nthe very poorest, a well-fed people, with fewer luxuries than we, but\nmore abundant necessaries; and while beef, ale, and good woollen clothes\ncould be obtained in plenty, without overworking either body or soul,\nmen had time to amuse themselves in something more intellectual\nthan mere toping in pot-houses. Moreover, the half century after the\nReformation in England was one not merely of new intellectual freedom,\nbut of immense animal good spirits. After years of dumb confusion and\ncruel persecution, a breathing time had come: Mary and the fires of\nSmithfield had vanished together like a hideous dream, and the mighty\nshout of joy which greeted Elizabeth's entry into London, was the\nkey-note of fifty glorious years; the expression of a new-found strength\nand freedom, which vented itself at home in drama and in song; abroad\nin mighty conquests, achieved with the laughing recklessness of boys at\nplay.\n\nSo first, preceded by the waits, came along the bridge toward the\ntown-hall a device prepared by the good rector, who, standing by, acted\nas showman, and explained anxiously to the bystanders the import of\na certain \"allegory\" wherein on a great banner was depicted Queen\nElizabeth herself, who, in ample ruff and farthingale, a Bible in one\nhand and a sword in the other, stood triumphant upon the necks of two\nsufficiently abject personages, whose triple tiara and imperial crown\nproclaimed them the Pope and the King of Spain; while a label, issuing\nfrom her royal mouth, informed the world that--\n\n     \"By land and sea a virgin queen I reign,\n     And spurn to dust both Antichrist and Spain.\"\n\nWhich, having been received with due applause, a well-bedizened lad,\nhaving in his cap as a posy \"Loyalty,\" stepped forward, and delivered\nhimself of the following verses:--\n\n     \"Oh, great Eliza! oh, world-famous crew!\n     Which shall I hail more blest, your queen or you?\n     While without other either falls to wrack,\n     And light must eyes, or eyes their light must lack.\n     She without you, a diamond sunk in mine,\n     Its worth unprized, to self alone must shine;\n     You without her, like hands bereft of head,\n     Like Ajax rage, by blindfold lust misled.\n     She light, you eyes; she head, and you the hands,\n     In fair proportion knit by heavenly hands;\n     Servants in queen, and queen in servants blest;\n     Your only glory, how to serve her best;\n     And hers how best the adventurous might to guide,\n     Which knows no check of foemen, wind, or tide,\n     So fair Eliza's spotless fame may fly\n     Triumphant round the globe, and shake th' astounded sky!\"\n\nWith which sufficiently bad verses Loyalty passed on, while my Lady Bath\nhinted to Sir Richard, not without reason, that the poet, in trying to\nexalt both parties, had very sufficiently snubbed both, and intimated\nthat it was \"hardly safe for country wits to attempt that euphuistic,\nantithetical, and delicately conceited vein, whose proper fountain was\nin Whitehall.\" However, on went Loyalty, very well pleased with himself,\nand next, amid much cheering, two great tinsel fish, a salmon and a\ntrout, symbolical of the wealth of Torridge, waddled along, by means\nof two human legs and a staff apiece, which protruded from the fishes'\nstomachs. They drew (or seemed to draw, for half the 'prentices in the\ntown were shoving it behind, and cheering on the panting monarchs of\nthe flood) a car wherein sate, amid reeds and river-flags, three or\nfour pretty girls in robes of gray-blue spangled with gold, their heads\nwreathed one with a crown of the sweet bog-myrtle, another with hops\nand white convolvulus, the third with pale heather and golden fern. They\nstopped opposite Amyas; and she of the myrtle wreath, rising and bowing\nto him and the company, began with a pretty blush to say her say:--\n\n     \"Hither from my moorland home,\n     Nymph of Torridge, proud I come;\n     Leaving fen and furzy brake,\n     Haunt of eft and spotted snake,\n     Where to fill mine urns I use,\n     Daily with Atlantic dews;\n     While beside the reedy flood\n     Wild duck leads her paddling brood.\n     For this morn, as Phoebus gay\n     Chased through heaven the night mist gray,\n     Close beside me, prankt in pride,\n     Sister Tamar rose, and cried,\n     'Sluggard, up! 'Tis holiday,\n     In the lowlands far away.\n     Hark! how jocund Plymouth bells,\n     Wandering up through mazy dells,\n     Call me down, with smiles to hail,\n     My daring Drake's returning sail.'\n     'Thine alone?' I answer'd.  'Nay;\n     Mine as well the joy to-day.\n     Heroes train'd on Northern wave,\n     To that Argo new I gave;\n     Lent to thee, they roam'd the main;\n     Give me, nymph, my sons again.'\n     'Go, they wait Thee,' Tamar cried,\n     Southward bounding from my side.\n     Glad I rose, and at my call,\n     Came my Naiads, one and all.\n     Nursling of the mountain sky,\n     Leaving Dian's choir on high,\n     Down her cataracts laughing loud,\n     Ockment leapt from crag and cloud,\n     Leading many a nymph, who dwells\n     Where wild deer drink in ferny dells;\n     While the Oreads as they past\n     Peep'd from Druid Tors aghast.\n     By alder copses sliding slow,\n     Knee-deep in flowers came gentler Yeo\n     And paused awhile her locks to twine\n     With musky hops and white woodbine,\n     Then joined the silver-footed band,\n     Which circled down my golden sand,\n     By dappled park, and harbor shady,\n     Haunt of love-lorn knight and lady,\n     My thrice-renowned sons to greet,\n     With rustic song and pageant meet.\n     For joy! the girdled robe around\n     Eliza's name henceforth shall sound,\n     Whose venturous fleets to conquest start,\n     Where ended once the seaman's chart,\n     While circling Sol his steps shall count\n     Henceforth from Thule's western mount,\n     And lead new rulers round the seas\n     From furthest Cassiterides.\n     For found is now the golden tree,\n     Solv'd th' Atlantic mystery,\n     Pluck'd the dragon-guarded fruit;\n     While around the charmed root,\n     Wailing loud, the Hesperids\n     Watch their warder's drooping lids.\n     Low he lies with grisly wound,\n     While the sorceress triple-crown'd\n     In her scarlet robe doth shield him,\n     Till her cunning spells have heal'd him.\n     Ye, meanwhile, around the earth\n     Bear the prize of manful worth.\n     Yet a nobler meed than gold\n     Waits for Albion's children bold;\n     Great Eliza's virgin hand\n     Welcomes you to Fairy-land,\n     While your native Naiads bring\n     Native wreaths as offering.\n     Simple though their show may be,\n     Britain's worship in them see.\n     'Tis not price, nor outward fairness,\n     Gives the victor's palm its rareness;\n     Simplest tokens can impart\n     Noble throb to noble heart:\n     Graecia, prize thy parsley crown,\n     Boast thy laurel, Caesar's town;\n     Moorland myrtle still shall be\n     Badge of Devon's Chivalry!\"\n\nAnd so ending, she took the wreath of fragrant gale from her own head,\nand stooping from the car, placed it on the head of Amyas Leigh, who\nmade answer--\n\n\"There is no place like home, my fair mistress and no scent to my taste\nlike this old home-scent in all the spice-islands that I ever sailed\nby!\"\n\n\"Her song was not so bad,\" said Sir Richard to Lady Bath--\"but how came\nshe to hear Plymouth bells at Tamar-head, full fifty miles away? That's\ntoo much of a poet's license, is it not?\"\n\n\"The river-nymphs, as daughters of Oceanus, and thus of immortal\nparentage, are bound to possess organs of more than mortal keenness;\nbut, as you say, the song was not so bad--erudite, as well as\nprettily conceived--and, saving for a certain rustical simplicity and\nmonosyllabic baldness, smacks rather of the forests of Castaly than\nthose of Torridge.\"\n\nSo spake my Lady Bath; whom Sir Richard wisely answered not; for she was\na terribly learned member of the college of critics, and disputed even\nwith Sidney's sister the chieftaincy of the Euphuists; so Sir Richard\nanswered not, but answer was made for him.\n\n\"Since the whole choir of Muses, madam, have migrated to the Court of\nWhitehall, no wonder if some dews of Parnassus should fertilize at times\neven our Devon moors.\"\n\nThe speaker was a tall and slim young man, some five-and-twenty years\nold, of so rare and delicate a beauty, that it seemed that some Greek\nstatue, or rather one of those pensive and pious knights whom the old\nGerman artists took delight to paint, had condescended to tread awhile\nthis work-day earth in living flesh and blood. The forehead was very\nlofty and smooth, the eyebrows thin and greatly arched (the envious\ngallants whispered that something at least of their curve was due to\nart, as was also the exceeding smoothness of those delicate cheeks).\nThe face was somewhat long and thin; the nose aquiline; and the languid\nmouth showed, perhaps, too much of the ivory upper teeth; but the\nmost striking point of the speaker's appearance was the extraordinary\nbrilliancy of his complexion, which shamed with its whiteness that of\nall fair ladies round, save where open on each cheek a bright red spot\ngave warning, as did the long thin neck and the taper hands, of sad\npossibilities, perhaps not far off; possibilities which all saw with an\ninward sigh, except she whose doting glances, as well as her resemblance\nto the fair youth, proclaimed her at once his mother, Mrs. Leigh\nherself.\n\nMaster Frank, for he it was, was dressed in the very extravagance of\nthe fashion,--not so much from vanity, as from that delicate instinct\nof self-respect which would keep some men spruce and spotless from one\nyear's end to another upon a desert island; \"for,\" as Frank used to say\nin his sententious way, \"Mr. Frank Leigh at least beholds me, though\nnone else be by; and why should I be more discourteous to him than\nI permit others to be? Be sure that he who is a Grobian in his own\ncompany, will, sooner or later, become a Grobian in that of his\nfriends.\"\n\nSo Mr. Frank was arrayed spotlessly; but after the latest fashion of\nMilan, not in trunk hose and slashed sleeves, nor in \"French standing\ncollar, treble quadruple daedalian ruff, or stiff-necked rabato, that\nhad more arches for pride, propped up with wire and timber, than five\nLondon Bridges;\" but in a close-fitting and perfectly plain suit of\ndove-color, which set off cunningly the delicate proportions of his\nfigure, and the delicate hue of his complexion, which was shaded from\nthe sun by a broad dove-colored Spanish hat, with feather to match,\nlooped up over the right ear with a pearl brooch, and therein a crowned\nE, supposed by the damsels of Bideford to stand for Elizabeth, which\nwas whispered to be the gift of some most illustrious hand. This same\nlooping up was not without good reason and purpose prepense; thereby all\nthe world had full view of a beautiful little ear, which looked as if\nit had been cut of cameo, and made, as my Lady Rich once told him, \"to\nhearken only to the music of the spheres, or to the chants of cherubim.\"\nBehind the said ear was stuck a fresh rose; and the golden hair was all\ndrawn smoothly back and round to the left temple, whence, tied with a\npink ribbon in a great true lover's knot, a mighty love-lock, \"curled as\nit had been laid in press,\" rolled down low upon his bosom. Oh, Frank!\nFrank! have you come out on purpose to break the hearts of all Bideford\nburghers' daughters? And if so, did you expect to further that triumph\nby dyeing that pretty little pointed beard (with shame I report it) of\na bright vermilion? But we know you better, Frank, and so does your\nmother; and you are but a masquerading angel after all, in spite of\nyour knots and your perfumes, and the gold chain round your neck which a\nGerman princess gave you; and the emerald ring on your right fore-finger\nwhich Hatton gave you; and the pair of perfumed gloves in your left\nwhich Sidney's sister gave you; and the silver-hilted Toledo which an\nItalian marquis gave you on a certain occasion of which you never choose\nto talk, like a prudent and modest gentleman as you are; but of which\nthe gossips talk, of course, all the more, and whisper that you saved\nhis life from bravoes--a dozen, at the least; and had that sword for\nyour reward, and might have had his beautiful sister's hand beside, and\nI know not what else; but that you had so many lady-loves already that\nyou were loath to burden yourself with a fresh one. That, at least, we\nknow to be a lie, fair Frank; for your heart is as pure this day as when\nyou knelt in your little crib at Burrough, and said--\n\n     \"Four corners to my bed\n     Four angels round my head;\n     Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,\n     Bless the bed that I lie on.\"\n\nAnd who could doubt it (if being pure themselves, they have instinctive\nsympathy with what is pure), who ever looked into those great deep blue\neyes of yours, \"the black fringed curtains of whose azure lids,\"\nusually down-dropt as if in deepest thought, you raise slowly, almost\nwonderingly each time you speak, as if awakening from some fair dream\nwhose home is rather in your platonical \"eternal world of supra-sensible\nforms,\" than on that work-day earth wherein you nevertheless acquit\nyourself so well? There--I must stop describing you, or I shall catch\nthe infection of your own euphuism, and talk of you as you would have\ntalked of Sidney or of Spenser, or of that Swan of Avon, whose song\nhad just begun when yours--but I will not anticipate; my Lady Bath is\nwaiting to give you her rejoinder.\n\n\"Ah, my silver-tongued scholar! and are you, then, the poet? or have\nyou been drawing on the inexhaustible bank of your friend Raleigh, or my\ncousin Sidney? or has our new Cygnet Immerito lent you a few unpublished\nleaves from some fresh Shepherd's Calendar?\"\n\n\"Had either, madam, of that cynosural triad been within call of my\nmost humble importunities, your ears had been delectate with far nobler\nmelody.\"\n\n\"But not our eyes with fairer faces, eh? Well, you have chosen your\nnymphs, and had good store from whence to pick, I doubt not. Few\nyoung Dulcineas round but must have been glad to take service under so\nrenowned a captain?\"\n\n\"The only difficulty, gracious countess, has been to know where to fix\nthe wandering choice of my bewildered eyes, where all alike are fair,\nand all alike facund.\"\n\n\"We understand,\" said she, smiling;--\n\n     \"Dan Cupid, choosing 'midst his mother's graces,\n     Himself more fair, made scorn of fairest faces.\"\n\nThe young scholar capped her distich forthwith, and bowing to her with a\nmeaning look,\n\n\n\"'Then, Goddess, turn,' he cried, 'and veil thy light; Blinded by thine,\nwhat eyes can choose aright?'\"\n\n\n\"Go, saucy sir,\" said my lady, in high glee: \"the pageant stays your\nsupreme pleasure.\"\n\nAnd away went Mr. Frank as master of the revels, to bring up the\n'prentices' pageant; while, for his sake, the nymph of Torridge was\nforgotten for awhile by all young dames, and most young gentlemen: and\nhis mother heaved a deep sigh, which Lady Bath overhearing--\n\n\"What? in the dumps, good madam, while all are rejoicing in your joy?\nAre you afraid that we court-dames shall turn your Adonis's brain for\nhim?\"\n\n\"I do, indeed, fear lest your condescension should make him forget that\nhe is only a poor squire's orphan.\"\n\n\"I will warrant him never to forget aught that he should recollect,\"\nsaid my Lady Bath.\n\nAnd she spoke truly. But soon Frank's silver voice was heard calling\nout--\n\n\"Room there, good people, for the gallant 'prentice lads!\"\n\nAnd on they came, headed by a giant of buckram and pasteboard armor,\nforth of whose stomach looked, like a clock-face in a steeple, a human\nvisage, to be greeted, as was the fashion then, by a volley of quips and\npuns from high and low.\n\nYoung Mr. William Cary, of Clovelly, who was the wit of those parts,\nopened the fire by asking him whether he were Goliath, Gogmagog, or\nGrantorto in the romance; for giants' names always began with a G. To\nwhich the giant's stomach answered pretty surlily--\n\n\"Mine don't; I begin with an O.\"\n\n\"Then thou criest out before thou art hurt, O cowardly giant!\"\n\n\"Let me out, lads,\" quoth the irascible visage, struggling in his\nbuckram prison, \"and I soon show him whether I be a coward.\"\n\n\"Nay, if thou gettest out of thyself, thou wouldst be beside thyself,\nand so wert but a mad giant.\"\n\n\"And that were pity,\" said Lady Bath; \"for by the romances, giants have\nnever overmuch wit to spare.\"\n\n\"Mercy, dear lady!\" said Frank, \"and let the giant begin with an O.\"\n\n\"A ----\"\n\n\"A false start, giant! you were to begin with an O.\"\n\n\"I'll make you end with an O, Mr. William Cary!\" roared the testy tower\nof buckram.\n\n\"And so I do, for I end with 'Fico!'\"\n\n\"Be mollified, sweet giant,\" said Frank, \"and spare the rash youth of\nyon foolish knight. Shall elephants catch flies, or Hurlo-Thrumbo stain\nhis club with brains of Dagonet the jester? Be mollified; leave thy\ncaverned grumblings, like Etna when its windy wrath is past, and\ndiscourse eloquence from thy central omphalos, like Pythoness\nventriloquizing.\"\n\n\"If you do begin laughing at me too, Mr. Leigh ----\" said the giant's\nclock-face, in a piteous tone.\n\n\"I laugh not. Art thou not Ordulf the earl, and I thy humblest squire?\nSpeak up, my lord; your cousin, my Lady Bath, commands you.\"\n\nAnd at last the giant began:--\n\n     \"A giant I, Earl Ordulf men me call,--\n     'Gainst Paynim foes Devonia's champion tall;\n     In single fight six thousand Turks I slew;\n     Pull'd off a lion's head, and ate it too:\n     With one shrewd blow, to let St. Edward in,\n     I smote the gates of Exeter in twain;\n     Till aged grown, by angels warn'd in dream,\n     I built an abbey fair by Tavy stream.\n     But treacherous time hath tripped my glories up,\n     The stanch old hound must yield to stancher pup;\n     Here's one so tall as I, and twice so bold,\n     Where I took only cuffs, takes good red gold.\n     From pole to pole resound his wondrous works,\n     Who slew more Spaniards than I e'er slew Turks;\n     I strode across the Tavy stream: but he\n     Strode round the world and back; and here 'a be!\"\n\n\"Oh, bathos!\" said Lady Bath, while the 'prentices shouted applause. \"Is\nthis hedge-bantling to be fathered on you, Mr. Frank?\"\n\n\"It is necessary, by all laws of the drama, madam,\" said Frank, with a\nsly smile, \"that the speech and the speaker shall fit each other. Pass\non, Earl Ordulf; a more learned worthy waits.\"\n\nWhereon, up came a fresh member of the procession; namely, no less\na person than Vindex Brimblecombe, the ancient schoolmaster, with\nfive-and-forty boys at his heels, who halting, pulled out his\nspectacles, and thus signified his forgiveness of his whilom broken\nhead:--\n\n\"That the world should have been circumnavigated, ladies and gentles,\nwere matter enough of jubilation to the student of Herodotus and Plato,\nPlinius and ---- ahem! much more when the circumnavigators are Britons;\nmore, again, when Damnonians.\"\n\n\"Don't swear, master,\" said young Will Cary.\n\n\"Gulielme Cary, Gulielme Cary, hast thou forgotten thy--\"\n\n\"Whippings? Never, old lad! Go on; but let not the license of the\nscholar overtop the modesty of the Christian.\"\n\n\"More again, as I said, when, incolae, inhabitants of Devon; but,\nmost of all, men of Bideford school. Oh renowned school! Oh schoolboys\nennobled by fellowship with him! Oh most happy pedagogue, to whom it has\nbefallen to have chastised a circumnavigator, and, like another Chiron,\ntrained another Hercules: yet more than Hercules, for he placed\nhis pillars on the ocean shore, and then returned; but my scholar's\nvoyage--\"\n\n\"Hark how the old fox is praising himself all along on the sly,\" said\nCary.\n\n\"Mr. William, Mr. William, peace;--silentium, my graceless pupil. Urge\nthe foaming steed, and strike terror into the rapid stag, but meddle not\nwith matters too high for thee.\"\n\n\"He has given you the dor now, sir,\" said Lady Bath; \"let the old man\nsay his say.\"\n\n\"I bring, therefore, as my small contribution to this day's feast; first\na Latin epigram, as thus--\"\n\n\"Latin? Let us hear it forthwith,\" cried my lady.\n\nAnd the old pedant mouthed out--\n\n     \"Torriguiam Tamaris ne spernat; Leighius addet\n     Mox terras terris, inclyte Drake, tuis.\"\n\n\"Neat, i' faith, la!\" Whereon all the rest, as in duty bound, approved\nalso.\n\n\"This for the erudite: for vulgar ears the vernacular is more consonant,\nsympathetic, instructive; as thus:--\n\n     \"Famed Argo ship, that noble chip, by doughty Jason's steering,\n     Brought back to Greece the golden fleece, from Colchis home\n          careering;\n     But now her fame is put to shame, while new Devonian Argo,\n     Round earth doth run in wake of sun, and brings wealthier cargo.\"\n\n\"Runs with a right fa-lal-la,\" observed Cary; \"and would go nobly to a\nfiddle and a big drum.\"\n\n     \"Ye Spaniards, quake! our doughty Drake a royal swan is tested,\n     On wing and oar, from shore to shore, the raging main who\n          breasted:--\n     But never needs to chant his deeds, like swan that lies a-dying,\n     So far his name, by trump of fame, around the sphere is flying.\"\n\n\"Hillo ho! schoolmaster!\" shouted a voice from behind; \"move on, and\nmake way for Father Neptune!\" Whereon a whole storm of raillery fell\nupon the hapless pedagogue.\n\n\"We waited for the parson's alligator, but we wain't for yourn.\"\n\n\"Allegory! my children, allegory!\" shrieked the man of letters.\n\n\"What do ye call he an alligator for? He is but a poor little starved\nevat!\"\n\n\"Out of the road, old Custis! March on, Don Palmado!\"\n\nThese allusions to the usual instrument of torture in West-country\nschools made the old gentleman wince; especially when they were followed\nhome by--\n\n\"Who stole Admiral Grenville's brooms, because birch rods were dear?\"\n\nBut proudly he shook his bald head, as a bull shakes off the flies, and\nreturned to the charge once more.\n\n\n\"Great Alexander, famed commander, wept and made a pother, At conquering\nonly half the world, but Drake had conquer'd t'other; And Hercules to\nbrink of seas!--\"\n\n\n\"Oh--!\"\n\nAnd clapping both hands to the back of his neck, the schoolmaster began\ndancing frantically about, while his boys broke out tittering, \"O! the\nochidore! look to the blue ochidore! Who've put ochidore to maister's\npoll!\"\n\nIt was too true: neatly inserted, as he stooped forward, between his\nneck and his collar, was a large live shore-crab, holding on tight with\nboth hands.\n\n\"Gentles! good Christians! save me! I am mare-rode! Incubo, vel ab\nincubo, opprimor! Satanas has me by the poll! Help! he tears my jugular;\nhe wrings my neck, as he does to Dr. Faustus in the play. Confiteor!--I\nconfess! Satan, I defy thee! Good people, I confess! [Greek text]! The\ntruth will out. Mr. Francis Leigh wrote the epigram!\" And diving through\nthe crowd, the pedagogue vanished howling, while Father Neptune, crowned\nwith sea-weeds, a trident in one hand, and a live dog-fish in the other,\nswaggered up the street surrounded by a tall bodyguard of mariners, and\nfollowed by a great banner, on which was depicted a globe, with Drake's\nship sailing thereon upside down, and overwritten--\n\n     \"See every man the Pelican,\n        Which round the world did go,\n     While her stern-post was uppermost,\n        And topmasts down below.\n     And by the way she lost a day,\n        Out of her log was stole:\n     But Neptune kind, with favoring wind,\n        Hath brought her safe and whole.\"\n\n\"Now, lads!\" cried Neptune; \"hand me my parable that's writ for me, and\nhere goeth!\"\n\nAnd at the top of his bull-voice, he began roaring--\n\n     \"I am King Neptune bold,\n       The ruler of the seas\n     I don't understand much singing upon land,\n       But I hope what I say will please.\n\n     \"Here be five Bideford men,\n       Which have sail'd the world around,\n     And I watch'd them well, as they all can tell,\n       And brought them home safe and sound.\n\n     \"For it is the men of Devon.\n       To see them I take delight,\n     Both to tack and to hull, and to heave and to pull,\n       And to prove themselves in fight.\n\n     \"Where be those Spaniards proud,\n       That make their valiant boasts;\n     And think for to keep the poor Indians for their sheep,\n       And to farm my golden coasts?\n\n     \"'Twas the devil and the Pope gave them\n       My kingdom for their own:\n     But my nephew Francis Drake, he caused them to quake,\n       And he pick'd them to the bone.\n\n     \"For the sea my realm it is,\n       As good Queen Bess's is the land;\n     So freely come again, all merry Devon men,\n       And there's old Neptune's hand.\"\n\n\"Holla, boys! holla! Blow up, Triton, and bring forward the freedom of\nthe seas.\"\n\nTriton, roaring through a conch, brought forward a cockle-shell full of\nsalt-water, and delivered it solemnly to Amyas, who, of course, put a\nnoble into it, and returned it after Grenville had done the same.\n\n\"Holla, Dick Admiral!\" cried neptune, who was pretty far gone in liquor;\n\"we knew thou hadst a right English heart in thee, for all thou standest\nthere as taut as a Don who has swallowed his rapier.\"\n\n\"Grammercy, stop thy bellowing, fellow, and on; for thou smellest vilely\nof fish.\"\n\n\"Everything smells sweet in its right place. I'm going home.\"\n\n\"I thought thou wert there all along, being already half-seas over,\"\nsaid Cary.\n\n\"Ay, right Upsee-Dutch; and that's more than thou ever wilt be, thou\n'long-shore stay-at-home. Why wast making sheep's eyes at Mistress\nSalterne here, while my pretty little chuck of Burrough there was\nplaying at shove-groat with Spanish doubloons?\"\n\n\"Go to the devil, sirrah!\" said Cary. Neptune had touched on a sore\nsubject; and more cheeks than Amyas Leigh's reddened at the hint.\n\n\"Amen, if Heaven so please!\" and on rolled the monarch of the seas; and\nso the pageant ended.\n\nThe moment Amyas had an opportunity, he asked his brother Frank,\nsomewhat peevishly, where Rose Salterne was.\n\n\"What! the mayor's daughter? With her uncle by Kilkhampton, I believe.\"\n\nNow cunning Master Frank, whose daily wish was to \"seek peace and ensue\nit,\" told Amyas this, because he must needs speak the truth: but he was\npurposed at the same time to speak as little truth as he could, for fear\nof accidents; and, therefore, omitted to tell his brother how that he,\ntwo days before, had entreated Rose Salterne herself to appear as the\nnymph of Torridge; which honor she, who had no objection either to\nexhibit her pretty face, to recite pretty poetry, or to be trained\nthereto by the cynosure of North Devon, would have assented willingly,\nbut that her father stopped the pretty project by a peremptory\ncountermove, and packed her off, in spite of her tears, to the said\nuncle on the Atlantic cliffs; after which he went up to Burrough, and\nlaughed over the whole matter with Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"I am but a burgher, Mrs. Leigh, and you a lady of blood; but I am too\nproud to let any man say that Simon Salterne threw his daughter at your\nson's head;--no; not if you were an empress!\"\n\n\"And to speak truth, Mr. Salterne, there are young gallants enough in\nthe country quarrelling about her pretty face every day, without making\nher a tourney-queen to tilt about.\"\n\nWhich was very true; for during the three years of Amyas's absence, Rose\nSalterne had grown into so beautiful a girl of eighteen, that half North\nDevon was mad about the \"Rose of Torridge,\" as she was called; and\nthere was not a young gallant for ten miles round (not to speak of her\nfather's clerks and 'prentices, who moped about after her like so many\nMalvolios, and treasured up the very parings of her nails) who would\nnot have gone to Jerusalem to win her. So that all along the vales of\nTorridge and of Taw, and even away to Clovelly (for young Mr. Cary was\none of the sick), not a gay bachelor but was frowning on his fellows,\nand vying with them in the fashion of his clothes, the set of his ruffs,\nthe harness of his horse, the carriage of his hawks, the pattern of his\nsword-hilt; and those were golden days for all tailors and armorers,\nfrom Exmoor to Okehampton town. But of all those foolish young lads\nnot one would speak to the other, either out hunting, or at the archery\nbutts, or in the tilt-yard; and my Lady Bath (who confessed that there\nwas no use in bringing out her daughters where Rose Salterne was in the\nway) prophesied in her classical fashion that Rose's wedding bid fair\nto be a very bridal of Atalanta, and feast of the Lapithae; and poor\nMr. Will Cary (who always blurted out the truth), when old Salterne once\nasked him angrily in Bideford Market, \"What a plague business had he\nmaking sheep's eyes at his daughter?\" broke out before all bystanders,\n\"And what a plague business had you, old boy, to throw such an apple of\ndiscord into our merry meetings hereabouts? If you choose to have such\na daughter, you must take the consequences, and be hanged to you.\" To\nwhich Mr. Salterne answered with some truth, \"That she was none of his\nchoosing, nor of Mr. Cary's neither.\" And so the dor being given, the\nbelligerents parted laughing, but the war remained in statu quo; and\nnot a week passed but, by mysterious hands, some nosegay, or languishing\nsonnet, was conveyed into The Rose's chamber, all which she stowed away,\nwith the simplicity of a country girl, finding it mighty pleasant; and\ntook all compliments quietly enough, probably because, on the authority\nof her mirror, she considered them no more than her due.\n\nAnd now, to add to the general confusion, home was come young Amyas\nLeigh, more desperately in love with her than ever. For, as is the\nway with sailors (who after all are the truest lovers, as they are the\nfinest fellows, God bless them, upon earth), his lonely ship-watches\nhad been spent in imprinting on his imagination, month after month, year\nafter year, every feature and gesture and tone of the fair lass whom he\nhad left behind him; and that all the more intensely, because, beside\nhis mother, he had no one else to think of, and was as pure as the day\nhe was born, having been trained as many a brave young man was then,\nto look upon profligacy not as a proof of manhood, but as what the old\nGermans, and those Gortyneans who crowned the offender with wool, knew\nit to be, a cowardly and effeminate sin.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nOF TWO GENTLEMEN OF WALES, AND HOW THEY HUNTED WITH THE HOUNDS, AND YET\nRAN WITH THE DEER\n\n     \"I know that Deformed; he has been a vile thief this seven years;\n     he goes up and down like a gentleman: I remember his name.\"--Much\n     Ado About Nothing.\n\nAmyas slept that night a tired and yet a troubled sleep; and his mother\nand Frank, as they bent over his pillow, could see that his brain was\nbusy with many dreams.\n\nAnd no wonder; for over and above all the excitement of the day, the\nrecollection of John Oxenham had taken strange possession of his mind;\nand all that evening, as he sat in the bay-windowed room where he had\nseen him last, Amyas was recalling to himself every look and gesture\nof the lost adventurer, and wondering at himself for so doing, till\nhe retired to sleep, only to renew the fancy in his dreams. At last he\nfound himself, he knew not how, sailing westward ever, up the wake of\nthe setting sun, in chase of a tiny sail which was John Oxenham's.\nUpon him was a painful sense that, unless he came up with her in time,\nsomething fearful would come to pass; but the ship would not sail. All\naround floated the sargasso beds, clogging her bows with their long\nsnaky coils of weed; and still he tried to sail, and tried to fancy that\nhe was sailing, till the sun went down and all was utter dark. And then\nthe moon arose, and in a moment John Oxenham's ship was close aboard;\nher sails were torn and fluttering; the pitch was streaming from her\nsides; her bulwarks were rotting to decay. And what was that line of\ndark objects dangling along the mainyard?--A line of hanged men! And,\nhorror of horrors, from the yard-arm close above him, John Oxenham's\ncorpse looked down with grave-light eyes, and beckoned and pointed, as\nif to show him his way, and strove to speak, and could not, and pointed\nstill, not forward, but back along their course. And when Amyas looked\nback, behold, behind him was the snow range of the Andes glittering in\nthe moon, and he knew that he was in the South Seas once more, and that\nall America was between him and home. And still the corpse kept pointing\nback, and back, and looking at him with yearning eyes of agony, and lips\nwhich longed to tell some awful secret; till he sprang up, and woke with\na shout of terror, and found himself lying in the little coved chamber\nin dear old Burrough, with the gray autumn morning already stealing in.\n\nFeverish and excited, he tried in vain to sleep again; and after an\nhour's tossing, rose and dressed, and started for a bathe on his beloved\nold pebble ridge. As he passed his mother's door, he could not help\nlooking in. The dim light of morning showed him the bed; but its\npillow had not been pressed that night. His mother, in her long white\nnight-dress, was kneeling at the other end of the chamber at her\nprie-dieu, absorbed in devotion. Gently he slipped in without a word,\nand knelt down at her side. She turned, smiled, passed her arm around\nhim, and went on silently with her prayers. Why not? They were for him,\nand he knew it, and prayed also; and his prayers were for her, and for\npoor lost John Oxenham, and all his vanished crew.\n\nAt last she rose, and standing above him, parted the yellow locks from\noff his brow, and looked long and lovingly into his face. There was\nnothing to be spoken, for there was nothing to be concealed between\nthese two souls as clear as glass. Each knew all which the other meant;\neach knew that its own thoughts were known. At last the mutual gaze was\nover; she stooped and kissed him on the brow, and was in the act to\nturn away, as a tear dropped on his forehead. Her little bare feet were\npeeping out from under her dress. He bent down and kissed them again and\nagain; and then looking up, as if to excuse himself,--\n\n\"You have such pretty feet, mother!\"\n\nInstantly, with a woman's instinct, she had hidden them. She had been a\nbeauty once, as I said; and though her hair was gray, and her roses had\nfaded long ago, she was beautiful still, in all eyes which saw deeper\nthan the mere outward red and white.\n\n\"Your dear father used to say so thirty years ago.\"\n\n\"And I say so still: you always were beautiful; you are beautiful now.\"\n\n\"What is that to you, silly boy? Will you play the lover with an old\nmother? Go and take your walk, and think of younger ladies, if you can\nfind any worthy of you.\"\n\nAnd so the son went forth, and the mother returned to her prayers.\n\nHe walked down to the pebble ridge, where the surges of the bay have\ndefeated their own fury, by rolling up in the course of ages a rampart\nof gray boulder-stones, some two miles long, as cunningly curved, and\nsmoothed, and fitted, as if the work had been done by human hands, which\nprotects from the high tides of spring and autumn a fertile sheet of\nsmooth, alluvial turf. Sniffing the keen salt air like a young sea-dog,\nhe stripped and plunged into the breakers, and dived, and rolled, and\ntossed about the foam with stalwart arms, till he heard himself hailed\nfrom off the shore, and looking up, saw standing on the top of the\nrampart the tall figure of his cousin Eustace.\n\nAmyas was half-disappointed at his coming; for, love-lorn rascal, he had\nbeen dreaming all the way thither of Rose Salterne, and had no wish\nfor a companion who would prevent his dreaming of her all the way back.\nNevertheless, not having seen Eustace for three years, it was but civil\nto scramble out and dress, while his cousin walked up and down upon the\nturf inside.\n\nEustace Leigh was the son of a younger brother of Leigh of Burrough, who\nhad more or less cut himself off from his family, and indeed from his\ncountrymen, by remaining a Papist. True, though born a Papist, he had\nnot always been one; for, like many of the gentry, he had become a\nProtestant under Edward the Sixth, and then a Papist again under Mary.\nBut, to his honor be it said, at that point he had stopped, having\ntoo much honesty to turn Protestant a second time, as hundreds did, at\nElizabeth's accession. So a Papist he remained, living out of the way\nof the world in a great, rambling, dark house, still called \"Chapel,\"\non the Atlantic cliffs, in Moorwinstow parish, not far from Sir Richard\nGrenville's house of Stow. The penal laws never troubled him; for, in\nthe first place, they never troubled any one who did not make conspiracy\nand rebellion an integral doctrine of his religious creed; and next,\nthey seldom troubled even them, unless, fired with the glory of\nmartyrdom, they bullied the long-suffering of Elizabeth and her council\ninto giving them their deserts, and, like poor Father Southwell in\nafter years, insisted on being hanged, whether Burleigh liked or not.\nMoreover, in such a no-man's-land and end-of-all-the-earth was that old\nhouse at Moorwinstow, that a dozen conspiracies might have been hatched\nthere without any one hearing of it; and Jesuits and seminary priests\nskulked in and out all the year round, unquestioned though unblest; and\nfound a sort of piquant pleasure, like naughty boys who have crept\ninto the store-closet, in living in mysterious little dens in a lonely\nturret, and going up through a trap-door to celebrate mass in a secret\nchamber in the roof, where they were allowed by the powers that were to\nplay as much as they chose at persecuted saints, and preach about hiding\nin dens and caves of the earth. For once, when the zealous parson\nof Moorwinstow, having discovered (what everybody knew already) the\nexistence of \"mass priests and their idolatry\" at Chapel House, made\nformal complaint thereof to Sir Richard, and called on him, as the\nnearest justice of the peace, to put in force the act of the fourteenth\nof Elizabeth, that worthy knight only rated him soundly for a\nfantastical Puritan, and bade him mind his own business, if he wished\nnot to make the place too hot for him; whereon (for the temporal\nauthorities, happily for the peace of England, kept in those days\na somewhat tight hand upon the spiritual ones) the worthy parson\nsubsided,--for, after all, Mr. Thomas Leigh paid his tithes regularly\nenough,--and was content, as he expressed it, to bow his head in the\nhouse of Rimmon like Naaman of old, by eating Mr. Leigh's dinners\nas often as he was invited, and ignoring the vocation of old Father\nFrancis, who sat opposite to him, dressed as a layman, and calling\nhimself the young gentleman's pedagogue.\n\nBut the said birds of ill-omen had a very considerable lien on the\nconscience of poor Mr. Thomas Leigh, the father of Eustace, in the form\nof certain lands once belonging to the Abbey of Hartland. He more than\nhalf believed that he should be lost for holding those lands; but he did\nnot believe it wholly, and, therefore, he did not give them up; which\nwas the case, as poor Mary Tudor found to her sorrow, with most of her\n\"Catholic\" subjects, whose consciences, while they compelled them to\nreturn to the only safe fold of Mother Church (extra quam nulla salus),\nby no means compelled them to disgorge the wealth of which they had\nplundered that only hope of their salvation. Most of them, however, like\npoor Tom Leigh, felt the abbey rents burn in their purses; and, as John\nBull generally does in a difficulty, compromised the matter by a second\nfolly (as if two wrong things made one right one), and petted foreign\npriests, and listened, or pretended not to listen, to their plottings\nand their practisings; and gave up a son here, and a son there, as a\nsort of a sin-offering and scapegoat, to be carried off to Douay, or\nRheims, or Rome, and trained as a seminary priest; in plain English, to\nbe taught the science of villainy, on the motive of superstition. One of\nsuch hapless scapegoats, and children who had been cast into the fire to\nMoloch, was Eustace Leigh, whom his father had sent, giving the fruit of\nhis body for the sin of his soul, to be made a liar of at Rheims.\n\nAnd a very fair liar he had become. Not that the lad was a bad fellow at\nheart; but he had been chosen by the harpies at home, on account of his\n\"peculiar vocation;\" in plain English, because the wily priests had seen\nin him certain capacities of vague hysterical fear of the unseen (the\nreligious sentiment, we call it now-a-days), and with them that tendency\nto be a rogue, which superstitious men always have. He was now a tall,\nhandsome, light-complexioned man, with a huge upright forehead, a very\nsmall mouth, and a dry and set expression of face, which was always\ntrying to get free, or rather to seem free, and indulge in smiles and\ndimples which were proper; for one ought to have Christian love, and\nif one had love one ought to be cheerful, and when people were cheerful\nthey smiled; and therefore he would smile, and tried to do so; but his\ncharity prepense looked no more alluring than malice prepense would have\ndone; and, had he not been really a handsome fellow, many a woman who\nraved about his sweetness would have likened his frankness to that of a\nskeleton dancing in fetters, and his smiles to the grins thereof.\n\nHe had returned to England about a month before, in obedience to the\nproclamation which had been set forth for that purpose (and certainly\nnot before it was needed), that, \"whosoever had children, wards,\netc., in the parts beyond the seas, should send in their names to the\nordinary, and within four months call them home again.\" So Eustace was\nnow staying with his father at Chapel, having, nevertheless, his private\nmatters to transact on behalf of the virtuous society by whom he\nhad been brought up; one of which private matters had brought him to\nBideford the night before.\n\nSo he sat down beside Amyas on the pebbles, and looked at him all over\nout of the corners of his eyes very gently, as if he did not wish to\nhurt him, or even the flies on his back; and Amyas faced right round,\nand looked him full in the face with the heartiest of smiles, and held\nout a lion's paw, which Eustace took rapturously, and a great shaking of\nhands ensued; Amyas gripping with a great round fist, and a quiet quiver\nthereof, as much as to say, \"I AM glad to see you;\" and Eustace pinching\nhard with white, straight fingers, and sawing the air violently up and\ndown, as much as to say, \"DON'T YOU SEE how glad I am to see you?\" A\nvery different greeting from the former.\n\n\"Hold hard, old lad,\" said Amyas, \"before you break my elbow. And where\ndo you come from?\"\n\n\"From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in\nit,\" said he, with a little smile and nod of mysterious self-importance.\n\n\"Like the devil, eh? Well, every man has his pattern. How is my uncle?\"\n\nNow, if there was one man on earth above another, of whom Eustace Leigh\nstood in dread, it was his cousin Amyas. In the first place, he knew\nAmyas could have killed him with a blow; and there are natures, who,\ninstead of rejoicing in the strength of men of greater prowess than\nthemselves, look at such with irritation, dread, at last, spite;\nexpecting, perhaps, that the stronger will do to them what they feel\nthey might have done in his place. Every one, perhaps, has the same\nenvious, cowardly devil haunting about his heart; but the brave men,\nthough they be very sparrows, kick him out; the cowards keep him, and\nfoster him; and so did poor Eustace Leigh.\n\nNext, he could not help feeling that Amyas despised him. They had not\nmet for three years; but before Amyas went, Eustace never could argue\nwith him, simply because Amyas treated him as beneath argument. No doubt\nhe was often rude and unfair enough; but the whole mass of questions\nconcerning the unseen world, which the priests had stimulated in his\ncousin's mind into an unhealthy fungus crop, were to Amyas simply, as he\nexpressed it, \"wind and moonshine;\" and he treated his cousin as a\nsort of harmless lunatic, and, as they say in Devon, \"half-baked.\" And\nEustace knew it; and knew, too, that his cousin did him an injustice.\n\"He used to undervalue me,\" said he to himself; \"let us see whether he\ndoes not find me a match for him now.\" And then went off into an agony\nof secret contrition for his self-seeking and his forgetting that\n\"the glory of God, and not his own exaltation,\" was the object of his\nexistence.\n\nThere, dear readers, Ex pede Herculem; I cannot tire myself or you\n(especially in this book) with any wire-drawn soul-dissections. I have\ntried to hint to you two opposite sorts of men,--the one trying to be\ngood with all his might and main, according to certain approved methods\nand rules, which he has got by heart, and like a weak oarsman, feeling\nand fingering his spiritual muscles over all day, to see if they are\ngrowing; the other not even knowing whether he is good or not, but just\ndoing the right thing without thinking about it, as simply as a little\nchild, because the Spirit of God is with him. If you cannot see the\ngreat gulf fixed between the two, I trust that you will discover it some\nday.\n\nBut in justice be it said, all this came upon Eustace, not because he\nwas a Romanist, but because he was educated by the Jesuits. Had he been\nsaved from them, he might have lived and died as simple and honest a\ngentleman as his brothers, who turned out like true Englishmen (as did\nall the Romish laity) to face the great Armada, and one of whom was\nfighting at that very minute under St. Leger in Ireland, and as brave\nand loyal a soldier as those Roman Catholics whose noble blood has\nstained every Crimean battlefield; but his fate was appointed otherwise;\nand the Upas-shadow which has blighted the whole Romish Church, blighted\nhim also.\n\n\"Ah, my dearest cousin!\" said Eustace, \"how disappointed I was this\nmorning at finding I had arrived just a day too late to witness your\ntriumph! But I hastened to your home as soon as I could, and learning\nfrom your mother that I should find you here, hurried down to bid you\nwelcome again to Devon.\"\n\n\"Well, old lad, it does look very natural to see you. I often used to\nthink of you walking the deck o' nights. Uncle and the girls are all\nright, then? But is the old pony dead yet? And how's Dick the smith, and\nNancy? Grown a fine maid by now, I warrant. 'Slid, it seems half a life\nthat I've been away.\n\n\"And you really thought of your poor cousin? Be sure that he, too,\nthought of you, and offered up nightly his weak prayers for your safety\n(doubtless, not without avail) to those saints, to whom would that\nyou--\"\n\n\"Halt there, coz. If they are half as good fellows as you and I take\nthem for, they'll help me without asking.\"\n\n\"They have helped you, Amyas.\"\n\n\"Maybe; I'd have done as much, I'm sure, for them, if I 'd been in their\nplace.\"\n\n\"And do you not feel, then, that you owe a debt of gratitude to them;\nand, above all, to her, whose intercessions have, I doubt not, availed\nfor your preservation? Her, the star of the sea, the all-compassionate\nguide of the mariner?\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Amyas. \"Here's Frank; let him answer.\"\n\nAnd, as he spoke, up came Frank, and after due greetings, sat down\nbeside them on the ridge.\n\n\"I say, brother, here's Eustace trying already to convert me; and\ntelling me that I owe all my luck to the Blessed Virgin's prayers for\nme.\n\n\"It may be so,\" said Frank; \"at least you owe it to the prayers of that\nmost pure and peerless virgin by whose commands you sailed; the sweet\nincense of whose orisons has gone up for you daily, and for whose sake\nyou were preserved from flood and foe, that you might spread the fame\nand advance the power of the spotless championess of truth, and right,\nand freedom,--Elizabeth, your queen.\"\n\nAmyas answered this rhapsody, which would have been then both\nfashionable and sincere, by a loyal chuckle. Eustace smiled meekly, but\nanswered somewhat venomously nevertheless--\n\n\"I, at least, am certain that I speak the truth, when I call my\npatroness a virgin undefiled.\"\n\nBoth the brothers' brows clouded at once. Amyas, as he lay on his back\non the pebbles, said quietly to the gulls over his head--\"I wonder what\nthe Frenchman whose head I cut off at the Azores, thinks by now about\nall that.\"\n\n\"Cut off a Frenchman's head?\" said Frank.\n\n\"Yes, faith; and so fleshed my maiden sword. I'll tell you. It was\nin some tavern; I and George Drake had gone in, and there sat this\nFrenchman, with his sword on the table, ready for a quarrel (I found\nafterwards he was a noted bully), and begins with us loudly enough about\nthis and that; but, after awhile, by the instigation of the devil, what\ndoes he vent but a dozen slanders against her majesty's honor, one atop\nof the other? I was ashamed to hear them, and I should be more ashamed\nto repeat them.\"\n\n\"I have heard enough of such,\" said Frank. \"They come mostly through\nlewd rascals about the French ambassador, who have been bred (God help\nthem) among the filthy vices of that Medicean Court in which the Queen\nof Scots had her schooling; and can only perceive in a virtuous freedom\na cloak for licentiousness like their own. Let the curs bark; Honi soit\nqui mal y pense is our motto, and shall be forever.\"\n\n\"But I didn't let the cur bark; for I took him by the ears, to show him\nout into the street. Whereon he got to his sword, and I to mine; and a\nvery near chance I had of never bathing on the pebble ridge more; for\nthe fellow did not fight with edge and buckler, like a Christian, but\nhad some newfangled French devil's device of scryming and foining with\nhis point, ha'ing and stamping, and tracing at me, that I expected to be\nfull of eyelet holes ere I could close with him.\"\n\n\"Thank God that you are safe, then!\" said Frank. \"I know that play well\nenough, and dangerous enough it is.\"\n\n\"Of course you know it; but I didn't, more's the pity.\"\n\n\"Well, I'll teach it thee, lad, as well as Rowland Yorke himself,\n\n     'Thy fincture, carricade, and sly passata,\n     Thy stramazon, and resolute stoccata,\n     Wiping maudritta, closing embrocata,\n     And all the cant of the honorable fencing mystery.'\"\n\n\"Rowland Yorke? Who's he, then?\"\n\n\"A very roystering rascal, who is making good profit in London just now\nby teaching this very art of fence; and is as likely to have his mortal\nthread clipt in a tavern brawl, as thy Frenchman. But how did you escape\nhis pinking iron?\"\n\n\"How? Had it through my left arm before I could look round; and at that\nI got mad, and leapt upon him, and caught him by the wrist, and then had\na fair side-blow; and, as fortune would have it, off tumbled his head on\nto the table, and there was an end of his slanders.\"\n\n\"So perish all her enemies!\" said Frank; and Eustace, who had been\ntrying not to listen, rose and said--\n\n\"I trust that you do not number me among them?\"\n\n\"As you speak, I do, coz,\" said Frank. \"But for your own sake, let\nme advise you to put faith in the true report of those who have daily\nexperience of their mistress's excellent virtue, as they have of the\nsun's shining, and of the earth's bringing forth fruit, and not in the\ntattle of a few cowardly back-stair rogues, who wish to curry favor with\nthe Guises. Come, we will say no more. Walk round with us by Appledore,\nand then home to breakfast.\"\n\nBut Eustace declined, having immediate business, he said, in Northam\ntown, and then in Bideford; and so left them to lounge for another\nhalf-hour on the beach, and then walk across the smooth sheet of turf to\nthe little white fishing village, which stands some two miles above the\nbar, at the meeting of the Torridge and the Taw.\n\nNow it came to pass, that Eustace Leigh, as we have seen, told his\ncousins that he was going to Northam: but he did not tell them that\nhis point was really the same as their own, namely, Appledore; and,\ntherefore, after having satisfied his conscience by going as far as the\nvery nearest house in Northam village, he struck away sharp to the left\nacross the fields, repeating I know not what to the Blessed Virgin all\nthe way; whereby he went several miles out of his road; and also, as\nis the wont of crooked spirits, Jesuits especially (as three centuries\nsufficiently testify), only outwitted himself. For his cousins going\nmerrily, like honest men, along the straight road across the turf,\narrived in Appledore, opposite the little \"Mariner's Rest\" Inn, just in\ntime to see what Eustace had taken so much trouble to hide from them,\nnamely, four of Mr. Thomas Leigh's horses standing at the door, held by\nhis groom, saddles and mail-bags on back, and mounting three of them,\nEustace Leigh and two strange gentlemen.\n\n\"There's one lie already this morning,\" growled Amyas; \"he told us he\nwas going to Northam.\"\n\n\"And we do not know that he has not been there,\" blandly suggested\nFrank.\n\n\"Why, you are as bad a Jesuit as he, to help him out with such a fetch.\"\n\n\"He may have changed his mind.\"\n\n\"Bless your pure imagination, my sweet boy,\" said Amyas, laying his\ngreat hand on Frank's head, and mimicking his mother's manner. \"I\nsay, dear Frank, let's step into this shop and buy a penny-worth of\nwhipcord.\"\n\n\"What do you want with whipcord, man?\"\n\n\"To spin my top, to be sure.\"\n\n\"Top? how long hast had a top?\"\n\n\"I'll buy one, then, and save my conscience; but the upshot of this\nsport I must see. Why may not I have an excuse ready made as well as\nMaster Eustace?\"\n\nSo saying, he pulled Frank into the little shop, unobserved by the party\nat the inn-door.\n\n\"What strange cattle has he been importing now? Look at that\nthree-legged fellow, trying to get aloft on the wrong side. How he claws\nat his horse's ribs, like a cat scratching an elder stem!\"\n\nThe three-legged man was a tall, meek-looking person, who had bedizened\nhimself with gorgeous garments, a great feather, and a sword so long\nand broad, that it differed little in size from the very thin and stiff\nshanks between which it wandered uncomfortably.\n\n\"Young David in Saul's weapons,\" said Frank. \"He had better not go in\nthem, for he certainly has not proved them.\"\n\n\"Look, if his third leg is not turned into a tail! Why does not some one\nin charity haul in half-a-yard of his belt for him?\"\n\nIt was too true; the sword, after being kicked out three or four times\nfrom its uncomfortable post between his legs, had returned unconquered;\nand the hilt getting a little too far back by reason of the too great\nlength of the belt, the weapon took up its post triumphantly behind,\nstanding out point in air, a tail confest, amid the tittering of the\nostlers, and the cheers of the sailors.\n\nAt last the poor man, by dint of a chair, was mounted safely, while his\nfellow-stranger, a burly, coarse-looking man, equally gay, and rather\nmore handy, made so fierce a rush at his saddle, that, like \"vaulting\nambition who o'erleaps his selle,\" he \"fell on t'other side:\" or would\nhave fallen, had he not been brought up short by the shoulders of the\nostler at his off-stirrup. In which shock off came hat and feather.\n\n\"Pardie, the bulldog-faced one is a fighting man. Dost see, Frank? he\nhas had his head broken.\"\n\n\"That scar came not, my son, but by a pair of most Catholic and\napostolic scissors. My gentle buzzard, that is a priest's tonsure.\"\n\n\"Hang the dog! O, that the sailors may but see it, and put him over the\nquay head. I've a half mind to go and do it myself.\"\n\n\"My dear Amyas,\" said Frank, laying two fingers on his arm, \"these\nmen, whosoever they are, are the guests of our uncle, and therefore\nthe guests of our family. Ham gained little by publishing Noah's shame;\nneither shall we, by publishing our uncle's.\"\n\n\"Murrain on you, old Franky, you never let a man speak his mind, and\nshame the devil.\"\n\n\"I have lived long enough in courts, old Amyas, without a murrain on\nyou, to have found out, first, that it is not so easy to shame the\ndevil; and secondly, that it is better to outwit him; and the only way\nto do that, sweet chuck, is very often not to speak your mind at all.\nWe will go down and visit them at Chapel in a day or two, and see if we\ncannot serve these reynards as the badger did the fox, when he found him\nin his hole, and could not get him out by evil savors.\"\n\n\"How then?\"\n\n\"Stuck a sweet nosegay in the door, which turned reynard's stomach at\nonce; and so overcame evil with good.\"\n\n\"Well, thou art too good for this world, that's certain; so we will go\nhome to breakfast. Those rogues are out of sight by now.\"\n\nNevertheless, Amyas was not proof against the temptation of going over\nto the inn-door, and asking who were the gentlemen who went with Mr.\nLeigh.\n\n\"Gentlemen of Wales,\" said the ostler, \"who came last night in a pinnace\nfrom Milford-haven, and their names, Mr. Morgan Evans and Mr. Evan\nMorgans.\"\n\n\"Mr. Judas Iscariot and Mr. Iscariot Judas,\" said Amyas between his\nteeth, and then observed aloud, that the Welsh gentlemen seemed rather\npoor horsemen.\n\n\"So I said to Mr. Leigh's groom, your worship. But he says that those\nparts be so uncommon rough and mountainous, that the poor gentlemen, you\nsee, being enforced to hunt on foot, have no such opportunities as young\ngentlemen hereabout, like your worship; whom God preserve, and send a\nvirtuous lady, and one worthy of you.\"\n\n\"Thou hast a villainously glib tongue, fellow!\" said Amyas, who was\nthoroughly out of humor; \"and a sneaking down visage too, when I come to\nlook at you. I doubt but you are a Papist too, I do!\"\n\n\"Well, sir! and what if I am! I trust I don't break the queen's laws by\nthat. If I don't attend Northam church, I pay my month's shilling for\nthe use of the poor, as the act directs; and beyond that, neither you\nnor any man dare demand of me.\"\n\n\"Dare! act directs! You rascally lawyer, you! and whence does an ostler\nlike you get your shilling to pay withal? Answer me.\" The examinate\nfound it so difficult to answer the question, that he suddenly became\nafflicted with deafness.\n\n\"Do you hear?\" roared Amyas, catching at him with his lion's paw.\n\n\"Yes, missus; anon, anon, missus!\" quoth he to an imaginary landlady\ninside, and twisting under Amyas's hand like an eel, vanished into the\nhouse, while Frank got the hot-headed youth away.\n\n\"What a plague is one to do, then? That fellow was a Papist spy!\"\n\n\"Of course he was!\" said Frank.\n\n\"Then, what is one to do, if the whole country is full of them?\"\n\n\"Not to make fools of ourselves about them, and so leave them to make\nfools of themselves.\"\n\n\"That's all very fine: but--well, I shall remember the villain's face if\nI see him again.\"\n\n\"There is no harm in that,\" said Frank.\n\n\"Glad you think so.\"\n\n\"Don't quarrel with me, Amyas, the first day.\"\n\n\"Quarrel with thee, my darling old fellow! I had sooner kiss the dust\noff thy feet, if I were worthy of it. So now away home; my inside cries\ncupboard.\"\n\nIn the meanwhile Messrs. Evans and Morgans were riding away, as fast\nas the rough by-lanes would let them, along the fresh coast of the bay,\nsteering carefully clear of Northam town on the one hand, and on the\nother, of Portledge, where dwelt that most Protestant justice of the\npeace, Mr. Coffin. And it was well for them that neither Amyas Leigh,\nnor indeed any other loyal Englishman, was by when they entered, as they\nshortly did, the lonely woods which stretch along the southern wall of\nthe bay. For there Eustace Leigh pulled up short; and both he and his\ngroom, leaping from their horses, knelt down humbly in the wet grass,\nand implored the blessing of the two valiant gentlemen of Wales,\nwho, having graciously bestowed it with three fingers apiece, became\nthenceforth no longer Morgan Evans and Evan Morgans, Welshmen and\ngentlemen; but Father Parsons and Father Gampian, Jesuits, and gentlemen\nin no sense in which that word is applied in this book.\n\nAfter a few minutes, the party were again in motion, ambling steadily\nand cautiously along the high table-land, towards Moorwinstow in the\nwest; while beneath them on the right, at the mouth of rich-wooded\nglens, opened vistas of the bright blue bay, and beyond it the sandhills\nof Braunton, and the ragged rocks of Morte; while far away to the north\nand west the lonely isle of Lundy hung like a soft gray cloud.\n\nBut they were not destined to reach their point as peaceably as they\ncould have wished. For just as they got opposite Clovelly dike, the huge\nold Roman encampment which stands about midway in their journey, they\nheard a halloo from the valley below, answered by a fainter one far\nahead. At which, like a couple of rogues (as indeed they were), Father\nCampian and Father Parsons looked at each other, and then both stared\nround at the wild, desolate, open pasture (for the country was then all\nunenclosed), and the great dark furze-grown banks above their heads; and\nCampian remarked gently to Parsons, that this was a very dreary spot,\nand likely enough for robbers.\n\n\"A likelier spot for us, Father,\" said Eustace, punning. \"The old Romans\nknew what they were about when they put their legions up aloft here to\noverlook land and sea for miles away; and we may thank them some day for\ntheir leavings. The banks are all sound; there is plenty of good water\ninside; and\" (added he in Latin), \"in case our Spanish friends--you\nunderstand?\"\n\n\"Pauca verba, my son!\" said Campian: but as he spoke, up from the ditch\nclose beside him, as if rising out of the earth, burst through the\nfurze-bushes an armed cavalier.\n\n\"Pardon, gentlemen!\" shouted he, as the Jesuit and his horse recoiled\nagainst the groom. \"Stand, for your lives!\"\n\n\"Mater caelorum!\" moaned Campian; while Parsons, who, as all the world\nknows, was a blustering bully enough (at least with his tongue), asked:\nWhat a murrain right had he to stop honest folks on the queen's highway?\nconfirming the same with a mighty oath, which he set down as peccatum\nveniale, on account of the sudden necessity; nay, indeed fraus pia, as\nproper to support the character of that valiant gentleman of Wales, Mr.\nEvan Morgans. But the horseman, taking no notice of his hint, dashed\nacross the nose of Eustace Leigh's horse, with a \"Hillo, old lad! where\nridest so early?\" and peering down for a moment into the ruts of the\nnarrow track-way, struck spurs into his horse, shouting, \"A fresh\nslot! right away for Hartland! Forward, gentlemen all! follow, follow,\nfollow!\"\n\n\"Who is this roysterer?\" asked Parsons, loftily.\n\n\"Will Cary, of Clovelly; an awful heretic: and here come more behind.\"\n\nAnd as he spoke four or five more mounted gallants plunged in and out of\nthe great dikes, and thundered on behind the party; whose horses, quite\nunderstanding what game was up, burst into full gallop, neighing and\nsquealing; and in another minute the hapless Jesuits were hurling along\nover moor and moss after a \"hart of grease.\"\n\nParsons, who, though a vulgar bully, was no coward, supported the\ncharacter of Mr. Evan Morgans well enough; and he would have really\nenjoyed himself, had he not been in agonies of fear lest those precious\nsaddle-bags in front of him should break from their lashings, and\nrolling to the earth, expose to the hoofs of heretic horses, perhaps to\nthe gaze of heretic eyes, such a cargo of bulls, dispensations, secret\ncorrespondences, seditious tracts, and so forth, that at the very\nthought of their being seen, his head felt loose upon his shoulders. But\nthe future martyr behind him, Mr. Morgan Evans, gave himself up at once\nto abject despair, and as he bumped and rolled along, sought vainly for\ncomfort in professional ejaculations in the Latin tongue.\n\n\"Mater intemerata! Eripe me e--Ugh! I am down! Adhaesit pavimento\nventer!--No! I am not! El dilectum tuum e potestate canis--Ah! Audisti\nme inter cornua unicornium! Put this, too, down in--ugh!--thy account in\nfavor of my poor--oh, sharpness of this saddle! Oh, whither, barbarous\nislanders!\"\n\nNow riding on his quarter, not in the rough track-way like a cockney,\nbut through the soft heather like a sportsman, was a very gallant knight\nwhom we all know well by this time, Richard Grenville by name; who had\nmade Mr. Cary and the rest his guests the night before, and then ridden\nout with them at five o'clock that morning, after the wholesome early\nways of the time, to rouse a well-known stag in the glens at Buckish, by\nhelp of Mr. Coffin's hounds from Portledge. Who being as good a Latiner\nas Campian's self, and overhearing both the scraps of psalm and the\n\"barbarous islanders,\" pushed his horse alongside of Mr. Eustace\nLeigh, and at the first check said, with two low bows towards the two\nstrangers--\n\n\"I hope Mr. Leigh will do me the honor of introducing me to his guests.\nI should be sorry, and Mr. Cary also, that any gentle strangers should\nbecome neighbors of ours, even for a day, without our knowing who they\nare who honor our western Thule with a visit; and showing them ourselves\nall due requital for the compliment of their presence.\"\n\nAfter which, the only thing which poor Eustace could do (especially as\nit was spoken loud enough for all bystanders), was to introduce in due\nform Mr. Evan Morgans and Mr. Morgan Evans, who, hearing the name, and,\nwhat was worse, seeing the terrible face with its quiet searching eye,\nfelt like a brace of partridge-poults cowering in the stubble, with a\nhawk hanging ten feet over their heads.\n\n\"Gentlemen,\" said Sir Richard blandly, cap in hand, \"I fear that your\nmails must have been somewhat in your way in this unexpected gallop. If\nyou will permit my groom, who is behind, to disencumber you of them\nand carry them to Chapel, you will both confer an honor on me, and be\nenabled yourselves to see the mort more pleasantly.\"\n\nA twinkle of fun, in spite of all his efforts, played about good Sir\nRichard's eye as he gave this searching hint. The two Welsh gentlemen\nstammered out clumsy thanks; and pleading great haste and fatigue from\na long journey, contrived to fall to the rear and vanish with their\nguides, as soon as the slot had been recovered.\n\n\"Will!\" said Sir Richard, pushing alongside of young Cary.\n\n\"Your worship?\"\n\n\"Jesuits, Will!\"\n\n\"May the father of lies fly away with them over the nearest cliff!\"\n\n\"He will not do that while this Irish trouble is about. Those fellows\nare come to practise here for Saunders and Desmond.\"\n\n\"Perhaps they have a consecrated banner in their bag, the scoundrels!\nShall I and young Coffin on and stop them? Hard if the honest men may\nnot rob the thieves once in a way.\"\n\n\"No; give the devil rope, and he will hang himself. Keep thy tongue at\nhome, and thine eyes too, Will.\"\n\n\"How then?\"\n\n\"Let Clovelly beach be watched night and day like any mousehole. No one\ncan land round Harty Point with these south-westers. Stop every fellow\nwho has the ghost of an Irish brogue, come he in or go he out, and send\nhim over to me.\"\n\n\"Some one should guard Bude-haven, sir.\"\n\n\"Leave that to me. Now then, forward, gentlemen all, or the stag will\ntake the sea at the Abbey.\"\n\nAnd on they crashed down the Hartland glens, through the oak-scrub and\nthe great crown-ferns; and the baying of the slow-hound and the tantaras\nof the horn died away farther and fainter toward the blue Atlantic,\nwhile the conspirators, with lightened hearts, pricked fast across\nBursdon upon their evil errand. But Eustace Leigh had other thoughts\nand other cares than the safety of his father's two mysterious guests,\nimportant as that was in his eyes; for he was one of the many who had\ndrunk in sweet poison (though in his case it could hardly be called\nsweet) from the magic glances of the Rose of Torridge. He had seen her\nin the town, and for the first time in his life fallen utterly in love;\nand now that she had come down close to his father's house, he looked on\nher as a lamb fallen unawares into the jaws of the greedy wolf, which\nhe felt himself to be. For Eustace's love had little or nothing of\nchivalry, self-sacrifice, or purity in it; those were virtues which were\nnot taught at Rheims. Careful as the Jesuits were over the practical\nmorality of their pupils, this severe restraint had little effect in\nproducing real habits of self-control. What little Eustace had learnt of\nwomen from them, was as base and vulgar as the rest of their teaching.\nWhat could it be else, if instilled by men educated in the schools of\nItaly and France, in the age which produced the foul novels of Cinthio\nand Bandello, and compelled Rabelais in order to escape the rack and\nstake, to hide the light of his great wisdom, not beneath a bushel, but\nbeneath a dunghill; the age in which the Romish Church had made\nmarriage a legalized tyranny, and the laity, by a natural and pardonable\nrevulsion, had exalted adultery into a virtue and a science? That all\nlove was lust; that all women had their price; that profligacy, though\nan ecclesiastical sin, was so pardonable, if not necessary, as to be\nhardly a moral sin, were notions which Eustace must needs have gathered\nfrom the hints of his preceptors; for their written works bear to this\nday fullest and foulest testimony that such was their opinion; and that\ntheir conception of the relation of the sexes was really not a whit\nhigher than that of the profligate laity who confessed to them. He\nlonged to marry Rose Salterne, with a wild selfish fury; but only that\nhe might be able to claim her as his own property, and keep all others\nfrom her. Of her as a co-equal and ennobling helpmate; as one in whose\nhonor, glory, growth of heart and soul, his own were inextricably wrapt\nup, he had never dreamed. Marriage would prevent God from being angry\nwith that, with which otherwise He might be angry; and therefore the\nsanction of the Church was the more \"probable and safe\" course. But as\nyet his suit was in very embryo. He could not even tell whether Rose\nknew of his love; and he wasted miserable hours in maddening thoughts,\nand tost all night upon his sleepless bed, and rose next morning fierce\nand pale, to invent fresh excuses for going over to her uncle's house,\nand lingering about the fruit which he dared not snatch.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE TWO WAYS OF BEING CROST IN LOVE\n\n     \"I could not love thee, dear, so much,\n     Loved I not honor more.\"--LOVELACE.\n\nAnd what all this while has become of the fair breaker of so many\nhearts, to whom I have not yet even introduced my readers?\n\nShe was sitting in the little farm-house beside the mill, buried in the\ngreen depths of the valley of Combe, half-way between Stow and Chapel,\nsulking as much as her sweet nature would let her, at being thus\nshut out from all the grand doings at Bideford, and forced to keep a\nMartinmas Lent in that far western glen. So lonely was she, in fact,\nthat though she regarded Eustace Leigh with somewhat of aversion, and\n(being a good Protestant) with a great deal of suspicion, she could not\nfind it in her heart to avoid a chat with him whenever he came down to\nthe farm and to its mill, which he contrived to do, on I know not what\nwould-be errand, almost every day. Her uncle and aunt at first looked\nstiff enough at these visits, and the latter took care always to make a\nthird in every conversation; but still Mr. Leigh was a gentleman's\nson, and it would not do to be rude to a neighboring squire and a good\ncustomer; and Rose was the rich man's daughter and they poor cousins,\nso it would not do either to quarrel with her; and besides, the\npretty maid, half by wilfulness, and half by her sweet winning tricks,\ngenerally contrived to get her own way wheresoever she went; and\nshe herself had been wise enough to beg her aunt never to leave them\nalone,--for she \"could not a-bear the sight of Mr. Eustace, only\nshe must have some one to talk with down here.\" On which her aunt\nconsidered, that she herself was but a simple country-woman; and that\ntownsfolks' ways of course must be very different from hers; and that\npeople knew their own business best; and so forth, and let things go\non their own way. Eustace, in the meanwhile, who knew well that the\ndifference in creed between him and Rose was likely to be the very\nhardest obstacle in the way of his love, took care to keep his private\nopinions well in the background; and instead of trying to convert the\nfolk at the mill, daily bought milk or flour from them, and gave it\naway to the old women in Moorwinstow (who agreed that after all, for\na Papist, he was a godly young man enough); and at last, having taken\ncounsel with Campian and Parsons on certain political plots then on\nfoot, came with them to the conclusion that they would all three go to\nchurch the next Sunday. Where Messrs. Evan Morgans and Morgan Evans,\nhaving crammed up the rubrics beforehand, behaved themselves in a most\northodox and unexceptionable manner; as did also poor Eustace, to the\ngreat wonder of all good folks, and then went home flattering himself\nthat he had taken in parson, clerk, and people; not knowing in his\nsimple unsimplicity, and cunning foolishness, that each good wife in the\nparish was saying to the other, \"He turned Protestant? The devil turned\nmonk! He's only after Mistress Salterne, the young hypocrite.\"\n\nBut if the two Jesuits found it expedient, for the holy cause in which\nthey were embarked, to reconcile themselves outwardly to the powers\nthat were, they were none the less busy in private in plotting their\noverthrow.\n\nEver since April last they had been playing at hide-and-seek through the\nlength and breadth of England, and now they were only lying quiet till\nexpected news from Ireland should give them their cue, and a great\n\"rising of the West\" should sweep from her throne that stiff-necked,\npersecuting, excommunicate, reprobate, illegitimate, and profligate\nusurper, who falsely called herself the Queen of England.\n\nFor they had as stoutly persuaded themselves in those days, as they\nhave in these (with a real Baconian contempt of the results of sensible\nexperience), that the heart of England was really with them, and that\nthe British nation was on the point of returning to the bosom of the\nCatholic Church, and giving up Elizabeth to be led in chains to the feet\nof the rightful Lord of Creation, the Old Man of the Seven Hills.\nAnd this fair hope, which has been skipping just in front of them for\ncenturies, always a step farther off, like the place where the rainbow\ntouches the ground, they used to announce at times, in language which\nterrified old Mr. Leigh. One day, indeed, as Eustace entered his\nfather's private room, after his usual visit to the mill, he could\nhear voices high in dispute; Parsons as usual, blustering; Mr. Leigh\npeevishly deprecating, and Campian, who was really the sweetest-natured\nof men, trying to pour oil on the troubled waters. Whereat Eustace (for\nthe good of the cause, of course) stopped outside and listened.\n\n\"My excellent sir,\" said Mr. Leigh, \"does not your very presence here\nshow how I am affected toward the holy cause of the Catholic faith? But\nI cannot in the meanwhile forget that I am an Englishman.\"\n\n\"And what is England?\" said Parsons: \"A heretic and schismatic Babylon,\nwhereof it is written, 'Come out of her, my people, lest you be partaker\nof her plagues.' Yea, what is a country? An arbitrary division of\nterritory by the princes of this world, who are naught, and come to\nnaught. They are created by the people's will; their existence depends\non the sanction of him to whom all power is given in heaven and\nearth--our Holy Father the Pope. Take away the latter, and what is a\nking?--the people who have made him may unmake him.\"\n\n\"My dear sir, recollect that I have sworn allegiance to Queen\nElizabeth!\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, you have, sir; and, as I have shown at large in my writings,\nyou were absolved from that allegiance from the moment that the bull of\nPius the Fifth declared her a heretic and excommunicate, and thereby to\nhave forfeited all dominion whatsoever. I tell you, sir, what I thought\nyou should have known already, that since the year 1569, England has had\nno queen, no magistrates, no laws, no lawful authority whatsoever; and\nthat to own allegiance to any English magistrate, sir, or to plead in an\nEnglish court of law, is to disobey the apostolic precept, 'How dare you\ngo to law before the unbelievers?' I tell you, sir, rebellion is now not\nmerely permitted, it is a duty.\"\n\n\"Take care, sir; for God's sake, take care!\" said Mr. Leigh. \"Right or\nwrong, I cannot have such language used in my house. For the sake of my\nwife and children, I cannot!\"\n\n\"My dear brother Parsons, deal more gently with the flock,\" interposed\nCampian. \"Your opinion, though probable, as I well know, in the eyes of\nmost of our order, is hardly safe enough here; the opposite is at least\nso safe that Mr. Leigh may well excuse his conscience for accepting it.\nAfter all, are we not sent hither to proclaim this very thing, and to\nrelieve the souls of good Catholics from a burden which has seemed to\nthem too heavy?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Parsons, half-sulkily, \"to allow all Balaams who will to\nsacrifice to Baal, while they call themselves by the name of the Lord.\"\n\n\"My dear brother, have I not often reminded you that Naaman was allowed\nto bow himself in the house of Rimmon? And can we therefore complain of\nthe office to which the Holy Father has appointed us, to declare to such\nas Mr. Leigh his especial grace, by which the bull of Pius the Fifth\n(on whose soul God have mercy!) shall henceforth bind the queen and the\nheretics only; but in no ways the Catholics, at least as long as the\npresent tyranny prevents the pious purposes of the bull?\"\n\n\"Be it so, sir; be it so. Only observe this, Mr. Leigh, that our brother\nCampian confesses this to be a tyranny. Observe, sir, that the bull does\nstill bind the so-called queen, and that she and her magistrates are\nstill none the less usurpers, nonentities, and shadows of a shade. And\nobserve this, sir, that when that which is lawful is excused to the\nweak, it remains no less lawful to the strong. The seven thousand who\nhad not bowed the knee to Baal did not slay his priests; but Elijah did,\nand won to himself a good reward. And if the rest of the children of\nIsrael sinned not in not slaying Eglon, yet Ehud's deed was none the\nless justified by all laws human and divine.\"\n\n\"For Heaven's sake, do not talk so, sir! or I must leave the room. What\nhave I to do with Ehud and Eglon, and slaughters, and tyrannies? Our\nqueen is a very good queen, if Heaven would but grant her repentance,\nand turn her to the true faith. I have never been troubled about\nreligion, nor any one else that I know of in the West country.\"\n\n\"You forget Mr. Trudgeon of Launceston, father, and poor Father Mayne,\"\ninterposed Eustace, who had by this time slipped in; and Campian added\nsoftly--\n\n\"Yes, your West of England also has been honored by its martyrs, as well\nas my London by the precious blood of Story.\"\n\n\"What, young malapert?\" cried poor Leigh, facing round upon his son,\nglad to find any one on whom he might vent his ill-humor; \"are you too\nagainst me, with a murrain on you? And pray, what the devil brought\nCuthbert Mayne to the gallows, and turned Mr. Trudgeon (he was always a\nfoolish hot-head) out of house and home, but just such treasonable talk\nas Mr. Parsons must needs hold in my house, to make a beggar of me and\nmy children, as he will before he has done.\"\n\n\"The Blessed Virgin forbid!\" said Campian.\n\n\"The Blessed Virgin forbid? But you must help her to forbid it, Mr.\nCampian. We should never have had the law of 1571, against bulls, and\nAgnus Deis, and blessed grains, if the Pope's bull of 1569 had not made\nthem matter of treason, by preventing a poor creature's saving his soul\nin the true Church without putting his neck into a halter by denying the\nqueen's authority.\"\n\n\"What, sir?\" almost roared Parsons, \"do you dare to speak evil of the\nedicts of the Vicar of Christ?\"\n\n\"I? No. I didn't. Who says I did? All I meant was, I am sure--Mr.\nCampian, you are a reasonable man, speak for me.\"\n\n\"Mr. Leigh only meant, I am sure, that the Holy Father's prudent\nintentions have been so far defeated by the perverseness and invincible\nmisunderstanding of the heretics, that that which was in itself meant\nfor the good of the oppressed English Catholics has been perverted to\ntheir harm.\"\n\n\"And thus, reverend sir,\" said Eustace, glad to get into his father's\ngood graces again, \"my father attaches blame, not to the Pope--Heaven\nforbid!--but to the pravity of his enemies.\"\n\n\"And it is for this very reason,\" said Campian, \"that we have brought\nwith us the present merciful explanation of the bull.\"\n\n\"I'll tell you what, gentlemen,\" said Mr. Leigh, who, like other weak\nmen, grew in valor as his opponent seemed inclined to make peace, \"I\ndon't think the declaration was needed. After the new law of 1571 was\nmade, it was never put in force till Mayne and Trudgeon made fools of\nthemselves, and that was full six years. There were a few offenders,\nthey say, who were brought up and admonished, and let go; but even that\ndid not happen down here, and need not happen now, unless you put my son\nhere (for you shall never put me, I warrant you) upon some deed which\nhad better be left alone, and so bring us all to shame.\"\n\n\"Your son, sir, if not openly vowed to God, has, I hope, a due sense\nof that inward vocation which we have seen in him, and reverences his\nspiritual fathers too well to listen to the temptations of his earthly\nfather.\"\n\n\"What, sir, will you teach my son to disobey me?\"\n\n\"Your son is ours also, sir. This is strange language in one who owes a\ndebt to the Church, which it was charitably fancied he meant to pay in\nthe person of his child.\"\n\nThese last words touched poor Mr. Leigh in a sore point, and breaking\nall bounds, he swore roundly at Parsons, who stood foaming with rage.\n\n\"A plague upon you, sir, and a black assizes for you, for you will come\nto the gallows yet! Do you mean to taunt me in my own house with that\nHartland land? You had better go back and ask those who sent you where\nthe dispensation to hold the land is, which they promised to get me\nyears ago, and have gone on putting me off, till they have got my money,\nand my son, and my conscience, and I vow before all the saints, seem now\nto want my head over and above. God help me!\"--and the poor man's eyes\nfairly filled with tears.\n\nNow was Eustace's turn to be roused; for, after all, he was an\nEnglishman and a gentleman; and he said kindly enough, but firmly--\n\n\"Courage, my dearest father. Remember that I am still your son, and not\na Jesuit yet; and whether I ever become one, I promise you, will depend\nmainly on the treatment which you meet with at the hands of these\nreverend gentlemen, for whom I, as having brought them hither, must\nconsider myself as surety to you.\"\n\nIf a powder-barrel had exploded in the Jesuits' faces, they could not\nhave been more amazed. Campian looked blank at Parsons, and Parsons at\nCampian; till the stouter-hearted of the two, recovering his breath at\nlast--\n\n\"Sir! do you know, sir, the curse pronounced on those who, after putting\ntheir hand to the plough, look back?\"\n\nEustace was one of those impulsive men, with a lack of moral courage,\nwho dare raise the devil, but never dare fight him after he has been\nraised; and he now tried to pass off his speech by winking and making\nsigns in the direction of his father, as much as to say that he was only\ntrying to quiet the old man's fears. But Campian was too frightened,\nParsons too angry, to take his hints: and he had to carry his part\nthrough.\n\n\"All I read is, Father Parsons, that such are not fit for the kingdom of\nGod; of which high honor I have for some time past felt myself unworthy.\nI have much doubt just now as to my vocation; and in the meanwhile have\nnot forgotten that I am a citizen of a free country.\" And so saying, he\ntook his father's arm, and walked out.\n\nHis last words had hit the Jesuits hard. They had put the poor\ncobweb-spinners in mind of the humiliating fact, which they have had\nthrust on them daily from that time till now, and yet have never learnt\nthe lesson, that all their scholastic cunning, plotting, intriguing,\nbulls, pardons, indulgences, and the rest of it, are, on this side\nthe Channel, a mere enchanter's cloud-castle and Fata Morgana, which\nvanishes into empty air by one touch of that magic wand, the constable's\nstaff. \"A citizen of a free country!\"--there was the rub; and they\nlooked at each other in more utter perplexity than ever. At last Parsons\nspoke.\n\n\"There's a woman in the wind. I'll lay my life on it. I saw him blush up\ncrimson yesterday when his mother asked him whether some Rose Salterne\nor other was still in the neighborhood.\"\n\n\"A woman! Well, the spirit may be willing, though the flesh be weak. We\nwill inquire into this. The youth may do us good service as a layman;\nand if anything should happen to his elder brother (whom the saints\nprotect!) he is heir to some wealth. In the meanwhile, our dear brother\nParsons will perhaps see the expediency of altering our tactics somewhat\nwhile we are here.\"\n\nAnd thereupon a long conversation began between the two, who had been\nsent together, after the wise method of their order, in obedience to the\nprecept, \"Two are better than one,\" in order that Campian might restrain\nParsons' vehemence, and Parsons spur on Campian's gentleness, and so\neach act as the supplement of the other, and each also, it must be\nconfessed, gave advice pretty nearly contradictory to his fellow's if\noccasion should require, \"without the danger,\" as their writers have it,\n\"of seeming changeable and inconsistent.\"\n\nThe upshot of this conversation was, that in a day or two (during which\ntime Mr. Leigh and Eustace also had made the amende honorable, and\nmatters went smoothly enough) Father Campian asked Father Francis,\nthe household chaplain, to allow him, as an especial favor, to hear\nEustace's usual confession on the ensuing Friday.\n\nPoor Father Francis dared not refuse so great a man; and assented with\nan inward groan, knowing well that the intent was to worm out some\nfamily secrets, whereby his power would be diminished, and the Jesuits'\nincreased. For the regular priesthood and the Jesuits throughout England\nwere toward each other in a state of armed neutrality, which wanted but\nlittle at any moment to become open war, as it did in James the First's\ntime, when those meek missionaries, by their gentle moral tortures,\nliterally hunted to death the poor Popish bishop of Hippopotamus (that\nis to say, London) for the time being.\n\nHowever, Campian heard Eustace's confession; and by putting to him such\nquestions as may be easily conceived by those who know anything about\nthe confessional, discovered satisfactorily enough, that he was what\nCampian would have called \"in love:\" though I should question much\nthe propriety of the term as applied to any facts which poor prurient\nCampian discovered, or indeed knew how to discover, seeing that a swine\nhas no eye for pearls. But he had found out enough: he smiled, and set\nto work next vigorously to discover who the lady might be.\n\nIf he had frankly said to Eustace, \"I feel for you; and if your desires\nare reasonable, or lawful, or possible, I will help you with all my\nheart and soul,\" he might have had the young man's secret heart, and\nsaved himself an hour's trouble; but, of course, he took instinctively\nthe crooked and suspicious method, expected to find the case the worst\npossible,--as a man was bound to do who had been trained to take the\nlowest possible view of human nature, and to consider the basest motives\nas the mainspring of all human action,--and began his moral torture\naccordingly by a series of delicate questions, which poor Eustace dodged\nin every possible way, though he knew that the good father was too\ncunning for him, and that he must give in at last. Nevertheless, like a\nrabbit who runs squealing round and round before the weasel, into whose\njaws it knows that it must jump at last by force of fascination, he\nparried and parried, and pretended to be stupid, and surprised, and\nhonorably scrupulous, and even angry; while every question as to her\nbeing married or single, Catholic or heretic, English or foreign,\nbrought his tormentor a step nearer the goal. At last, when Campian,\nfinding the business not such a very bad one, had asked something about\nher worldly wealth, Eustace saw a door of escape and sprang at it.\n\n\"Even if she be a heretic, she is heiress to one of the wealthiest\nmerchants in Devon.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Campian, thoughtfully. \"And she is but eighteen, you say?\"\n\n\"Only eighteen.\"\n\n\"Ah! well, my son, there is time. She may be reconciled to the Church:\nor you may change.\"\n\n\"I shall die first.\"\n\n\"Ah, poor lad! Well; she may be reconciled, and her wealth may be of use\nto the cause of Heaven.\"\n\n\"And it shall be of use. Only absolve me, and let me be at peace. Let\nme have but her,\" he cried piteously. \"I do not want her wealth,--not I!\nLet me have but her, and that but for one year, one month, one day!--and\nall the rest--money, fame, talents, yea, my life itself, hers if it be\nneeded--are at the service of Holy Church. Ay, I shall glory in showing\nmy devotion by some special sacrifice,--some desperate deed. Prove me\nnow, and see what there is I will not do!\"\n\nAnd so Eustace was absolved; after which Campian added,--\n\n\"This is indeed well, my son: for there is a thing to be done now, but\nit may be at the risk of life.\"\n\n\"Prove me!\" cried Eustace, impatiently.\n\n\"Here is a letter which was brought me last night; no matter from\nwhence; you can understand it better than I, and I longed to have shown\nit you, but that I feared my son had become--\"\n\n\"You feared wrongly, then, my dear Father Campian.\"\n\nSo Campian translated to him the cipher of the letter.\n\n\"This to Evan Morgans, gentleman, at Mr. Leigh's house in Moorwinstow,\nDevonshire. News may be had by one who will go to the shore of Clovelly,\nany evening after the 25th of November, at dead low tide, and there\nwatch for a boat, rowed by one with a red beard, and a Portugal by his\nspeech. If he be asked, 'How many?' he will answer, 'Eight hundred and\none.' Take his letters and read them. If the shore be watched, let him\nwho comes show a light three times in a safe place under the cliff\nabove the town; below is dangerous landing. Farewell, and expect great\nthings!\"\n\n\"I will go,\" said Eustace; \"to-morrow is the 25th, and I know a sure and\neasy place. Your friend seems to know these shores well.\"\n\n\"Ah! what is it we do not know?\" said Campian, with a mysterious smile.\n\"And now?\"\n\n\"And now, to prove to you how I trust to you, you shall come with me,\nand see this--the lady of whom I spoke, and judge for yourself whether\nmy fault is not a venial one.\"\n\n\"Ah, my son, have I not absolved you already? What have I to do with\nfair faces? Nevertheless, I will come, both to show you that I trust\nyou, and it may be to help towards reclaiming a heretic, and saving a\nlost soul: who knows?\"\n\nSo the two set out together; and, as it was appointed, they had just got\nto the top of the hill between Chapel and Stow mill, when up the lane\ncame none other than Mistress Rose Salterne herself, in all the glories\nof a new scarlet hood, from under which her large dark languid eyes\ngleamed soft lightnings through poor Eustace's heart and marrow. Up\nto them she tripped on delicate ankles and tiny feet, tall, lithe, and\ngraceful, a true West-country lass; and as she passed them with a\npretty blush and courtesy, even Campian looked back at the fair innocent\ncreature, whose long dark curls, after the then country fashion, rolled\ndown from beneath the hood below her waist, entangling the soul of\nEustace Leigh within their glossy nets.\n\n\"There!\" whispered he, trembling from head to foot. \"Can you excuse me\nnow?\"\n\n\"I had excused you long ago;\" said the kindhearted father. \"Alas, that\nso much fair red and white should have been created only as a feast for\nworms!\"\n\n\"A feast for gods, you mean!\" cried Eustace, on whose common sense the\nnaive absurdity of the last speech struck keenly; and then, as if to\nescape the scolding which he deserved for his heathenry--\n\n\"Will you let me return for a moment? I will follow you: let me go!\"\n\nCampian saw that it was of no use to say no, and nodded. Eustace darted\nfrom his side, and running across a field, met Rose full at the next\nturn of the road.\n\nShe started, and gave a pretty little shriek.\n\n\"Mr. Leigh! I thought you had gone forward.\"\n\n\"I came back to speak to you, Rose--Mistress Salterne, I mean.\"\n\n\"To me?\"\n\n\"To you I must speak, tell you all, or die!\" And he pressed up close to\nher. She shrank back, somewhat frightened.\n\n\"Do not stir; do not go, I implore you! Rose, only hear me!\" And\nfiercely and passionately seizing her by the hand, he poured out the\nwhole story of his love, heaping her with every fantastic epithet of\nadmiration which he could devise.\n\nThere was little, perhaps, of all his words which Rose had not heard\nmany a time before; but there was a quiver in his voice, and a fire in\nhis eye, from which she shrank by instinct.\n\n\"Let me go!\" she said; \"you are too rough, sir!\"\n\n\"Ay!\" he said, seizing now both her hands, \"rougher, perhaps, than the\ngay gallants of Bideford, who serenade you, and write sonnets to you,\nand send you posies. Rougher, but more loving, Rose! Do not turn away!\nI shall die if you take your eyes off me! Tell me,--tell me, now\nhere--this moment--before we part--if I may love you!\"\n\n\"Go away!\" she answered, struggling, and bursting into tears. \"This is\ntoo rude. If I am but a merchant's daughter. I am God's child. Remember\nthat I am alone. Leave me; go! or I will call for help!\"\n\nEustace had heard or read somewhere that such expressions in a woman's\nmouth were mere facons de parler, and on the whole signs that she had no\nobjection to be alone, and did not intend to call for help; and he only\ngrasped her hands the more fiercely, and looked into her face with keen\nand hungry eyes; but she was in earnest, nevertheless, and a loud shriek\nmade him aware that, if he wished to save his own good name, he must\ngo: but there was one question, for an answer to which he would risk his\nvery life.\n\n\"Yes, proud woman! I thought so! Some one of those gay gallants has been\nbeforehand with me. Tell me who--\"\n\nBut she broke from him, and passed him, and fled down the lane.\n\n\"Mark it!\" cried he, after her. \"You shall rue the day when you despised\nEustace Leigh! Mark it, proud beauty!\" And he turned back to join\nCampian, who stood in some trepidation.\n\n\"You have not hurt the maiden, my son? I thought I heard a scream.\"\n\n\"Hurt her! No. Would God that she were dead, nevertheless, and I by her!\nSay no more to me, father. We will home.\" Even Campian knew enough of\nthe world to guess what had happened, and they both hurried home in\nsilence.\n\nAnd so Eustace Leigh played his move, and lost it.\n\nPoor little Rose, having run nearly to Chapel, stopped for very shame,\nand walked quietly by the cottages which stood opposite the gate, and\nthen turned up the lane towards Moorwinstow village, whither she was\nbound. But on second thoughts, she felt herself so \"red and flustered,\"\nthat she was afraid of going into the village, for fear (as she said to\nherself) of making people talk, and so, turning into a by-path, struck\naway toward the cliffs, to cool her blushes in the sea-breeze. And there\nfinding a quiet grassy nook beneath the crest of the rocks, she sat down\non the turf, and fell into a great meditation.\n\nRose Salterne was a thorough specimen of a West-coast maiden, full of\npassionate impulsive affections, and wild dreamy imaginations, a fit\nsubject, as the North-Devon women are still, for all romantic and gentle\nsuperstitions. Left early without mother's care, she had fed her fancy\nupon the legends and ballads of her native land, till she believed--what\ndid she not believe?--of mermaids and pixies, charms and witches,\ndreams and omens, and all that world of magic in which most of the\ncountrywomen, and countrymen too, believed firmly enough but twenty\nyears ago. Then her father's house was seldom without some merchant, or\nsea-captain from foreign parts, who, like Othello, had his tales of--\n\n        \"Antres vast, and deserts idle,\n     Of rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads reach heaven.\"\n\nAnd,--\n\n     \"And of the cannibals that each other eat,\n     The anthropophagi, and men whose heads\n     Do grow beneath their shoulders.\"\n\nAll which tales, she, like Desdemona, devoured with greedy ears,\nwhenever she could \"the house affairs with haste despatch.\" And when\nthese failed, there was still boundless store of wonders open to her in\nold romances which were then to be found in every English house of the\nbetter class. The Legend of King Arthur, Florice and Blancheflour, Sir\nYsumbras, Sir Guy of Warwick, Palamon and Arcite, and the Romaunt of the\nRose, were with her text-books and canonical authorities. And lucky it\nwas, perhaps, for her that Sidney's Arcadia was still in petto, or Mr.\nFrank (who had already seen the first book or two in manuscript, and\nextolled it above all books past, present, or to come) would have surely\nbrought a copy down for Rose, and thereby have turned her poor little\nflighty brains upside down forever. And with her head full of these, it\nwas no wonder if she had likened herself of late more than once to some\nof those peerless princesses of old, for whose fair hand paladins and\nkaisers thundered against each other in tilted field; and perhaps she\nwould not have been sorry (provided, of course, no one was killed) if\nduels, and passages of arms in honor of her, as her father reasonably\ndreaded, had actually taken place.\n\nFor Rose was not only well aware that she was wooed, but found the said\nwooing (and little shame to her) a very pleasant process. Not that she\nhad any wish to break hearts: she did not break her heart for any of her\nadmirers, and why should they break theirs for her? They were all very\ncharming, each in his way (the gentlemen, at least; for she had long\nsince learnt to turn up her nose at merchants and burghers); but one of\nthem was not so very much better than the other.\n\nOf course, Mr. Frank Leigh was the most charming; but then, as a\ncourtier and squire of dames, he had never given her a sign of real\nlove, nothing but sonnets and compliments, and there was no trusting\nsuch things from a gallant, who was said (though, by the by, most\nscandalously) to have a lady love at Milan, and another at Vienna, and\nhalf-a-dozen in the Court, and half-a-dozen more in the city.\n\nAnd very charming was Mr. William Cary, with his quips and his jests,\nand his galliards and lavoltas; over and above his rich inheritance;\nbut then, charming also Mr. Coffin of Portledge, though he were a little\nproud and stately; but which of the two should she choose? It would be\nvery pleasant to be mistress of Clovelly Court; but just as pleasant to\nfind herself lady of Portledge, where the Coffins had lived ever since\nNoah's flood (if, indeed, they had not merely returned thither after\nthat temporary displacement), and to bring her wealth into a family\nwhich was as proud of its antiquity as any nobleman in Devon, and might\nhave made a fourth to that famous trio of Devonshire Cs, of which it is\nwritten,--\n\n     \"Crocker, Cruwys, and Copplestone,\n     When the Conqueror came were all at home.\"\n\nAnd Mr. Hugh Fortescue, too--people said that he was certain to become a\ngreat soldier--perhaps as great as his brother Arthur--and that would\nbe pleasant enough, too, though he was but the younger son of an\ninnumerable family: but then, so was Amyas Leigh. Ah, poor Amyas! Her\ngirl's fancy for him had vanished, or rather, perhaps, it was very much\nwhat it always had been, only that four or five more girl's fancies\nbeside it had entered in, and kept it in due subjection. But still, she\ncould not help thinking a good deal about him, and his voyage, and the\nreports of his great strength, and beauty, and valor, which had already\nreached her in that out-of-the-way corner; and though she was not in the\nleast in love with him, she could not help hoping that he had at least\n(to put her pretty little thought in the mildest shape) not altogether\nforgotten her; and was hungering, too, with all her fancy, to give him\nno peace till he had told her all the wonderful things which he had seen\nand done in this ever-memorable voyage. So that, altogether, it was no\nwonder, if in her last night's dream the figure of Amyas had been even\nmore forward and troublesome than that of Frank or the rest.\n\nBut, moreover, another figure had been forward and troublesome enough in\nlast night's sleep-world; and forward and troublesome enough, too, now\nin to-day's waking-world, namely, Eustace, the rejected. How strange\nthat she should have dreamt of him the night before! and dreamt, too,\nof his fighting with Mr. Frank and Mr. Amyas! It must be a warning--see,\nshe had met him the very next day in this strange way; so the first half\nof her dream had come true; and after what had past, she only had to\nbreathe a whisper, and the second part of the dream would come true\nalso. If she wished for a passage of arms in her own honor, she could\neasily enough compass one: not that she would do it for worlds! And\nafter all, though Mr. Eustace had been very rude and naughty, yet still\nit was not his own fault; he could not help being in love with her.\nAnd--and, in short, the poor little maid felt herself one of the most\nimportant personages on earth, with all the cares (or hearts) of the\ncountry in her keeping, and as much perplexed with matters of weight as\never was any Cleophila, or Dianeme, Fiordispina or Flourdeluce, in verse\nrun tame, or prose run mad.\n\nPoor little Rose! Had she but had a mother! But she was to learn her\nlesson, such as it was, in another school. She was too shy (too proud\nperhaps) to tell her aunt her mighty troubles; but a counsellor she must\nhave; and after sitting with her head in her hands, for half-an-hour\nor more, she arose suddenly, and started off along the cliffs towards\nMarsland. She would go and see Lucy Passmore, the white witch; Lucy knew\neverything; Lucy would tell her what to do; perhaps even whom to marry.\n\nLucy was a fat, jolly woman of fifty, with little pig-eyes, which\ntwinkled like sparks of fire, and eyebrows which sloped upwards and\noutwards, like those of a satyr, as if she had been (as indeed she had)\nall her life looking out of the corners of her eyes. Her qualifications\nas white witch were boundless cunning, equally boundless good nature,\nconsiderable knowledge of human weaknesses, some mesmeric power, some\nskill in \"yarbs,\" as she called her simples, a firm faith in the virtue\nof her own incantations, and the faculty of holding her tongue. By dint\nof these she contrived to gain a fair share of money, and also (which\nshe liked even better) of power, among the simple folk for many miles\nround. If a child was scalded, a tooth ached, a piece of silver was\nstolen, a heifer shrew-struck, a pig bewitched, a young damsel crost in\nlove, Lucy was called in, and Lucy found a remedy, especially for the\nlatter complaint. Now and then she found herself on ticklish ground, for\nthe kind-heartedness which compelled her to help all distressed damsels\nout of a scrape, sometimes compelled her also to help them into one;\nwhereon enraged fathers called Lucy ugly names, and threatened to send\nher into Exeter gaol for a witch, and she smiled quietly, and hinted\nthat if she were \"like some that were ready to return evil for evil,\nsuch talk as that would bring no blessing on them that spoke it;\" which\nbeing translated into plain English, meant, \"If you trouble me, I will\noverlook (i. e. fascinate) you, and then your pigs will die, your horses\nstray, your cream turn sour, your barns be fired, your son have St.\nVitus's dance, your daughter fits, and so on, woe on woe, till you are\nvery probably starved to death in a ditch, by virtue of this terrible\nlittle eye of mine, at which, in spite of all your swearing and\nbullying, you know you are now shaking in your shoes for fear. So you\nhad much better hold your tongue, give me a drink of cider, and leave\nill alone, lest you make it worse.\"\n\nNot that Lucy ever proceeded to any such fearful extremities. On the\ncontrary, her boast, and her belief too, was, that she was sent into\nthe world to make poor souls as happy as she could, by lawful means,\nof course, if possible, but if not--why, unlawful ones were better than\nnone; for she \"couldn't a-bear to see the poor creatures taking on;\nshe was too, too tender-hearted.\" And so she was, to every one but her\nhusband, a tall, simple-hearted rabbit-faced man, a good deal older than\nherself. Fully agreeing with Sir Richard Grenville's great axiom,\nthat he who cannot obey cannot rule, Lucy had been for the last\nfive-and-twenty years training him pretty smartly to obey her, with the\nintention, it is to be charitably hoped, of letting him rule her in\nturn when his lesson was perfected. He bore his honors, however, meekly\nenough, having a boundless respect for his wife's wisdom, and a firm\nbelief in her supernatural powers, and let her go her own way and earn\nher own money, while he got a little more in a truly pastoral method\n(not extinct yet along those lonely cliffs), by feeding a herd of some\ndozen donkeys and twenty goats. The donkeys fetched, at each low-tide,\nwhite shell-sand which was to be sold for manure to the neighboring\nfarmers; the goats furnished milk and \"kiddy-pies;\" and when there was\nneither milking nor sand-carrying to be done, old Will Passmore just\nsat under a sunny rock and watched the buck-goats rattle their horns\ntogether, thinking about nothing at all, and taking very good care\nall the while neither to inquire nor to see who came in and out of his\nlittle cottage in the glen.\n\nThe prophetess, when Rose approached her oracular cave, was seated on\na tripod in front of the fire, distilling strong waters out of\npenny-royal. But no sooner did her distinguished visitor appear at the\nhatch, than the still was left to take care of itself, and a clean\napron and mutch having been slipt on, Lucy welcomed Rose with endless\ncourtesies, and--\"Bless my dear soul alive, who ever would have thought\nto see the Rose of Torridge to my poor little place!\"\n\nRose sat down: and then? How to begin was more than she knew, and she\nstayed silent a full five minutes, looking earnestly at the point of\nher shoe, till Lucy, who was an adept in such cases, thought it best\nto proceed to business at once, and save Rose the delicate operation\nof opening the ball herself; and so, in her own way, half fawning, half\nfamiliar--\n\n\"Well, my dear young lady, and what is it I can do for ye? For I guess\nyou want a bit of old Lucy's help, eh? Though I'm most mazed to see ye\nhere, surely. I should have supposed that pretty face could manage they\nsort of matters for itself. Eh?\"\n\nRose, thus bluntly charged, confessed at once, and with many blushes and\nhesitations, made her soon understand that what she wanted was \"To have\nher fortune told.\"\n\n\"Eh? Oh! I see. The pretty face has managed it a bit too well already,\neh? Tu many o' mun, pure fellows? Well, 'tain't every mayden has her\npick and choose, like some I know of, as be blest in love by stars\nabove. So you hain't made up your mind, then?\"\n\nRose shook her head.\n\n\"Ah--well,\" she went on, in a half-bantering tone. \"Not so asy, is it,\nthen? One's gude for one thing, and one for another, eh? One has the\nblood, and another the money.\"\n\nAnd so the \"cunning woman\" (as she truly was), talking half to herself,\nran over all the names which she thought likely, peering at Rose all the\nwhile out of the corners of her foxy bright eyes, while Rose stirred the\npeat ashes steadfastly with the point of her little shoe, half angry,\nhalf ashamed, half frightened, to find that \"the cunning woman\" had\nguessed so well both her suitors and her thoughts about them, and tried\nto look unconcerned at each name as it came out.\n\n\"Well, well,\" said Lucy, who took nothing by her move, simply because\nthere was nothing to take; \"think over it--think over it, my dear life;\nand if you did set your mind on any one--why, then--then maybe I might\nhelp you to a sight of him.\"\n\n\"A sight of him?\"\n\n\"His sperrit, dear life, his sperrit only, I mane. I 'udn't have no\nkeeping company in my house, no, not for gowld untowld, I 'udn't; but\nthe sperrit of mun--to see whether mun would be true or not, you'd like\nto know that, now, 'udn't you, my darling?\"\n\nRose sighed, and stirred the ashes about vehemently.\n\n\"I must first know who it is to be. If you could show me that--now--\"\n\n\"Oh, I can show ye that, tu, I can. Ben there's a way to 't, a sure way;\nbut 'tis mortal cold for the time o' year, you zee.\"\n\n\"But what is it, then?\" said Rose, who had in her heart been longing for\nsomething of that very kind, and had half made up her mind to ask for a\ncharm.\n\n\"Why, you'm not afraid to goo into the say by night for a minute, are\nyou? And to-morrow night would serve, too; 't will be just low tide to\nmidnight.\"\n\n\"If you would come with me perhaps--\"\n\n\"I'll come, I'll come, and stand within call, to be sure. Only do ye\nmind this, dear soul alive, not to goo telling a crumb about mun, noo,\nnot for the world, or yu'll see naught at all, indeed, now. And beside,\nthere's a noxious business grow'd up against me up to Chapel there; and\nI hear tell how Mr. Leigh saith I shall to Exeter gaol for a witch--did\nye ever hear the likes?--because his groom Jan saith I overlooked\nmun--the Papist dog! And now never he nor th' owld Father Francis goo by\nme without a spetting, and saying of their Ayes and Malificas--I do\nknow what their Rooman Latin do mane, zo well as ever they, I du!--and a\nmaking o' their charms and incantations to their saints and idols! They\nbe mortal feared of witches, they Papists, and mortal hard on 'em, even\non a pure body like me, that doth a bit in the white way; 'case why you\nsee, dear life,\" said she, with one of her humorous twinkles, \"tu to a\ntrade do never agree. Do ye try my bit of a charm, now; do ye!\"\n\nRose could not resist the temptation; and between them both the charm\nwas agreed on, and the next night was fixed for its trial, on the\npayment of certain current coins of the realm (for Lucy, of course,\nmust live by her trade); and slipping a tester into the dame's hand as\nearnest, Rose went away home, and got there in safety.\n\nBut in the meanwhile, at the very hour that Eustace had been prosecuting\nhis suit in the lane at Moorwinstow, a very different scene was being\nenacted in Mrs. Leigh's room at Burrough.\n\nFor the night before, Amyas, as he was going to bed, heard his brother\nFrank in the next room tune his lute, and then begin to sing. And\nboth their windows being open, and only a thin partition between the\nchambers, Amyas's admiring ears came in for every word of the following\ncanzonet, sung in that delicate and mellow tenor voice for which Frank\nwas famed among all fair ladies:--\n\n      \"Ah, tyrant Love, Megaera's serpents bearing,\n     Why thus requite my sighs with venom'd smart?\n       Ah, ruthless dove, the vulture's talons wearing,\n     Why flesh them, traitress, in this faithful heart?\n       Is this my meed?  Must dragons' teeth alone\n       In Venus' lawns by lovers' hands be sown?\n\n      \"Nay, gentlest Cupid; 'twas my pride undid me.\n     Nay, guiltless dove; by mine own wound I fell.\n       To worship, not to wed, Celestials bid me:\n     I dreamt to mate in heaven, and wake in hell;\n       Forever doom'd, Ixion-like, to reel\n       On mine own passions' ever-burning wheel.\"\n\nAt which the simple sailor sighed, and longed that he could write such\nneat verses, and sing them so sweetly. How he would besiege the ear\nof Rose Salterne with amorous ditties! But still, he could not be\neverything; and if he had the bone and muscle of the family, it was but\nfair that Frank should have the brains and voice; and, after all, he was\nbone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, and it was just the same as\nif he himself could do all the fine things which Frank could do; for as\nlong as one of the family won honor, what matter which of them it was?\nWhereon he shouted through the wall, \"Good night, old song-thrush; I\nsuppose I need not pay the musicians.\"\n\n\"What, awake?\" answered Frank. \"Come in here, and lull me to sleep with\na sea-song.\"\n\nSo Amyas went in, and found Frank laid on the outside of his bed not yet\nundrest.\n\n\"I am a bad sleeper,\" said he; \"I spend more time, I fear, in burning\nthe midnight oil than prudent men should. Come and be my jongleur,\nmy minnesinger, and tell me about Andes, and cannibals, and the\nice-regions, and the fire-regions, and the paradises of the West.\"\n\nSo Amyas sat down, and told: but somehow, every story which he tried to\ntell came round, by crooked paths, yet sure, to none other point than\nRose Salterne, and how he thought of her here and thought of her there,\nand how he wondered what she would say if she had seen him in this\nadventure, and how he longed to have had her with him to show her that\nglorious sight, till Frank let him have his own way, and then out came\nthe whole story of the simple fellow's daily and hourly devotion to her,\nthrough those three long years of world-wide wanderings.\n\n\"And oh, Frank, I could hardly think of anything but her in the church\nthe other day, God forgive me! and it did seem so hard for her to be the\nonly face which I did not see--and have not seen her yet, either.\"\n\n\"So I thought, dear lad,\" said Frank, with one of his sweetest smiles;\n\"and tried to get her father to let her impersonate the nymph of\nTorridge.\"\n\n\"Did you, you dear kind fellow? That would have been too delicious.\"\n\n\"Just so, too delicious; wherefore, I suppose, it was ordained not to\nbe, that which was being delicious enough.\"\n\n\"And is she as pretty as ever?\"\n\n\"Ten times as pretty, dear lad, as half the young fellows round have\ndiscovered. If you mean to win her and wear her (and God grant you may\nfare no worse!) you will have rivals enough to get rid of.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Amyas, \"I hope I shall not have to make short work with\nsome of them.\"\n\n\"I hope not,\" said Frank, laughing. \"Now go to bed, and to-morrow\nmorning give your sword to mother to keep, lest you should be tempted to\ndraw it on any of her majesty's lieges.\"\n\n\"No fear of that, Frank; I am no swash-buckler, thank God; but if any\none gets in my way, I'll serve him as the mastiff did the terrier,\nand just drop him over the quay into the river, to cool himself, or my\nname's not Amyas.\"\n\nAnd the giant swung himself laughing out of the room, and slept all\nnight like a seal, not without dreams, of course, of Rose Salterne.\n\nThe next morning, according to his wont, he went into his mother's room,\nwhom he was sure to find up and at her prayers; for he liked to say his\nprayers, too, by her side, as he used to do when he was a little boy. It\nseemed so homelike, he said, after three years' knocking up and down\nin no-man's land. But coming gently to the door, for fear of disturbing\nher, and entering unperceived, beheld a sight which stopped him short.\n\nMrs. Leigh was sitting in her chair, with her face bowed fondly down\nupon the head of his brother Frank, who knelt before her, his face\nburied in her lap. Amyas could see that his whole form was quivering\nwith stifled emotion. Their mother was just finishing the last words\nof a well-known text,--\"for my sake, and the Gospel's, shall receive a\nhundred-fold in this present life, fathers, and mothers, and brothers,\nand sisters.\"\n\n\"But not a wife!\" interrupted Frank, with a voice stifled with sobs;\n\"that was too precious a gift for even Him to promise to those who gave\nup a first love for His sake!\"\n\n\"And yet,\" said he, after a moment's silence, \"has He not heaped me with\nblessings enough already, that I must repine and rage at His refusing me\none more, even though that one be--No, mother! I am your son, and God's;\nand you shall know it, even though Amyas never does!\" And he looked up\nwith his clear blue eyes and white forehead; and his face was as the\nface of an angel.\n\nBoth of them saw that Amyas was present, and started and blushed. His\nmother motioned him away with her eyes, and he went quietly out, as one\nstunned. Why had his name been mentioned?\n\nLove, cunning love, told him all at once. This was the meaning of last\nnight's canzonet! This was why its words had seemed to fit his own heart\nso well! His brother was his rival. And he had been telling him all his\nlove last night. What a stupid brute he was! How it must have made poor\nFrank wince! And then Frank had listened so kindly; even bid him God\nspeed in his suit. What a gentleman old Frank was, to be sure! No wonder\nthe queen was so fond of him, and all the Court ladies!--Why, if it\ncame to that, what wonder if Rose Salterne should be fond of him too?\nHey-day! \"That would be a pretty fish to find in my net when I come to\nhaul it!\" quoth Amyas to himself, as he paced the garden; and clutching\ndesperately hold of his locks with both hands, as if to hold his poor\nconfused head on its shoulders, he strode and tramped up and down the\nshell-paved garden walks for a full half hour, till Frank's voice (as\ncheerful as ever, though he more than suspected all) called him.\n\n\"Come in to breakfast, lad; and stop grinding and creaking upon those\nmiserable limpets, before thou hast set every tooth in my head on edge!\"\n\nAmyas, whether by dint of holding his head straight, or by higher means,\nhad got the thoughts of the said head straight enough by this time; and\nin he came, and fell to upon the broiled fish and strong ale, with a\nsort of fury, as determined to do his duty to the utmost in all matters\nthat day, and therefore, of course, in that most important matter of\nbodily sustenance; while his mother and Frank looked at him, not without\nanxiety and even terror, doubting what turn his fancy might have taken\nin so new a case; at last--\n\n\"My dear Amyas, you will really heat your blood with all that strong\nale! Remember, those who drink beer, think beer.\"\n\n\"Then they think right good thoughts, mother. And in the meanwhile,\nthose who drink water, think water. Eh, old Frank? and here's your\nhealth.\"\n\n\"And clouds are water,\" said his mother, somewhat reassured by his\ngenuine good humor; \"and so are rainbows; and clouds are angels'\nthrones, and rainbows the sign of God's peace on earth.\"\n\nAmyas understood the hint, and laughed. \"Then I'll pledge Frank out\nof the next ditch, if it please you and him. But first--I say--he must\nhearken to a parable; a manner mystery, miracle play, I have got in\nmy head, like what they have at Easter, to the town-hall. Now then,\nhearken, madam, and I and Frank will act.\" And up rose Amyas, and shoved\nback his chair, and put on a solemn face.\n\nMrs. Leigh looked up, trembling; and Frank, he scarce knew why, rose.\n\n\"No; you pitch again. You are King David, and sit still upon your\nthrone. David was a great singer, you know, and a player on the viols;\nand ruddy, too, and of a fair countenance; so that will fit. Now, then,\nmother, don't look so frightened. I am not going to play Goliath, for\nall my cubits; I am to present Nathan the prophet. Now, David, hearken,\nfor I have a message unto thee, O King!\n\n\"There were two men in one city, one rich, and the other poor: and the\nrich man had many flocks and herds, and all the fine ladies in Whitehall\nto court if he liked; and the poor man had nothing but--\"\n\nAnd in spite of his broad honest smile, Amyas's deep voice began to\ntremble and choke.\n\nFrank sprang up, and burst into tears: \"Oh! Amyas, my brother, my\nbrother! stop! I cannot endure this. Oh, God! was it not enough to have\nentangled myself in this fatal fancy, but over and above, I must meet\nthe shame of my brother's discovering it?\"\n\n\"What shame, then, I'd like to know?\" said Amyas, recovering himself.\n\"Look here, brother Frank! I've thought it all over in the garden; and\nI was an ass and a braggart for talking to you as I did last night.\nOf course you love her! Everybody must; and I was a fool for not\nrecollecting that; and if you love her, your taste and mine agree, and\nwhat can be better? I think you are a sensible fellow for loving her,\nand you think me one. And as for who has her, why, you're the eldest;\nand first come first served is the rule, and best to keep to it.\nBesides, brother Frank, though I'm no scholar, yet I'm not so blind but\nthat I tell the difference between you and me; and of course your chance\nagainst mine, for a hundred to one; and I am not going to be fool enough\nto row against wind and tide too. I'm good enough for her, I hope; but\nif I am, you are better, and the good dog may run, but it's the best\nthat takes the hare; and so I have nothing more to do with the matter\nat all; and if you marry her, why, it will set the old house on its legs\nagain, and that's the first thing to be thought of, and you may just as\nwell do it as I, and better too. Not but that it's a plague, a horrible\nplague!\" went on Amyas, with a ludicrously doleful visage; \"but so\nare other things too, by the dozen; it's all in the day's work, as the\nhuntsman said when the lion ate him. One would never get through the\nfurze-croft if one stopped to pull out the prickles. The pig didn't\nscramble out of the ditch by squeaking; and the less said the sooner\nmended; nobody was sent into the world only to suck honey-pots. What\nmust be must, man is but dust; if you can't get crumb, you must fain\neat crust. So I'll go and join the army in Ireland, and get it out of\nmy head, for cannon balls fright away love as well as poverty does; and\nthat's all I've got to say.\" Wherewith Amyas sat down, and returned to\nthe beer; while Mrs. Leigh wept tears of joy.\n\n\"Amyas! Amyas!\" said Frank; \"you must not throw away the hopes of years,\nand for me, too! Oh, how just was your parable! Ah! mother mine! to\nwhat use is all my scholarship and my philosophy, when this dear simple\nsailor-lad outdoes me at the first trial of courtesy!\"\n\n\"My children, my children, which of you shall I love best? Which of you\nis the more noble? I thanked God this morning for having given me one\nsuch son; but to have found that I possess two!\" And Mrs. Leigh laid her\nhead on the table, and buried her face in her hands, while the generous\nbattle went on.\n\n\"But, dearest Amyas!--\"\n\n\"But, Frank! if you don't hold your tongue, I must go forth. It\nwas quite trouble enough to make up one's mind, without having you\nafterwards trying to unmake it again.\"\n\n\"Amyas! if you give her up to me, God do so to me, and more also, if I\ndo not hereby give her up to you!\"\n\n\"He had done it already--this morning!\" said Mrs. Leigh, looking up\nthrough her tears. \"He renounced her forever on his knees before me!\nonly he is too noble to tell you so.\"\n\n\"The more reason I should copy him,\" said Amyas, setting his lips, and\ntrying to look desperately determined, and then suddenly jumping up,\nhe leaped upon Frank, and throwing his arms round his neck, sobbed out,\n\"There, there, now! For God's sake, let us forget all, and think about\nour mother, and the old house, and how we may win her honor before we\ndie! and that will be enough to keep our hands full, without fretting\nabout this woman and that.--What an ass I have been for years! instead\nof learning my calling, dreaming about her, and don't know at this\nminute whether she cares more for me than she does for her father's\n'prentices!\"\n\n\"Oh, Amyas! every word of yours puts me to fresh shame! Will you believe\nthat I know as little of her likings as you do?\"\n\n\"Don't tell me that, and play the devil's game by putting fresh hopes\ninto me, when I am trying to kick them out. I won't believe it. If she\nis not a fool, she must love you; and if she don't, why, be hanged if\nshe is worth loving!\"\n\n\"My dearest Amyas! I must ask you too to make no more such speeches to\nme. All those thoughts I have forsworn.\"\n\n\"Only this morning; so there is time to catch them again before they are\ngone too far.\"\n\n\"Only this morning,\" said Frank, with a quiet smile: \"but centuries have\npassed since then.\"\n\n\"Centuries? I don't see many gray hairs yet.\"\n\n\"I should not have been surprised if you had, though,\" answered Frank,\nin so sad and meaning a tone that Amyas could only answer--\n\n\"Well, you are an angel!\"\n\n\"You, at least, are something even more to the purpose, for you are a\nman!\"\n\nAnd both spoke truth, and so the battle ended; and Frank went to his\nbooks, while Amyas, who must needs be doing, if he was not to dream,\nstarted off to the dockyard to potter about a new ship of Sir Richard's,\nand forget his woes, in the capacity of Sir Oracle among the sailors.\nAnd so he had played his move for Rose, even as Eustace had, and lost\nher: but not as Eustace had.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nCLOVELLY COURT IN THE OLDEN TIME\n\n          \"It was among the ways of good Queen Bess,\n             Who ruled as well as ever mortal can, sir,\n           When she was stogg'd, and the country in a mess,\n             She was wont to send for a Devon man, sir.\"\n\n                                         West Country Song.\n\nThe next morning Amyas Leigh was not to be found. Not that he had gone\nout to drown himself in despair, or even to bemoan himself \"down by the\nTorridge side.\" He had simply ridden off, Frank found, to Sir Richard\nGrenville at Stow: his mother at once divined the truth, that he was\ngone to try for a post in the Irish army, and sent off Frank after him\nto bring him home again, and make him at least reconsider himself.\n\nSo Frank took horse and rode thereon ten miles or more: and then, as\nthere were no inns on the road in those days, or indeed in these, and\nhe had some ten miles more of hilly road before him, he turned down\nthe hill towards Clovelly Court, to obtain, after the hospitable humane\nfashion of those days, good entertainment for man and horse from Mr.\nCary the squire.\n\nAnd when he walked self-invited, like the loud-shouting Menelaus, into\nthe long dark wainscoted hall of the court, the first object he beheld\nwas the mighty form of Amyas, who, seated at the long table, was\nalternately burying his face in a pasty, and the pasty in his face, his\nsorrows having, as it seemed, only sharpened his appetite, while young\nWill Cary, kneeling on the opposite bench, with his elbows on the table,\nwas in that graceful attitude laying down the law fiercely to him in a\nlow voice.\n\n\"Hillo! lad,\" cried Amyas; \"come hither and deliver me out of the hands\nof this fire-eater, who I verily believe will kill me, if I do not let\nhim kill some one else.\"\n\n\"Ah! Mr. Frank,\" said Will Cary, who, like all other young gentlemen of\nthese parts, held Frank in high honor, and considered him a very oracle\nand cynosure of fashion and chivalry, \"welcome here: I was just longing\nfor you, too; I wanted your advice on half-a-dozen matters. Sit down,\nand eat. There is the ale.\"\n\n\"None so early, thank you.\"\n\n\"Ah no!\" said Amyas, burying his head in the tankard, and then mimicking\nFrank, \"avoid strong ale o' mornings. It heats the blood, thickens\nthe animal spirits, and obfuscates the cerebrum with frenetical and\nlymphatic idols, which cloud the quintessential light of the pure\nreason. Eh? young Plato, young Daniel, come hither to judgment! And yet,\nthough I cannot see through the bottom of the tankard already, I can see\nplain enough still to see this, that Will shall not fight.\"\n\n\"Shall I not, eh? who says that? Mr. Frank, I appeal to you, now; only\nhear.\"\n\n\"We are in the judgment-seat,\" said Frank, settling to the pasty.\n\"Proceed, appellant.\"\n\n\"Well, I was telling Amyas, that Tom Coffin, of Portledge; I will stand\nhim no longer.\"\n\n\"Let him be, then,\" said Amyas; \"he could stand very well by himself,\nwhen I saw him last.\"\n\n\"Plague on you, hold your tongue. Has he any right to look at me as he\ndoes, whenever I pass him?\"\n\n\"That depends on how he looks; a cat may look at a king, provided she\ndon't take him for a mouse.\"\n\n\"Oh, I know how he looks, and what he means too, and he shall stop, or I\nwill stop him. And the other day, when I spoke of Rose Salterne\"--\"Ah!\"\ngroaned Frank, \"Ate's apple again!\"--\"(never mind what I said) he burst\nout laughing in my face; and is not that a fair quarrel? And what is\nmore, I know that he wrote a sonnet, and sent it to her to Stow by a\nmarket woman. What right has he to write sonnets when I can't? It's not\nfair play, Mr. Frank, or I am a Jew, and a Spaniard, and a Papist; it's\nnot!\" And Will smote the table till the plates danced again.\n\n\"My dear knight of the burning pestle, I have a plan, a device, a\ndisentanglement, according to most approved rules of chivalry. Let us\nfix a day, and summon by tuck of drum all young gentlemen under the\nage of thirty, dwelling within fifteen miles of the habitation of that\npeerless Oriana.\"\n\n\"And all 'prentice-boys too,\" cried Amyas, out of the pasty.\n\n\"And all 'prentice-boys. The bold lads shall fight first, with good\nquarterstaves, in Bideford Market, till all heads are broken; and the\nhead which is not broken, let the back belonging to it pay the penalty\nof the noble member's cowardice. After which grand tournament, to which\nthat of Tottenham shall be but a flea-bite and a batrachomyomachy--\"\n\n\"Confound you, and your long words, sir,\" said poor Will, \"I know you\nare flouting me.\"\n\n\"Pazienza, Signor Cavaliere; that which is to come is no flouting, but\nbloody and warlike earnest. For afterwards all the young gentlemen\nshall adjourn into a convenient field, sand, or bog--which last will be\nbetter, as no man will be able to run away, if he be up to his knees\nin soft peat: and there stripping to our shirts, with rapiers of equal\nlength and keenest temper, each shall slay his man, catch who catch can,\nand the conquerors fight again, like a most valiant main of gamecocks\nas we are, till all be dead, and out of their woes; after which the\nsurvivor, bewailing before heaven and earth the cruelty of our Fair\nOriana, and the slaughter which her basiliscine eyes have caused, shall\nfall gracefully upon his sword, and so end the woes of this our lovelorn\ngeneration. Placetne Domini? as they used to ask in the Senate at\nOxford.\"\n\n\"Really,\" said Cary, \"this is too bad.\"\n\n\"So is, pardon me, your fighting Mr. Coffin with anything longer than a\nbodkin.\"\n\n\"Bodkins are too short for such fierce Bobadils,\" said Amyas; \"they\nwould close in so near, that we should have them falling to fisticuffs\nafter the first bout.\"\n\n\"Then let them fight with squirts across the market-place; for by heaven\nand the queen's laws, they shall fight with nothing else.\"\n\n\"My dear Mr. Cary,\" went on Frank, suddenly changing his bantering tone\nto one of the most winning sweetness, \"do not fancy that I cannot feel\nfor you, or that I, as well as you, have not known the stings of love\nand the bitterer stings of jealousy. But oh, Mr. Cary, does it not seem\nto you an awful thing to waste selfishly upon your own quarrel that\ndivine wrath which, as Plato says, is the very root of all virtues, and\nwhich has been given you, like all else which you have, that you may\nspend it in the service of her whom all bad souls fear, and all virtuous\nsouls adore,--our peerless queen? Who dares, while she rules England,\ncall his sword or his courage his own, or any one's but hers? Are there\nno Spaniards to conquer, no wild Irish to deliver from their oppressors,\nthat two gentlemen of Devon can find no better place to flesh their\nblades than in each other's valiant and honorable hearts?\"\n\n\"By heaven!\" cried Amyas, \"Frank speaks like a book; and for me, I do\nthink that Christian gentlemen may leave love quarrels to bulls and\nrams.\"\n\n\"And that the heir of Clovelly,\" said Frank, smiling, \"may find more\nnoble examples to copy than the stags in his own deer-park.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Will, penitently, \"you are a great scholar, Mr. Frank, and\nyou speak like one; but gentlemen must fight sometimes, or where would\nbe their honor?\"\n\n\"I speak,\" said Frank, a little proudly, \"not merely as a scholar,\nbut as a gentleman, and one who has fought ere now, and to whom it has\nhappened, Mr. Cary, to kill his man (on whose soul may God have mercy);\nbut it is my pride to remember that I have never yet fought in my own\nquarrel, and my trust in God that I never shall. For as there is nothing\nmore noble and blessed than to fight in behalf of those whom we love,\nso to fight in our own private behalf is a thing not to be allowed to a\nChristian man, unless refusal imports utter loss of life or honor;\nand even then, it may be (though I would not lay a burden on any man's\nconscience), it is better not to resist evil, but to overcome it with\ngood.\"\n\n\"And I can tell you, Will,\" said Amyas, \"I am not troubled with fear of\nghosts; but when I cut off the Frenchman's head, I said to myself, 'If\nthat braggart had been slandering me instead of her gracious majesty, I\nshould expect to see that head lying on my pillow every time I went to\nbed at night.'\"\n\n\"God forbid!\" said Will, with a shudder. \"But what shall I do? for to\nthe market tomorrow I will go, if it were choke-full of Coffins, and a\nghost in each coffin of the lot.\"\n\n\"Leave the matter to me,\" said Amyas. \"I have my device, as well as\nscholar Frank here; and if there be, as I suppose there must be, a\nquarrel in the market to-morrow, see if I do not--\"\n\n\"Well, you are two good fellows,\" said Will. \"Let us have another\ntankard in.\"\n\n\"And drink the health of Mr. Coffin, and all gallant lads of the North,\"\nsaid Frank; \"and now to my business. I have to take this runaway youth\nhere home to his mother; and if he will not go quietly, I have orders to\ncarry him across my saddle.\"\n\n\"I hope your nag has a strong back, then,\" said Amyas; \"but I must go on\nand see Sir Richard, Frank. It is all very well to jest as we have been\ndoing, but my mind is made up.\"\n\n\"Stop,\" said Cary. \"You must stay here tonight; first, for good\nfellowship's sake; and next, because I want the advice of our Phoenix\nhere, our oracle, our paragon. There, Mr. Frank, can you construe that\nfor me? Speak low, though, gentlemen both; there comes my father; you\nhad better give me the letter again. Well, father, whence this morning?\"\n\n\"Eh, company here? Young men, you are always welcome, and such as you.\nWould there were more of your sort in these dirty times! How is your\ngood mother, Frank, eh? Where have I been, Will? Round the house-farm,\nto look at the beeves. That sheeted heifer of Prowse's is all wrong;\nher coat stares like a hedgepig's. Tell Jewell to go up and bring her in\nbefore night. And then up the forty acres; sprang two coveys, and picked\na leash out of them. The Irish hawk flies as wild as any haggard still,\nand will never make a bird. I had to hand her to Tom, and take the\nlittle peregrine. Give me a Clovelly hawk against the world, after\nall; and--heigh ho, I am very hungry! Half-past twelve, and dinner not\nserved? What, Master Amyas, spoiling your appetite with strong ale?\nBetter have tried sack, lad; have some now with me.\"\n\nAnd the worthy old gentleman, having finished his oration, settled\nhimself on a great bench inside the chimney, and put his hawk on a perch\nover his head, while his cockers coiled themselves up close to the warm\npeat-ashes, and his son set to work to pull off his father's boots, amid\nsundry warnings to take care of his corns.\n\n\"Come, Master Amyas, a pint of white wine and sugar, and a bit of a\nshoeing-horn to it ere we dine. Some pickled prawns, now, or a rasher\noff the coals, to whet you?\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" quoth Amyas; \"but I have drunk a mort of outlandish\nliquors, better and worse, in the last three years, and yet never found\naught to come up to good ale, which needs neither shoeing-horn before\nnor after, but takes care of itself, and of all honest stomachs too, I\nthink.\"\n\n\"You speak like a book, boy,\" said old Cary; \"and after all, what a\nplague comes of these newfangled hot wines, and aqua vitaes, which have\ncome in since the wars, but maddening of the brains, and fever of the\nblood?\"\n\n\"I fear we have not seen the end of that yet,\" said Frank. \"My friends\nwrite me from the Netherlands that our men are falling into a swinish\ntrick of swilling like the Hollanders. Heaven grant that they may not\nbring home the fashion with them.\"\n\n\"A man must drink, they say, or die of the ague, in those vile swamps,\"\nsaid Amyas. \"When they get home here, they will not need it.\"\n\n\"Heaven grant it,\" said Frank; \"I should be sorry to see Devonshire\na drunken county; and there are many of our men out there with Mr.\nChampernoun.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Cary, \"there, as in Ireland, we are proving her majesty's\nsaying true, that Devonshire is her right hand, and the young children\nthereof like the arrows in the hand of the giant.\"\n\n\"They may well be,\" said his son, \"when some of them are giants\nthemselves, like my tall school-fellow opposite.\"\n\n\"He will be up and doing again presently, I'll warrant him,\" said old\nCary.\n\n\"And that I shall,\" quoth Amyas. \"I have been devising brave deeds;\nand see in the distance enchanters to be bound, dragons choked, empires\nconquered, though not in Holland.\"\n\n\"You do?\" asked Will, a little sharply; for he had had a half suspicion\nthat more was meant than met the ear.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Amyas, turning off his jest again, \"I go to what Raleigh\ncalls the Land of the Nymphs. Another month, I hope, will see me abroad\nin Ireland.\"\n\n\"Abroad? Call it rather at home,\" said old Cary; \"for it is full of\nDevon men from end to end, and you will be among friends all day long.\nGeorge Bourchier from Tawstock has the army now in Munster, and Warham\nSt. Leger is marshal; George Carew is with Lord Grey of Wilton (Poor\nPeter Carew was killed at Glendalough); and after the defeat last year,\nwhen that villain Desmond cut off Herbert and Price, the companies were\nmade up with six hundred Devon men, and Arthur Fortescue at their head;\nso that the old county holds her head as proudly in the Land of Ire as\nshe does in the Low Countries and the Spanish Main.\"\n\n\"And where,\" asked Amyas, \"is Davils of Marsland, who used to teach me\nhow to catch trout, when I was staying down at Stow? He is in Ireland,\ntoo, is he not?\"\n\n\"Ah, my lad,\" said Mr. Cary, \"that is a sad story. I thought all England\nhad known it.\"\n\n\"You forget, sir, I am a stranger. Surely he is not dead?\"\n\n\"Murdered foully, lad! Murdered like a dog, and by the man whom he had\ntreated as his son, and who pretended, the false knave! to call him\nfather.\"\n\n\"His blood is avenged?\" said Amyas, fiercely.\n\n\"No, by heaven, not yet! Stay, don't cry out again. I am getting\nold--I must tell my story my own way. It was last July,--was it not,\nWill?--Over comes to Ireland Saunders, one of those Jesuit foxes, as the\nPope's legate, with money and bulls, and a banner hallowed by the Pope,\nand the devil knows what beside; and with him James Fitzmaurice, the\nsame fellow who had sworn on his knees to Perrott, in the church at\nKilmallock, to be a true liegeman to Queen Elizabeth, and confirmed it\nby all his saints, and such a world of his Irish howling, that Perrott\ntold me he was fain to stop his own ears. Well, he had been practising\nwith the King of France, but got nothing but laughter for his pains, and\nso went over to the Most Catholic King, and promises him to join Ireland\nto Spain, and set up Popery again, and what not. And he, I suppose,\nthinking it better that Ireland should belong to him than to the Pope's\nbastard, fits him out, and sends him off on such another errand as\nStukely's,--though I will say, for the honor of Devon, if Stukely lived\nlike a fool, he died like an honest man.\"\n\n\"Sir Thomas Stukely dead too?\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Wait a while, lad, and you shall have that tragedy afterwards. Well,\nwhere was I? Oh, Fitzmaurice and the Jesuits land at Smerwick, with\nthree ships, choose a place for a fort, bless it with their holy water,\nand their moppings and their scourings, and the rest of it, to purify\nit from the stain of heretic dominion; but in the meanwhile one of\nthe Courtenays,--a Courtenay of Haccombe, was it?--or a Courtenay of\nBoconnock? Silence, Will, I shall have it in a minute--yes, a Courtenay\nof Haccombe it was, lying at anchor near by, in a ship of war of his,\ncuts out the three ships, and cuts off the Dons from the sea. John and\nJames Desmond, with some small rabble, go over to the Spaniards. Earl\nDesmond will not join them, but will not fight them, and stands by to\ntake the winning side; and then in comes poor Davils, sent down by the\nLord Deputy to charge Desmond and his brothers, in the queen's name, to\nassault the Spaniards. Folks say it was rash of his lordship: but I\nsay, what could be better done? Every one knows that there never was a\nstouter or shrewder soldier than Davils; and the young Desmonds, I have\nheard him say many a time, used to look on him as their father. But\nhe found out what it was to trust Englishmen turned Irish. Well,\nthe Desmonds found out on a sudden that the Dons were such desperate\nPaladins, that it was madness to meddle, though they were five to one;\nand poor Davils, seeing that there was no fight in them, goes back for\nhelp, and sleeps that night at some place called Tralee. Arthur Carter\nof Bideford, St. Leger's lieutenant, as stout an old soldier as Davils\nhimself, sleeps in the same bed with him; the lacquey-boy, who is now\nwith Sir Richard at Stow, on the floor at their feet. But in the dead of\nnight, who should come in but James Desmond, sword in hand, with a dozen\nof his ruffians at his heels, each with his glib over his ugly face,\nand his skene in his hand. Davils springs up in bed, and asks but this,\n'What is the matter, my son?' whereon the treacherous villain, without\ngiving him time to say a prayer, strikes at him, naked as he was,\ncrying, 'Thou shalt be my father no longer, nor I thy son! Thou shalt\ndie!' and at that all the rest fall on him. The poor little lad (so he\nsays) leaps up to cover his master with his naked body, gets three or\nfour stabs of skenes, and so falls for dead; with his master and Captain\nCarter, who were dead indeed--God reward them! After that the ruffians\nransacked the house, till they had murdered every Englishman in it, the\nlacquey-boy only excepted, who crawled out, wounded as he was, through\na window; while Desmond, if you will believe it, went back, up to his\nelbows in blood, and vaunted his deeds to the Spaniards, and asked\nthem--'There! Will you take that as a pledge that I am faithful to you?'\nAnd that, my lad, was the end of Henry Davils, and will be of all who\ntrust to the faith of wild savages.\"\n\n\"I would go a hundred miles to see that Desmond hanged!\" said Amyas,\nwhile great tears ran down his face. \"Poor Mr. Davils! And now, what is\nthe story of Sir Thomas?\"\n\n\"Your brother must tell you that, lad; I am somewhat out of breath.\"\n\n\"And I have a right to tell it,\" said Frank, with a smile. \"Do you know\nthat I was very near being Earl of the bog of Allen, and one of the\npeers of the realm to King Buoncompagna, son and heir to his holiness\nPope Gregory the Thirteenth?\"\n\n\"No, surely!\"\n\n\"As I am a gentleman. When I was at Rome I saw poor Stukely often; and\nthis and more he offered me on the part (as he said) of the Pope, if I\nwould just oblige him in the two little matters of being reconciled to\nthe Catholic Church, and joining the invasion of Ireland.\"\n\n\"Poor deluded heretic,\" said Will Cary, \"to have lost an earldom for\nyour family by such silly scruples of loyalty!\"\n\n\"It is not a matter for jesting, after all,\" said Frank; \"but I saw Sir\nThomas often, and I cannot believe he was in his senses, so frantic was\nhis vanity and his ambition; and all the while, in private matters as\nhonorable a gentleman as ever. However, he sailed at last for Ireland,\nwith his eight hundred Spaniards and Italians; and what is more, I\nknow that the King of Spain paid their charges. Marquis Vinola--James\nBuoncompagna, that is--stayed quietly at Rome, preferring that Stukely\nshould conquer his paternal heritage of Ireland for him while he took\ncare of the bona robas at home. I went down to Civita Vecchia to see\nhim off; and though his younger by many years, I could not but take\nthe liberty of entreating him, as a gentleman and a man of Devon, to\nconsider his faith to his queen and the honor of his country. There were\nhigh words between us; God forgive me if I spoke too fiercely, for I\nnever saw him again.\"\n\n\"Too fiercely to an open traitor, Frank? Why not have run him through?\"\n\n\"Nay, I had no clean life for Sundays, Amyas; so I could not throw away\nmy week-day one; and as for the weal of England, I knew that it was\nlittle he would damage it, and told him so. And at that he waxed utterly\nmad, for it touched his pride, and swore that if the wind had not been\nfair for sailing, he would have fought me there and then; to which I\ncould only answer, that I was ready to meet him when he would; and he\nparted from me, saying, 'It is a pity, sir, I cannot fight you now; when\nnext we meet, it will be beneath my dignity to measure swords with you.'\n\n\"I suppose he expected to come back a prince at least--Heaven knows; I\nowe him no ill-will, nor I hope does any man. He has paid all debts now\nin full, and got his receipt for them.\"\n\n\"How did he die, then, after all?\"\n\n\"On his voyage he touched in Portugal. King Sebastian was just sailing\nfor Africa with his new ally, Mohammed the Prince of Fez, to help King\nAbdallah, and conquer what he could. He persuaded Stukely to go with\nhim. There were those who thought that he, as well as the Spaniards, had\nno stomach for seeing the Pope's son King of Ireland. Others used to\nsay that he thought an island too small for his ambition, and must needs\nconquer a continent--I know not why it was, but he went. They had heavy\nweather in the passage; and when they landed, many of their soldiers\nwere sea-sick. Stukely, reasonably enough, counselled that they should\nwait two or three days and recruit; but Don Sebastian was so mad for the\nassault that he must needs have his veni, vidi, vici; and so ended with\na veni, vidi, perii; for he Abdallah, and his son Mohammed, all perished\nin the first battle at Alcasar; and Stukely, surrounded and overpowered,\nfought till he could fight no more, and then died like a hero with all\nhis wounds in front; and may God have mercy on his soul!\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Amyas, \"we heard of that battle off Lima, but nothing about\npoor Stukely.\"\n\n\"That last was a Popish prayer, Master Frank,\" said old Mr. Cary.\n\n\"Most worshipful sir, you surely would not wish God not to have mercy on\nhis soul?\"\n\n\"No--eh? Of course not: but that's all settled by now, for he is dead,\npoor fellow.\"\n\n\"Certainly, my dear sir. And you cannot help being a little fond of him\nstill.\"\n\n\"Eh? why, I should be a brute if I were not. He and I were\nschoolfellows, though he was somewhat the younger; and many a good\nthrashing have I given him, and one cannot help having a tenderness for\na man after that. Beside, we used to hunt together in Exmoor, and have\nroyal nights afterward into Ilfracombe, when we were a couple of mad\nyoung blades. Fond of him? Why, I would have sooner given my forefinger\nthan that he should have gone to the dogs thus.\"\n\n\"Then, my dear sir, if you feel for him still, in spite of all his\nfaults, how do you know that God may not feel for him still, in spite of\nall his faults? For my part,\" quoth Frank, in his fanciful way, \"without\nbelieving in that Popish Purgatory, I cannot help holding with Plato,\nthat such heroical souls, who have wanted but little of true greatness,\nare hereafter by some strait discipline brought to a better mind;\nperhaps, as many ancients have held with the Indian Gymnosophists, by\ntransmigration into the bodies of those animals whom they have resembled\nin their passions; and indeed, if Sir Thomas Stukely's soul should now\nanimate the body of a lion, all I can say is that he would be a very\nvaliant and royal lion; and also doubtless become in due time heartily\nashamed and penitent for having been nothing better than a lion.\"\n\n\"What now, Master Frank? I don't trouble my head with such matters--I\nsay Stukely was a right good-hearted fellow at bottom; and if you plague\nmy head with any of your dialectics, and propositions, and college quips\nand quiddities, you sha'n't have any more sack, sir. But here come the\nknaves, and I hear the cook knock to dinner.\"\n\nAfter a madrigal or two, and an Italian song of Master Frank's, all\nwhich went sweetly enough, the ladies rose, and went. Whereon Will Cary,\ndrawing his chair close to Frank's, put quietly into his hand a dirty\nletter.\n\n\"This was the letter left for me,\" whispered he, \"by a country fellow\nthis morning. Look at it and tell me what I am to do.\"\n\nWhereon Frank opened, and read--\n\n     \"Mister Cary, be you wary\n        By deer park end to-night.\n     Yf Irish ffoxe com out of rocks\n        Grip and hold hym tight.\"\n\n\"I would have showed it my father,\" said Will, \"but--\"\n\n\"I verily believe it to be a blind. See now, this is the handwriting of\na man who has been trying to write vilely, and yet cannot. Look at\nthat B, and that G; their formae formativae never were begotten in a\nhedge-school. And what is more, this is no Devon man's handiwork. We say\n'to' and not 'by,' Will, eh? in the West country?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\n\"And 'man,' instead of 'him'?\"\n\n\"True, O Daniel! But am I to do nothing therefore?\"\n\n\"On that matter I am no judge. Let us ask much-enduring Ulysses here;\nperhaps he has not sailed round the world without bringing home a device\nor two.\"\n\nWhereon Amyas was called to counsel, as soon as Mr. Cary could be\nstopped in a long cross-examination of him as to Mr. Doughty's famous\ntrial and execution.\n\nAmyas pondered awhile, thrusting his hands into his long curls; and\nthen--\n\n\"Will, my lad, have you been watching at the Deer Park End of late?\"\n\n\"Never.\"\n\n\"Where, then?\"\n\n\"At the town-beach.\"\n\n\"Where else?\n\n\"At the town-head.\"\n\n\"Where else?\"\n\n\"Why, the fellow is turned lawyer! Above Freshwater.\"\n\n\"Where is Freshwater?\"\n\n\"Why, where the water-fall comes over the cliff, half-a-mile from the\ntown. There is a path there up into the forest.\"\n\n\"I know. I'll watch there to-night. Do you keep all your old haunts\nsafe, of course, and send a couple of stout knaves to the mill, to watch\nthe beach at the Deer Park End, on the chance; for your poet may be a\ntrue man, after all. But my heart's faith is, that this comes just to\ndraw you off from some old beat of yours, upon a wild-goose chase. If\nthey shoot the miller by mistake, I suppose it don't much matter?\"\n\n\"Marry, no.\"\n\n     \"'When a miller's knock'd on the head,\n     The less of flour makes the more of bread.'\"\n\n\"Or, again,\" chimed in old Mr. Cary, \"as they say in the North--\n\n     \"'Find a miller that will not steal,\n     Or a webster that is leal,\n     Or a priest that is not greedy,\n     And lay them three a dead corpse by;\n     And by the virtue of them three,\n     The said dead corpse shall quicken'd be.'\"\n\n\"But why are you so ready to watch Freshwater to-night, Master Amyas?\"\n\n\"Because, sir, those who come, if they come, will never land at\nMouthmill; if they are strangers, they dare not; and if they are\nbay's-men, they are too wise, as long as the westerly swell sets in. As\nfor landing at the town, that would be too great a risk; but Freshwater\nis as lonely as the Bermudas; and they can beach a boat up under the\ncliff at all tides, and in all weathers, except north and nor'west. I\nhave done it many a time, when I was a boy.\"\n\n\"And give us the fruit of your experience now in your old age, eh? Well,\nyou have a gray head on green shoulders, my lad; and I verily believe\nyou are right. Who will you take with you to watch?\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said Frank, \"I will go with my brother; and that will be enough.\"\n\n\"Enough? He is big enough, and you brave enough, for ten; but still, the\nmore the merrier.\"\n\n\"But the fewer, the better fare. If I might ask a first and last favor,\nworshipful sir,\" said Frank, very earnestly, \"you would grant me two\nthings: that you would let none go to Freshwater but me and my brother;\nand that whatsoever we shall bring you back shall be kept as secret as\nthe commonweal and your loyalty shall permit. I trust that we are not so\nunknown to you, or to others, that you can doubt for a moment but that\nwhatsoever we may do will satisfy at once your honor and our own.\"\n\n\"My dear young gentleman, there is no need of so many courtier's words.\nI am your father's friend, and yours. And God forbid that a Cary--for I\nguess your drift--should ever wish to make a head or a heart ache; that\nis, more than--\"\n\n\"Those of whom it is written, 'Though thou bray a fool in a mortar, yet\nwill not his folly depart from him,'\" interposed Frank, in so sad a tone\nthat no one at the table replied; and few more words were exchanged,\ntill the two brothers were safe outside the house; and then--\n\n\"Amyas,\" said Frank, \"that was a Devon man's handiwork, nevertheless; it\nwas Eustace's handwriting.\"\n\n\"Impossible!\"\n\n\"No, lad. I have been secretary to a prince, and learnt to interpret\ncipher, and to watch every pen-stroke; and, young as I am, I think that\nI am not easily deceived. Would God I were! Come on, lad; and strike no\nman hastily, lest thou cut off thine own flesh.\"\n\nSo forth the two went, along the park to the eastward, and past the\nhead of the little wood-embosomed fishing-town, a steep stair of houses\nclinging to the cliff far below them, the bright slate roofs and white\nwalls glittering in the moonlight; and on some half-mile farther, along\nthe steep hill-side, fenced with oak wood down to the water's edge, by\na narrow forest path, to a point where two glens meet and pour their\nstreamlets over a cascade some hundred feet in height into the sea\nbelow. By the side of this waterfall a narrow path climbs upward from\nthe beach; and here it was that the two brothers expected to meet the\nmessenger.\n\nFrank insisted on taking his station below Amyas. He said that he was\ncertain that Eustace himself would make his appearance, and that he\nwas more fit than Amyas to bring him to reason by parley; that if Amyas\nwould keep watch some twenty yards above, the escape of the messenger\nwould be impossible. Moreover, he was the elder brother, and the post of\nhonor was his right. So Amyas obeyed him, after making him promise that\nif more than one man came up the path, he would let them pass him before\nhe challenged, so that both might bring them to bay at the same time.\n\nSo Amyas took his station under a high marl bank, and, bedded in\nluxuriant crown-ferns, kept his eye steadily on Frank, who sat down on\na little knoll of rock (where is now a garden on the cliff-edge) which\nparts the path and the dark chasm down which the stream rushes to its\nfinal leap over the cliff.\n\nThere Amyas sat a full half-hour, and glanced at whiles from Frank to\nlook upon the scene around. Outside the southwest wind blew fresh and\nstrong, and the moonlight danced upon a thousand crests of foam; but\nwithin the black jagged point which sheltered the town, the sea did\nbut heave, in long oily swells of rolling silver, onward into the black\nshadow of the hills, within which the town and pier lay invisible,\nsave where a twinkling light gave token of some lonely fisher's wife,\nwatching the weary night through for the boat which would return with\ndawn. Here and there upon the sea, a black speck marked a herring-boat,\ndrifting with its line of nets; and right off the mouth of the\nglen, Amyas saw, with a beating heart, a large two-masted vessel\nlying-to--that must be the \"Portugal\"! Eagerly he looked up the glen,\nand listened; but he heard nothing but the sweeping of the wind across\nthe downs five hundred feet above, and the sough of the waterfall upon\nthe rocks below; he saw nothing but the vast black sheets of oak-wood\nsloping up to the narrow blue sky above, and the broad bright hunter's\nmoon, and the woodcocks, which, chuckling to each other, hawked to and\nfro, like swallows, between the tree-tops and the sky.\n\nAt last he heard a rustle of the fallen leaves; he shrank closer and\ncloser into the darkness of the bank. Then swift light steps--not down\nthe path, from above, but upward, from below; his heart beat quick and\nloud. And in another half-minute a man came in sight, within three yards\nof Frank's hiding-place.\n\nFrank sprang out instantly. Amyas saw his bright blade glance in the\nclear October moonlight.\n\n\"Stand in the queen's name!\"\n\nThe man drew a pistol from under his cloak, and fired full in his face.\nHad it happened in these days of detonators, Frank's chance had been\nsmall; but to get a ponderous wheel-lock under weigh was a longer\nbusiness, and before the fizzing of the flint had ceased, Frank had\nstruck up the pistol with his rapier, and it exploded harmlessly over\nhis head. The man instantly dashed the weapon in his face and closed.\n\nThe blow, luckily, did not take effect on that delicate forehead, but\nstruck him on the shoulder: nevertheless, Frank, who with all his grace\nand agility was as fragile as a lily, and a very bubble of the earth,\nstaggered, and lost his guard, and before he could recover himself,\nAmyas saw a dagger gleam, and one, two, three blows fiercely repeated.\n\nMad with fury, he was with them in an instant. They were scuffling\ntogether so closely in the shade that he was afraid to use his sword\npoint; but with the hilt he dealt a single blow full on the ruffian's\ncheek. It was enough; with a hideous shriek, the fellow rolled over at\nhis feet, and Amyas set his foot on him, in act to run him through.\n\n\"Stop! stay!\" almost screamed Frank; \"it is Eustace! our cousin\nEustace!\" and he leant against a tree.\n\nAmyas sprang towards him: but Frank waved him off.\n\n\"It is nothing--a scratch. He has papers: I am sure of it. Take them;\nand for God's sake let him go!\"\n\n\"Villain! give me your papers!\" cried Amyas, setting his foot once more\non the writhing Eustace, whose jaw was broken across.\n\n\"You struck me foully from behind,\" moaned he, his vanity and envy even\nthen coming out, in that faint and foolish attempt to prove Amyas not so\nvery much better a man.\n\n\"Hound, do you think that I dare not strike you in front? Give me your\npapers, letters, whatever Popish devilry you carry; or as I live, I will\ncut off your head, and take them myself, even if it cost me the shame\nof stripping your corpse. Give them up! Traitor, murderer! give them, I\nsay!\" And setting his foot on him afresh, he raised his sword.\n\nEustace was usually no craven: but he was cowed. Between agony and\nshame, he had no heart to resist. Martyrdom, which looked so splendid\nwhen consummated selon les regles on Tower Hill or Tyburn, before\npitying, or (still better) scoffing multitudes, looked a confused,\ndirty, ugly business there in the dark forest; and as he lay, a stream\nof moonlight bathed his mighty cousin's broad clear forehead, and his\nlong golden locks, and his white terrible blade, till he seemed, to\nEustace's superstitious eye, like one of those fair young St. Michaels\ntrampling on the fiend, which he had seen abroad in old German pictures.\nHe shuddered; pulled a packet from his bosom, and threw it from him,\nmurmuring, \"I have not given it.\"\n\n\"Swear to me that these are all the papers which you have in cipher or\nout of cipher. Swear on your soul, or you die!\"\n\nEustace swore.\n\n\"Tell me, who are your accomplices?\"\n\n\"Never!\" said Eustace. \"Cruel! have you not degraded me enough already?\"\nand the wretched young man burst into tears, and hid his bleeding face\nin his hands.\n\nOne hint of honor made Amyas as gentle as a lamb. He lifted Eustace up,\nand bade him run for his life.\n\n\"I am to owe my life, then, to you?\"\n\n\"Not in the least; only to your being a Leigh. Go, or it will be worse\nfor you!\" And Eustace went; while Amyas, catching up the precious\npacket, hurried to Frank. He had fainted already, and his brother had\nto carry him as far as the park before he could find any of the other\nwatchers. The blind, as far as they were concerned, was complete. They\nhad heard and seen nothing. Whosoever had brought the packet had landed\nthey knew not where; and so all returned to the court, carrying Frank,\nwho recovered gradually, having rather bruises than wounds; for his foe\nhad struck wildly, and with a trembling hand.\n\nHalf-an-hour after, Amyas, Mr. Cary, and his son Will were in deep\nconsultation over the following epistle, the only paper in the packet\nwhich was not in cipher:--\n\n\n\"'DEAR BROTHER N. S. in Chto. et Ecclesia.\n\n\"This is to inform you and the friends of the cause, that S. Josephus\nhas landed in Smerwick, with eight hundred valiant Crusaders, burning\nwith holy zeal to imitate last year's martyrs of Carrigfolium, and\nto expiate their offences (which I fear may have been many) by the\npropagation of our most holy faith. I have purified the fort (which they\nare strenuously rebuilding) with prayer and holy water, from the stain\nof heretical footsteps, and consecrated it afresh to the service of\nHeaven, as the first-fruits of the isle of saints; and having displayed\nthe consecrated banner to the adoration of the faithful, have returned\nto Earl Desmond, that I may establish his faith, weak as yet, by reason\nof the allurements of this world: though since, by the valor of his\nbrother James, he that hindered was taken out of the way (I mean Davils\nthe heretic, sacrifice well-pleasing in the eyes of Heaven!), the young\nman has lent a more obedient ear to my counsels. If you can do anything,\ndo it quickly, for a great door and effectual is opened, and there are\nmany adversaries. But be swift, for so do the poor lambs of the Church\ntremble at the fury of the heretics, that a hundred will flee before one\nEnglishman. And, indeed, were it not for that divine charity toward\nthe Church (which covers the multitude of sins) with which they are\nresplendent, neither they nor their country would be, by the carnal\njudgment, counted worthy of so great labor in their behalf. For they\nthemselves are given much to lying, theft, and drunkenness, vain\nbabbling, and profane dancing and singing; and are still, as S. Gildas\nreports of them, 'more careful to shroud their villainous faces in bushy\nhair, than decently to cover their bodies; while their land (by\nreason of the tyranny of their chieftains, and the continual wars and\nplunderings among their tribes, which leave them weak and divided,\nan easy prey to the myrmidons of the excommunicate and usurping\nEnglishwoman) lies utterly waste with fire, and defaced with corpses of\nthe starved and slain. But what are these things, while the holy virtue\nof Catholic obedience still flourishes in their hearts? The Church cares\nnot for the conservation of body and goods, but of immortal souls.\n\n\"If any devout lady shall so will, you may obtain from her liberality a\nshirt for this worthless tabernacle, and also a pair of hose; for I am\nunsavory to myself and to others, and of such luxuries none here has\nsuperfluity; for all live in holy poverty, except the fleas, who have\nthat consolation in this world for which this unhappy nation, and those\nwho labor among them, must wait till the world to come.*\n\n\"Your loving brother,\n\n\"N. S.\"\n\n     * See note at end of chapter.\n\n\"Sir Richard must know of this before daybreak,\" cried old Cary. \"Eight\nhundred men landed! We must call out the Posse Comitatus, and sail with\nthem bodily. I will go myself, old as I am. Spaniards in Ireland? not a\ndog of them must go home again.\"\n\n\"Not a dog of them,\" answered Will; \"but where is Mr. Winter and his\nsquadron?\"\n\n\"Safe in Milford Haven; a messenger must be sent to him too.\"\n\n\"I'll go,\" said Amyas: \"but Mr. Cary is right. Sir Richard must know all\nfirst.\"\n\n\"And we must have those Jesuits.\"\n\n\"What? Mr. Evans and Mr. Morgans? God help us--they are at my uncle's!\nConsider the honor of our family!\"\n\n\"Judge for yourself, my dear boy,\" said old Mr. Cary, gently: \"would\nit not be rank treason to let these foxes escape, while we have this\ndamning proof against them?\"\n\n\"I will go myself, then.\"\n\n\"Why not? You may keep all straight, and Will shall go with you. Call a\ngroom, Will, and get your horse saddled, and my Yorkshire gray; he will\nmake better play with this big fellow on his back, than the little pony\nastride of which Mr. Leigh came walking in (as I hear) this morning. As\nfor Frank, the ladies will see to him well enough, and glad enough, too,\nto have so fine a bird in their cage for a week or two.\"\n\n\"And my mother?\"\n\n\"We'll send to her to-morrow by daybreak. Come, a stirrup cup to start\nwith, hot and hot. Now, boots, cloaks, swords, a deep pull and a warm\none, and away!\"\n\nAnd the jolly old man bustled them out of the house and into their\nsaddles, under the broad bright winter's moon.\n\n\"You must make your pace, lads, or the moon will be down before you are\nover the moors.\" And so away they went.\n\nNeither of them spoke for many a mile. Amyas, because his mind was fixed\nfirmly on the one object of saving the honor of his house; and Will,\nbecause he was hesitating between Ireland and the wars, and Rose\nSalterne and love-making. At last he spoke suddenly.\n\n\"I'll go, Amyas.\"\n\n\"Whither?\"\n\n\"To Ireland with you, old man. I have dragged my anchor at last.\"\n\n\"What anchor, my lad of parables?\"\n\n\"See, here am I, a tall and gallant ship.\"\n\n\"Modest even if not true.\"\n\n\"Inclination, like an anchor, holds me tight.\"\n\n\"To the mud.\"\n\n\"Nay, to a bed of roses--not without their thorns.\"\n\n\"Hillo! I have seen oysters grow on fruit-trees before now, but never an\nanchor in a rose-garden.\"\n\n\"Silence, or my allegory will go to noggin-staves.\"\n\n\"Against the rocks of my flinty discernment.\"\n\n\"Pooh--well. Up comes duty like a jolly breeze, blowing dead from the\nnortheast, and as bitter and cross as a northeaster too, and tugs\nme away toward Ireland. I hold on by the rosebed--any ground in a\nstorm--till every strand is parted, and off I go, westward ho! to get my\nthroat cut in a bog-hole with Amyas Leigh.\"\n\n\"Earnest, Will?\"\n\n\"As I am a sinful man.\"\n\n\"Well done, young hawk of the White Cliff!\"\n\n\"I had rather have called it Gallantry Bower still, though,\" said\nWill, punning on the double name of the noble precipice which forms the\nhighest point of the deer park.\n\n\"Well, as long as you are on land, you know it is Gallantry Bower still:\nbut we always call it White Cliff when you see it from the sea-board, as\nyou and I shall do, I hope, to-morrow evening.\"\n\n\"What, so soon?\"\n\n\"Dare we lose a day?\"\n\n\"I suppose not: heigh-ho!\"\n\nAnd they rode on again in silence, Amyas in the meanwhile being not a\nlittle content (in spite of his late self-renunciation) to find that one\nof his rivals at least was going to raise the siege of the Rose garden\nfor a few months, and withdraw his forces to the coast of Kerry.\n\nAs they went over Bursdon, Amyas pulled up suddenly.\n\n\"Did you not hear a horse's step on our left?\"\n\n\"On our left--coming up from Welsford moor? Impossible at this time of\nnight. It must have been a stag, or a sownder of wild swine: or may be\nonly an old cow.\"\n\n\"It was the ring of iron, friend. Let us stand and watch.\"\n\nBursdon and Welsford were then, as now, a rolling range of dreary\nmoors, unbroken by tor or tree, or anything save few and far between\na world-old furze-bank which marked the common rights of some distant\ncattle farm, and crossed then, not as now, by a decent road, but by a\nrough confused track-way, the remnant of an old Roman road from Clovelly\ndikes to Launceston. To the left it trended down towards a lower range\nof moors, which form the watershed of the heads of Torridge; and thither\nthe two young men peered down over the expanse of bog and furze, which\nglittered for miles beneath the moon, one sheet of frosted silver, in\nthe heavy autumn dew.\n\n\"If any of Eustace's party are trying to get home from Freshwater, they\nmight save a couple of miles by coming across Welsford, instead of going\nby the main track, as we have done.\" So said Amyas, who though (luckily\nfor him) no \"genius,\" was cunning as a fox in all matters of tactic and\npractic, and would have in these days proved his right to be considered\nan intellectual person by being a thorough man of business.\n\n\"If any of his party are mad, they'll try it, and be stogged till the\nday of judgment. There are bogs in the bottom twenty feet deep. Plague\non the fellow, whoever he is, he has dodged us! Look there!\"\n\nIt was too true. The unknown horseman had evidently dismounted below,\nand led his horse up on the other side of a long furze-dike; till coming\nto the point where it turned away again from his intended course, he\nappeared against the sky, in the act of leading his nag over a gap.\n\n\"Ride like the wind!\" and both youths galloped across furze and heather\nat him; but ere they were within a hundred yards of him, he had leapt\nagain on his horse, and was away far ahead.\n\n\"There is the dor to us, with a vengeance,\" cried Cary, putting in the\nspurs.\n\n\"It is but a lad; we shall never catch him.\"\n\n\"I'll try, though; and do you lumber after as you can, old heavysides;\"\nand Cary pushed forward.\n\nAmyas lost sight of him for ten minutes, and then came up with him\ndismounted, and feeling disconsolately at his horse's knees.\n\n\"Look for my head. It lies somewhere about among the furze there; and\noh! I am as full of needles as ever was a pin-cushion.\"\n\n\"Are his knees broken?\"\n\n\"I daren't look. No, I believe not. Come along, and make the best of a\nbad matter. The fellow is a mile ahead, and to the right, too.\"\n\n\"He is going for Moorwinstow, then; but where is my cousin?\"\n\n\"Behind us, I dare say. We shall nab him at least.\"\n\n\"Cary, promise me that if we do, you will keep out of sight, and let me\nmanage him.\"\n\n\"My boy, I only want Evan Morgans and Morgan Evans. He is but the cat's\npaw, and we are after the cats themselves.\"\n\nAnd so they went on another dreary six miles, till the land trended\ndownwards, showing dark glens and masses of woodland far below.\n\n\"Now, then, straight to Chapel, and stop the foxes' earth? Or through\nthe King's Park to Stow, and get out Sir Richard's hounds, hue and cry,\nand queen's warrant in proper form?\"\n\n\"Let us see Sir Richard first; and whatsoever he decides about my uncle,\nI will endure as a loyal subject must.\"\n\nSo they rode through the King's Park, while Sir Richard's colts came\nwhinnying and staring round the intruders, and down through a rich\nwoodland lane five hundred feet into the valley, till they could hear\nthe brawling of the little trout-stream, and beyond, the everlasting\nthunder of the ocean surf.\n\nDown through warm woods, all fragrant with dying autumn flowers, leaving\nfar above the keen Atlantic breeze, into one of those delicious Western\ncombes, and so past the mill, and the little knot of flower-clad\ncottages. In the window of one of them a light was still burning. The\ntwo young men knew well whose window that was; and both hearts beat\nfast; for Rose Salterne slept, or rather seemed to wake, in that\nchamber.\n\n\"Folks are late in Combe to-night,\" said Amyas, as carelessly as he\ncould.\n\nCary looked earnestly at the window, and then sharply enough at Amyas;\nbut Amyas was busy settling his stirrup; and Cary rode on, unconscious\nthat every fibre in his companion's huge frame was trembling like his\nown.\n\n\"Muggy and close down here,\" said Amyas, who, in reality, was quite\nfaint with his own inward struggles.\n\n\"We shall be at Stow gate in five minutes,\" said Cary, looking back and\ndown longingly as his horse climbed the opposite hill; but a turn of the\nzigzag road hid the cottage, and the next thought was, how to effect an\nentrance into Stow at three in the morning without being eaten by the\nban-dogs, who were already howling and growling at the sound of the\nhorse-hoofs.\n\nHowever, they got safely in, after much knocking and calling, through\nthe postern gate in the high west wall, into a mansion, the description\nwhereof I must defer to the next chapter, seeing that the moon has\nalready sunk into the Atlantic, and there is darkness over land and sea.\n\nSir Richard, in his long gown, was soon downstairs in the hall; the\nletter read, and the story told; but ere it was half finished--\n\n\"Anthony, call up a groom, and let him bring me a horse round.\nGentlemen, if you will excuse me five minutes, I shall be at your\nservice.\"\n\n\"You will not go alone, Richard?\" asked Lady Grenville, putting her\nbeautiful face in its nightcoif out of an adjoining door.\n\n\"Surely, sweet chuck, we three are enough to take two poor polecats of\nJesuits. Go in, and help me to boot and gird.\"\n\nIn half an hour they were down and up across the valley again, under the\nfew low ashes clipt flat by the sea-breeze which stood round the lonely\ngate of Chapel.\n\n\"Mr. Cary, there is a back path across the downs to Marsland; go and\nguard that.\" Cary rode off; and Sir Richard, as he knocked loudly at the\ngate--\n\n\"Mr. Leigh, you see that I have consulted your honor, and that of your\npoor uncle, by adventuring thus alone. What will you have me do now,\nwhich may not be unfit for me and you?\"\n\n\"Oh, sir!\" said Amyas, with tears in his honest eyes, \"you have shown\nyourself once more what you always have been--my dear and beloved master\non earth, not second even to my admiral Sir Francis Drake.\"\n\n\"Or the queen, I hope,\" said Grenville, smiling, \"but pocas palabras.\nWhat will you do?\"\n\n\"My wretched cousin, sir, may not have returned--and if I might watch\nfor him on the main road--unless you want me with you.\"\n\n\"Richard Grenville can walk alone, lad. But what will you do with your\ncousin?\"\n\n\"Send him out of the country, never to return; or if he refuses, run him\nthrough on the spot.\"\n\n\"Go, lad.\" And as he spoke, a sleepy voice asked inside the gate, \"Who\nwas there?\"\n\n\"Sir Richard Grenville. Open, in the queen's name?\"\n\n\"Sir Richard? He is in bed, and be hanged to you. No honest folk come at\nthis hour of night.\"\n\n\"Amyas!\" shouted Sir Richard. Amyas rode back.\n\n\"Burst that gate for me, while I hold your horse.\"\n\nAmyas leaped down, took up a rock from the roadside, such as Homer's\nheroes used to send at each other's heads, and in an instant the door\nwas flat on the ground, and the serving-man on his back inside, while\nSir Richard quietly entering over it, like Una into the hut, told the\nfellow to get up and hold his horse for him (which the clod, who knew\nwell enough that terrible voice, did without further murmurs), and then\nstrode straight to the front door. It was already opened. The household\nhad been up and about all along, or the noise at the entry had aroused\nthem.\n\nSir Richard knocked, however, at the open door; and, to his\nastonishment, his knock was answered by Mr. Leigh himself, fully\ndressed, and candle in hand.\n\n\"Sir Richard Grenville! What, sir! is this neighborly, not to say\ngentle, to break into my house in the dead of night?\"\n\n\"I broke your outer door, sir, because I was refused entrance when I\nasked in the queen's name. I knocked at your inner one, as I should\nhave knocked at the poorest cottager's in the parish, because I found\nit open. You have two Jesuits here, sir! and here is the queen's warrant\nfor apprehending them. I have signed it with my own hand, and, moreover,\nserve it now, with my own hand, in order to save you scandal--and it may\nbe, worse. I must have these men, Mr. Leigh.\"\n\n\"My dear Sir Richard--!\"\n\n\"I must have them, or I must search the house; and you would not put\neither yourself or me to so shameful a necessity?\"\n\n\"My dear Sir Richard!--\"\n\n\"Must I, then, ask you to stand back from your own doorway, my dear\nsir?\" said Grenville. And then changing his voice to that fearful lion's\nroar, for which he was famous, and which it seemed impossible that lips\nso delicate could utter, he thundered, \"Knaves, behind there! Back!\"\n\nThis was spoken to half-a-dozen grooms and serving-men, who, well armed,\nwere clustered in the passage.\n\n\"What? swords out, you sons of cliff rabbits?\" And in a moment, Sir\nRichard's long blade flashed out also, and putting Mr. Leigh gently\naside, as if he had been a child, he walked up to the party, who\nvanished right and left; having expected a cur dog, in the shape of a\nparish constable, and come upon a lion instead. They were stout fellows\nenough, no doubt, in a fair fight: but they had no stomach to be hanged\nin a row at Launceston Castle, after a preliminary running through the\nbody by that redoubted admiral and most unpeaceful justice of the peace.\n\n\"And now, my dear Mr. Leigh,\" said Sir Richard, as blandly as ever,\n\"where are my men? The night is cold; and you, as well as I, need to be\nin our beds.\"\n\n\"The men, Sir Richard--the Jesuits--they are not here, indeed.\"\n\n\"Not here, sir?\"\n\n\"On the word of a gentleman, they left my house an hour ago. Believe me,\nsir, they did. I will swear to you if you need.\"\n\n\"I believe Mr. Leigh of Chapel's word without oaths. Whither are they\ngone?\"\n\n\"Nay, sir--how can I tell? They are--they are, as I may say, fled, sir;\nescaped.\"\n\n\"With your connivance; at least with your son's. Where are they gone?\"\n\n\"As I live, I do not know.\"\n\n\"Mr. Leigh--is this possible? Can you add untruth to that treason from\nthe punishment of which I am trying to shield you?\"\n\nPoor Mr. Leigh burst into tears.\n\n\"Oh! my God! my God! is it come to this? Over and above having the fear\nand anxiety of keeping these black rascals in my house, and having to\nstop their villainous mouths every minute, for fear they should hang me\nand themselves, I am to be called a traitor and a liar in my old age,\nand that, too, by Richard Grenville! Would God I had never been born!\nWould God I had no soul to be saved, and I'd just go and drown care in\ndrink, and let the queen and the Pope fight it out their own way!\" And\nthe poor old man sank into a chair, and covered his face with his hands,\nand then leaped up again.\n\n\"Bless my heart! Excuse me, Sir Richard--to sit down and leave you\nstanding. 'S life, sir, sorrow is making a hawbuck of me. Sit down, my\ndear sir! my worshipful sir! or rather come with me into my room, and\nhear a poor wretched man's story, for I swear before God the men are\nfled; and my poor boy Eustace is not home either, and the groom tells me\nthat his devil of a cousin has broken his jaw for him; and his mother is\nall but mad this hour past. Good lack! good lack!\"\n\n\"He nearly murdered his angel of a cousin, sir!\" said Sir Richard,\nseverely.\n\n\"What, sir? They never told me.\"\n\n\"He had stabbed his cousin Frank three times, sir, before Amyas, who is\nas noble a lad as walks God's earth, struck him down. And in defence\nof what, forsooth, did he play the ruffian and the swashbuckler, but to\nbring home to your house this letter, sir, which you shall hear at your\nleisure, the moment I have taken order about your priests.\" And walking\nout of the house he went round and called to Cary to come to him.\n\n\"The birds are flown, Will,\" whispered he. \"There is but one chance for\nus, and that is Marsland Mouth. If they are trying to take boat there,\nyou may be yet in time. If they are gone inland we can do nothing till\nwe raise the hue and cry to-morrow.\"\n\nAnd Will galloped off over the downs toward Marsland, while Sir Richard\nceremoniously walked in again, and professed himself ready and happy to\nhave the honor of an audience in Mr. Leigh's private chamber. And as we\nknow pretty well already what was to be discussed therein, we had better\ngo over to Marsland Mouth, and, if possible, arrive there before Will\nCary: seeing that he arrived hot and swearing, half an hour too late.\n\n\nNote.--I have shrunk somewhat from giving these and other sketches (true\nand accurate as I believe them to be) of Ireland during Elizabeth's\nreign, when the tyranny and lawlessness of the feudal chiefs had reduced\nthe island to such a state of weakness and barbarism, that it was\nabsolutely necessary for England either to crush the Norman-Irish\nnobility, and organize some sort of law and order, or to leave Ireland\nan easy prey to the Spaniards, or any other nation which should go to\nwar with us. The work was done--clumsily rather than cruelly; but wrongs\nwere inflicted, and avenged by fresh wrongs, and those by fresh again.\nMay the memory of them perish forever! It has been reserved for this\nage, and for the liberal policy of this age, to see the last ebullitions\nof Celtic excitability die out harmless and ashamed of itself, and\nto find that the Irishman, when he is brought as a soldier under the\nregenerative influence of law, discipline, self-respect, and loyalty,\ncan prove himself a worthy rival of the more stern Norse-Saxon warrior.\nGod grant that the military brotherhood between Irish and English,\nwhich is the special glory of the present war, may be the germ of a\nbrotherhood industrial, political, and hereafter, perhaps, religious\nalso; and that not merely the corpses of heroes, but the feuds and\nwrongs which have parted them for centuries, may lie buried, once and\nforever, in the noble graves of Alma and Inkerman.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE COMBES OF THE FAR WEST\n\n            \"Far, far from hence\n     The Adriatic breaks in a warm bay\n     Among the green Illyrian hills, and there\n     The sunshine in the happy glens is fair,\n     And by the sea and in the brakes\n     The grass is cool, the sea-side air\n     Buoyant and fresh, the mountain flowers\n     More virginal and sweet than ours.\"\n\n                                  MATTHEW ARNOLD.\n\nAnd even such are those delightful glens, which cut the high table-land\nof the confines of Devon and Cornwall, and opening each through its\ngorge of down and rock, towards the boundless Western Ocean. Each is\nlike the other, and each is like no other English scenery. Each has its\nupright walls, inland of rich oak-wood, nearer the sea of dark green\nfurze, then of smooth turf, then of weird black cliffs which range out\nright and left far into the deep sea, in castles, spires, and wings\nof jagged iron-stone. Each has its narrow strip of fertile meadow, its\ncrystal trout stream winding across and across from one hill-foot to the\nother; its gray stone mill, with the water sparkling and humming round\nthe dripping wheel; its dark, rock pools above the tide mark, where the\nsalmon-trout gather in from their Atlantic wanderings, after each autumn\nflood: its ridge of blown sand, bright with golden trefoil and crimson\nlady's finger; its gray bank of polished pebbles, down which the\nstream rattles toward the sea below. Each has its black field of jagged\nshark's-tooth rock which paves the cove from side to side, streaked with\nhere and there a pink line of shell sand, and laced with white foam from\nthe eternal surge, stretching in parallel lines out to the westward,\nin strata set upright on edge, or tilted towards each other at strange\nangles by primeval earthquakes;--such is the \"mouth\"--as those coves are\ncalled; and such the jaw of teeth which they display, one rasp of which\nwould grind abroad the timbers of the stoutest ship. To landward,\nall richness, softness, and peace; to seaward, a waste and howling\nwilderness of rock and roller, barren to the fisherman, and hopeless to\nthe shipwrecked mariner.\n\nIn only one of these \"mouths\" is a landing for boats, made possible by\na long sea-wall of rock, which protects it from the rollers of the\nAtlantic; and that mouth is Marsland, the abode of the White Witch, Lucy\nPassmore; whither, as Sir Richard Grenville rightly judged, the Jesuits\nwere gone. But before the Jesuits came, two other persons were standing\non that lonely beach, under the bright October moon, namely, Rose\nSalterne and the White Witch herself; for Rose, fevered with curiosity\nand superstition, and allured by the very wildness and possible danger\nof the spell, had kept her appointment; and, a few minutes before\nmidnight, stood on the gray shingle beach with her counsellor.\n\n\"You be safe enough here to-night, miss. My old man is snoring sound\nabed, and there's no other soul ever sets foot here o' nights, except\nit be the mermaids now and then. Goodness, Father, where's our boat? It\nought to be up here on the pebbles.\"\n\nRose pointed to a strip of sand some forty yards nearer the sea, where\nthe boat lay.\n\n\"Oh, the lazy old villain! he's been round the rocks after pollock this\nevening, and never taken the trouble to hale the boat up. I'll trounce\nhim for it when I get home. I only hope he's made her fast where she is,\nthat's all! He's more plague to me than ever my money will be. O deary\nme!\"\n\nAnd the goodwife bustled down toward the boat, with Rose behind her.\n\n\"Iss, 'tis fast, sure enough: and the oars aboard too! Well, I never!\nOh, the lazy thief, to leave they here to be stole! I'll just sit in the\nboat, dear, and watch mun, while you go down to the say; for you must\nbe all alone to yourself, you know, or you'll see nothing. There's the\nlooking-glass; now go, and dip your head three times, and mind you don't\nlook to land or sea before you've said the words, and looked upon the\nglass. Now, be quick, it's just upon midnight.\"\n\nAnd she coiled herself up in the boat, while Rose went faltering down\nthe strip of sand, some twenty yards farther, and there slipping off her\nclothes, stood shivering and trembling for a moment before she entered\nthe sea.\n\nShe was between two walls of rock: that on her left hand, some twenty\nfeet high, hid her in deepest shade; that on her right, though much\nlower, took the whole blaze of the midnight moon. Great festoons of live\nand purple sea-weed hung from it, shading dark cracks and crevices, fit\nhaunts for all the goblins of the sea. On her left hand, the peaks of\nthe rock frowned down ghastly black; on her right hand, far aloft, the\ndowns slept bright and cold.\n\nThe breeze had died away; not even a roller broke the perfect stillness\nof the cove. The gulls were all asleep upon the ledges. Over all was a\ntrue autumn silence; a silence which may be heard. She stood awed, and\nlistened in hope of a sound which might tell her that any living thing\nbeside herself existed.\n\nThere was a faint bleat, as of a new-born lamb, high above her head;\nshe started and looked up. Then a wail from the cliffs, as of a child\nin pain, answered by another from the opposite rocks. They were but the\npassing snipe, and the otter calling to her brood; but to her they\nwere mysterious, supernatural goblins, come to answer to her call.\nNevertheless, they only quickened her expectation; and the witch had\ntold her not to fear them. If she performed the rite duly, nothing\nwould harm her: but she could hear the beating of her own heart, as she\nstepped, mirror in hand, into the cold water, waded hastily, as far as\nshe dare, and then stopped aghast.\n\nA ring of flame was round her waist; every limb was bathed in lambent\nlight; all the multitudinous life of the autumn sea, stirred by her\napproach, had flashed suddenly into glory;--\n\n\n\"And around her the lamps of the sea nymphs, Myriad fiery globes, swam\nheaving and panting, and rainbows, Crimson and azure and emerald, were\nbroken in star-showers, lighting Far through the wine-dark depths of the\ncrystal, the gardens of Nereus, Coral and sea-fan and tangle, the blooms\nand the palms of the ocean.\"\n\n\nShe could see every shell which crawled on the white sand at her feet,\nevery rock-fish which played in and out of the crannies, and stared at\nher with its broad bright eyes; while the great palmate oarweeds which\nwaved along the chasm, half-seen in the glimmering water, seemed to\nbeckon her down with long brown hands to a grave amid their chilly\nbowers. She turned to flee; but she had gone too far now to retreat;\nhastily dipping her head three times, she hurried out to the sea-marge,\nand looking through her dripping locks at the magic mirror, pronounced\nthe incantation--\n\n     \"A maiden pure, here I stand,\n     Neither on sea, nor yet on land;\n     Angels watch me on either hand.\n     If you be landsman, come down the strand;\n     If you be sailor, come up the sand;\n     If you be angel, come from the sky,\n     Look in my glass, and pass me by;\n     Look in my glass, and go from the shore;\n     Leave me, but love me for evermore.\"\n\nThe incantation was hardly finished, her eyes were straining into the\nmirror, where, as may be supposed, nothing appeared but the sparkle of\nthe drops from her own tresses, when she heard rattling down the pebbles\nthe hasty feet of men and horses.\n\nShe darted into a cavern of the high rock, and hastily dressed herself:\nthe steps held on right to the boat. Peeping out, half-dead with terror,\nshe saw there four men, two of whom had just leaped from their horses,\nand turning them adrift, began to help the other two in running the boat\ndown.\n\nWhereon, out of the stern sheets, arose, like an angry ghost, the portly\nfigure of Lucy Passmore, and shrieked in shrillest treble--\n\n\"Eh! ye villains, ye roogs, what do ye want staling poor folks' boats by\nnight like this?\"\n\nThe whole party recoiled in terror, and one turned to run up the beach,\nshouting at the top of his voice, \"'Tis a marmaiden--a marmaiden asleep\nin Willy Passmore's boat!\"\n\n\"I wish it were any sich good luck,\" she could hear Will say; \"'tis my\nwife, oh dear!\" and he cowered down, expecting the hearty cuff which he\nreceived duly, as the White Witch, leaping out of the boat, dared any\nman to touch it, and thundered to her husband to go home to bed.\n\nThe wily dame, as Rose well guessed, was keeping up this delay chiefly\nto gain time for her pupil: but she had also more solid reasons for\nmaking the fight as hard as possible; for she, as well as Rose, had\nalready discerned in the ungainly figure of one of the party the same\nsuspicious Welsh gentleman, on whose calling she had divined long\nago; and she was so loyal a subject as to hold in extreme horror her\nhusband's meddling with such \"Popish skulkers\" (as she called the whole\nparty roundly to their face)--unless on consideration of a very handsome\nsum of money. In vain Parsons thundered, Campian entreated, Mr. Leigh's\ngroom swore, and her husband danced round in an agony of mingled fear\nand covetousness.\n\n\"No,\" she cried, \"as I am an honest woman and loyal! This is why you\nleft the boat down to the shoore, you old traitor, you, is it? To help\noff sich noxious trade as this out of the hands of her majesty's quorum\nand rotulorum? Eh? Stand back, cowards! Will you strike a woman?\"\n\nThis last speech (as usual) was merely indicative of her intention to\nstrike the men; for, getting out one of the oars, she swung it round and\nround fiercely, and at last caught Father Parsons such a crack across\nthe shins, that he retreated with a howl.\n\n\"Lucy, Lucy!\" shrieked her husband, in shrillest Devon falsetto, \"be you\nmazed? Be you mazed, lass? They promised me two gold nobles before I'd\nlend them the boot!\"\n\n\"Tu?\" shrieked the matron, with a tone of ineffable scorn. \"And do yu\ncall yourself a man?\"\n\n\"Tu nobles! tu nobles!\" shrieked he again, hopping about at oar's\nlength.\n\n\"Tu? And would you sell your soul under ten?\"\n\n\"Oh, if that is it,\" cried poor Campian, \"give her ten, give her\nten, brother Pars--Morgans, I mean; and take care of your shins, Offa\nCerbero, you know--Oh, virago! Furens quid faemina possit! Certainly she\nis some Lamia, some Gorgon, some--\"\n\n\"Take that, for your Lamys and Gorgons to an honest woman!\" and in\na moment poor Campian's thin legs were cut from under him, while the\nvirago, \"mounting on his trunk astride,\" like that more famous one on\nHudibras, cried, \"Ten nobles, or I'll kep ye here till morning!\" And the\nten nobles were paid into her hand.\n\nAnd now the boat, its dragon guardian being pacified, was run down to\nthe sea, and close past the nook where poor little Rose was squeezing\nherself into the farthest and darkest corner, among wet sea-weed and\nrough barnacles, holding her breath as they approached.\n\nThey passed her, and the boat's keel was already in the water; Lucy had\nfollowed them close, for reasons of her own, and perceiving close to the\nwater's edge a dark cavern, cunningly surmised that it contained Rose,\nand planted her ample person right across its mouth, while she grumbled\nat her husband, the strangers, and above all at Mr. Leigh's groom, to\nwhom she prophesied pretty plainly Launceston gaol and the gallows;\nwhile the wretched serving-man, who would as soon have dared to leap off\nWelcombe Cliff as to return railing for railing to the White Witch, in\nvain entreated her mercy, and tried, by all possible dodging, to keep\none of the party between himself and her, lest her redoubted eye should\n\"overlook\" him once more to his ruin.\n\nBut the night's adventures were not ended yet; for just as the boat was\nlaunched, a faint halloo was heard upon the beach, and a minute after,\na horseman plunged down the pebbles, and along the sand, and pulling his\nhorse up on its haunches close to the terrified group, dropped, rather\nthan leaped, from the saddle.\n\nThe serving-man, though he dared not tackle a witch, knew well enough\nhow to deal with a swordsman; and drawing, sprang upon the newcomer, and\nthen recoiled--\n\n\"God forgive me, it's Mr. Eustace! Oh, dear sir, I took you for one of\nSir Richard's men! Oh, sir, you're hurt!\"\n\n\"A scratch, a scratch!\" almost moaned Eustace. \"Help me into the boat,\nJack. Gentlemen, I must with you.\"\n\n\"Not with us, surely, my dear son, vagabonds upon the face of the\nearth?\" said kind-hearted Campian.\n\n\"With you, forever. All is over here. Whither God and the cause\nlead\"--and he staggered toward the boat.\n\nAs he passed Rose, she saw his ghastly bleeding face, half bound up with\na handkerchief, which could not conceal the convulsions of rage, shame,\nand despair, which twisted it from all its usual beauty. His eyes glared\nwildly round--and once, right into the cavern. They met hers, so full,\nand keen, and dreadful, that forgetting she was utterly invisible, the\nterrified girl was on the point of shrieking aloud.\n\n\"He has overlooked me!\" said she, shuddering to herself, as she\nrecollected his threat of yesterday.\n\n\"Who has wounded you?\" asked Campian.\n\n\"My cousin--Amyas--and taken the letter!\"\n\n\"The devil take him, then!\" cried Parsons, stamping up and down upon the\nsand in fury.\n\n\"Ay, curse him--you may! I dare not! He saved me--sent me here!\"--and\nwith a groan, he made an effort to enter the boat.\n\n\"Oh, my dear young gentleman,\" cried Lucy Passmore, her woman's heart\nbursting out at the sight of pain, \"you must not goo forth with a grane\nwound like to that. Do ye let me just bind mun up--do ye now!\" and she\nadvanced.\n\nEustace thrust her back.\n\n\"No! better bear it, I deserve it--devils! I deserve it! On board, or we\nshall all be lost--William Cary is close behind me!\"\n\nAnd at that news the boat was thrust into the sea, faster than ever it\nwent before, and only in time; for it was but just round the rocks, and\nout of sight, when the rattle of Cary's horsehoofs was heard above.\n\n\"That rascal of Mr. Leigh's will catch it now, the Popish villain!\" said\nLucy Passmore, aloud. \"You lie still there, dear life, and settle your\nsperrits; you'm so safe as ever was rabbit to burrow. I'll see what\nhappens, if I die for it!\" And so saying, she squeezed herself up\nthrough a cleft to a higher ledge, from whence she could see what passed\nin the valley.\n\n\"There mun is! in the meadow, trying to catch the horses! There comes\nMr. Cary! Goodness, Father, how a rid'th! he's over wall already! Ron,\nJack! ron then! A'll get to the river! No, a wain't! Goodness, Father!\nThere's Mr. Cary cotched mun! A's down, a's down!\"\n\n\"Is he dead?\" asked Rose, shuddering.\n\n\"Iss, fegs, dead as nits! and Mr. Cary off his horse, standing\noverthwart mun! No, a bain't! A's up now. Suspose he was hit wi' the\nflat. Whatever is Mr. Cary tu? Telling wi' mun, a bit. Oh dear, dear,\ndear!\"\n\n\"Has he killed him?\" cried poor Rose.\n\n\"No, fegs, no! kecking mun, kecking mun, so hard as ever was futeball!\nGoodness, Father, who did ever? If a haven't kecked mun right into\nriver, and got on mun's horse and rod away!\"\n\nAnd so saying, down she came again.\n\n\"And now then, my dear life, us be better to goo hoom and get you sommat\nwarm. You'm mortal cold, I rackon, by now. I was cruel fear'd for ye:\nbut I kept mun off clever, didn't I, now?\"\n\n\"I wish--I wish I had not seen Mr. Leigh's face!\"\n\n\"Iss, dreadful, weren't it, poor young soul; a sad night for his poor\nmother!\"\n\n\"Lucy, I can't get his face out of my mind. I'm sure he overlooked me.\"\n\n\"Oh then! who ever heard the like o' that? When young gentlemen do\noverlook young ladies, tain't thikketheor aways, I knoo. Never you think\non it.\"\n\n\"But I can't help thinking of it,\" said Rose. \"Stop. Shall we go home\nyet? Where's that servant?\"\n\n\"Never mind, he wain't see us, here under the hill. I'd much sooner to\nknow where my old man was. I've a sort of a forecasting in my inwards,\nlike, as I always has when aught's gwain to happen, as though I shuldn't\nzee mun again, like, I have, miss. Well--he was a bedient old soul,\nafter all, he was. Goodness, Father! and all this while us have forgot\nthe very thing us come about! Who did you see?\"\n\n\"Only that face!\" said Rose, shuddering.\n\n\"Not in the glass, maid? Say then, not in the glass?\"\n\n\"Would to heaven it had been! Lucy, what if he were the man I was fated\nto--\"\n\n\"He? Why, he's a praste, a Popish praste, that can't marry if he would,\npoor wratch.\"\n\n\"He is none; and I have cause enough to know it!\" And, for want of a\nbetter confidant, Rose poured into the willing ears of her companion the\nwhole story of yesterday's meeting.\n\n\"He's a pretty wooer!\" said Lucy at last, contemptuously. \"Be a brave\nmaid, then, be a brave maid, and never terrify yourself with his unlucky\nface. It's because there was none here worthy of ye, that ye seed none\nin glass. Maybe he's to be a foreigner, from over seas, and that's why\nhis sperit was so long a coming. A duke, or a prince to the least, I'll\nwarrant, he'll be, that carries off the Rose of Bideford.\"\n\nBut in spite of all the good dame's flattery, Rose could not wipe that\nfierce face away from her eyeballs. She reached home safely, and crept\nto bed undiscovered: and when the next morning, as was to be expected,\nfound her laid up with something very like a fever, from excitement,\nterror, and cold, the phantom grew stronger and stronger before her, and\nit required all her woman's tact and self-restraint to avoid betraying\nby her exclamations what had happened on that fantastic night. After a\nfortnight's weakness, however, she recovered and went back to Bideford:\nbut ere she arrived there, Amyas was far across the seas on his way to\nMilford Haven, as shall be told in the ensuing chapters.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE TRUE AND TRAGICAL HISTORY OF MR. JOHN OXENHAM OF PLYMOUTH\n\n     \"The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew;\n       The furrow follow'd free;\n     We were the first that ever burst\n       Into that silent sea.\"\n\n                          The Ancient Mariner.\n\nIt was too late and too dark last night to see the old house at Stow. We\nwill look round us, then, this bright October day, while Sir Richard and\nAmyas, about eleven o'clock in the forenoon, are pacing up and down the\nterraced garden to the south. Amyas has slept till luncheon, i. e. till\nan hour ago: but Sir Richard, in spite of the bustle of last night, was\nup and in the valley by six o'clock, recreating the valiant souls of\nhimself and two terrier dogs by the chase of sundry badgers.\n\nOld Stow House stands, or rather stood, some four miles beyond the\nCornish border, on the northern slope of the largest and loveliest of\nthose combes of which I spoke in the last chapter. Eighty years after\nSir Richard's time there arose there a huge Palladian pile, bedizened\nwith every monstrosity of bad taste, which was built, so the story runs,\nby Charles the Second, for Sir Richard's great-grandson, the heir of\nthat famous Sir Bevil who defeated the Parliamentary troops at Stratton,\nand died soon after, fighting valiantly at Lansdowne over Bath. But,\nlike most other things which owed their existence to the Stuarts,\nit rose only to fall again. An old man who had seen, as a boy, the\nfoundation of the new house laid, lived to see it pulled down again,\nand the very bricks and timber sold upon the spot; and since then the\nstables have become a farm-house, the tennis-court a sheep-cote, the\ngreat quadrangle a rick-yard; and civilization, spreading wave on\nwave so fast elsewhere, has surged back from that lonely corner of the\nland--let us hope, only for a while.\n\nBut I am not writing of that great new Stow House, of the past glories\nwhereof quaint pictures still hang in the neighboring houses; nor of\nthat famed Sir Bevil, most beautiful and gallant of his generation,\non whom, with his grandfather Sir Richard, old Prince has his pompous\nepigram--\n\n     \"Where next shall famous Grenvil's ashes stand?\n     Thy grandsire fills the sea, and thou the land.\"\n\nI have to deal with a simpler age, and a sterner generation; and with\nthe old house, which had stood there, in part at least, from gray and\nmythic ages, when the first Sir Richard, son of Hamon Dentatus, Lord of\nCarboyle, the grandson of Duke Robert, son of Rou, settled at Bideford,\nafter slaying the Prince of South-Galis, and the Lord of Glamorgan, and\ngave to the Cistercian monks of Neath all his conquests in South Wales.\nIt was a huge rambling building, half castle, half dwelling-house, such\nas may be seen still (almost an unique specimen) in Compton Castle\nnear Torquay, the dwelling-place of Humphrey Gilbert, Walter Raleigh's\nhalf-brother, and Richard Grenville's bosom friend, of whom more\nhereafter. On three sides, to the north, west, and south, the lofty\nwalls of the old ballium still stood, with their machicolated turrets,\nloopholes, and dark downward crannies for dropping stones and fire on\nthe besiegers, the relics of a more unsettled age: but the southern\ncourt of the ballium had become a flower-garden, with quaint terraces,\nstatues, knots of flowers, clipped yews and hollies, and all the\npedantries of the topiarian art. And toward the east, where the vista\nof the valley opened, the old walls were gone, and the frowning Norman\nkeep, ruined in the Wars of the Roses, had been replaced by the rich\nand stately architecture of the Tudors. Altogether, the house, like the\ntime, was in a transitionary state, and represented faithfully enough\nthe passage of the old middle age into the new life which had just burst\ninto blossom throughout Europe, never, let us pray, to see its autumn or\nits winter.\n\nFrom the house on three sides, the hill sloped steeply down, and the\ngarden where Sir Richard and Amyas were walking gave a truly English\nprospect. At one turn they could catch, over the western walls, a\nglimpse of the blue ocean flecked with passing sails; and at the next,\nspread far below them, range on range of fertile park, stately avenue,\nyellow autumn woodland, and purple heather moors, lapping over and over\neach other up the valley to the old British earthwork, which stood black\nand furze-grown on its conical peak; and standing out against the sky on\nthe highest bank of hill which closed the valley to the east, the lofty\ntower of Kilkhampton church, rich with the monuments and offerings of\nfive centuries of Grenvilles. A yellow eastern haze hung soft over park,\nand wood, and moor; the red cattle lowed to each other as they stood\nbrushing away the flies in the rivulet far below; the colts in the\nhorse-park close on their right whinnied as they played together, and\ntheir sires from the Queen's Park, on the opposite hill, answered them\nin fuller though fainter voices. A rutting stag made the still woodland\nrattle with his hoarse thunder, and a rival far up the valley gave back\na trumpet note of defiance, and was himself defied from heathery brows\nwhich quivered far away above, half seen through the veil of eastern\nmist. And close at home, upon the terrace before the house, amid romping\nspaniels and golden-haired children, sat Lady Grenville herself, the\nbeautiful St. Leger of Annery, the central jewel of all that glorious\nplace, and looked down at her noble children, and then up at her more\nnoble husband, and round at that broad paradise of the West, till life\nseemed too full of happiness, and heaven of light.\n\nAnd all the while up and down paced Amyas and Sir Richard, talking long,\nearnestly, and slow; for they both knew that the turning point of the\nboy's life was come.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Sir Richard, after Amyas, in his blunt simple way, had told\nhim the whole story about Rose Salterne and his brother,--\"yes, sweet\nlad, thou hast chosen the better part, thou and thy brother also, and it\nshall not be taken from you. Only be strong, lad, and trust in God that\nHe will make a man of you.\"\n\n\"I do trust,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Thank God,\" said Sir Richard, \"that you have yourself taken from my\nheart that which was my great anxiety for you, from the day that your\ngood father, who sleeps in peace, committed you to my hands. For all\nbest things, Amyas, become, when misused, the very worst; and the love\nof woman, because it is able to lift man's soul to the heavens, is also\nable to drag him down to hell. But you have learnt better, Amyas; and\nknow, with our old German forefathers, that, as Tacitus saith, Sera\njuvenum Venus, ideoque inexhausta pubertas. And not only that, Amyas;\nbut trust me, that silly fashion of the French and Italians, to be\nhanging ever at some woman's apron string, so that no boy shall count\nhimself a man unless he can vagghezziare le donne, whether maids or\nwives, alas! matters little; that fashion, I say, is little less hurtful\nto the soul than open sin; for by it are bred vanity and expense, envy\nand heart-burning, yea, hatred and murder often; and even if that be\nescaped, yet the rich treasure of a manly worship, which should be kept\nfor one alone, is squandered and parted upon many, and the bride at last\ncomes in for nothing but the very last leavings and caput mortuum of\nher bridegroom's heart, and becomes a mere ornament for his table, and\na means whereby he may obtain a progeny. May God, who has saved me from\nthat death in life, save you also!\" And as he spoke, he looked down\ntoward his wife upon the terrace below; and she, as if guessing\ninstinctively that he was talking of her, looked up with so sweet\na smile, that Sir Richard's stern face melted into a very glory of\nspiritual sunshine.\n\nAmyas looked at them both and sighed; and then turning the conversation\nsuddenly--\n\n\"And I may go to Ireland to-morrow?\"\n\n\"You shall sail in the 'Mary' for Milford Haven, with these letters to\nWinter. If the wind serves, you may bid the master drop down the river\ntonight, and be off; for we must lose no time.\"\n\n\"Winter?\" said Amyas. \"He is no friend of mine, since he left Drake and\nus so cowardly at the Straits of Magellan.\"\n\n\"Duty must not wait for private quarrels, even though they be just ones,\nlad: but he will not be your general. When you come to the marshal, or\nthe Lord Deputy, give either of them this letter, and they will set you\nwork,--and hard work too, I warrant.\n\n\"I want nothing better.\"\n\n\"Right, lad; the best reward for having wrought well already, is to have\nmore to do; and he that has been faithful over a few things, must find\nhis account in being made ruler over many things. That is the true and\nheroical rest, which only is worthy of gentlemen and sons of God. As for\nthose who, either in this world or the world to come, look for idleness,\nand hope that God shall feed them with pleasant things, as it were with\na spoon, Amyas, I count them cowards and base, even though they call\nthemselves saints and elect.\"\n\n\"I wish you could persuade my poor cousin of that.\"\n\n\"He has yet to learn what losing his life to save it means, Amyas. Bad\nmen have taught him (and I fear these Anabaptists and Puritans at home\nteach little else), that it is the one great business of every one to\nsave his own soul after he dies; every one for himself; and that that,\nand not divine self-sacrifice, is the one thing needful, and the better\npart which Mary chose.\"\n\n\"I think men are inclined enough already to be selfish, without being\ntaught that.\"\n\n\"Right, lad. For me, if I could hang up such a teacher on high as an\nenemy of mankind, and a corrupter of youth, I would do it gladly. Is\nthere not cowardice and self-seeking enough about the hearts of us\nfallen sons of Adam, that these false prophets, with their baits of\nheaven, and their terrors of hell, must exalt our dirtiest vices into\nheavenly virtues and the means of bliss? Farewell to chivalry and to\ndesperate valor, farewell to patriotism and loyalty, farewell to England\nand to the manhood of England, if once it shall become the fashion of\nour preachers to bid every man, as the Jesuits do, take care first of\nwhat they call the safety of his soul. Every man will be afraid to die\nat his post, because he will be afraid that he is not fit to die. Amyas,\ndo thou do thy duty like a man, to thy country, thy queen, and thy God;\nand count thy life a worthless thing, as did the holy men of old. Do\nthy work, lad; and leave thy soul to the care of Him who is just and\nmerciful in this, that He rewards every man according to his work. Is\nthere respect of persons with God? Now come in, and take the letters,\nand to horse. And if I hear of thee dead there at Smerwick fort, with\nall thy wounds in front, I shall weep for thy mother, lad; but I shall\nhave never a sigh for thee.\"\n\nIf any one shall be startled at hearing a fine gentleman and a warrior\nlike Sir Richard quote Scripture, and think Scripture also, they must\nbe referred to the writings of the time; which they may read not without\nprofit to themselves, if they discover therefrom how it was possible\nthen for men of the world to be thoroughly ingrained with the Gospel,\nand yet to be free from any taint of superstitious fear, or false\ndevoutness. The religion of those days was such as no soldier need have\nbeen ashamed of confessing. At least, Sir Richard died as he lived,\nwithout a shudder, and without a whine; and these were his last words,\nfifteen years after that, as he lay shot through and through, a captive\namong Popish Spaniards, priests, crucifixes, confession, extreme\nunction, and all other means and appliances for delivering men out of\nthe hands of a God of love:--\n\n\"Here die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyful and quiet mind; for that\nI have ended my life as a true soldier ought, fighting for his country,\nqueen, religion, and honor: my soul willingly departing from this body,\nleaving behind the lasting fame of having behaved as every valiant\nsoldier is in his duty bound to do.\"\n\nThose were the last words of Richard Grenville. The pulpits of those\ndays had taught them to him.\n\nBut to return. That day's events were not over yet. For, when they went\ndown into the house, the first person whom they met was the old steward,\nin search of his master.\n\n\"There is a manner of roog, Sir Richard, a masterless man, at the door;\na very forward fellow, and must needs speak with you.\"\n\n\"A masterless man? He had better not to speak to me, unless he is in\nlove with gaol and gallows.\"\n\n\"Well, your worship,\" said the steward, \"I expect that is what he does\nwant, for he swears he will not leave the gate till he has seen you.\"\n\n\"Seen me? Halidame! he shall see me, here and at Launceston too, if he\nlikes. Bring him in.\"\n\n\"Fegs, Sir Richard, we are half afeard. With your good leave--\"\n\n\"Hillo, Tony,\" cried Amyas, \"who was ever afeard yet with Sir Richard's\ngood leave?\"\n\n\"What, has the fellow a tail or horns?\"\n\n\"Massy no: but I be afeard of treason for your honor; for the fellow is\npinked all over in heathen patterns, and as brown as a filbert; and a\ntall roog, a very strong roog, sir, and a foreigner too, and a mighty\nstaff with him. I expect him to be a manner of Jesuit, or wild Irish,\nsir; and indeed the grooms have no stomach to handle him, nor the dogs\nneither, or he had been under the pump before now, for they that saw him\ncoming up the hill swear that he had fire coming out of his mouth.\"\n\n\"Fire out of his mouth?\" said Sir Richard. \"The men are drunk.\"\n\n\"Pinked all over? He must be a sailor,\" said Amyas; \"let me out and see\nthe fellow, and if he needs putting forth--\"\n\n\"Why, I dare say he is not so big but what he will go into thy pocket.\nSo go, lad, while I finish my writing.\"\n\nAmyas went out, and at the back door, leaning on his staff, stood a\ntall, raw-boned, ragged man, \"pinked all over,\" as the steward had said.\n\n\"Hillo, lad!\" quoth Amyas. \"Before we come to talk, thou wilt please to\nlay down that Plymouth cloak of thine.\" And he pointed to the cudgel,\nwhich among West-country mariners usually bore that name.\n\n\"I'll warrant,\" said the old steward, \"that where he found his cloak he\nfound purse not far off.\"\n\n\"But not hose or doublet; so the magical virtue of his staff has\nnot helped him much. But put down thy staff, man, and speak like a\nChristian, if thou be one.\"\n\n\"I am a Christian, though I look like a heathen; and no rogue, though\na masterless man, alas! But I want nothing, deserving nothing, and only\nask to speak with Sir Richard, before I go on my way.\"\n\nThere was something stately and yet humble about the man's tone and\nmanner which attracted Amyas, and he asked more gently where he was\ngoing and whence he came.\n\n\"From Padstow Port, sir, to Clovelly town, to see my old mother, if\nindeed she be yet alive, which God knoweth.\"\n\n\"Clovally man! why didn't thee say thee was Clovally man?\" asked all the\ngrooms at once, to whom a West-countryman was of course a brother. The\nold steward asked--\n\n\"What's thy mother's name, then?\"\n\n\"Susan Yeo.\"\n\n\"What, that lived under the archway?\" asked a groom.\n\n\"Lived?\" said the man.\n\n\"Iss, sure; her died three days since, so we heard, poor soul.\"\n\nThe man stood quite silent and unmoved for a minute or two; and then\nsaid quietly to himself, in Spanish, \"That which is, is best.\"\n\n\"You speak Spanish?\" asked Amyas, more and more interested.\n\n\"I had need to do so, young sir; I have been five years in the Spanish\nMain, and only set foot on shore two days ago; and if you will let me\nhave speech of Sir Richard, I will tell him that at which both the ears\nof him that heareth it shall tingle; and if not, I can but go on to Mr.\nCary of Clovelly, if he be yet alive, and there disburden my soul; but I\nwould sooner have spoken with one that is a mariner like to myself.\"\n\n\"And you shall,\" said Amyas. \"Steward, we will have this man in; for all\nhis rags, he is a man of wit.\" And he led him in.\n\n\"I only hope he ben't one of those Popish murderers,\" said the old\nsteward, keeping at a safe distance from him as they entered the hall.\n\n\"Popish, old master? There's little fear of my being that. Look here!\"\nAnd drawing back his rags, he showed a ghastly scar, which encircled his\nwrist and wound round and up his fore-arm.\n\n\"I got that on the rack,\" said he, quietly, \"in the Inquisition at\nLima.\"\n\n\"O Father! Father! why didn't you tell us that you were a poor\nChristian?\" asked the penitent steward.\n\n\"Because I have had naught but my deserts; and but a taste of them\neither, as the Lord knoweth who delivered me; and I wasn't going to make\nmyself a beggar and a show on their account.\"\n\n\"By heaven, you are a brave fellow!\" said Amyas. \"Come along straight to\nSir Richard's room.\"\n\nSo in they went, where Sir Richard sat in his library among books,\ndespatches, state-papers, and warrants; for though he was not yet, as in\nafter times (after the fashion of those days) admiral, general, member\nof parliament, privy councillor, justice of the peace, and so forth, all\nat once, yet there were few great men with whom he did not correspond,\nor great matters with which he was not cognizant.\n\n\"Hillo, Amyas, have you bound the wild man already, and brought him in\nto swear allegiance?\"\n\nBut before Amyas could answer, the man looked earnestly on him--\"Amyas?\"\nsaid he; \"is that your name, sir?\"\n\n\"Amyas Leigh is my name, at your service, good fellow.\"\n\n\"Of Burrough by Bideford?\"\n\n\"Why then? What do you know of me?\"\n\n\"Oh sir, sir! young brains and happy ones have short memories; but old\nand sad brains too long ones often! Do you mind one that was with Mr.\nOxenham, sir? A swearing reprobate he was, God forgive him, and hath\nforgiven him too, for His dear Son's sake--one, sir, that gave you a\nhorn, a toy with a chart on it?\"\n\n\"Soul alive!\" cried Amyas, catching him by the hand; \"and are you he?\nThe horn? why, I have it still, and will keep it to my dying day, too.\nBut where is Mr. Oxenham?\"\n\n\"Yes, my good fellow, where is Mr. Oxenham?\" asked Sir Richard, rising.\n\"You are somewhat over-hasty in welcoming your old acquaintance, Amyas,\nbefore we have heard from him whether he can give honest account of\nhimself and of his captain. For there is more than one way by which\nsailors may come home without their captains, as poor Mr. Barker of\nBristol found to his cost. God grant that there may have been no such\ntraitorous dealing here.\"\n\n\"Sir Richard Grenville, if I had been a guilty man to my noble captain,\nas I have to God, I had not come here this day to you, from whom\nvillainy has never found favor, nor ever will; for I know your\nconditions well, sir; and trust in the Lord, that if you will be pleased\nto hear me, you shall know mine.\"\n\n\"Thou art a well-spoken knave. We shall see.\"\n\n\"My dear sir,\" said Amyas, in a whisper, \"I will warrant this man\nguiltless.\"\n\n\"I verily believe him to be; but this is too serious a matter to be left\non guess. If he will be sworn--\"\n\nWhereon the man, humbly enough, said, that if it would please Sir\nRichard, he would rather not be sworn.\n\n\"But it does not please me, rascal! Did I not warn thee, Amyas?\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said the man, proudly, \"God forbid that my word should not be as\ngood as my oath: but it is against my conscience to be sworn.\"\n\n\"What have we here? some fantastical Anabaptist, who is wiser than his\nteachers.\"\n\n\"My conscience, sir--\"\n\n\"The devil take it and thee! I never heard a man yet begin to prate of\nhis conscience, but I knew that he was about to do something more than\nordinarily cruel or false.\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said the man, coolly enough, \"do you sit here to judge me\naccording to law, and yet contrary to the law swear profane oaths, for\nwhich a fine is provided?\"\n\nAmyas expected an explosion: but Sir Richard pulled a shilling out and\nput it on the table. \"There--my fine is paid, sirrah, to the poor of\nKilkhampton: but hearken thou all the same. If thou wilt not speak an\noath, thou shalt speak on compulsion; for to Launceston gaol thou goest,\nthere to answer for Mr. Oxenham's death, on suspicion whereof, and of\nmutiny causing it, I will attach thee and every soul of his crew that\ncomes home. We have lost too many gallant captains of late by treachery\nof their crews, and he that will not clear himself on oath, must be held\nfor guilty, and self-condemned.\"\n\n\"My good fellow,\" said Amyas, who could not give up his belief in the\nman's honesty, \"why, for such fantastical scruples, peril not only your\nlife, but your honor, and Mr. Oxenham's also? For if you be examined by\nquestion, you may be forced by torment to say that which is not true.\"\n\n\"Little fear of that, young sir!\" answered he, with a grim smile; \"I\nhave had too much of the rack already, and the strappado too, to care\nmuch what man can do unto me. I would heartily that I thought it lawful\nto be sworn: but not so thinking, I can but submit to the cruelty of\nman; though I did expect more merciful things, as a most miserable and\nwrecked mariner, at the hands of one who hath himself seen God's ways\nin the sea, and His wonders in the great deep. Sir Richard Grenville,\nif you will hear my story, may God avenge on my head all my sins from my\nyouth up until now, and cut me off from the blood of Christ, and, if it\nwere possible, from the number of His elect, if I tell you one whit more\nor less than truth; and if not, I commend myself into the hands of God.\"\n\nSir Richard smiled. \"Well, thou art a brave ass, and valiant, though an\nass manifest. Dost thou not see, fellow, how thou hast sworn a ten-times\nbigger oath than ever I should have asked of thee? But this is the way\nwith your Anabaptists, who by their very hatred of forms and ceremonies,\nshow of how much account they think them, and then bind themselves out\nof their own fantastical self-will with far heavier burdens than ever\nthe lawful authorities have laid on them for the sake of the commonweal.\nBut what do they care for the commonweal, as long as they can save, as\nthey fancy, each man his own dirty soul for himself? However, thou art\nsworn now with a vengeance; go on with thy tale: and first, who art\nthou, and whence?\"\n\n\"Well, sir,\" said the man, quite unmoved by this last explosion; \"my\nname is Salvation Yeo, born in Clovelly Street, in the year 1526, where\nmy father exercised the mystery of a barber surgeon, and a preacher of\nthe people since called Anabaptists, for which I return humble thanks to\nGod.\"\n\nSir Richard.--Fie! thou naughty knave; return thanks that thy father was\nan ass?\n\nYeo.--Nay, but because he was a barber surgeon; for I myself learnt\na touch of that trade, and thereby saved my life, as I will tell\npresently. And I do think that a good mariner ought to have all\nknowledge of carnal and worldly cunning, even to tailoring and\nshoemaking, that he may be able to turn his hand to whatsoever may hap.\n\nSir Richard.--Well spoken, fellow: but let us have thy text without thy\ncomments. Forwards!\n\nYeo.--Well, sir. I was bred to the sea from my youth, and was with\nCaptain Hawkins in his three voyages, which he made to Guinea for negro\nslaves, and thence to the West Indies.\n\nSir Richard.--Then thrice thou wentest to a bad end, though Captain\nHawkins be my good friend; and the last time to a bad end thou camest.\n\nYeo.--No denying that last, your worship: but as for the former, I\ndoubt--about the unlawfulness, I mean; being the negroes are of the\nchildren of Ham, who are cursed and reprobate, as Scripture declares,\nand their blackness testifies, being Satan's own livery; among whom\ntherefore there can be none of the elect, wherefore the elect are not\nrequired to treat them as brethren.\n\nSir Richard.--What a plague of a pragmatical sea-lawyer have we here?\nAnd I doubt not, thou hypocrite, that though thou wilt call the negroes'\nblack skin Satan's livery, when it serves thy turn to steal them, thou\nwilt find out sables to be Heaven's livery every Sunday, and up with a\ngodly howl unless a parson shall preach in a black gown, Geneva fashion.\nOut upon thee! Go on with thy tale, lest thou finish thy sermon at\nLaunceston after all.\n\nYeo.--The Lord's people were always a reviled people and a persecuted\npeople: but I will go forward, sir; for Heaven forbid but that I should\ndeclare what God has done for me. For till lately, from my youth up,\nI was given over to all wretchlessness and unclean living, and was by\nnature a child of the devil, and to every good work reprobate, even as\nothers.\n\nSir Richard.--Hark to his \"even as others\"! Thou new-whelped Pharisee,\ncanst not confess thine own villainies without making out others as bad\nas thyself, and so thyself no worse than others? I only hope that thou\nhast shown none of thy devil's doings to Mr. Oxenham.\n\nYeo.--On the word of a Christian man, sir, as I said before, I kept true\nfaith with him, and would have been a better friend to him, sir, what is\nmore, than ever he was to himself.\n\nSir Richard.--Alas! that might easily be.\n\nYeo.--I think, sir, and will make good against any man, that Mr. Oxenham\nwas a noble and valiant gentleman; true of his word, stout of his sword,\nskilful by sea and land, and worthy to have been Lord High Admiral of\nEngland (saving your worship's presence), but that through two great\nsins, wrath and avarice, he was cast away miserably or ever his soul was\nbrought to the knowledge of the truth. Ah, sir, he was a captain worth\nsailing under!\n\nAnd Yeo heaved a deep sigh.\n\nSir Richard.--Steady, steady, good fellow! If thou wouldst quit\npreaching, thou art no fool after all. But tell us the story without\nmore bush-beating.\n\nSo at last Yeo settled himself to his tale:--\n\n\"Well, sirs, I went, as Mr. Leigh knows, to Nombre de Dios, with Mr.\nDrake and Mr. Oxenham, in 1572, where what we saw and did, your worship,\nI suppose, knows as well as I; and there was, as you've heard maybe,\na covenant between Mr. Oxenham and Mr. Drake to sail the South Seas\ntogether, which they made, your worship, in my hearing, under the tree\nover Panama. For when Mr. Drake came down from the tree, after seeing\nthe sea afar off, Mr. Oxenham and I went up and saw it too; and when we\ncame down, Drake says, 'John, I have made a vow to God that I will sail\nthat water, if I live and God gives me grace;' which he had done, sir,\nupon his bended knees, like a godly man as he always was, and would I\nhad taken after him! and Mr. O. says, 'I am with you, Drake, to live or\ndie, and I think I know some one there already, so we shall not be quite\namong strangers;' and laughed withal. Well, sirs, that voyage, as you\nknow, never came off, because Captain Drake was fighting in Ireland; so\nMr. Oxenham, who must be up and doing, sailed for himself, and I, who\nloved him, God knows, like a brother (saving the difference in our\nranks), helped him to get the crew together, and went as his gunner.\nThat was in 1575; as you know, he had a 140-ton ship, sir, and seventy\nmen out of Plymouth and Fowey and Dartmouth, and many of them old hands\nof Drake's, beside a dozen or so from Bideford that I picked up when I\nsaw young Master here.\"\n\n\"Thank God that you did not pick me up too.\"\n\n\"Amen, amen!\" said Yeo, clasping his hands on his breast. \"Those seventy\nmen, sir,--seventy gallant men, sir, with every one of them an immortal\nsoul within him,--where are they now? Gone, like the spray!\" And he\nswept his hands abroad with a wild and solemn gesture. \"And their blood\nis upon my head!\"\n\nBoth Sir Richard and Amyas began to suspect that the man's brain was not\naltogether sound.\n\n\"God forbid, my man,\" said the knight, kindly.\n\n\"Thirteen men I persuaded to join in Bideford town, beside William\nPenberthy of Marazion, my good comrade. And what if it be said to me at\nthe day of judgment, 'Salvation Yeo, where are those fourteen whom thou\ndidst tempt to their deaths by covetousness and lust of gold?' Not that\nI was alone in my sin, if the truth must be told. For all the way out\nMr. Oxenham was making loud speech, after his pleasant way, that he\nwould make all their fortunes, and take them to such a Paradise, that\nthey should have no lust to come home again. And I--God knows why--for\nevery one boast of his would make two, even to lying and empty fables,\nand anything to keep up the men's hearts. For I had really persuaded\nmyself that we should all find treasures beyond Solomon his temple,\nand Mr. Oxenham would surely show us how to conquer some golden city or\ndiscover some island all made of precious stones. And one day, as the\ncaptain and I were talking after our fashion, I said, 'And you shall be\nour king, captain.' To which he, 'If I be, I shall not be long without\na queen, and that no Indian one either.' And after that he often jested\nabout the Spanish ladies, saying that none could show us the way to\ntheir hearts better than he. Which speeches I took no count of then,\nsirs: but after I minded them, whether I would or not. Well, sirs, we\ncame to the shore of New Spain, near to the old place--that's Nombre\nde Dios; and there Mr. Oxenham went ashore into the woods with a boat's\ncrew, to find the negroes who helped us three years before. Those are\nthe Cimaroons, gentles, negro slaves who have fled from those devils\nincarnate, their Spanish masters, and live wild, like the beasts\nthat perish; men of great stature, sirs, and fierce as wolves in\nthe onslaught, but poor jabbering mazed fellows if they be but a bit\ndismayed: and have many Indian women with them, who take to these\nnegroes a deal better than to their own kin, which breeds war enough, as\nyou may guess.\n\n\"Well, sirs, after three days the captain comes back, looking heavy\nenough, and says, 'We played our trick once too often, when we played\nit once. There is no chance of stopping another reco (that is, a\nmule-train, sirs) now. The Cimaroons say that since our last visit\nthey never move without plenty of soldiers, two hundred shot at least.\nTherefore,' he said, 'my gallants, we must either return empty-handed\nfrom this, the very market and treasury of the whole Indies, or do such\na deed as men never did before, which I shall like all the better for\nthat very reason.' And we, asking his meaning, 'Why,' he said, 'if Drake\nwill not sail the South Seas, we will;' adding profanely that Drake was\nlike Moses, who beheld the promised land afar; but he was Joshua, who\nwould enter into it, and smite the inhabitants thereof. And, for our\nconfirmation, showed me and the rest the superscription of a letter: and\nsaid, 'How I came by this is none of your business: but I have had it in\nmy bosom ever since I left Plymouth; and I tell you now, what I forbore\nto tell you at first, that the South Seas have been my mark all along!\nsuch news have I herein of plate-ships, and gold-ships, and what not,\nwhich will come up from Quito and Lima this very month, all which, with\nthe pearls of the Gulf of Panama, and other wealth unspeakable, will be\nours, if we have but true English hearts within us.'\n\n\"At which, gentles, we were like madmen for lust of that gold, and\ncheerfully undertook a toil incredible; for first we run our ship\naground in a great wood which grew in the very sea itself, and then took\nout her masts, and covered her in boughs, with her four cast pieces of\ngreat ordnance (of which more hereafter), and leaving no man in her,\nstarted for the South Seas across the neck of Panama, with two small\npieces of ordnance and our culverins, and good store of victuals, and\nwith us six of those negroes for a guide, and so twelve leagues to a\nriver which runs into the South Sea.\n\n\"And there, having cut wood, we made a pinnace (and work enough we had\nat it) of five-and-forty foot in the keel; and in her down the stream,\nand to the Isle of Pearls in the Gulf of Panama.\"\n\n\"Into the South Sea? Impossible!\" said Sir Richard. \"Have a care what\nyou say, my man; for there is that about you which would make me sorry\nto find you out a liar.\"\n\n\"Impossible or not, liar or none, we went there, sir.\"\n\n\"Question him, Amyas, lest he turn out to have been beforehand with\nyou.\"\n\nThe man looked inquiringly at Amyas, who said--\n\n\"Well, my man, of the Gulf of Panama I cannot ask you, for I never was\ninside it, but what other parts of the coast do you know?\"\n\n\"Every inch, sir, from Cabo San Francisco to Lima; more is my sorrow,\nfor I was a galley-slave there for two years and more.\"\n\n\"You know Lima?\"\n\n\"I was there three times, worshipful gentlemen, and the last was\nFebruary come two years; and there I helped lade a great plate-ship, the\nCacafuogo,' they called her.\"\n\nAmyas started. Sir Richard nodded to him gently to be silent, and then--\n\n\"And what became of her, my lad?\"\n\n\"God knows, who knows all, and the devil who freighted her. I broke\nprison six weeks afterwards, and never heard but that she got safe into\nPanama.\"\n\n\"You never heard, then, that she was taken?\"\n\n\"Taken, your worships? Who should take her?\"\n\n\"Why should not a good English ship take her as well as another?\" said\nAmyas.\n\n\"Lord love you, sir; yes, faith, if they had but been there. Many's the\ntime that I thought to myself, as we went alongside, 'Oh, if Captain\nDrake was but here, well to windward, and our old crew of the \"Dragon\"!'\nAsk your pardon, gentles: but how is Captain Drake, if I may make so\nbold?\"\n\nNeither could hold out longer.\n\n\"Fellow, fellow!\" cried Sir Richard, springing up, \"either thou art the\ncunningest liar that ever earned a halter, or thou hast done a deed\nthe like of which never man adventured. Dost thou not know that Captain\nDrake took that 'Cacafuogo' and all her freight, in February come two\nyears?\"\n\n\"Captain Drake! God forgive me, sir; but--Captain Drake in the South\nSeas? He saw them, sir, from the tree-top over Panama, when I was with\nhim, and I too; but sailed them, sir?--sailed them?\"\n\n\"Yes, and round the world too,\" said Amyas, \"and I with him; and took\nthat very 'Cacafuogo' off Cape San Francisco, as she came up to Panama.\"\n\nOne glance at the man's face was enough to prove his sincerity. The\ngreat stern Anabaptist, who had not winced at the news of his mother's\ndeath, dropt right on his knees on the floor, and burst into violent\nsobs.\n\n\"Glory to God! Glory to God! O Lord, I thank thee! Captain Drake in\nthe South Seas! The blood of thy innocents avenged, O Lord! The spoiler\nspoiled, and the proud robbed; and all they whose hands were mighty have\nfound nothing. Glory, glory! Oh, tell me, sir, did she fight?\"\n\n\"We gave her three pieces of ordnance only, and struck down her\nmizzenmast, and then boarded sword in hand, but never had need to strike\na blow; and before we left her, one of her own boys had changed her\nname, and rechristened her the 'Cacaplata.'\"\n\n\"Glory, glory! Cowards they are, as I told them. I told them they never\ncould stand the Devon mastiffs, and well they flogged me for saying it;\nbut they could not stop my mouth. O sir, tell me, did you get the ship\nthat came up after her?\"\n\n\"What was that?\"\n\n\"A long race-ship, sir, from Guayaquil, with an old gentleman on\nboard,--Don Francisco de Xararte was his name, and by token, he had a\ngold falcon hanging to a chain round his neck, and a green stone in the\nbreast of it. I saw it as we rowed him aboard. O tell me, sir, tell me\nfor the love of God, did you take that ship?\"\n\n\"We did take that ship, and the jewel too, and her majesty has it at\nthis very hour.\"\n\n\"Then tell me, sir,\" said he slowly, as if he dreaded an answer; \"tell\nme, sir, and oh, try and mind--was there a little maid aboard with the\nold gentleman?\"\n\n\"A little maid? Let me think. No; I saw none.\"\n\nThe man settled his features again sadly.\n\n\"I thought not. I never saw her come aboard. Still I hoped, like; I\nhoped. Alackaday! God help me, Salvation Yeo!\"\n\n\"What have you to do with this little maid, then, good fellow!\" asked\nGrenville.\n\n\"Ah, sir, before I tell you that, I must go back and finish the story of\nMr. Oxenham, if you will believe me enough to hear it.\"\n\n\"I do believe thee, good fellow, and honor thee too.\"\n\n\"Then, sir, I can speak with a free tongue. Where was I?\"\n\n\"Where was he, Amyas?\"\n\n\"At the Isle of Pearls.\"\n\n\"And yet, O gentles, tell me first, how Captain Drake came into the\nSouth Seas:--over the neck, as we did?\"\n\n\"Through the Straits, good fellow, like any Spaniard: but go on with thy\nstory, and thou shalt have Mr. Leigh's after.\"\n\n\"Through the Straits! O glory! But I'll tell my tale. Well, sirs\nboth--To the Island of Pearls we came, we and some of the negroes. We\nfound many huts, and Indians fishing for pearls, and also a fair house,\nwith porches; but no Spaniard therein, save one man; at which Mr.\nOxenham was like a man transported, and fell on that Spaniard, crying,\n'Perro, where is your mistress? Where is the bark from Lima?' To which\nhe boldly enough, 'What was his mistress to the Englishman?' But Mr. O.\nthreatened to twine a cord round his head till his eyes burst out; and\nthe Spaniard, being terrified, said that the ship from Lima was expected\nin a fortnight's time. So for ten days we lay quiet, letting neither\nnegro nor Spaniard leave the island, and took good store of pearls,\nfeeding sumptuously on wild cattle and hogs until the tenth day, when\nthere came by a small bark; her we took, and found her from Quito, and\non board 60,000 pezos of gold and other store. With which if we had been\ncontent, gentlemen, all had gone well. And some were willing to go back\nat once, having both treasure and pearls in plenty; but Mr. O., he\nwaxed right mad, and swore to slay any one who made that motion again,\nassuring us that the Lima ship of which he had news was far greater and\nricher, and would make princes of us all; which bark came in sight on\nthe sixteenth day, and was taken without shot or slaughter. The taking\nof which bark, I verily believe, was the ruin of every mother's son of\nus.\"\n\nAnd being asked why, he answered, \"First, because of the discontent\nwhich was bred thereby; for on board was found no gold, but only 100,000\npezos of silver.\"\n\nSir Richard Grenville.--Thou greedy fellow; and was not that enough to\nstay your stomachs?\n\nYeo answered that he would to God it had been; and that, moreover, the\nweight of that silver was afterwards a hindrance to them, and fresh\ncause of discontent, as he would afterwards declare. \"So that it had\nbeen well for us, sirs, if we had left it behind, as Mr. Drake left his\nthree years before, and carried away the gold only. In which I do see\nthe evident hand of God, and His just punishment for our greediness\nof gain; who caused Mr. Oxenham, by whom we had hoped to attain great\nwealth, to be a snare to us, and a cause of utter ruin.\"\n\n\"Do you think, then,\" said Sir Richard, \"that Mr. Oxenham deceived you\nwilfully?\"\n\n\"I will never believe that, sir: Mr. Oxenham had his private reasons for\nwaiting for that ship, for the sake of one on board, whose face would\nthat he had never seen, though he saw it then, as I fear, not for the\nfirst time by many a one.\" And so was silent.\n\n\"Come,\" said both his hearers, \"you have brought us thus far, and you\nmust go on.\"\n\n\"Gentlemen, I have concealed this matter from all men, both on my voyage\nhome and since; and I hope you will be secret in the matter, for the\nhonor of my noble captain, and the comfort of his friends who are alive.\nFor I think it shame to publish harm of a gallant gentleman, and of an\nancient and worshipful family, and to me a true and kind captain, when\nwhat is done cannot be undone, and least said soonest mended. Neither\nnow would I have spoken of it, but that I was inwardly moved to it for\nthe sake of that young gentleman there\" (looking at Amyas), \"that\nhe might be warned in time of God's wrath against the crying sin of\nadultery, and flee youthful lusts, which war against the soul.\"\n\n\"Thou hast done wisely enough, then,\" said Sir Richard; \"and look to it\nif I do not reward thee: but the young gentleman here, thank God, needs\nno such warnings, having got them already both by precept and example,\nwhere thou and poor Oxenham might have had them also.\"\n\n\"You mean Captain Drake, your worship?\"\n\n\"I do, sirrah. If all men were as clean livers as he, the world would be\nspared one half the tears that are shed in it.\"\n\n\"Amen, sir. At least there would have been many a tear spared to us and\nours. For--as all must out--in that bark of Lima he took a young\nlady, as fair as the sunshine, sir, and seemingly about two or\nthree-and-twenty years of age, having with her a tall young lad of\nsixteen, and a little girl, a marvellously pretty child, of about a\nsix or seven. And the lady herself was of an excellent beauty, like a\nwhale's tooth for whiteness, so that all the crew wondered at her, and\ncould not be satisfied with looking upon her. And, gentlemen, this was\nstrange, that the lady seemed in no wise afraid or mournful, and bid\nher little girl fear naught, as did also Mr. Oxenham: but the lad kept a\nvery sour countenance, and the more when he saw the lady and Mr. Oxenham\nspeaking together apart.\n\n\"Well, sir, after this good luck we were minded to have gone straight\nback to the river whence we came, and so home to England with all speed.\nBut Mr. Oxenham persuaded us to return to the island, and get a few more\npearls. To which foolishness (which after caused the mishap) I verily\nbelieve he was moved by the instigation of the devil and of that lady.\nFor as we were about to go ashore, I, going down into the cabin of the\nprize, saw Mr. Oxenham and that lady making great cheer of each other\nwith, 'My life,' and 'My king,' and 'Light of my eyes,' and such toys;\nand being bidden by Mr. Oxenham to fetch out the lady's mails, and take\nthem ashore, heard how the two laughed together about the old ape of\nPanama (which ape, or devil rather, I saw afterwards to my cost), and\nalso how she said that she had been dead for five years, and now that\nMr. Oxenham was come, she was alive again, and so forth.\n\n\"Mr. Oxenham bade take the little maid ashore, kissing her and playing\nwith her, and saying to the lady, 'What is yours is mine, and what is\nmine is yours.' And she asking whether the lad should come ashore, he\nanswered, 'He is neither yours nor mine; let the spawn of Beelzebub stay\non shore.' After which I, coming on deck again, stumbled over that very\nlad, upon the hatchway ladder, who bore so black and despiteful a face,\nthat I verily believe he had overheard their speech, and so thrust him\nupon deck; and going below again, told Mr. Oxenham what I thought, and\nsaid that it were better to put a dagger into him at once, professing to\nbe ready so to do. For which grievous sin, seeing that it was\ncommitted in my unregenerate days, I hope I have obtained the grace of\nforgiveness, as I have that of hearty repentance. But the lady cried\nout, 'Though he be none of mine, I have sin enough already on my soul;'\nand so laid her hand on Mr. Oxenham's mouth, entreating pitifully. And\nMr. Oxenham answered laughing, when she would let him, 'What care we?\nlet the young monkey go and howl to the old one;' and so went ashore\nwith the lady to that house, whence for three days he never came forth,\nand would have remained longer, but that the men, finding but few\npearls, and being wearied with the watching and warding so many\nSpaniards, and negroes came clamoring to him, and swore that they\nwould return or leave him there with the lady. So all went on board\nthe pinnace again, every one in ill humor with the captain, and he with\nthem.\n\n\"Well, sirs, we came back to the mouth of the river, and there began our\ntroubles; for the negroes, as soon as we were on shore, called on Mr.\nOxenham to fulfil the bargain he had made with them. And now it came out\n(what few of us knew till then) that he had agreed with the Cimaroons\nthat they should have all the prisoners which were taken, save the gold.\nAnd he, though loath, was about to give up the Spaniards to them, near\nforty in all, supposing that they intended to use them as slaves: but\nas we all stood talking, one of the Spaniards, understanding what was\nforward, threw himself on his knees before Mr. Oxenham, and shrieking\nlike a madman, entreated not to be given up into the hands of 'those\ndevils,' said he, 'who never take a Spanish prisoner, but they roast him\nalive, and then eat his heart among them.' We asked the negroes if this\nwas possible? To which some answered, What was that to us? But others\nsaid boldly, that it was true enough, and that revenge made the best\nsauce, and nothing was so sweet as Spanish blood; and one, pointing\nto the lady, said such foul and devilish things as I should be ashamed\neither for me to speak, or you to hear. At this we were like men amazed\nfor very horror; and Mr. Oxenham said, 'You incarnate fiends, if you had\ntaken these fellows for slaves, it had been fair enough; for you were\nonce slaves to them, and I doubt not cruelly used enough: but as for\nthis abomination,' says he, 'God do so to me, and more also, if I\nlet one of them come into your murderous hands.' So there was a great\nquarrel; but Mr. Oxenham stoutly bade put the prisoners on board\nthe ships again, and so let the prizes go, taking with him only the\ntreasure, and the lady and the little maid. And so the lad went on to\nPanama, God's wrath having gone out against us.\n\n\"Well, sirs, the Cimaroons after that went away from us, swearing\nrevenge (for which we cared little enough), and we rowed up the river\nto a place where three streams met, and then up the least of the three,\nsome four days' journey, till it grew all shoal and swift; and there we\nhauled the pinnace upon the sands, and Mr. Oxenham asked the men whether\nthey were willing to carry the gold and silver over the mountains to the\nNorth Sea. Some of them at first were loath to do it, and I and others\nadvised that we should leave the plate behind, and take the gold only,\nfor it would have cost us three or four journeys at the least. But Mr.\nOxenham promised every man 100 pezos of silver over and above his wages,\nwhich made them content enough, and we were all to start the morrow\nmorning. But, sirs, that night, as God had ordained, came a mishap by\nsome rash speeches of Mr. Oxenham's, which threw all abroad again; for\nwhen we had carried the treasure about half a league inland, and hidden\nit away in a house which we made of boughs, Mr. O. being always full of\nthat his fair lady, spoke to me and William Penberthy of Marazion, my\ngood comrade, and a few more, saying, 'That we had no need to return\nto England, seeing that we were already in the very garden of Eden, and\nwanted for nothing, but could live without labor or toil; and that it\nwas better, when we got over to the North Sea, to go and seek out some\nfair island, and there dwell in joy and pleasure till our lives' end.\nAnd we two,' he said, 'will be king and queen, and you, whom I can\ntrust, my officers; and for servants we will have the Indians, who, I\nwarrant, will be more fain to serve honest and merry masters like us\nthan those Spanish devils,' and much more of the like; which words I\nliked well,--my mind, alas! being given altogether to carnal pleasure\nand vanity,--as did William Penberthy, my good comrade, on whom I trust\nGod has had mercy. But the rest, sirs, took the matter all across, and\nbegan murmuring against the captain, saying that poor honest mariners\nlike them had always the labor and the pain, while he took his delight\nwith his lady; and that they would have at least one merry night before\nthey were slain by the Cimaroons, or eaten by panthers and lagartos;\nand so got out of the pinnace two great skins of Canary wine, which were\ntaken in the Lima prize, and sat themselves down to drink. Moreover,\nthere were in the pinnace a great sight of hens, which came from the\nsame prize, by which Mr. O. set great store, keeping them for the lady\nand the little maid; and falling upon these, the men began to blaspheme,\nsaying, 'What a plague had the captain to fill the boat with dirty live\nlumber for that giglet's sake? They had a better right to a good supper\nthan ever she had, and might fast awhile to cool her hot blood;' and\nso cooked and ate those hens, plucking them on board the pinnace, and\nletting the feathers fall into the stream. But when William Penberthy,\nmy good comrade, saw the feathers floating away down, he asked them if\nthey were mad, to lay a trail by which the Spaniards would surely track\nthem out, if they came after them, as without doubt they would. But they\nlaughed him to scorn, and said that no Spanish cur dared follow on\nthe heels of true English mastiffs as they were, and other boastful\nspeeches; and at last, being heated with wine, began afresh to murmur at\nthe captain. And one speaking of his counsel about the island, the rest\naltogether took it amiss and out of the way; and some sprang up crying\ntreason, and others that he meant to defraud them of the plate which he\nhad promised, and others that he meant to desert them in a strange land,\nand so forth, till Mr. O., hearing the hubbub, came out to them from\nthe house, when they reviled him foully, swearing that he meant to cheat\nthem; and one Edward Stiles, a Wapping man, mad with drink, dared to say\nthat he was a fool for not giving up the prisoners to the negroes, and\nwhat was it to him if the lady roasted? the negroes should have her yet;\nand drawing his sword, ran upon the captain: for which I was about to\nstrike him through the body; but the captain, not caring to waste steel\non such a ribald, with his fist caught him such a buffet behind the ear,\nthat he fell down stark dead, and all the rest stood amazed. Then Mr.\nOxenham called out, 'All honest men who know me, and can trust me, stand\nby your lawful captain against these ruffians.' Whereon, sirs, I, and\nPenberthy my good comrade, and four Plymouth men, who had sailed with\nMr. O. in Mr. Drake's ship, and knew his trusty and valiant conditions,\ncame over to him, and swore before God to stand by him and the lady.\nThen said Mr. O. to the rest, 'Will you carry this treasure, knaves,\nor will you not? Give me an answer here.' And they refused, unless he\nwould, before they started, give each man his share. So Mr. O. waxed\nvery mad, and swore that he would never be served by men who did not\ntrust him, and so went in again; and that night was spent in great\ndisquiet, I and those five others keeping watch about the house of\nboughs till the rest fell asleep, in their drink. And next morning, when\nthe wine was gone out of them, Mr. O. asked them whether they would go\nto the hills with him, and find those negroes, and persuade them after\nall to carry the treasure. To which they agreed after awhile, thinking\nthat so they should save themselves labor; and went off with Mr.\nOxenham, leaving us six who had stood by him to watch the lady and the\ntreasure, after he had taken an oath of us that we would deal justly and\nobediently by him and by her, which God knows, gentlemen, we did. So\nhe parted with much weeping and wailing of the lady, and was gone seven\ndays; and all that time we kept that lady faithfully and honestly,\nbringing her the best we could find, and serving her upon our bended\nknees, both for her admirable beauty, and for her excellent conditions,\nfor she was certainly of some noble kin, and courteous, and without\nfear, as if she had been a very princess. But she kept always within the\nhouse, which the little maid (God bless her!) did not, but soon learned\nto play with us and we with her, so that we made great cheer of her,\ngentlemen, sailor fashion--for you know we must always have our minions\naboard to pet and amuse us--maybe a monkey, or a little dog, or a\nsinging bird, ay, or mice and spiders, if we have nothing better to\nplay withal. And she was wonderful sharp, sirs, was the little maid, and\npicked up her English from us fast, calling us jolly mariners, which I\ndoubt but she has forgotten by now, but I hope in God it be not so;\" and\ntherewith the good fellow began wiping his eyes.\n\n\"Well, sir, on the seventh day we six were down by the pinnace clearing\nher out, and the little maid with us gathering of flowers, and William\nPenberthy fishing on the bank, about a hundred yards below, when on\na sudden he leaps up and runs toward us, crying, 'Here come our hens'\nfeathers back again with a vengeance!' and so bade catch up the little\nmaid, and run for the house, for the Spaniards were upon us.\n\n\"Which was too true; for before we could win the house, there were full\neighty shot at our heels, but could not overtake us; nevertheless, some\nof them stopping, fixed their calivers and let fly, killing one of the\nPlymouth men. The rest of us escaped to the house, and catching up the\nlady, fled forth, not knowing whither we went, while the Spaniards,\nfinding the house and treasure, pursued us no farther.\n\n\"For all that day and the next we wandered in great misery, the lady\nweeping continually, and calling for Mr. Oxenham most piteously, and\nthe little maid likewise, till with much ado we found the track of our\ncomrades, and went up that as best we might: but at nightfall, by good\nhap, we met the whole crew coming back, and with them 200 negroes or\nmore, with bows and arrows. At which sight was great joy and embracing,\nand it was a strange thing, sirs, to see the lady; for before that she\nwas altogether desperate: and yet she was now a very lioness, as soon\nas she had got her love again; and prayed him earnestly not to care\nfor that gold, but to go forward to the North Sea, vowing to him in my\nhearing that she cared no more for poverty than she had cared for her\ngood name, and then--they being a little apart from the rest--pointed\nround to the green forest, and said in Spanish--which I suppose they\nknew not that I understood,--'See, all round us is Paradise. Were it not\nenough for you and me to stay here forever, and let them take the gold\nor leave it as they will?'\n\n\"To which Mr. Oxenham--'Those who lived in Paradise had not sinned as we\nhave, and would never have grown old or sick, as we shall.'\n\n\"And she--'If we do that, there are poisons enough in these woods, by\nwhich we may die in each other's arms, as would to Heaven we had died\nseven years agone!'\n\n\"But he--'No, no, my life. It stands upon my honor both to fulfil my\nbond with these men, whom I have brought hither, and to take home to\nEngland at least something of my prize as a proof of my own valor.'\n\n\"Then she smiling--'Am I not prize enough, and proof enough?' But he\nwould not be so tempted, and turning to us offered us the half of that\ntreasure, if we would go back with him, and rescue it from the Spaniard.\nAt which the lady wept and wailed much; but I took upon myself to\ncomfort her, though I was but a simple mariner, telling her that it\nstood upon Mr. Oxenham's honor; and that in England nothing was esteemed\nso foul as cowardice, or breaking word and troth betwixt man and man;\nand that better was it for him to die seven times by the Spaniards, than\nto face at home the scorn of all who sailed the seas. So, after much\nado, back they went again; I and Penberthy, and the three Plymouth men\nwhich escaped from the pinnace, keeping the lady as before.\n\n\"Well, sirs, we waited five days, having made houses of boughs as\nbefore, without hearing aught; and on the sixth we saw coming afar off\nMr. Oxenham, and with him fifteen or twenty men, who seemed very weary\nand wounded; and when we looked for the rest to be behind them, behold\nthere were no more; at which, sirs, as you may well think, our hearts\nsank within us.\n\n\"And Mr. O., coming nearer, cried out afar off, 'All is lost!' and so\nwalked into the camp without a word, and sat himself down at the foot\nof a great tree with his head between his hands, speaking neither to the\nlady or to any one, till she very pitifully kneeling before him, cursing\nherself for the cause of all his mischief, and praying him to avenge\nhimself upon that her tender body, won him hardly to look once upon her,\nafter which (as is the way of vain and unstable man) all between them\nwas as before.\n\n\"But the men were full of curses against the negroes, for their\ncowardice and treachery; yea, and against high Heaven itself, which had\nput the most part of their ammunition into the Spaniards' hands; and\ntold me, and I believe truly, how they forced the enemy awaiting them in\na little copse of great trees, well fortified with barricades of boughs,\nand having with them our two falcons, which they had taken out of the\npinnace. And how Mr. Oxenham divided both the English and the negroes\ninto two bands, that one might attack the enemy in front, and the\nother in the rear, and so set upon them with great fury, and would have\nutterly driven them out, but that the negroes, who had come on with much\nhowling, like very wild beasts, being suddenly scared with the shot and\nnoise of the ordnance, turned and fled, leaving the Englishmen alone; in\nwhich evil strait Mr. O. fought like a very Guy of Warwick, and I verily\nbelieve every man of them likewise; for there was none of them who had\nnot his shrewd scratch to show. And indeed, Mr. Oxenham's party had once\ngotten within the barricades, but the Spaniards being sheltered by\nthe tree trunks (and especially by one mighty tree, which stood as I\nremembered it, and remember it now, borne up two fathoms high upon its\nown roots, as it were upon arches and pillars), shot at them with such\nadvantage, that they had several slain, and seven more taken alive, only\namong the roots of that tree. So seeing that they could prevail nothing,\nhaving little but their pikes and swords, they were fain to give back;\nthough Mr. Oxenham swore he would not stir a foot, and making at the\nSpanish captain was borne down with pikes, and hardly pulled away by\nsome, who at last reminding him of his lady, persuaded him to come away\nwith the rest. Whereon the other party fled also; but what had become\nof them they knew not, for they took another way. And so they miserably\ndrew off, having lost in men eleven killed and seven taken alive,\nbesides five of the rascal negroes who were killed before they had time\nto run; and there was an end of the matter.*\n\n     * In the documents from which I have drawn this veracious\n     history, a note is appended to this point of Yeo's story,\n     which seems to me to smack sufficiently of the old\n     Elizabethan seaman, to be inserted at length.\n\n     \"All so far, and most after, agreeth with Lopez Vaz his\n     tale, taken from his pocket by my Lord Cumberland's mariners\n     at the river Plate, in the year 1586.  But note here his\n     vainglory and falsehood, or else fear of the Spaniard.\n\n     \"First, lest it should be seen how great an advantage the\n     Spaniards had, he maketh no mention of the English calivers,\n     nor those two pieces of ordnance which were in the pinnace.\n\n     \"Second, he saith nothing of the flight of the Cimaroons:\n     though it was evidently to be gathered from that which he\n     himself saith, that of less than seventy English were slain\n     eleven, and of the negroes but five.  And while of the\n     English seven were taken alive, yet of the negroes none.\n     And why, but because the rascals ran?\n\n     \"Thirdly, it is a thing incredible, and out of experience,\n     that eleven English should be slain and seven taken, with\n     loss only of two Spaniards killed.\n\n     \"Search now, and see (for I will not speak of mine own small\n     doings), in all those memorable voyages, which the worthy\n     and learned Mr. Hakluyt hath so painfully collected, and\n     which are to my old age next only to my Bible, whether in\n     all the fights which we have endured with the Spaniards,\n     their loss, even in victory, hath not far exceeded ours.\n     For we are both bigger of body and fiercer of spirit, being\n     even to the poorest of us (thanks so the care of our\n     illustrious princes), the best fed men of Europe, the most\n     trained to feats of strength and use of weapons, and put our\n     trust also not in any Virgin or saints, dead rags and bones,\n     painted idols which have no breath in their mouths, or St.\n     Bartholomew medals and such devil's remembrancers; but in\n     the only true God and our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom\n     whosoever trusteth, one of them shall chase a thousand.  So\n     I hold, having had good experience; and say, if they have\n     done it once, let them do it again, and kill their eleven to\n     our two, with any weapon they will, save paper bullets blown\n     out of Fame's lying trumpet.  Yet I have no quarrel with the\n     poor Portugal; for I doubt not but friend Lopez Vaz had\n     looking over his shoulder as he wrote some mighty black\n     velvet Don, with a name as long as that Don Bernaldino\n     Delgadillo de Avellaneda who set forth lately his\n     vainglorious libel of lies concerning the last and fatal\n     voyage of my dear friends Sir F. Drake and Sir John Hawkins,\n     who rest in peace, having finished their labors, as would\n     God I rested.  To whose shameless and unspeakable lying my\n     good friend Mr. Henry Savile of this county did most pithily\n     and wittily reply, stripping the ass out of his lion's skin;\n     and Sir Thomas Baskerville, general of the fleet, by my\n     advice, send him a cartel of defiance, offering to meet him\n     with choice of weapons, in any indifferent kingdom of equal\n     distance from this realm; which challenge he hath prudently\n     put in his pipe, or rather rolled it up for one of his\n     Spanish cigarros, and smoked it, and I doubt not, found it\n     foul in the mouth.\"\n\n\"But the next day, gentlemen, in came some five-and-twenty more, being\nthe wreck of the other party, and with them a few negroes; and these\nlast proved themselves no honester men than they were brave, for there\nbeing great misery among us English, and every one of us straggling\nwhere he could to get food, every day one or more who went out never\ncame back, and that caused a suspicion that the negroes had betrayed\nthem to the Spaniards, or, maybe, slain and eaten them. So these fellows\nbeing upbraided, with that altogether left us, telling us boldly,\nthat if they had eaten our fellows, we owed them a debt instead of the\nSpanish prisoners; and we, in great terror and hunger, went forward and\nover the mountains till we came to a little river which ran northward,\nwhich seemed to lead into the Northern Sea; and there Mr. O.--who, sirs,\nI will say, after his first rage was over, behaved himself all through\nlike a valiant and skilful commander--bade us cut down trees and make\ncanoes, to go down to the sea; which we began to do, with great labor\nand little profit, hewing down trees with our swords, and burning them\nout with fire, which, after much labor, we kindled; but as we were\na-burning out of the first tree, and cutting down of another, a great\nparty of negroes came upon us, and with much friendly show bade us flee\nfor our lives, for the Spaniards were upon us in great force. And so we\nwere up and away again, hardly able to drag our legs after us for hunger\nand weariness, and the broiling heat. And some were taken (God help\nthem!) and some fled with the negroes, of whom what became God alone\nknoweth; but eight or ten held on with the captain, among whom was I,\nand fled downward toward the sea for one day; but afterwards finding, by\nthe noise in the woods, that the Spaniards were on the track of us, we\nturned up again toward the inland, and coming to a cliff, climbed up\nover it, drawing up the lady and the little maid with cords of liana\n(which hang from those trees as honeysuckle does here, but exceeding\nstout and long, even to fifty fathoms); and so breaking the track, hoped\nto be out of the way of the enemy.\n\n\"By which, nevertheless, we only increased our misery. For two fell from\nthat cliff, as men asleep for very weariness, and miserably broke their\nbones; and others, whether by the great toil, or sunstrokes, or eating\nof strange berries, fell sick of fluxes and fevers; where was no drop\nof water, but rock of pumice stone as bare as the back of my hand, and\nfull, moreover, of great cracks, black and without bottom, over which\nwe had not strength to lift the sick, but were fain to leave them there\naloft, in the sunshine, like Dives in his torments, crying aloud for\na drop of water to cool their tongues; and every man a great stinking\nvulture or two sitting by him, like an ugly black fiend out of the pit,\nwaiting till the poor soul should depart out of the corpse: but nothing\ncould avail, and for the dear life we must down again and into the\nwoods, or be burned up alive upon those rocks.\n\n\"So getting down the slope on the farther side, we came into the woods\nonce more, and there wandered for many days, I know not how many;\nour shoes being gone, and our clothes all rent off us with brakes and\nbriars. And yet how the lady endured all was a marvel to see; for she\nwent barefoot many days, and for clothes was fain to wrap herself in Mr.\nOxenham's cloak; while the little maid went all but naked: but ever she\nlooked still on Mr. Oxenham, and seemed to take no care as long as he\nwas by, comforting and cheering us all with pleasant words; yea, and\nonce sitting down under a great fig-tree, sang us all to sleep with\nvery sweet music; yet, waking about midnight, I saw her sitting still\nupright, weeping very bitterly; on whom, sirs, God have mercy; for she\nwas a fair and a brave jewel.\n\n\"And so, to make few words of a sad matter, at last there were none left\nbut Mr. Oxenham and the lady and the little maid, together with me and\nWilliam Penberthy of Marazion, my good comrade. And Mr. Oxenham always\nled the lady, and Penberthy and I carried the little maid. And for food\nwe had fruits, such as we could find, and water we got from the leaves\nof certain lilies which grew on the bark of trees, which I found by\nseeing the monkeys drink at them; and the little maid called them\nmonkey-cups, and asked for them continually, making me climb for them.\nAnd so we wandered on, and upward into very high mountains, always\nfearing lest the Spaniards should track us with dogs, which made the\nlady leap up often in her sleep, crying that the bloodhounds were upon\nher. And it befell upon a day, that we came into a great wood of ferns\n(which grew not on the ground like ours, but on stems as big as a\npinnace's mast, and the bark of them was like a fine meshed net, very\nstrange to see), where was very pleasant shade, cool and green; and\nthere, gentlemen, we sat down on a bank of moss, like folk desperate and\nfordone, and every one looked the other in the face for a long while.\nAfter which I took off the bark of those ferns, for I must needs be\ndoing something to drive away thought, and began to plait slippers for\nthe little maid.\n\n\"And as I was plaiting, Mr. Oxenham said, 'What hinders us from dying\nlike men, every man falling on his own sword?' To which I answered that\nI dare not; for a wise woman had prophesied of me, sirs, that I should\ndie at sea, and yet neither by water or battle, wherefore I did not\nthink right to meddle with the Lord's purposes. And William Penberthy\nsaid, 'That he would sell his life, and that dear, but never give it\naway.' But the lady said, 'Ah, how gladly would I die! but then la\npaouvre garse,' which is in French 'the poor maid,' meaning the little\none. Then Mr. Oxenham fell into a very great weeping, a weakness I never\nsaw him in before or since; and with many tears besought me never\nto desert that little maid, whatever might befall; which I promised,\nswearing to it like a heathen, but would, if I had been able, have kept\nit like a Christian. But on a sudden there was a great cry in the\nwood, and coming through the trees on all sides Spanish arquebusiers,\na hundred strong at least, and negroes with them, who bade us stand\nor they would shoot. William Penberthy leapt up, crying 'Treason!' and\nrunning upon the nearest negro ran him through, and then another, and\nthen falling on the Spaniards, fought manfully till he was borne down\nwith pikes, and so died. But I, seeing no thing better to do, sate\nstill and finished my plaiting. And so we were all taken, and I and Mr.\nOxenham bound with cords; but the soldiers made a litter for the lady\nand child, by commandment of Senor Diego de Trees, their commander, a\nvery courteous gentleman.\n\n\"Well, sirs, we were brought down to the place where the house of boughs\nhad been by the river-side; there we went over in boats, and found\nwaiting for us certain Spanish gentlemen, and among others one old and\nill-favored man, gray-bearded and bent, in a suit of black velvet, who\nseemed to be a great man among them. And if you will believe me, Mr.\nLeigh, that was none other than the old man with the gold falcon at his\nbreast, Don Francisco Xararte by name, whom you found aboard of the Lima\nship. And had you known as much of him as I do, or as Mr. Oxenham did\neither, you had cut him up for shark's bait, or ever you let the cur\nashore again.\n\n\"Well, sirs, as soon as the lady came to shore, that old man ran upon\nher sword in hand, and would have slain her, but some there held him\nback. On which he turned to, and reviled with every foul and spiteful\nword which he could think of, so that some there bade him be silent for\nshame; and Mr. Oxenham said, 'It is worthy of you, Don Francisco, thus\nto trumpet abroad your own disgrace. Did I not tell you years ago that\nyou were a cur; and are you not proving my words for me?'\n\n\"He answered, 'English dog, would to Heaven I had never seen you!'\n\n\"And Mr. Oxenham, 'Spanish ape, would to Heaven that I had sent\nmy dagger through your herring-ribs when you passed me behind St.\nIldegonde's church, eight years last Easter-eve.' At which the old man\nturned pale, and then began again to upbraid the lady, vowing that\nhe would have her burnt alive, and other devilish words, to which she\nanswered at last--\n\n\"'Would that you had burnt me alive on my wedding morning, and spared me\neight years of misery!' And he--\n\n\"'Misery? Hear the witch, senors! Oh, have I not pampered her, heaped\nwith jewels, clothes, coaches, what not? The saints alone know what 'I\nhave spent on her. What more would she have of me?'\n\n\"To which she answered only but this one word, 'Fool!' but in so\nterrible a voice, though low, that they who were about to laugh at the\nold pantaloon, were more minded to weep for her.\n\n\"'Fool!' she said again, after a while, 'I will waste no words upon you.\nI would have driven a dagger to your heart months ago, but that I\nwas loath to set you free so soon from your gout and your rheumatism.\nSelfish and stupid, know when you bought my body from my parents, you\ndid not buy my soul! Farewell, my love, my life! and farewell, senors!\nMay you be more merciful to your daughters than my parents were to me!'\nAnd so, catching a dagger from the girdle of one of the soldiers, smote\nherself to the heart, and fell dead before them all.\n\n\"At which Mr. Oxenham smiled, and said, 'That was worthy of us both. If\nyou will unbind my hands, senors, I shall be most happy to copy so fair\na schoolmistress.'\n\n\"But Don Diego shook his head, and said--\n\n\"'It were well for you, valiant senor, were I at liberty to do so; but\non questioning those of your sailors whom I have already taken, I cannot\nhear that you have any letters of license, either from the queen of\nEngland, or any other potentate. I am compelled, therefore, to ask you\nwhether this is so; for it is a matter of life and death.'\n\n\"To which Mr. Oxenham answered merrily, that so it was: but that he\nwas not aware that any potentate's license was required to permit a\ngentleman's meeting his lady love; and that as for the gold which they\nhad taken, if they had never allowed that fresh and fair young May to be\nforced into marrying that old January, he should never have meddled with\ntheir gold; so that was rather their fault than his. And added, that if\nhe was to be hanged, as he supposed, the only favor which he asked for\nwas a long drop and no priests. And all the while, gentlemen, he still\nkept his eyes fixed on the lady's corpse, till he was led away with me,\nwhile all that stood by, God reward them for it, lamented openly the\ntragical end of those two sinful lovers.\n\n\"And now, sirs, what befell me after that matters little; for I never\nsaw Captain Oxenham again, nor ever shall in this life.\"\n\n\"He was hanged, then?\"\n\n\"So I heard for certain the next year, and with him the gunner and\nsundry more: but some were given away for slaves to the Spaniards,\nand may be alive now, unless, like me, they have fallen into the cruel\nclutches of the Inquisition. For the Inquisition now, gentlemen, claims\nthe bodies and souls of all heretics all over the world (as the devils\ntold me with their own lips, when I pleaded that I was no Spanish\nsubject); and none that it catches, whether peaceable merchants or\nshipwrecked mariners, but must turn or burn.\"\n\n\"But how did you get into the Inquisition?\"\n\n\"Why, sir, after we were taken, we set forth to go down the river again;\nand the old Don took the little maid with him in one boat (and bitterly\nshe screeched at parting from us and from the poor dead corpse), and Mr.\nOxenham with Don Diego de Trees in another, and I in a third. And from\nthe Spaniards I learnt that we were to be taken down to Lima, to the\nViceroy; but that the old man lived hard by Panama, and was going\nstraight back to Panama forthwith with the little maid. But they said,\n'It will be well for her if she ever gets there, for the old man swears\nshe is none of his, and would have left her behind him in the woods,\nnow, if Don Diego had not shamed him out of it.' And when I heard that,\nseeing that there was nothing but death before me, I made up my mind\nto escape; and the very first night, sirs, by God's help, I did it,\nand went southward away into the forest, avoiding the tracks of the\nCimaroons, till I came to an Indian town. And there, gentlemen, I got\nmore mercy from heathens than ever I had from Christians; for when they\nfound that I was no Spaniard, they fed me and gave me a house, and\na wife (and a good wife she was to me), and painted me all over in\npatterns, as you see; and because I had some knowledge of surgery and\nblood-letting, and my fleams in my pocket, which were worth to me a\nfortune, I rose to great honor among them, though they taught me more of\nsimples than ever I taught them of surgery. So I lived with them merrily\nenough, being a very heathen like them, or indeed worse, for they\nworshipped their Xemes, but I nothing. And in time my wife bare me a\nchild; in looking at whose sweet face, gentlemen, I forgot Mr. Oxenham\nand his little maid, and my oath, ay, and my native land also. Wherefore\nit was taken from me, else had I lived and died as the beasts which\nperish; for one night, after we were all lain down, came a noise outside\nthe town, and I starting up saw armed men and calivers shining in the\nmoonlight, and heard one read in Spanish, with a loud voice, some fool's\nsermon, after their custom when they hunt the poor Indians, how God had\ngiven to St. Peter the dominion of the whole earth, and St. Peter\nagain the Indies to the Catholic king; wherefore, if they would all\nbe baptized and serve the Spaniard, they should have some monkey's\nallowance or other of more kicks than pence; and if not, then have\nat them with fire and sword; but I dare say your worships know that\ndevilish trick of theirs better than I.\"\n\n\"I know it, man. Go on.\"\n\n\"Well--no sooner were the words spoken than, without waiting to hear\nwhat the poor innocents within would answer (though that mattered\nlittle, for they understood not one word of it), what do the villains\nbut let fly right into the town with their calivers, and then rush\nin, sword in hand, killing pell-mell all they met, one of which shots,\ngentlemen, passing through the doorway, and close by me, struck my poor\nwife to the heart, that she never spoke word more. I, catching up the\nbabe from her breast, tried to run: but when I saw the town full of\nthem, and their dogs with them in leashes, which was yet worse, I knew\nall was lost, and sat down again by the corpse with the babe on my\nknees, waiting the end, like one stunned and in a dream; for now I\nthought God from whom I had fled had surely found me out, as He did\nJonah, and the punishment of all my sins was come. Well, gentlemen, they\ndragged me out, and all the young men and women, and chained us together\nby the neck; and one, catching the pretty babe out of my arms, calls\nfor water and a priest (for they had their shavelings with them), and no\nsooner was it christened than, catching the babe by the heels, he dashed\nout its brains,--oh! gentlemen, gentlemen!--against the ground, as if it\nhad been a kitten; and so did they to several more innocents that night,\nafter they had christened them; saying it was best for them to go to\nheaven while they were still sure thereof; and so marched us all for\nslaves, leaving the old folk and the wounded to die at leisure. But when\nmorning came, and they knew by my skin that I was no Indian, and by my\nspeech that I was no Spaniard, they began threatening me with torments,\ntill I confessed that I was an Englishman, and one of Oxenham's crew.\nAt that says the leader, 'Then you shall to Lima, to hang by the side of\nyour captain the pirate;' by which I first knew that my poor captain was\ncertainly gone; but alas for me! the priest steps in and claims me for\nhis booty, calling me Lutheran, heretic, and enemy of God; and so, to\nmake short a sad story, to the Inquisition at Cartagena I went, where\nwhat I suffered, gentlemen, were as disgustful for you to hear, as\nunmanly for me to complain of; but so it was, that being twice racked,\nand having endured the water-torment as best I could, I was put to the\nscarpines, whereof I am, as you see, somewhat lame of one leg to this\nday. At which I could abide no more, and so, wretch that I am! denied my\nGod, in hope to save my life; which indeed I did, but little it profited\nme; for though I had turned to their superstition, I must have two\nhundred stripes in the public place, and then go to the galleys for\nseven years. And there, gentlemen, ofttimes I thought that it had been\nbetter for me to have been burned at once and for all: but you know\nas well as I what a floating hell of heat and cold, hunger and thirst,\nstripes and toil, is every one of those accursed craft. In which hell,\nnevertheless, gentlemen, I found the road to heaven,--I had almost said\nheaven itself. For it fell out, by God's mercy, that my next comrade was\nan Englishman like myself, a young man of Bristol, who, as he told me,\nhad been some manner of factor on board poor Captain Barker's ship, and\nhad been a preacher among the Anabaptists here in England. And, oh! Sir\nRichard Grenville, if that man had done for you what he did for me, you\nwould never say a word against those who serve the same Lord, because\nthey don't altogether hold with you. For from time to time, sir, seeing\nme altogether despairing and furious, like a wild beast in a pit, he set\nbefore me in secret earnestly the sweet promises of God in Christ,--who\nsays, 'Come to me, all ye that are heavy laden, and I will refresh\nyou; and though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as\nsnow,--till all that past sinful life of mine looked like a dream when\none awaketh, and I forgot all my bodily miseries in the misery of my\nsoul, so did I loathe and hate myself for my rebellion against that\nloving God who had chosen me before the foundation of the world, and\ncome to seek and save me when I was lost; and falling into very despair\nat the burden of my heinous sins, knew no peace until I gained sweet\nassurance that my Lord had hanged my burden upon His cross, and washed\nmy sinful soul in His most sinless blood, Amen!\"\n\nAnd Sir Richard Grenville said Amen also.\n\n\"But, gentlemen, if that sweet youth won a soul to Christ, he paid\nas dearly for it as ever did saint of God. For after a three or four\nmonths, when I had been all that while in sweet converse with him, and\nI may say in heaven in the midst of hell, there came one night to the\nbarranco at Lima, where we were kept when on shore, three black devils\nof the Holy Office, and carried him off without a word, only saying to\nme, 'Look that your turn come not next, for we hear that you have had\nmuch talk with the villain.' And at these words I was so struck cold\nwith terror that I swooned right away, and verily, if they had taken me\nthere and then, I should have denied my God again, for my faith was but\nyoung and weak: but instead, they left me aboard the galley for a few\nmonths more (that was a whole voyage to Panama and back), in daily dread\nlest I should find myself in their cruel claws again--and then nothing\nfor me, but to burn as a relapsed heretic. But when we came back to\nLima, the officers came on board again, and said to me, 'That heretic\nhas confessed naught against you, so we will leave you for this time:\nbut because you have been seen talking with him so much, and the Holy\nOffice suspects your conversion to be but a rotten one, you are adjudged\nto the galleys for the rest of your life in perpetual servitude.'\"\n\n\"But what became of him?\" asked Amyas.\n\n\"He was burned, sir, a day or two before we got to Lima, and five others\nwith him at the same stake, of whom two were Englishmen; old comrades of\nmine, as I guess.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Amyas, \"we heard of that when we were off Lima; and they\nsaid, too, that there were six more lying still in prison, to be burnt\nin a few days. If we had had our fleet with us (as we should have had if\nit had not been for John Winter) we would have gone in and rescued them\nall, poor wretches, and sacked the town to boot: but what could we do\nwith one ship?\"\n\n\"Would to God you had, sir; for the story was true enough; and among\nthem, I heard, were two young ladies of quality and their confessor,\nwho came to their ends for reproving out of Scripture the filthy and\nloathsome living of those parts, which, as I saw well enough and too\nwell, is liker to Sodom than to a Christian town; but God will avenge\nHis saints, and their sins. Amen.\"\n\n\"Amen,\" said Sir Richard: \"but on with thy tale, for it is as strange as\never man heard.\"\n\n\"Well, gentlemen, when I heard that I must end my days in that galley, I\nwas for awhile like a madman: but in a day or two there came over me, I\nknow not how, a full assurance of salvation, both for this life and the\nlife to come, such as I had never had before; and it was revealed to me\n(I speak the truth, gentlemen, before Heaven) that now I had been tried\nto the uttermost, and that my deliverance was at hand.\n\n\"And all the way up to Panama (that was after we had laden the\n'Cacafuogo') I cast in my mind how to escape, and found no way: but just\nas I was beginning to lose heart again, a door was opened by the Lord's\nown hand; for (I know not why) we were marched across from Panama to\nNombre, which had never happened before, and there put all together into\na great barranco close by the quay-side, shackled, as is the fashion, to\none long bar that ran the whole length of the house. And the very first\nnight that we were there, I, looking out of the window, spied, lying\nclose aboard of the quay, a good-sized caravel well armed and just\nloading for sea; and the land breeze blew off very strong, so that the\nsailors were laying out a fresh warp to hold her to the shore. And it\ncame into my mind, that if we were aboard of her, we should be at sea\nin five minutes; and looking at the quay, I saw all the soldiers who had\nguarded us scattered about drinking and gambling, and some going into\ntaverns to refresh themselves after their journey. That was just at\nsundown; and half an hour after, in comes the gaoler to take a last look\nat us for the night, and his keys at his girdle. Whereon, sirs (whether\nby madness, or whether by the spirit which gave Samson strength to rend\nthe lion), I rose against him as he passed me, without forethought or\ntreachery of any kind, chained though I was, caught him by the head,\nand threw him there and then against the wall, that he never spoke word\nafter; and then with his keys freed myself and every soul in that\nroom, and bid them follow me, vowing to kill any man who disobeyed my\ncommands. They followed, as men astounded and leaping out of night into\nday, and death into life, and so aboard that caravel and out of the\nharbor (the Lord only knows how, who blinded the eyes of the idolaters),\n'with no more hurt than a few chance-shot from the soldiers on the quay.\nBut my tale has been over-long already, gentlemen--\"\n\n\"Go on till midnight, my good fellow, if you will.\"\n\n\"Well, sirs, they chose me for captain, and a certain Genoese for\nlieutenant, and away to go. I would fain have gone ashore after all, and\nback to Panama to hear news of the little maid: but that would have been\nbut a fool's errand. Some wanted to turn pirates: but I, and the Genoese\ntoo, who was a prudent man, though an evil one, persuaded them to run\nfor England and get employment in the Netherland wars, assuring them\nthat there would be no safety in the Spanish Main, when once our escape\ngot wind. And the more part being of one mind, for England we sailed,\nwatering at the Barbadoes because it was desolate; and so eastward\ntoward the Canaries. In which voyage what we endured (being taken by\nlong calms), by scurvy, calentures, hunger, and thirst, no tongue can\ntell. Many a time were we glad to lay out sheets at night to catch\nthe dew, and suck them in the morning; and he that had a noggin of\nrain-water out of the scuppers was as much sought to as if he had been\nAdelantado of all the Indies; till of a hundred and forty poor wretches\na hundred and ten were dead, blaspheming God and man, and above all\nme and the Genoese, for taking the Europe voyage, as if I had not sins\nenough of my own already. And last of all, when we thought ourselves\nsafe, we were wrecked by southwesters on the coast of Brittany, near to\nCape Race, from which but nine souls of us came ashore with their lives;\nand so to Brest, where I found a Flushinger who carried me to Falmouth\nand so ends my tale, in which if I have said one word more or less than\ntruth, I can wish myself no worse, than to have it all to undergo a\nsecond time.\"\n\nAnd his voice, as he finished, sank from very weariness of soul; while\nSir Richard sat opposite him in silence, his elbows on the table,\nhis cheeks on his doubled fists, looking him through and through with\nkindling eyes. No one spoke for several minutes; and then--\n\n\"Amyas, you have heard this story. You believe it?\"\n\n\"Every word, sir, or I should not have the heart of a Christian man.\"\n\n\"So do I. Anthony!\"\n\nThe butler entered.\n\n\"Take this man to the buttery; clothe him comfortably, and feed him with\nthe best; and bid the knaves treat him as if he were their own father.\"\n\nBut Yeo lingered.\n\n\"If I might be so bold as to ask your worship a favor?--\"\n\n\"Anything in reason, my brave fellow.\"\n\n\"If your worship could put me in the way of another adventure to the\nIndies?\"\n\n\"Another! Hast not had enough of the Spaniards already?\"\n\n\"Never enough, sir, while one of the idolatrous tyrants is left\nunhanged,\" said he, with a right bitter smile. \"But it's not for that\nonly, sir: but my little maid--Oh, sir! my little maid, that I swore to\nMr. Oxenham to look to, and never saw her from that day to this! I must\nfind her, sir, or I shall go mad, I believe. Not a night but she comes\nand calls to me in my dreams, the poor darling; and not a morning but\nwhen I wake there is my oath lying on my soul, like a great black cloud,\nand I no nearer the keeping of it. I told that poor young minister of it\nwhen we were in the galleys together; and he said oaths were oaths, and\nkeep it I must; and keep it I will, sir, if you'll but help me.\"\n\n\"Have patience, man. God will take as good care of thy little maid as\never thou wilt.\"\n\n\"I know it, sir. I know it: but faith's weak, sir! and oh! if she were\nbred up a Papist and an idolater; wouldn't her blood be on my head then,\nsir? Sooner than that, sooner than that, I'd be in the Inquisition again\nto-morrow, I would!\"\n\n\"My good fellow, there are no adventures to the Indies forward now: but\nif you want to fight Spaniards, here is a gentleman will show you the\nway. Amyas, take him with you to Ireland. If he has learnt half the\nlessons God has set him to learn, he ought to stand you in good stead.\"\n\nYeo looked eagerly at the young giant.\n\n\"Will you have me, sir? There's few matters I can't turn my hand to:\nand maybe you'll be going to the Indies again, some day, eh? and take me\nwith you? I'd serve your turn well, though I say it, either for gunner\nor for pilot. I know every stone and tree from Nombre to Panama, and all\nthe ports of both the seas. You'll never be content, I'll warrant, till\nyou've had another turn along the gold coasts, will you now?\"\n\nAmyas laughed, and nodded; and the bargain was concluded.\n\nSo out went Yeo to eat, and Amyas having received his despatches, got\nready for his journey home.\n\n\"Go the short way over the moors, lad; and send back Cary's gray when\nyou can. You must not lose an hour, but be ready to sail the moment the\nwind goes about.\"\n\nSo they started: but as Amyas was getting into the saddle, he saw that\nthere was some stir among the servants, who seemed to keep carefully out\nof Yeo's way, whispering and nodding mysteriously; and just as his foot\nwas in the stirrup, Anthony, the old butler, plucked him back.\n\n\"Dear father alive, Mr. Amyas!\" whispered he: \"and you ben't going by\nthe moor road all alone with that chap?\"\n\n\"Why not, then? I'm too big for him to eat, I reckon.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Amyas! he's not right, I tell you; not company for a\nChristian--to go forth with creatures as has flames of fire in their\ninwards; 'tis temptation of Providence, indeed, then, it is.\"\n\n\"Tale of a tub.\"\n\n\"Tale of a Christian, sir. There was two boys pig-minding, seed him at\nit down the hill, beside a maiden that was taken mazed (and no wonder,\npoor soul!) and lying in screeching asterisks now down to the mill--you\nask as you go by--and saw the flames come out of the mouth of mun, and\nthe smoke out of mun's nose like a vire-drake, and the roaring of mun\nlike the roaring of ten thousand bulls. Oh, sir! and to go with he after\ndark over moor! 'Tis the devil's devices, sir, against you, because\nyou'm going against his sarvants the Pope of Room and the Spaniard; and\nyou'll be Pixy-led, sure as life, and locked into a bog, you will, and\nsee mun vanish away to fire and brimstone, like a jack-o'-lantern. Oh,\nhave a care, then, have a care!\"\n\nAnd the old man wrung his hands, while Amyas, bursting with laughter,\nrode off down the park, with the unconscious Yeo at his stirrup,\nchatting away about the Indies, and delighting Amyas more and more by\nhis shrewdness, high spirit, and rough eloquence.\n\nThey had gone ten miles or more; the day began to draw in, and the\nwestern wind to sweep more cold and cheerless every moment, when Amyas,\nknowing that there was not an inn hard by around for many a mile ahead,\ntook a pull at a certain bottle which Lady Grenville had put into his\nholster, and then offered Yeo a pull also.\n\nHe declined; he had meat and drink too about him, Heaven be praised!\n\n\"Meat and drink? Fall to, then, man, and don't stand on manners.\"\n\nWhereon Yeo, seeing an old decayed willow by a brook, went to it, and\ntook therefrom some touchwood, to which he set a light with his knife\nand a stone, while Amyas watched, a little puzzled and startled,\nas Yeo's fiery reputation came into his mind. Was he really a\nsalamander-sprite, and going to warm his inside by a meal of burning\ntinder? But now Yeo, in his solemn methodical way, pulled out of his\nbosom a brown leaf, and began rolling a piece of it up neatly to the\nsize of his little finger; and then, putting the one end into his mouth\nand the other on the tinder, sucked at it till it was a-light; and\ndrinking down the smoke, began puffing it out again at his nostrils with\na grunt of deepest satisfaction, and resumed his dog-trot by Amyas's\nside, as if he had been a walking chimney.\n\nOn which Amyas burst into a loud laugh, and cried--\n\n\"Why, no wonder they said you breathed fire? Is not that the Indians'\ntobacco?\"\n\n\"Yea, verily, Heaven be praised! but did you never see it before?\"\n\n\"Never, though we heard talk of it along the coast; but we took it for\none more Spanish lie. Humph--well, live and learn!\"\n\n\"Ah, sir, no lie, but a blessed truth, as I can tell, who have ere now\ngone in the strength of this weed three days and nights without eating;\nand therefore, sir, the Indians always carry it with them on their\nwar-parties: and no wonder; for when all things were made none was made\nbetter than this; to be a lone man's companion, a bachelor's friend,\na hungry man's food, a sad man's cordial, a wakeful man's sleep, and a\nchilly man's fire, sir; while for stanching of wounds, purging of rheum,\nand settling of the stomach, there's no herb like unto it under the\ncanopy of heaven.\"\n\nThe truth of which eulogium Amyas tested in after years, as shall be\nfully set forth in due place and time. But \"Mark in the meanwhile,\" says\none of the veracious chroniclers from whom I draw these facts, writing\nseemingly in the palmy days of good Queen Anne, and \"not having\" (as he\nsays) \"before his eyes the fear of that misocapnic Solomon James I. or\nof any other lying Stuart,\" \"that not to South Devon, but to North; not\nto Sir Walter Raleigh, but to Sir Amyas Leigh; not to the banks of Dart,\nbut to the banks of Torridge, does Europe owe the day-spring of the\nlatter age, that age of smoke which shall endure and thrive, when the\nage of brass shall have vanished like those of iron and of gold; for\nwhereas Mr. Lane is said to have brought home that divine weed (as\nSpenser well names it) from Virginia, in the year 1584, it is hereby\nindisputable that full four years earlier, by the bridge of Putford in\nthe Torridge moors (which all true smokers shall hereafter visit as a\nhallowed spot and point of pilgrimage) first twinkled that fiery beacon\nand beneficent lodestar of Bidefordian commerce, to spread hereafter\nfrom port to port and peak to peak, like the watch-fires which\nproclaimed the coming of the Armada or the fall of Troy, even to the\nshores of the Bosphorus, the peaks of the Caucasus, and the farthest\nisles of the Malayan sea, while Bideford, metropolis of tobacco, saw her\nPool choked with Virginian traders, and the pavement of her Bridgeland\nStreet groaning beneath the savory bales of roll Trinadado, leaf, and\npudding; and her grave burghers, bolstered and blocked out of their own\nhouses by the scarce less savory stock-fish casks which filled cellar,\nparlor, and attic, were fain to sit outside the door, a silver pipe\nin every strong right hand, and each left hand chinking cheerfully the\ndoubloons deep lodged in the auriferous caverns of their trunk-hose;\nwhile in those fairy-rings of fragrant mist, which circled round their\ncontemplative brows, flitted most pleasant visions of Wiltshire farmers\njogging into Sherborne fair, their heaviest shillings in their pockets,\nto buy (unless old Aubrey lies) the lotus-leaf of Torridge for its\nweight in silver, and draw from thence, after the example of the\nCaciques of Dariena, supplies of inspiration much needed, then as now,\nin those Gothamite regions. And yet did these improve, as Englishmen,\nupon the method of those heathen savages; for the latter (so Salvation\nYeo reported as a truth, and Dampier's surgeon Mr. Wafer after him),\nwhen they will deliberate of war or policy, sit round in the hut of the\nchief; where being placed, enter to them a small boy with a cigarro of\nthe bigness of a rolling-pin and puffs the smoke thereof into the face\nof each warrior, from the eldest to the youngest; while they, putting\ntheir hand funnel-wise round their mouths, draw into the sinuosities of\nthe brain that more than Delphic vapor of prophecy; which boy presently\nfalls down in a swoon, and being dragged out by the heels and laid by to\nsober, enter another to puff at the sacred cigarro, till he is dragged\nout likewise; and so on till the tobacco is finished, and the seed of\nwisdom has sprouted in every soul into the tree of meditation, bearing\nthe flowers of eloquence, and in due time the fruit of valiant action.\"\nWith which quaint fact (for fact it is, in spite of the bombast) I end\nthe present chapter.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nHOW THE NOBLE BROTHERHOOD OF THE ROSE WAS FOUNDED\n\n     \"It is virtue, yea virtue, gentlemen, that maketh gentlemen; that\n     maketh the poor rich, the base-born noble, the subject a sovereign,\n     the deformed beautiful, the sick whole, the weak strong, the most\n     miserable most happy.  There are two principal and peculiar gifts\n     in the nature of man, knowledge and reason; the one commandeth, and\n     the other obeyeth: these things neither the whirling wheel of\n     fortune can change, neither the deceitful cavillings of worldlings\n     separate, neither sickness abate, neither age abolish.\"--LILLY's\n     Euphues, 1586.\n\nIt now falls to my lot to write of the foundation of that most\nchivalrous brotherhood of the Rose, which after a few years made itself\nnot only famous in its native country of Devon, but formidable, as will\nbe related hereafter, both in Ireland and in the Netherlands, in the\nSpanish Main and the heart of South America. And if this chapter shall\nseem to any Quixotic and fantastical, let them recollect that the\ngeneration who spoke and acted thus in matters of love and honor were,\nnevertheless, practised and valiant soldiers, and prudent and crafty\npoliticians; that he who wrote the \"Arcadia\" was at the same time, in\nspite of his youth, one of the subtlest diplomatists of Europe; that\nthe poet of the \"Faerie Queene\" was also the author of \"The State\nof Ireland;\" and if they shall quote against me with a sneer Lilly's\n\"Euphues\" itself, I shall only answer by asking--Have they ever read\nit? For if they have done so, I pity them if they have not found it, in\nspite of occasional tediousness and pedantry, as brave, righteous, and\npious a book as man need look into: and wish for no better proof of\nthe nobleness and virtue of the Elizabethan age, than the fact that\n\"Euphues\" and the \"Arcadia\" were the two popular romances of the day. It\nmay have suited the purposes of Sir Walter Scott, in his cleverly drawn\nSir Piercie Shafton, to ridicule the Euphuists, and that affectatam\ncomitatem of the travelled English of which Languet complains; but over\nand above the anachronism of the whole character (for, to give but one\ninstance, the Euphuist knight talks of Sidney's quarrel with Lord Oxford\nat least ten years before it happened), we do deny that Lilly's book\ncould, if read by any man of common sense, produce such a coxcomb,\nwhose spiritual ancestors would rather have been Gabriel Harvey and\nLord Oxford,--if indeed the former has not maligned the latter, and\nill-tempered Tom Nash maligned the maligner in his turn.\n\nBut, indeed, there is a double anachronism in Sir Piercie; for he does\nnot even belong to the days of Sidney, but to those worse times which\nbegan in the latter years of Elizabeth, and after breaking her mighty\nheart, had full license to bear their crop of fools' heads in the\nprofligate days of James. Of them, perhaps, hereafter. And in the\nmeanwhile, let those who have not read \"Euphues\" believe that, if they\ncould train a son after the fashion of his Ephoebus, to the great\nsaving of their own money and his virtue, all fathers, even in these\nmoney-making days, would rise up and call them blessed. Let us\nrather open our eyes, and see in these old Elizabeth gallants our own\nancestors, showing forth with the luxuriant wildness of youth all the\nvirtues which still go to the making of a true Englishman. Let us not\nonly see in their commercial and military daring, in their political\nastuteness, in their deep reverence for law, and in their solemn sense\nof the great calling of the English nation, the antitypes or rather\nthe examples of our own: but let us confess that their chivalry is only\nanother garb of that beautiful tenderness and mercy which is now, as\nit was then, the twin sister of English valor; and even in their\nextravagant fondness for Continental manners and literature, let us\nrecognize that old Anglo-Norman teachableness and wide-heartedness,\nwhich has enabled us to profit by the wisdom and civilization of all\nages and of all lands, without prejudice to our own distinctive national\ncharacter.\n\nAnd so I go to my story, which, if any one dislikes, he has but to turn\nthe leaf till he finds pasturage which suits him better.\n\nAmyas could not sail the next day, or the day after; for the southwester\nfreshened, and blew three parts of a gale dead into the bay. So having\ngot the \"Mary Grenville\" down the river into Appledore pool, ready to\nstart with the first shift of wind, he went quietly home; and when\nhis mother started on a pillion behind the old serving-man to ride\nto Clovelly, where Frank lay wounded, he went in with her as far as\nBideford, and there met, coming down the High Street, a procession of\nhorsemen headed by Will Cary, who, clad cap-a-pie in a shining armor,\nsword on thigh, and helmet at saddle-bow, looked as gallant a young\ngentleman as ever Bideford dames peeped at from door and window. Behind\nhim, upon country ponies, came four or five stout serving-men, carrying\nhis lances and baggage, and their own long-bows, swords, and bucklers;\nand behind all, in a horse-litter, to Mrs. Leigh's great joy, Master\nFrank himself. He deposed that his wounds were only flesh-wounds, the\ndagger having turned against his ribs; that he must see the last of\nhis brother; and that with her good leave he would not come home to\nBurrough, but take up his abode with Cary in the Ship Tavern, close to\nthe Bridge-foot. This he did forthwith, and settling himself on a couch,\nheld his levee there in state, mobbed by all the gossips of the town,\nnot without white fibs as to who had brought him into that sorry plight.\n\nBut in the meanwhile he and Amyas concocted a scheme, which was put\ninto effect the next day (being market-day); first by the innkeeper, who\nbegan under Amyas's orders a bustle of roasting, boiling, and frying,\nunparalleled in the annals of the Ship Tavern; and next by Amyas\nhimself, who, going out into the market, invited as many of his old\nschoolfellows, one by one apart, as Frank had pointed out to him, to a\nmerry supper and a \"rowse\" thereon consequent; by which crafty scheme,\nin came each of Rose Salterne's gentle admirers, and found himself, to\nhis considerable disgust, seated at the same table with six rivals, to\nnone of whom had he spoken for the last six months. However, all were\ntoo well bred to let the Leighs discern as much; and they (though, of\ncourse, they knew all) settled their guests, Frank on his couch lying\nat the head of the table, and Amyas taking the bottom: and contrived, by\nfilling all mouths with good things, to save them the pain of speaking\nto each other till the wine should have loosened their tongues and\nwarmed their hearts. In the meanwhile both Amyas and Frank, ignoring the\nsilence of their guests with the most provoking good-humor, chatted,\nand joked, and told stories, and made themselves such good company, that\nWill Cary, who always found merriment infectious, melted into a jest,\nand then into another, and finding good-humor far more pleasant than\nbad, tried to make Mr. Coffin laugh, and only made him bow, and to\nmake Mr. Fortescue laugh, and only made him frown; and unabashed\nnevertheless, began playing his light artillery upon the waiters, till\nhe drove them out of the room bursting with laughter.\n\nSo far so good. And when the cloth was drawn, and sack and sugar became\nthe order of the day, and \"Queen and Bible\" had been duly drunk with all\nthe honors, Frank tried a fresh move, and--\n\n\"I have a toast, gentlemen--here it is. 'The gentlemen of the Irish\nwars; and may Ireland never be without a St. Leger to stand by a\nFortescue, a Fortescue to stand by a St. Leger, and a Chichester to\nstand by both.'\"\n\nWhich toast of course involved the drinking the healths of the three\nrepresentatives of those families, and their returning thanks, and\npaying a compliment each to the other's house: and so the ice cracked a\nlittle further; and young Fortescue proposed the health of \"Amyas Leigh\nand all bold mariners;\" to which Amyas replied by a few blunt kindly\nwords, \"that he wished to know no better fortune than to sail round the\nworld again with the present company as fellow-adventurers, and so give\nthe Spaniards another taste of the men of Devon.\"\n\nAnd by this time, the wine going down sweetly, caused the lips of them\nthat were asleep to speak; till the ice broke up altogether, and every\nman began talking like a rational Englishman to the man who sat next\nhim.\n\n\"And now, gentlemen,\" said Frank, who saw that it was the fit moment\nfor the grand assault which he had planned all along; \"let me give you\na health which none of you, I dare say, will refuse to drink with heart\nand soul as well as with lips;--the health of one whom beauty and virtue\nhave so ennobled, that in their light the shadow of lowly birth\nis unseen;--the health of one whom I would proclaim as peerless in\nloveliness, were it not that every gentleman here has sisters, who might\nwell challenge from her the girdle of Venus: and yet what else dare\nI say, while those same lovely ladies who, if they but use their own\nmirrors, must needs be far better judges of beauty than I can be, have\nin my own hearing again and again assigned the palm to her? Surely, if\nthe goddesses decide among themselves the question of the golden apple,\nParis himself must vacate the judgment-seat. Gentlemen, your hearts, I\ndoubt not, have already bid you, as my unworthy lips do now, to drink\n'The Rose of Torridge.'\"\n\nIf the Rose of Torridge herself had walked into the room, she could\nhardly have caused more blank astonishment than Frank's bold speech.\nEvery guest turned red, and pale, and red again, and looked at the other\nas much as to say, \"What right has any one but I to drink her? Lift\nyour glass, and I will dash it out of your hand;\" but Frank, with sweet\neffrontery, drank \"The health of the Rose of Torridge, and a double\nhealth to that worthy gentleman, whosoever he may be, whom she is fated\nto honor with her love!\"\n\n\"Well done, cunning Frank Leigh!\" cried blunt Will Cary; \"none of us\ndare quarrel with you now, however much we may sulk at each other. For\nthere's none of us, I'll warrant, but thinks that she likes him the best\nof all; and so we are bound to believe that you have drunk our healths\nall round.\"\n\n\"And so I have: and what better thing can you do, gentlemen, than to\ndrink each other's healths all round likewise: and so show yourselves\ntrue gentlemen, true Christians, ay, and true lovers? For what is love\n(let me speak freely to you, gentlemen and guests), what is love, but\nthe very inspiration of that Deity whose name is Love? Be sure that not\nwithout reason did the ancients feign Eros to be the eldest of the gods,\nby whom the jarring elements of chaos were attuned into harmony and\norder. How, then, shall lovers make him the father of strife? Shall\nPsyche wed with Cupid, to bring forth a cockatrice's egg? or the soul be\nfilled with love, the likeness of the immortals, to burn with envy and\njealousy, division and distrust? True, the rose has its thorn: but it\nleaves poison and stings to the nettle. Cupid has his arrow: but he\nhurls no scorpions. Venus is awful when despised, as the daughters of\nProetus found: but her handmaids are the Graces, not the Furies. Surely\nhe who loves aright will not only find love lovely, but become himself\nlovely also. I speak not to reprehend you, gentlemen; for to you (as\nyour piercing wits have already perceived, to judge by your honorable\nblushes) my discourse tends; but to point you, if you will but permit\nme, to that rock which I myself have, I know not by what Divine good\nhap, attained; if, indeed, I have attained it, and am not about to be\nwashed off again by the next tide.\"\n\nFrank's rapid and fantastic oratory, utterly unexpected as it was, had\nas yet left their wits no time to set their tempers on fire; but when,\nweak from his wounds, he paused for breath, there was a haughty\nmurmur from more than one young gentleman, who took his speech as\nan impertinent interference with each man's right to make a fool of\nhimself; and Mr. Coffin, who had sat quietly bolt upright, and looking\nat the opposite wall, now rose as quietly, and with a face which tried\nto look utterly unconcerned, was walking out of the room: another\nminute, and Lady Bath's prophecy about the feast of the Lapithae might\nhave come true.\n\nBut Frank's heart and head never failed him.\n\n\"Mr. Coffin!\" said he, in a tone which compelled that gentleman to turn\nround, and so brought him under the power of a face which none could\nhave beheld for five minutes and borne malice, so imploring, tender,\nearnest was it. \"My dear Mr. Coffin! If my earnestness has made me\nforget even for a moment the bounds of courtesy, let me entreat you to\nforgive me. Do not add to my heavy griefs, heavy enough already, the\ngrief of losing a friend. Only hear me patiently to the end (generously,\nI know, you will hear me); and then, if you are still incensed, I can\nbut again entreat your forgiveness a second time.\"\n\nMr. Coffin, to tell the truth, had at that time never been to Court; and\nhe was therefore somewhat jealous of Frank, and his Court talk, and his\nCourt clothes, and his Court company; and moreover, being the eldest\nof the guests, and only two years younger than Frank himself, he was a\nlittle nettled at being classed in the same category with some who were\nscarce eighteen. And if Frank had given the least hint which seemed\nto assume his own superiority, all had been lost: but when, instead\nthereof, he sued in forma pauperis, and threw himself upon Coffin's\nmercy, the latter, who was a true-hearted man enough, and after all had\nknown Frank ever since either of them could walk, had nothing to do but\nto sit down again and submit, while Frank went on more earnestly than\never.\n\n\"Believe me; believe me, Mr. Coffin, and gentlemen all, I no more\narrogate to myself a superiority over you than does the sailor hurled\non shore by the surge fancy himself better than his comrade who is still\nbattling with the foam. For I too, gentlemen,--let me confess it, that\nby confiding in you I may, perhaps, win you to confide in me,--have\nloved, ay and do love, where you love also. Do not start. Is it a matter\nof wonder that the sun which has dazzled you has dazzled me; that\nthe lodestone which has drawn you has drawn me? Do not frown, either,\ngentlemen. I have learnt to love you for loving what I love, and to\nadmire you for admiring that which I admire. Will you not try the same\nlesson: so easy, and, when learnt, so blissful? What breeds more close\ncommunion between subjects than allegiance to the same queen? between\nbrothers, than duty to the same father? between the devout, than\nadoration for the same Deity? And shall not worship for the same beauty\nbe likewise a bond of love between the worshippers? and each lover see\nin his rival not an enemy, but a fellow-sufferer? You smile and say in\nyour hearts, that though all may worship, but one can enjoy; and that\none man's meat must be the poison of the rest. Be it so, though I deny\nit. Shall we anticipate our own doom, and slay ourselves for fear of\ndying? Shall we make ourselves unworthy of her from our very eagerness\nto win her, and show ourselves her faithful knights, by cherishing\nenvy,--most unknightly of all sins? Shall we dream with the Italian\nor the Spaniard that we can become more amiable in a lady's eyes, by\nbecoming hateful in the eyes of God and of each other? Will she love\nus the better, if we come to her with hands stained in the blood of\nhim whom she loves better than us? Let us recollect ourselves rather,\ngentlemen; and be sure that our only chance of winning her, if she be\nworth winning, is to will what she wills, honor whom she honors, love\nwhom she loves. If there is to be rivalry among us, let it be a rivalry\nin nobleness, an emulation in virtue. Let each try to outstrip the other\nin loyalty to his queen, in valor against her foes, in deeds of courtesy\nand mercy to the afflicted and oppressed; and thus our love will indeed\nprove its own divine origin, by raising us nearer to those gods whose\ngift it is. But yet I show you a more excellent way, and that is\ncharity. Why should we not make this common love to her, whom I am\nunworthy to name, the sacrament of a common love to each other? Why\nshould we not follow the heroical examples of those ancient knights, who\nhaving but one grief, one desire, one goddess, held that one heart was\nenough to contain that grief, to nourish that desire, to worship that\ndivinity; and so uniting themselves in friendship till they became but\none soul in two bodies, lived only for each other in living only for\nher, vowing as faithful worshippers to abide by her decision, to find\ntheir own bliss in hers, and whomsoever she esteemed most worthy of\nher love, to esteem most worthy also, and count themselves, by that her\nchoice, the bounden servants of him whom their mistress had condescended\nto advance to the dignity of her master?--as I (not without hope that I\nshall be outdone in generous strife) do here promise to be the faithful\nfriend, and, to my ability, the hearty servant, of him who shall be\nhonored with the love of the Rose of Torridge.\"\n\nHe ceased, and there was a pause.\n\nAt last young Fortescue spoke.\n\n\"I may be paying you a left-handed compliment, sir: but it seems to me\nthat you are so likely, in that case, to become your own faithful friend\nand hearty servant (even if you have not borne off the bell already\nwhile we have been asleep), that the bargain is hardly fair between such\na gay Italianist and us country swains.\"\n\n\"You undervalue yourself and your country, my dear sir. But set your\nmind at rest. I know no more of that lady's mind than you do: nor shall\nI know. For the sake of my own peace, I have made a vow neither to see\nher, nor to hear, if possible, tidings of her, till three full years are\npast. Dixi?\"\n\nMr. Coffin rose.\n\n\"Gentlemen, I may submit to be outdone by Mr. Leigh in eloquence, but\nnot in generosity; if he leaves these parts for three years, I do so\nalso.\"\n\n\"And go in charity with all mankind,\" said Cary. \"Give us your hand,\nold fellow. If you are a Coffin, you were sawn out of no wishy-washy\nelm-board, but right heart-of-oak. I am going, too, as Amyas here can\ntell, to Ireland away, to cool my hot liver in a bog, like a Jack-hare\nin March. Come, give us thy neif, and let us part in peace. I was minded\nto have fought thee this day--\"\n\n\"I should have been most happy, sir,\" said Coffin.\n\n--\"But now I am all love and charity to mankind. Can I have the pleasure\nof begging pardon of the world in general, and thee in particular? Does\nany one wish to pull my nose; send me an errand; make me lend him five\npounds; ay, make me buy a horse of him, which will be as good as giving\nhim ten? Come along! Join hands all round, and swear eternal friendship,\nas brothers of the sacred order of the--of what. Frank Leigh? Open thy\nmouth, Daniel, and christen us!\"\n\n\"The Rose!\" said Frank quietly, seeing that his new love-philtre was\nworking well, and determined to strike while the iron was hot, and carry\nthe matter too far to carry it back again.\n\n\"The Rose!\" cried Cary, catching hold of Coffin's hand with his right,\nand Fortescue's with his left. \"Come, Mr. Coffin! Bend, sturdy oak! 'Woe\nto the stiffnecked and stout-hearted!' says Scripture.\"\n\nAnd somehow or other, whether it was Frank's chivalrous speech, or\nCary's fun, or Amyas's good wine, or the nobleness which lies in every\nyoung lad's heart, if their elders will take the trouble to call it out,\nthe whole party came in to terms one by one, shook hands all round, and\nvowed on the hilt of Amyas's sword to make fools of themselves no more,\nat least by jealousy: but to stand by each other and by their lady-love,\nand neither grudge nor grumble, let her dance with, flirt with, or marry\nwith whom she would; and in order that the honor of their peerless dame,\nand the brotherhood which was named after her, might be spread through\nall lands, and equal that of Angelica or Isonde of Brittany, they would\neach go home, and ask their fathers' leave (easy enough to obtain in\nthose brave times) to go abroad wheresoever there were \"good wars,\" to\nemulate there the courage and the courtesy of Walter Manny and Gonzalo\nFernandes, Bayard and Gaston de Foix. Why not? Sidney was the hero of\nEurope at five-and-twenty; and why not they?\n\nAnd Frank watched and listened with one of his quiet smiles (his eyes,\nas some folks' do, smiled even when his lips were still), and only said:\n\"Gentlemen, be sure that you will never repent this day.\"\n\n\"Repent?\" said Cary. \"I feel already as angelical as thou lookest, Saint\nSilvertongue. What was it that sneezed?--the cat?\"\n\n\"The lion, rather, by the roar of it,\" said Amyas, making a dash at the\narras behind him. \"Why, here is a doorway here! and--\"\n\nAnd rushing under the arras, through an open door behind, he returned,\ndragging out by the head Mr. John Brimblecombe.\n\nWho was Mr. John Brimblecombe?\n\nIf you have forgotten him, you have done pretty nearly what every one\nelse in the room had done. But you recollect a certain fat lad, son of\nthe schoolmaster, whom Sir Richard punished for tale-bearing three years\nbefore, by sending him, not to Coventry, but to Oxford. That was the\nman. He was now one-and-twenty, and a bachelor of Oxford, where he\nhad learnt such things as were taught in those days, with more or less\nsuccess; and he was now hanging about Bideford once more, intending to\nreturn after Christmas and read divinity, that he might become a parson,\nand a shepherd of souls in his native land.\n\nJack was in person exceedingly like a pig: but not like every pig: not\nin the least like the Devon pigs of those days, which, I am sorry to\nsay, were no more shapely than the true Irish greyhound who pays\nPat's \"rint\" for him; or than the lanky monsters who wallow in German\nrivulets, while the village swineherd, beneath a shady lime, forgets his\nfleas in the melody of a Jew's harp--strange mud-colored creatures, four\nfeet high and four inches thick, which look as if they had passed their\nlives, as a collar of Oxford brawn is said to do, between two tight\nboards. Such were then the pigs of Devon: not to be compared with the\ntrue wild descendant of Noah's stock, high-withered, furry, grizzled,\ngame-flavored little rooklers, whereof many a sownder still grunted\nabout Swinley down and Braunton woods, Clovelly glens and Bursdon moor.\nNot like these, nor like the tame abomination of those barbarous times,\nwas Jack: but prophetic in face, figure, and complexion, of Fisher Hobbs\nand the triumphs of science. A Fisher Hobbs' pig of twelve stone, on\nhis hind-legs--that was what he was, and nothing else; and if you do not\nknow, reader, what a Fisher Hobbs is, you know nothing about pigs,\nand deserve no bacon for breakfast. But such was Jack. The same plump\nmulberry complexion, garnished with a few scattered black bristles; the\nsame sleek skin, looking always as if it was upon the point of bursting;\nthe same little toddling legs; the same dapper bend in the small of the\nback; the same cracked squeak; the same low upright forehead, and tiny\neyes; the same round self-satisfied jowl; the same charming sensitive\nlittle cocked nose, always on the look-out for a savory smell,--and\nyet while watching for the best, contented with the worst; a pig of\nself-helpful and serene spirit, as Jack was, and therefore, like him,\nfatting fast while other pigs' ribs are staring through their skins.\n\nSuch was Jack; and lucky it was for him that such he was; for it was\nlittle that he got to fat him at Oxford, in days when a servitor meant\nreally a servant-student; and wistfully that day did his eyes, led by\nhis nose, survey at the end of the Ship Inn passage the preparations\nfor Amyas's supper. The innkeeper was a friend of his; for, in the first\nplace, they had lived within three doors of each other all their lives;\nand next, Jack was quite pleasant company enough, beside being a\nlearned man and an Oxford scholar, to be asked in now and then to the\ninnkeeper's private parlor, when there were no gentlemen there, to\ncrack his little joke and tell his little story, sip the leavings of the\nguests' sack, and sometimes help the host to eat the leavings of their\nsupper. And it was, perhaps, with some such hope that Jack trotted off\nround the corner to the Ship that very afternoon; for that faithful\nlittle nose of his, as it sniffed out of a back window of the school,\nhad given him warning of Sabean gales, and scents of Paradise, from the\ninn kitchen below; so he went round, and asked for his pot of small ale\n(his only luxury), and stood at the bar to drink it; and looked inward\nwith his little twinkling right eye, and sniffed inward with his little\ncurling right nostril, and beheld, in the kitchen beyond, salad in\nstacks and fagots: salad of lettuce, salad of cress and endive, salad of\nboiled coleworts, salad of pickled coleworts, salad of angelica, salad\nof scurvy-wort, and seven salads more; for potatoes were not as yet, and\nsalads were during eight months of the year the only vegetable. And on\nthe dresser, and before the fire, whole hecatombs of fragrant victims,\nwhich needed neither frankincense nor myrrh; Clovelly herrings and\nTorridge salmon, Exmoor mutton and Stow venison, stubble geese and\nwoodcocks, curlew and snipe, hams of Hampshire, chitterlings of Taunton,\nand botargos of Cadiz, such as Pantagruel himself might have devoured.\nAnd Jack eyed them, as a ragged boy eyes the cakes in a pastrycook's\nwindow; and thought of the scraps from the commoners' dinner, which were\nhis wages for cleaning out the hall; and meditated deeply on the unequal\ndistribution of human bliss.\n\n\"Ah, Mr. Brimblecombe!\" said the host, bustling out with knife and apron\nto cool himself in the passage. \"Here are doings! Nine gentlemen to\nsupper!\"\n\n\"Nine! Are they going to eat all that?\"\n\n\"Well, I can't say--that Mr. Amyas is as good as three to his trencher:\nbut still there's crumbs, Mr. Brimblecombe, crumbs; and waste not\nwant not is my doctrine; so you and I may have a somewhat to stay our\nstomachs, about an eight o'clock.\"\n\n\"Eight?\" said Jack, looking wistfully at the clock. \"It's but four now.\nWell, it's kind of you, and perhaps I'll look in.\"\n\n\"Just you step in now, and look to this venison. There's a breast! you\nmay lay your two fingers into the say there, and not get to the bottom\nof the fat. That's Sir Richard's sending. He's all for them Leighs, and\nno wonder, they'm brave lads, surely; and there's a saddle-o'-mutton! I\nrode twenty miles for mun yesterday, I did, over beyond Barnstaple; and\nfive year old, Mr. John, it is, if ever five years was; and not a tooth\nto mun's head, for I looked to that; and smelt all the way home like any\napple; and if it don't ate so soft as ever was scald cream, never you\ncall me Thomas Burman.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Jack. \"And that's their dinner. Well, some are born with a\nsilver spoon in their mouth.\"\n\n\"Some be born with roast beef in their mouths, and plum-pudding in\ntheir pocket to take away the taste o' mun; and that's better than empty\nspunes, eh?\"\n\n\"For them that get it,\" said Jack. \"But for them that don't--\" And with\na sigh he returned to his small ale, and then lingered in and out of the\ninn, watching the dinner as it went into the best room, where the guests\nwere assembled.\n\nAnd as he lounged there, Amyas went in, and saw him, and held out his\nhand, and said--\n\n\"Hillo, Jack! how goes the world? How you've grown!\" and passed\non;--what had Jack Brimblecombe to do with Rose Salterne?\n\nSo Jack lingered on, hovering around the fragrant smell like a fly round\na honey-pot, till he found himself invisibly attracted, and as it were\nled by the nose out of the passage into the adjoining room, and to that\nside of the room where there was a door; and once there he could not\nhelp hearing what passed inside; till Rose Salterne's name fell on his\near. So, as it was ordained, he was taken in the fact. And now behold\nhim brought in red-hand to judgment, not without a kick or two from\nthe wrathful foot of Amyas Leigh. Whereat there fell on him a storm of\nabuse, which, for the honor of that gallant company, I shall not give in\ndetail; but which abuse, strange to say, seemed to have no effect on the\nimpenitent and unabashed Jack, who, as soon as he could get his breath,\nmade answer fiercely, amid much puffing and blowing.\n\n\"What business have I here? As much as any of you. If you had asked me\nin, I would have come: but as you didn't, I came without asking.\"\n\n\"You shameless rascal!\" said Cary. \"Come if you were asked, where there\nwas good wine? I'll warrant you for that!\"\n\n\"Why,\" said Amyas, \"no lad ever had a cake at school but he would\ndog him up one street and down another all day for the crumbs, the\ntrencher-scraping spaniel!\"\n\n\"Patience, masters!\" said Frank. \"That Jack's is somewhat of a gnathonic\nand parasitic soul, or stomach, all Bideford apple-women know; but I\nsuspect more than Deus Venter has brought him hither.\"\n\n\"Deus eavesdropping, then. We shall have the whole story over the town\nby to-morrow,\" said another; beginning at that thought to feel somewhat\nashamed of his late enthusiasm.\n\n\"Ah, Mr. Frank! You were always the only one that would stand up for me!\nDeus Venter, quotha? 'Twas Deus Cupid, it was!\"\n\nA roar of laughter followed this announcement.\n\n\"What?\" asked Frank; \"was it Cupid, then, who sneezed approval to our\nlove, Jack, as he did to that of Dido and Aeneas?\"\n\nBut Jack went on desperately.\n\n\"I was in the next room, drinking of my beer. I couldn't help that,\ncould I? And then I heard her name; and I couldn't help listening then.\nFlesh and blood couldn't.\"\n\n\"Nor fat either!\"\n\n\"No, nor fat, Mr. Cary. Do you suppose fat men haven't souls to be saved\nas well as thin ones, and hearts to burst, too, as well as stomachs?\nFat! Fat can feel, I reckon, as well as lean. Do you suppose there's\nnaught inside here but beer?\"\n\nAnd he laid his hand, as Drayton might have said, on that stout bastion,\nhornwork, ravelin, or demilune, which formed the outworks to the citadel\nof his purple isle of man.\n\n\"Naught but beer?--Cheese, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Bread?\"\n\n\"Beef?\"\n\n\"Love!\" cried Jack. \"Yes, Love!--Ay, you laugh; but my eyes are not so\ngrown up with fat but what I can see what's fair as well as you.\"\n\n\"Oh, Jack, naughty Jack, dost thou heap sin on sin, and luxury on\ngluttony?\"\n\n\"Sin? If I sin, you sin: I tell you, and I don't care who knows it, I've\nloved her these three years as well as e'er a one of you, I have. I've\nthought o' nothing else, prayed for nothing else, God forgive me! And\nthen you laugh at me, because I'm a poor parson's son, and you fine\ngentlemen: God made us both, I reckon. You?--you make a deal of giving\nher up to-day. Why, it's what I've done for three miserable years as\never poor sinner spent; ay, from the first day I said to myself, 'Jack,\nif you can't have that pearl, you'll have none; and that you can't\nhave, for it's meat for your masters: so conquer or die.' And I couldn't\nconquer. I can't help loving her, worshipping her, no more than you; and\nI will die: but you needn't laugh meanwhile at me that have done as much\nas you, and will do again.\"\n\n\"It is the old tale,\" said Frank to himself; \"whom will not love\ntransform into a hero?\"\n\nAnd so it was. Jack's squeaking voice was firm and manly, his pig's\neyes flashed very fire, his gestures were so free and earnest, that the\nungainliness of his figure was forgotten; and when he finished with\na violent burst of tears, Frank, forgetting his wounds, sprang up and\ncaught him by the hand.\n\n\"John Brimblecombe, forgive me! Gentlemen, if we are gentlemen, we\nought to ask his pardon. Has he not shown already more chivalry, more\nself-denial, and therefore more true love, than any of us? My friends,\nlet the fierceness of affection, which we have used as an excuse for\nmany a sin of our own, excuse his listening to a conversation in which\nhe well deserved to bear a part.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Jack, \"you make me one of your brotherhood; and see if I do\nnot dare to suffer as much as any of you! You laugh? Do you fancy none\ncan use a sword unless he has a baker's dozen of quarterings in his\narms, or that Oxford scholars know only how to handle a pen?\"\n\n\"Let us try his metal,\" said St. Leger. \"Here's my sword, Jack; draw,\nCoffin! and have at him.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Coffin, looking somewhat disgusted at the notion of\nfighting a man of Jack's rank; but Jack caught at the weapon offered to\nhim.\n\n\"Give me a buckler, and have at any of you!\"\n\n\"Here's a chair bottom,\" cried Cary; and Jack, seizing it in his left,\nflourished his sword so fiercely, and called so loudly to Coffin to come\non, that all present found it necessary, unless they wished blood to be\nspilt, to turn the matter off with a laugh: but Jack would not hear of\nit.\n\n\"Nay: if you will let me be of your brotherhood, well and good: but if\nnot, one or other I will fight: and that's flat.\"\n\n\"You see, gentlemen,\" said Amyas, \"we must admit him or die the death;\nso we needs must go when Sir Urian drives. Come up, Jack, and take the\noaths. You admit him, gentlemen?\"\n\n\"Let me but be your chaplain,\" said Jack, \"and pray for your luck when\nyou're at the wars. If I do stay at home in a country curacy, 'tis not\nmuch that you need be jealous of me with her, I reckon,\" said Jack, with\na pathetical glance at his own stomach.\n\n\"Sia!\" said Cary: \"but if he be admitted, it must be done according to\nthe solemn forms and ceremonies in such cases provided. Take him into\nthe next room, Amyas, and prepare him for his initiation.\"\n\n\"What's that?\" asked Amyas, puzzled by the word. But judging from the\ncorner of Will's eye that initiation was Latin for a practical joke,\nhe led forth his victim behind the arras again, and waited five minutes\nwhile the room was being darkened, till Frank's voice called to him to\nbring in the neophyte.\n\n\"John Brimblecombe,\" said Frank, in a sepulchral tone, \"you cannot be\nignorant, as a scholar and bachelor of Oxford, of that dread sacrament\nby which Catiline bound the soul of his fellow-conspirators, in order\nthat both by the daring of the deed he might have proof of their\nsincerity, and by the horror thereof astringe their souls by adamantine\nfetters, and Novem-Stygian oaths, to that wherefrom hereafter the\nweakness of the flesh might shrink. Wherefore, O Jack! we too have\ndetermined, following that ancient and classical example, to fill, as he\ndid, a bowl with the lifeblood of our most heroic selves, and to pledge\neach other therein, with vows whereat the stars shall tremble in their\nspheres, and Luna, blushing, veil her silver cheeks. Your blood alone is\nwanted to fill up the goblet. Sit down, John Brimblecombe, and bare your\narm!\"\n\n\"But, Mr. Frank!--\" said Jack, who was as superstitious as any old\nwife, and, what with the darkness and the discourse, already in a cold\nperspiration.\n\n\"But me no buts! or depart as recreant, not by the door like a man, but\nup the chimney like a flittermouse.\"\n\n\"But, Mr. Frank!\"\n\n\"Thy vital juice, or the chimney! Choose!\" roared Cary in his ear.\n\n\"Well, if I must,\" said Jack; \"but it's desperate hard that because you\ncan't keep faith without these barbarous oaths, I must take them too,\nthat have kept faith these three years without any.\"\n\nAt this pathetic appeal Frank nearly melted: but Amyas and Cary had\nthrust the victim into a chair and all was prepared for the sacrifice.\n\n\"Bind his eyes, according to the classic fashion,\" said Will.\n\n\"Oh no, dear Mr. Cary; I'll shut them tight enough, I warrant: but not\nwith your dagger, dear Mr. William--sure, not with your dagger? I can't\nafford to lose blood, though I do look lusty--I can't indeed; sure, a\npin would do--I've got one here, to my sleeve, somewhere--Oh!\"\n\n\"See the fount of generous juice! Flow on, fair stream. How he\nbleeds!--pints, quarts! Ah, this proves him to be in earnest!\"\n\n\"A true lover's blood is always at his fingers' ends.\"\n\n\"He does not grudge it; of course not. Eh, Jack? What matters an odd\ngallon for her sake?\"\n\n\"For her sake? Nothing, nothing! Take my life, if you will: but--oh,\ngentlemen, a surgeon, if you love me! I'm going off--I 'm fainting!\"\n\n\"Drink, then, quick; drink and swear! Pat his back, Cary. Courage, man!\nit will be over in a minute. Now, Frank!--\"\n\nAnd Frank spoke--\n\n\n\"If plighted troth I fail, or secret speech reveal, May Cocytean ghosts\naround my pillow squeal; While Ate's brazen claws distringe my spleen\nin sunder, And drag me deep to Pluto's keep, 'mid brimstone, smoke, and\nthunder!\"\n\n\n\"Placetne, domine?\"\n\n\"Placet!\" squeaked Jack, who thought himself at the last gasp, and\ngulped down full three-quarters of the goblet which Cary held to his\nlips.\n\n\"Ugh--Ah--Puh! Mercy on us! It tastes mighty like wine!\"\n\n\"A proof, my virtuous brother,\" said Frank, \"first, of thy\nabstemiousness, which has thus forgotten what wine tastes like; and\nnext, of thy pure and heroical affection, by which thy carnal senses\nbeing exalted to a higher and supra-lunar sphere, like those Platonical\ndaemonizomenoi and enthusiazomenoi (of whom Jamblichus says that they\nwere insensible to wounds and flame, and much more, therefore, to evil\nsavors), doth make even the most nauseous draught redolent of that\ncelestial fragrance, which proceeding, O Jack! from thine own inward\nvirtue, assimilates by sympathy even outward accidents unto its own\nharmony and melody; for fragrance is, as has been said well, the song\nof flowers, and sweetness, the music of apples--Ahem! Go in peace, thou\nhast conquered!\"\n\n\"Put him out of the door, Will,\" said Amyas, \"or he will swoon on our\nhands.\"\n\n\"Give him some sack,\" said Frank.\n\n\"Not a blessed drop of yours, sir,\" said Jack. \"I like good wine as well\nas any man on earth, and see as little of it; but not a drop of\nyours, sirs, after your frumps and flouts about hanging-on and\ntrencher-scraping. When I first began to love her, I bid good-bye to all\ndirty tricks; for I had some one then for whom to keep myself clean.\"\n\nAnd so Jack was sent home, with a pint of good red Alicant wine in him\n(more, poor fellow, than he had tasted at once in his life before);\nwhile the rest, in high glee with themselves and the rest of the world,\nrelighted the candles, had a right merry evening, and parted like good\nfriends and sensible gentlemen of devon, thinking (all except Frank)\nJack Brimblecombe and his vow the merriest jest they had heard for\nmany a day. After which they all departed: Amyas and Cary to Winter's\nsquadron; Frank (as soon as he could travel) to the Court again;\nand with him young Basset, whose father Sir Arthur, being in London,\nprocured for him a page's place in Leicester's household. Fortescue and\nChicester went to their brothers in Dublin; St. Leger to his uncle\nthe Marshal of Munster; Coffin joined Champernoun and Norris in the\nNetherlands; and so the Brotherhood of the Rose was scattered far and\nwide, and Mistress Salterne was left alone with her looking-glass.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nHOW AMYAS KEPT HIS CHRISTMAS DAY\n\n     \"Take aim, you noble musqueteers,\n     And shoot you round about;\n     Stand to it, valiant pikemen,\n     And we shall keep them out.\n     There's not a man of all of us\n     A foot will backward flee;\n     I'll be the foremost man in fight,\n     Says brave Lord Willoughby!\"\n\n                   Elizabethan Ballad.\n\nIt was the blessed Christmas afternoon. The light was fading down; the\neven-song was done; and the good folks of Bideford were trooping home\nin merry groups, the father with his children, the lover with his\nsweetheart, to cakes and ale, and flapdragons and mummer's plays, and\nall the happy sports of Christmas night. One lady only, wrapped close in\nher black muffler and followed by her maid, walked swiftly, yet sadly,\ntoward the long causeway and bridge which led to Northam town.\nSir Richard Grenville and his wife caught her up and stopped her\ncourteously.\n\n\"You will come home with us, Mrs. Leigh,\" said Lady Grenville, \"and\nspend a pleasant Christmas night?\"\n\nMrs. Leigh smiled sweetly, and laying one hand on Lady Grenville's arm,\npointed with the other to the westward, and said:\n\n\"I cannot well spend a merry Christmas night while that sound is in my\nears.\"\n\nThe whole party around looked in the direction in which she pointed.\nAbove their heads the soft blue sky was fading into gray, and here and\nthere a misty star peeped out: but to the westward, where the downs and\nwoods of Raleigh closed in with those of Abbotsham, the blue was webbed\nand turfed with delicate white flakes; iridescent spots, marking the\npath by which the sun had sunk, showed all the colors of the dying\ndolphin; and low on the horizon lay a long band of grassy green. But\nwhat was the sound which troubled Mrs. Leigh? None of them, with their\nmerry hearts, and ears dulled with the din and bustle of the town, had\nheard it till that moment: and yet now--listen! It was dead calm. There\nwas not a breath to stir a blade of grass. And yet the air was full of\nsound, a low deep roar which hovered over down and wood, salt-marsh and\nriver, like the roll of a thousand wheels, the tramp of endless armies,\nor--what it was--the thunder of a mighty surge upon the boulders of the\npebble ridge.\n\n\"The ridge is noisy to-night,\" said Sir Richard. \"There has been wind\nsomewhere.\"\n\n\"There is wind now, where my boy is, God help him!\" said Mrs. Leigh: and\nall knew that she spoke truly. The spirit of the Atlantic storm had sent\nforward the token of his coming, in the smooth ground-swell which was\nheard inland, two miles away. To-morrow the pebbles, which were now\nrattling down with each retreating wave, might be leaping to the ridge\ntop, and hurled like round-shot far ashore upon the marsh by the\nforce of the advancing wave, fleeing before the wrath of the western\nhurricane.\n\n\"God help my boy!\" said Mrs. Leigh again.\n\n\"God is as near him by sea as by land,\" said good Sir Richard.\n\n\"True, but I am a lone mother; and one that has no heart just now but to\ngo home and pray.\"\n\nAnd so Mrs. Leigh went onward up the lane, and spent all that night in\nlistening between her prayers to the thunder of the surge, till it was\ndrowned, long ere the sun rose, in the thunder of the storm.\n\nAnd where is Amyas on this same Christmas afternoon?\n\nAmyas is sitting bareheaded in a boat's stern in Smerwick bay, with the\nspray whistling through his curls, as he shouts cheerfully--\n\n\"Pull, and with a will, my merry men all, and never mind shipping a sea.\nCannon balls are a cargo that don't spoil by taking salt-water.\"\n\nHis mother's presage has been true enough. Christmas eve has been the\nlast of the still, dark, steaming nights of the early winter; and the\nwestern gale has been roaring for the last twelve hours upon the Irish\ncoast.\n\nThe short light of the winter day is fading fast. Behind him is a\nleaping line of billows lashed into mist by the tempest. Beside him\ngreen foam-fringed columns are rushing up the black rocks, and falling\nagain in a thousand cataracts of snow. Before him is the deep and\nsheltered bay: but it is not far up the bay that he and his can see; for\nsome four miles out at sea begins a sloping roof of thick gray cloud,\nwhich stretches over their heads, and up and far away inland, cutting\nthe cliffs off at mid-height, hiding all the Kerry mountains, and\ndarkening the hollows of the distant firths into the blackness of night.\nAnd underneath that awful roof of whirling mist the storm is howling\ninland ever, sweeping before it the great foam-sponges, and the gray\nsalt spray, till all the land is hazy, dim, and dun. Let it howl on! for\nthere is more mist than ever salt spray made, flying before that gale;\nmore thunder than ever sea-surge wakened echoing among the cliffs of\nSmerwick bay; along those sand-hills flash in the evening gloom red\nsparks which never came from heaven; for that fort, now christened by\nthe invaders the Fort Del Oro, where flaunts the hated golden flag of\nSpain, holds San Josepho and eight hundred of the foe; and but three\nnights ago, Amyas and Yeo, and the rest of Winter's shrewdest hands,\nslung four culverins out of the Admiral's main deck, and floated them\nashore, and dragged them up to the battery among the sand-hills; and now\nit shall be seen whether Spanish and Italian condottieri can hold their\nown on British ground against the men of Devon.\n\nSmall blame to Amyas if he was thinking, not of his lonely mother at\nBurrough Court, but of those quick bright flashes on sand-hill and\non fort, where Salvation Yeo was hurling the eighteen-pound shot with\ndeadly aim, and watching with a cool and bitter smile of triumph the\nflying of the sand, and the crashing of the gabions. Amyas and his party\nhad been on board, at the risk of their lives, for a fresh supply of\nshot; for Winter's battery was out of ball, and had been firing stones\nfor the last four hours, in default of better missiles. They ran the\nboat on shore through the surf, where a cove in the shore made landing\npossible, and almost careless whether she stove or not, scrambled\nover the sand-hills with each man his brace of shot slung across his\nshoulder; and Amyas, leaping into the trenches, shouted cheerfully to\nSalvation Yeo--\n\n\"More food for the bull-dogs, Gunner, and plums for the Spaniards'\nChristmas pudding!\"\n\n\"Don't speak to a man at his business, Master Amyas. Five mortal times\nhave I missed; but I will have that accursed Popish rag down, as I'm a\nsinner.\"\n\n\"Down with it, then; nobody wants you to shoot crooked. Take good iron\nto it, and not footy paving-stones.\"\n\n\"I believe, sir, that the foul fiend is there, a turning of my shot\naside, I do. I thought I saw him once: but, thank Heaven, here's ball\nagain. Ah, sir, if one could but cast a silver one! Now, stand by, men!\"\n\nAnd once again Yeo's eighteen-pounder roared, and away. And, oh glory!\nthe great yellow flag of Spain, which streamed in the gale, lifted\nclean into the air, flagstaff and all, and then pitched wildly down\nhead-foremost, far to leeward.\n\nA hurrah from the sailors, answered by the soldiers of the opposite\ncamp, shook the very cloud above them: but ere its echoes had died away,\na tall officer leapt upon the parapet of the fort, with the fallen flag\nin his hand, and rearing it as well as he could upon his lance point,\nheld it firmly against the gale, while the fallen flagstaff was raised\nagain within.\n\nIn a moment a dozen long bows were bent at the daring foeman: but Amyas\nbehind shouted--\n\n\"Shame, lads! Stop and let the gallant gentleman have due courtesy!\"\n\nSo they stopped, while Amyas, springing on the rampart of the battery,\ntook off his hat, and bowed to the flag-holder, who, as soon as relieved\nof his charge, returned the bow courteously, and descended.\n\nIt was by this time all but dark, and the firing began to slacken on\nall sides; Salvation and his brother gunners, having covered up their\nslaughtering tackle with tarpaulings, retired for the night, leaving\nAmyas, who had volunteered to take the watch till midnight; and the rest\nof the force having got their scanty supper of biscuit (for provisions\nwere running very short) lay down under arms among the sand-hills, and\ngrumbled themselves to sleep.\n\nHe had paced up and down in the gusty darkness for some hour or more,\nexchanging a passing word now and then with the sentinel, when two\nmen entered the battery, chatting busily together. One was in complete\narmor; the other wrapped in the plain short cloak of a man of pens\nand peace: but the talk of both was neither of sieges nor of sallies,\ncatapult, bombard, nor culverin, but simply of English hexameters.\n\nAnd fancy not, gentle reader, that the two were therein fiddling while\nRome was burning; for the commonweal of poetry and letters, in that same\ncritical year 1580, was in far greater danger from those same hexameters\nthan the common woe of Ireland (as Raleigh called it) was from the\nSpaniards.\n\nImitating the classic metres, \"versifying,\" as it was called in\ncontradistinction to rhyming, was becoming fast the fashion among the\nmore learned. Stonyhurst and others had tried their hands at hexameter\ntranslations from the Latin and Greek epics, which seem to have been\ndoggerel enough; and ever and anon some youthful wit broke out in\niambics, sapphics, elegiacs, and what not, to the great detriment of the\nqueen's English and her subjects' ears.\n\nI know not whether Mr. William Webbe had yet given to the world any\nfragments of his precious hints for the \"Reformation of English poetry,\"\nto the tune of his own \"Tityrus, happily thou liest tumbling under a\nbeech-tree:\" but the Cambridge Malvolio, Gabriel Harvey, had succeeded\nin arguing Spenser, Dyer, Sidney, and probably Sidney's sister, and the\nwhole clique of beaux-esprits round them, into following his model of\n\n     \"What might I call this tree?  A laurel?  O bonny laurel!\n     Needes to thy bowes will I bowe this knee, and vail my bonetto;\"\n\nafter snubbing the first book of \"that Elvish Queene,\" which was then\nin manuscript, as a base declension from the classical to the romantic\nschool.\n\nAnd now Spenser (perhaps in mere melancholy wilfulness and want of\npurpose, for he had just been jilted by a fair maid of Kent) was wasting\nhis mighty genius upon doggerel which he fancied antique; and some\npiratical publisher (bitter Tom Nash swears, and with likelihood that\nHarvey did it himself) had just given to the world,--\"Three proper\nwittie and familiar Letters, lately past between two University\nmen, touching the Earthquake in April last, and our English reformed\nVersifying,\" which had set all town wits a-buzzing like a swarm of\nflies, being none other than a correspondence between Spenser and\nHarvey, which was to prove to the world forever the correctness and\nmelody of such lines as,\n\n     \"For like magnificoes, not a beck but glorious in show,\n     In deede most frivolous, not a looke but Tuscanish always.\"\n\nLet them pass--Alma Mater has seen as bad hexameters since. But then the\nmatter was serious. There is a story (I know not how true) that Spenser\nwas half bullied into re-writing the \"Faerie Queene\" in hexameters, had\nnot Raleigh, a true romanticist, \"whose vein for ditty or amorous ode\nwas most lofty, insolent, and passionate,\" persuaded him to follow\nhis better genius. The great dramatists had not yet arisen, to form\ncompletely that truly English school, of which Spenser, unconscious of\nhis own vast powers, was laying the foundation. And, indeed, it was not\ntill Daniel, twenty years after, in his admirable apology for rhyme, had\nsmashed Mr. Campian and his \"eight several kinds of classical numbers,\"\nthat the matter was finally settled, and the English tongue left to go\nthe road on which Heaven had started it. So that we may excuse Raleigh's\nanswering somewhat waspish to some quotation of Spenser's from the three\nletters of \"Immerito and G. H.\"\n\n\"Tut, tut, Colin Clout, much learning has made thee mad. A good old\nfishwives' ballad jingle is worth all your sapphics and trimeters, and\n'riff-raff thurlery bouncing.' Hey? have I you there, old lad? Do you\nmind that precious verse?\"\n\n\"But, dear Wat, Homer and Virgil--\"\n\n\"But, dear Ned, Petrarch and Ovid--\"\n\n\"But, Wat, what have we that we do not owe to the ancients?\"\n\n\"Ancients, quotha? Why, the legend of King Arthur, and Chevy Chase too,\nof which even your fellow-sinner Sidney cannot deny that every time\nhe hears it even from a blind fiddler it stirs his heart like a\ntrumpet-blast. Speak well of the bridge that carries you over, man! Did\nyou find your Redcross Knight in Virgil, or such a dame as Una in old\nOvid? No more than you did your Pater and Credo, you renegado baptized\nheathen, you!\"\n\n\"Yet, surely, our younger and more barbarous taste must bow before\ndivine antiquity, and imitate afar--\"\n\n\"As dottrels do fowlers. If Homer was blind, lad, why dost not poke\nout thine eye? Ay, this hexameter is of an ancient house, truly, Ned\nSpenser, and so is many a rogue: but he cannot make way on our rough\nEnglish roads. He goes hopping and twitching in our language like a\nthree-legged terrier over a pebble-bank, tumble and up again, rattle and\ncrash.\"\n\n\"Nay, hear, now--\n\n     'See ye the blindfolded pretty god that feathered archer,\n        Of lovers' miseries which maketh his bloody game?'*\n\nTrue, the accent gapes in places, as I have often confessed to Harvey,\nbut--\"\n\n     * Strange as it may seem, this distich is Spenser's own; and\n     the other hexameters are all authentic.\n\nHarvey be hanged for a pedant, and the whole crew of versifiers, from\nLord Dorset (but he, poor man, has been past hanging some time since)\nto yourself! Why delude you into playing Procrustes as he does with the\nqueen's English, racking one word till its joints be pulled asunder, and\nsqueezing the next all a-heap as the Inquisitors do heretics in their\nbanca cava? Out upon him and you, and Sidney, and the whole kin. You\nhave not made a verse among you, and never will, which is not as lame a\ngosling as Harvey's own--\n\n     'Oh thou weathercocke, that stands on the top of Allhallows,\n     Come thy ways down, if thou dar'st for thy crown, and take the wall\n     on us.'\n\n\"Hark, now! There is our young giant comforting his soul with a ballad.\nYou will hear rhyme and reason together here, now. He will not miscall\n'blind-folded,' 'blind-fold-ed, I warrant; or make an 'of' and a 'which'\nand a 'his' carry a whole verse on their wretched little backs.\"\n\nAnd as he spoke, Amyas, who had been grumbling to himself some Christmas\ncarol, broke out full-mouthed:--\n\n     \"As Joseph was a-walking\n     He heard an angel sing--\n     'This night shall be the birth night\n     Of Christ, our heavenly King.\n\n     His birthbed shall be neither\n     In housen nor in hall,\n     Nor in the place of paradise,\n     But in the oxen's stall.\n\n     He neither shall be rocked\n     In silver nor in gold,\n     But in the wooden manger\n     That lieth on the mould.\n\n     He neither shall be washen\n     With white wine nor with red,\n     But with the fair spring water\n     That on you shall be shed.\n\n     He neither shall be clothed\n     In purple nor in pall,\n     But in the fair white linen\n     That usen babies all.'\n\n     As Joseph was a-walking\n     Thus did the angel sing,\n     And Mary's Son at midnight\n     Was born to be our King.\n\n     Then be you glad, good people,\n     At this time of the year;\n     And light you up your candles,\n     For His star it shineth clear.\"\n\n\"There, Edmunde Classicaster,\" said Raleigh, \"does not that simple\nstrain go nearer to the heart of him who wrote 'The Shepherd's\nCalendar,' than all artificial and outlandish\n\n     'Wote ye why his mother with a veil hath covered his face?'\n\nWhy dost not answer, man?\"\n\nBut Spenser was silent awhile, and then,--\n\n\"Because I was thinking rather of the rhymer than the rhyme. Good\nheaven! how that brave lad shames me, singing here the hymns which his\nmother taught him, before the very muzzles of Spanish guns; instead of\nbewailing unmanly, as I have done, the love which he held, I doubt not,\nas dear as I did even my Rosalind. This is his welcome to the winter's\nstorm; while I, who dream, forsooth, of heavenly inspiration, can but\nsee therein an image of mine own cowardly despair.\n\n     'Thou barren ground, whom winter's wrath has wasted,\n     Art made a mirror to behold my plight.'*\n\nPah! away with frosts, icicles, and tears, and sighs--\"\n\n     * \"The Shepherd's Calendar.\"\n\n\"And with hexameters and trimeters too, I hope,\" interrupted Raleigh:\n\"and all the trickeries of self-pleasing sorrow.\"\n\n\"--I will set my heart to higher work than barking at the hand which\nchastens me.\"\n\n\"Wilt put the lad into the 'Faerie Queene,' then, by my side? He\ndeserves as good a place there, believe me, as ever a Guyon, or even as\nLord Grey your Arthegall. Let us hail him. Hallo! young chanticleer of\nDevon! Art not afraid of a chance shot, that thou crowest so lustily\nupon thine own mixen?\"\n\n\"Cocks crow all night long at Christmas, Captain Raleigh, and so do I,\"\nsaid Amyas's cheerful voice; \"but who's there with you?\"\n\n\"A penitent pupil of yours--Mr. Secretary Spenser.\"\n\n\"Pupil of mine?\" said Amyas. \"I wish he'd teach me a little of his art;\nI could fill up my time here with making verses.\"\n\n\"And who would be your theme, fair sir?\" said Spenser.\n\n\"No 'who' at all. I don't want to make sonnets to blue eyes, nor black\neither: but if I could put down some of the things I saw in the Spice\nIslands--\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Raleigh, \"he would beat you out of Parnassus, Mr. Secretary.\nRemember, you may write about Fairyland, but he has seen it.\"\n\n\"And so have others,\" said Spenser; \"it is not so far off from any one\nof us. Wherever is love and loyalty, great purposes, and lofty souls,\neven though in a hovel or a mine, there is Fairyland.\"\n\n\"Then Fairyland should be here, friend; for you represent love, and\nLeigh loyalty; while, as for great purposes and lofty souls, who so fit\nto stand for them as I, being (unless my enemies and my conscience are\nliars both) as ambitious and as proud as Lucifer's own self?\"\n\n\"Ah, Walter, Walter, why wilt always slander thyself thus?\"\n\n\"Slander? Tut.--I do but give the world a fair challenge, and tell it,\n'There--you know the worst of me: come on and try a fall, for either\nyou or I must down.' Slander? Ask Leigh here, who has but known me a\nfortnight, whether I am not as vain as a peacock, as selfish as a fox,\nas imperious as a bona roba, and ready to make a cat's paw of him or any\nman, if there be a chestnut in the fire: and yet the poor fool cannot\nhelp loving me, and running of my errands, and taking all my schemes and\nmy dreams for gospel; and verily believes now, I think, that I shall be\nthe man in the moon some day, and he my big dog.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Amyas, half apologetically, \"if you are the cleverest man\nin the world what harm in my thinking so?\"\n\n\"Hearken to him, Edmund! He will know better when he has outgrown this\nsame callow trick of honesty, and learnt of the great goddess Detraction\nhow to show himself wiser than the wise, by pointing out to the world\nthe fool's motley which peeps through the rents in the philosopher's\ncloak. Go to, lad! slander thy equals, envy thy betters, pray for an eye\nwhich sees spots in every sun, and for a vulture's nose to scent\ncarrion in every rose-bed. If thy friend win a battle, show that he has\nneedlessly thrown away his men; if he lose one, hint that he sold it;\nif he rise to a place, argue favor; if he fall from one, argue divine\njustice. Believe nothing, hope nothing, but endure all things, even to\nkicking, if aught may be got thereby; so shalt thou be clothed in purple\nand fine linen, and sit in kings' palaces, and fare sumptuously every\nday.\"\n\n\"And wake with Dives in the torment,\" said Amyas. \"Thank you for\nnothing, captain.\"\n\n\"Go to, Misanthropos,\" said Spenser. \"Thou hast not yet tasted the\nsweets of this world's comfits, and thou railest at them?\"\n\n\"The grapes are sour, lad.\"\n\n\"And will be to the end,\" said Amyas, \"if they come off such a devil's\ntree as that. I really think you are out of your mind, Captain Raleigh,\nat times.\"\n\n\"I wish I were; for it is a troublesome, hungry, windy mind as man ever\nwas cursed withal. But come in, lad. We were sent from the lord deputy\nto bid thee to supper. There is a dainty lump of dead horse waiting for\nthee.\"\n\n\"Send me some out, then,\" said matter-of-fact Amyas. \"And tell his\nlordship that, with his good leave, I don't stir from here till morning,\nif I can keep awake. There is a stir in the fort, and I expect them out\non us.\"\n\n\"Tut, man! their hearts are broken. We know it by their deserters.\"\n\n\"Seeing's believing. I never trust runaway rogues. If they are false to\ntheir masters, they'll be false to us.\"\n\n\"Well, go thy ways, old honesty; and Mr. Secretary shall give you a\nbook to yourself in the 'Faerie Queene'--'Sir Monoculus or the Legend of\nCommon Sense,' eh, Edmund?\"\n\n\"Monoculus?\"\n\n\"Ay, Single-eye, my prince of word-coiners--won't that fit?--And give\nhim the Cyclops head for a device. Heigh-ho! They may laugh that win.\nI am sick of this Irish work; were it not for the chance of advancement\nI'd sooner be driving a team of red Devons on Dartside; and now I am\nangry with the dear lad because he is not sick of it too. What a plague\nbusiness has he to be paddling up and down, contentedly doing his duty,\nlike any city watchman? It is an insult to the mighty aspirations of our\nnobler hearts,--eh, my would-be Ariosto?\"\n\n\"Ah, Raleigh! you can afford to confess yourself less than some, for you\nare greater than all. Go on and conquer, noble heart! But as for me, I\nsow the wind, and I suppose I shall reap the whirlwind.\"\n\n\"Your harvest seems come already; what a blast that was! Hold on by me,\nColin Clout, and I'll hold on by thee. So! Don't tread on that pikeman's\nstomach, lest he take thee for a marauding Don, and with sudden dagger\nslit Cohn's pipe, and Colin's weasand too.\"\n\nAnd the two stumbled away into the darkness, leaving Amyas to stride up\nand down as before, puzzling his brains over Raleigh's wild words and\nSpenser's melancholy, till he came to the conclusion that there was some\nmysterious connection between cleverness and unhappiness, and thanking\nhis stars that he was neither scholar, courtier, nor poet, said grace\nover his lump of horseflesh when it arrived, devoured it as if it had\nbeen venison, and then returned to his pacing up and down; but this time\nin silence, for the night was drawing on, and there was no need to tell\nthe Spaniards that any one was awake and watching.\n\nSo he began to think about his mother, and how she might be spending\nher Christmas; and then about Frank, and wondered at what grand Court\nfestival he was assisting, amid bright lights and sweet music and gay\nladies, and how he was dressed, and whether he thought of his brother\nthere far away on the dark Atlantic shore; and then he said his prayers\nand his creed; and then he tried not to think of Rose Salterne, and of\ncourse thought about her all the more. So on passed the dull hours, till\nit might be past eleven o'clock, and all lights were out in the battery\nand the shipping, and there was no sound of living thing but the\nmonotonous tramp of the two sentinels beside him, and now and then a\ngrunt from the party who slept under arms some twenty yards to the rear.\n\nSo he paced to and fro, looking carefully out now and then over the\nstrip of sand-hill which lay between him and the fort; but all was blank\nand black, and moreover it began to rain furiously.\n\nSuddenly he seemed to hear a rustle among the harsh sand-grass. True,\nthe wind was whistling through it loudly enough, but that sound was\nnot altogether like the wind. Then a soft sliding noise; something had\nslipped down a bank, and brought the sand down after it. Amyas stopped,\ncrouched down beside a gun, and laid his ear to the rampart, whereby\nhe heard clearly, as he thought, the noise of approaching feet; whether\nrabbits or Christians, he knew not, but he shrewdly guessed the latter.\n\nNow Amyas was of a sober and business-like turn, at least when he was\nnot in a passion; and thinking within himself that if he made any noise,\nthe enemy (whether four or two-legged) would retire, and all the sport\nbe lost, he did not call to the two sentries, who were at the opposite\nends of the battery; neither did he think it worth while to rouse the\nsleeping company, lest his ears should have deceived him, and the whole\ncamp turn out to repulse the attack of a buck rabbit.\n\nSo he crouched lower and lower beside the culverin, and was rewarded in\na minute or two by hearing something gently deposited against the mouth\nof the embrasure, which, by the noise, should be a piece of timber.\n\n\"So far, so good,\" said he to himself; \"when the scaling ladder is up,\nthe soldier follows, I suppose. I can only humbly thank them for giving\nmy embrasure the preference. There he comes! I hear his feet scuffling.\"\n\nHe could hear plainly enough some one working himself into the mouth of\nthe embrasure: but the plague was, that it was so dark that he could\nnot see his hand between him and the sky, much less his foe at two yards\noff. However, he made a pretty fair guess as to the whereabouts, and,\nrising softly, discharged such a blow downwards as would have split a\nyule log. A volley of sparks flew up from the hapless Spaniard's armor,\nand a grunt issued from within it, which proved that, whether he was\nkilled or not, the blow had not improved his respiration.\n\nAmyas felt for his head, seized it, dragged him in over the gun, sprang\ninto the embrasure on his knees, felt for the top of the ladder, found\nit, hove it clean off and out, with four or five men on it, and then of\ncourse tumbled after it ten feet into the sand, roaring like a town bull\nto her majesty's liege subjects in general.\n\nSailor-fashion, he had no armor on but a light morion and a cuirass,\nso he was not too much encumbered to prevent his springing to his legs\ninstantly, and setting to work, cutting and foining right and left at\nevery sound, for sight there was none.\n\nBattles (as soldiers know, and newspaper editors do not) are usually\nfought, not as they ought to be fought, but as they can be fought; and\nwhile the literary man is laying down the law at his desk as to how many\ntroops should be moved here, and what rivers should be crossed there,\nand where the cavalry should have been brought up, and when the flank\nshould have been turned, the wretched man who has to do the work finds\nthe matter settled for him by pestilence, want of shoes, empty stomachs,\nbad roads, heavy rains, hot suns, and a thousand other stern warriors\nwho never show on paper.\n\nSo with this skirmish; \"according to Cocker,\" it ought to have been\na very pretty one; for Hercules of Pisa, who planned the sortie, had\narranged it all (being a very sans-appel in all military science) upon\nthe best Italian precedents, and had brought against this very hapless\nbattery a column of a hundred to attack directly in front, a company of\nfifty to turn the right flank, and a company of fifty to turn the left\nflank, with regulations, orders, passwords, countersigns, and what not;\nso that if every man had had his rights (as seldom happens), Don Guzman\nMaria Magdalena de Soto, who commanded the sortie, ought to have taken\nthe work out of hand, and annihilated all therein. But alas! here stern\nfate interfered. They had chosen a dark night, as was politic; they had\nwaited till the moon was up, lest it should be too dark, as was politic\nlikewise: but, just as they had started, on came a heavy squall of rain,\nthrough which seven moons would have given no light, and which washed\nout the plans of Hercules of Pisa as if they had been written on a\nschoolboy's slate. The company who were to turn the left flank walked\nmanfully down into the sea, and never found out where they were going\ntill they were knee-deep in water. The company who were to turn the\nright flank, bewildered by the utter darkness, turned their own flank\nso often, that tired of falling into rabbit-burrows and filling their\nmouths with sand, they halted and prayed to all the saints for a compass\nand lantern; while the centre body, who held straight on by a trackway\nto within fifty yards of the battery, so miscalculated that short\ndistance, that while they thought the ditch two pikes' length off, they\nfell into it one over the other, and of six scaling ladders, the only\none which could be found was the very one which Amyas threw down again.\nAfter which the clouds broke, the wind shifted, and the moon shone out\nmerrily. And so was the deep policy of Hercules of Pisa, on which hung\nthe fate of Ireland and the Papacy, decided by a ten minutes' squall.\n\nBut where is Amyas?\n\nIn the ditch, aware that the enemy is tumbling into it, but unable to\nfind them; while the company above, finding it much too dark to attempt\na counter sortie, have opened a smart fire of musketry and arrows on\nthings in general, whereat the Spaniards are swearing like Spaniards (I\nneed say no more), and the Italians spitting like venomous cats; while\nAmyas, not wishing to be riddled by friendly balls, has got his back\nagainst the foot of the rampart, and waits on Providence.\n\nSuddenly the moon clears; and with one more fierce volley, the English\nsailors, seeing the confusion, leap down from the embrasures, and to it\npell-mell. Whether this also was \"according to Cocker,\" I know not: but\nthe sailor, then as now, is not susceptible of highly-finished drill.\n\nAmyas is now in his element, and so are the brave fellows at his heels;\nand there are ten breathless, furious minutes among the sand-hills; and\nthen the trumpets blow a recall, and the sailors drop back again by twos\nand threes, and are helped up into the embrasures over many a dead and\ndying foe; while the guns of Fort del Oro open on them, and blaze away\nfor half an hour without reply; and then all is still once more. And in\nthe meanwhile, the sortie against the deputy's camp has fared no better,\nand the victory of the night remains with the English.\n\nTwenty minutes after, Winter and the captains who were on shore were\ndrying themselves round a peat-fire on the beach, and talking over the\nskirmish, when Will Cary asked--\n\n\"Where is Leigh? who has seen him? I am sadly afraid he has gone too\nfar, and been slain.\"\n\n\"Slain? Never less, gentlemen!\" replied the voice of the very person in\nquestion, as he stalked out of the darkness into the glare of the fire,\nand shot down from his shoulders into the midst of the ring, as he might\na sack of corn, a huge dark body, which was gradually seen to be a man\nin rich armor; who being so shot down, lay quietly where he was dropped,\nwith his feet (luckily for him mailed) in the fire.\n\n\"I say,\" quoth Amyas, \"some of you had better take him up, if he is to\nbe of any use. Unlace his helm, Will Cary.\"\n\n\"Pull his feet out of the embers; I dare say he would have been glad\nenough to put us to the scarpines; but that's no reason we should put\nhim to them.\"\n\nAs has been hinted, there was no love lost between Admiral Winter\nand Amyas; and Amyas might certainly have reported himself in a more\nceremonious manner. So Winter, whom Amyas either had not seen, or had\nnot chosen to see, asked him pretty sharply, \"What the plague he had to\ndo with bringing dead men into camp?\"\n\n\"If he's dead, it's not my fault. He was alive enough when I started\nwith him, and I kept him right end uppermost all the way; and what would\nyou have more, sir?\"\n\n\"Mr. Leigh!\" said Winter, \"it behoves you to speak with somewhat\nmore courtesy, if not respect, to captains who are your elders and\ncommanders.\"\n\n\"Ask your pardon, sir,\" said the giant, as he stood in front of the fire\nwith the rain steaming and smoking off his armor; \"but I was bred in\na school where getting good service done was more esteemed than making\nfine speeches.\"\n\n\"Whatsoever school you were trained in, sir,\" said Winter, nettled at\nthe hint about Drake; \"it does not seem to have been one in which you\nlearned to obey orders. Why did you not come in when the recall was\nsounded?\"\n\n\"Because,\" said Amyas, very coolly, \"in the first place I did not hear\nit; and in the next, in my school I was taught when I had once started\nnot to come home empty-handed.\"\n\nThis was too pointed; and Winter sprang up with an oath--\"Do you mean to\ninsult me, sir?\"\n\n\"I am sorry, sir, that you should take a compliment to Sir Francis Drake\nas an insult to yourself. I brought in this gentleman because I thought\nhe might give you good information; if he dies meanwhile, the loss will\nbe yours, or rather the queen's.\"\n\n\"Help me, then,\" said Cary, glad to create a diversion in Amyas's favor,\n\"and we will bring him round;\" while Raleigh rose, and catching Winter's\narm, drew him aside, and began talking earnestly.\n\n\"What a murrain have you, Leigh, to quarrel with Winter?\" asked two or\nthree.\n\n\"I say, my reverend fathers and dear children, do get the Don's talking\ntackle free again, and leave me and the admiral to settle it our own\nway.\"\n\nThere was more than one captain sitting in the ring, but discipline, and\nthe degrees of rank, were not so severely defined as now; and Amyas, as\na \"gentleman adventurer,\" was, on land, in a position very difficult\nto be settled, though at sea he was as liable to be hanged as any other\nperson on board; and on the whole it was found expedient to patch the\nmatter up. So Captain Raleigh returning, said that though Admiral Winter\nhad doubtless taken umbrage at certain words of Mr. Leigh's, yet that\nhe had no doubt that Mr. Leigh meant nothing thereby but what was\nconsistent with the profession of a soldier and a gentleman, and worthy\nboth of himself and of the admiral.\n\nFrom which proposition Amyas found it impossible to dissent; whereon\nRaleigh went back, and informed Winter that Leigh had freely retracted\nhis words, and fully wiped off any imputation which Mr. Winter might\nconceive to have been put upon him, and so forth. So Winter returned,\nand Amyas said frankly enough--\n\n\"Admiral Winter, I hope, as a loyal soldier, that you will understand\nthus far; that naught which has passed to-night shall in any way prevent\nyou finding me a forward and obedient servant to all your commands, be\nthey what they may, and a supporter of your authority among the men,\nand honor against the foe, even with my life. For I should be ashamed if\nprivate differences should ever prejudice by a grain the public weal.\"\n\nThis was a great effort of oratory for Amyas; and he therefore, in order\nto be safe by following precedent, tried to talk as much as he could\nlike Sir Richard Grenville. Of course Winter could answer nothing to it,\nin spite of the plain hint of private differences, but that he should\nnot fail to show himself a captain worthy of so valiant and trusty\na gentleman; whereon the whole party turned their attention to the\ncaptive, who, thanks to Will Cary, was by this time sitting up, standing\nmuch in need of a handkerchief, and looking about him, having been\nunhelmed, in a confused and doleful manner.\n\n\"Take the gentleman to my tent,\" said Winter, \"and let the surgeon see\nto him. Mr. Leigh, who is he?--\"\n\n\"An enemy, but whether Spaniard or Italian I know not; but he seemed\nsomebody among them, I thought the captain of a company. He and I cut at\neach other twice or thrice at first, and then lost each other; and after\nthat I came on him among the sand-hills, trying to rally his men, and\nswearing like the mouth of the pit, whereby I guess him a Spaniard. But\nhis men ran; so I brought him in.\"\n\n\"And how?\" asked Raleigh. \"Thou art giving us all the play but the\nmurders and the marriages.\"\n\n\"Why, I bid him yield, and he would not. Then I bid him run, and he\nwould not. And it was too pitch-dark for fighting; so I took him by the\nears, and shook the wind out of him, and so brought him in.\"\n\n\"Shook the wind out of him?\" cried Cary, amid the roar of laughter which\nfollowed. \"Dost know thou hast nearly wrung his neck in two? His vizor\nwas full of blood.\"\n\n\"He should have run or yielded, then,\" said Amyas; and getting up,\nslipped off to find some ale, and then to sleep comfortably in a dry\nburrow which he scratched out of a sandbank.\n\nThe next morning, as Amyas was discussing a scanty breakfast of biscuit\n(for provisions were running very short in camp), Raleigh came up to\nhim.\n\n\"What, eating? That's more than I have done to-day.\"\n\n\"Sit down, and share, then.\"\n\n\"Nay, lad, I did not come a-begging. I have set some of my rogues to dig\nrabbits; but as I live, young Colbrand, you may thank your stars that\nyou are alive to-day to eat. Poor young Cheek--Sir John Cheek, the\ngrammarian's son--got his quittance last night by a Spanish pike,\nrushing headlong on, just as you did. But have you seen your prisoner?\"\n\n\"No; nor shall, while he is in Winter's tent.\"\n\n\"Why not, then? What quarrel have you against the admiral, friend\nBobadil? Cannot you let Francis Drake fight his own battles, without\nthrusting your head in between them?\"\n\n\"Well, that is good! As if the quarrel was not just as much mine, and\nevery man's in the ship. Why, when he left Drake, he left us all, did he\nnot?\"\n\n\"And what if he did? Let bygones be bygones is the rule of a Christian,\nand of a wise man too, Amyas. Here the man is, at least, safe home,\nin favor and in power; and a prudent youth will just hold his tongue,\nmumchance, and swim with the stream.\"\n\n\"But that's just what makes me mad; to see this fellow, after deserting\nus there in unknown seas, win credit and rank at home here for being the\nfirst man who ever sailed back through the Straits. What had he to do\nwith sailing back at all! As well make the fox a knight for being the\nfirst that ever jumped down a jakes to escape the hounds. The fiercer\nthe flight the fouler the fear, say I.\"\n\n\"Amyas! Amyas! thou art a hard hitter, but a soft politician.\"\n\n\"I am no politician, Captain Raleigh, nor ever wish to be. An honest\nman's my friend, and a rogue's my foe; and I'll tell both as much, as\nlong as I breathe.\"\n\n\"And die a poor saint,\" said Raleigh, laughing. \"But if Winter invites\nyou to his tent himself, you won't refuse to come?\"\n\n\"Why, no, considering his years and rank; but he knows too well to do\nthat.\"\n\n\"He knows too well not to do it,\" said Raleigh, laughing as he walked\naway. And verily in half-an-hour came an invitation, extracted of\ncourse, from the admiral by Raleigh's silver tongue, which Amyas could\nnot but obey.\n\n\"We all owe you thanks for last night's service, sir,\" said Winter, who\nhad for some good reasons changed his tone. \"Your prisoner is found to\nbe a gentleman of birth and experience, and the leader of the assault\nlast night. He has already told us more than we had hoped, for which\nalso we are beholden to you; and, indeed, my Lord Grey has been asking\nfor you already.\"\n\n\"I have, young sir,\" said a quiet and lofty voice; and Amyas saw limping\nfrom the inner tent the proud and stately figure of the stern deputy,\nLord Grey of Wilton, a brave and wise man, but with a naturally harsh\ntemper, which had been soured still more by the wound which had crippled\nhim, while yet a boy, at the battle of Leith. He owed that limp to Mary\nQueen of Scots; and he did not forget the debt.\n\n\"I have been asking for you; having heard from many, both of your last\nnight's prowess, and of your conduct and courage beyond the promise of\nyour years, displayed in that ever-memorable voyage, which may well be\nranked with the deeds of the ancient Argonauts.\"\n\nAmyas bowed low; and the lord deputy went on, \"You will needs wish\nto see your prisoner. You will find him such a one as you need not be\nashamed to have taken, and as need not be ashamed to have been taken by\nyou: but here he is, and will, I doubt not, answer as much for himself.\nKnow each other better, gentlemen both: last night was an ill one for\nmaking acquaintances. Don Guzman Maria Magdalena Sotomayor de Soto, know\nthe hidalgo, Amyas Leigh!\"\n\nAs he spoke, the Spaniard came forward, still in his armor, all save his\nhead, which was bound up in a handkerchief.\n\nHe was an exceedingly tall and graceful personage, of that sangre azul\nwhich marked high Visigothic descent; golden-haired and fair-skinned,\nwith hands as small and white as a woman's; his lips were delicate but\nthin, and compressed closely at the corners of the mouth; and his pale\nblue eye had a glassy dulness. In spite of his beauty and his carriage,\nAmyas shrank from him instinctively; and yet he could not help\nholding out his hand in return, as the Spaniard, holding out his, said\nlanguidly, in most sweet and sonorous Spanish--\n\n\"I kiss his hands and feet. The senor speaks, I am told, my native\ntongue?\"\n\n\"I have that honor.\"\n\n\"Then accept in it (for I can better express myself therein than in\nEnglish, though I am not altogether ignorant of that witty and learned\nlanguage) the expression of my pleasure at having fallen into the\nhands of one so renowned in war and travel; and of one also,\" he added,\nglancing at Amyas's giant bulk, \"the vastness of whose strength, beyond\nthat of common mortality, makes it no more shame for me to have been\noverpowered and carried away by him than if my captor had been a paladin\nof Charlemagne's.\"\n\nHonest Amyas bowed and stammered, a little thrown off his balance by the\nunexpected assurance and cool flattery of his prisoner; but he said--\n\n\"If you are satisfied, illustrious senor, I am bound to be so. I\nonly trust that in my hurry and the darkness I have not hurt you\nunnecessarily.\"\n\nThe Don laughed a pretty little hollow laugh: \"No, kind senor, my head,\nI trust, will after a few days have become united to my shoulders;\nand, for the present, your company will make me forget any slight\ndiscomfort.\"\n\n\"Pardon me, senor; but by this daylight I should have seen that armor\nbefore.\"\n\n\"I doubt it not, senor, as having been yourself also in the forefront of\nthe battle,\" said the Spaniard, with a proud smile.\n\n\"If I am right, senor, you are he who yesterday held up the standard\nafter it was shot down.\"\n\n\"I do not deny that undeserved honor; and I have to thank the courtesy\nof you and your countrymen for having permitted me to do so with\nimpunity.\"\n\n\"Ah, I heard of that brave feat,\" said the lord deputy. \"You should\nconsider yourself, Mr. Leigh, honored by being enabled to show courtesy\nto such a warrior.\"\n\nHow long this interchange of solemn compliments, of which Amyas was\ngetting somewhat weary, would have gone on, I know not; but at that\nmoment Raleigh entered hastily--\n\n\"My lord, they have hung out a white flag, and are calling for a\nparley!\"\n\nThe Spaniard turned pale, and felt for his sword, which was gone; and\nthen, with a bitter laugh, murmured to himself--\"As I expected.\"\n\n\"I am very sorry to hear it. Would to Heaven they had simply fought it\nout!\" said Lord Grey, half to himself; and then, \"Go, Captain Raleigh,\nand answer them that (saving this gentleman's presence) the laws of\nwar forbid a parley with any who are leagued with rebels against their\nlawful sovereign.\"\n\n\"But what if they wish to treat for this gentleman's ransom?\"\n\n\"For their own, more likely,\" said the Spaniard; \"but tell them, on my\npart, senor, that Don Guzman refuses to be ransomed; and will return to\nno camp where the commanding officer, unable to infect his captains with\nhis own cowardice, dishonors them against their will.\"\n\n\"You speak sharply, senor,\" said Winter, after Raleigh had gone out.\n\n\"I have reason, Senor Admiral, as you will find, I fear, erelong.\"\n\n\"We shall have the honor of leaving you here, for the present, sir, as\nAdmiral Winter's guest,\" said the lord deputy.\n\n\"But not my sword, it seems.\"\n\n\"Pardon me, senor; but no one has deprived you of your sword,\" said\nWinter.\n\n\"I don't wish to pain you, sir,\" said Amyas, \"but I fear that we were\nboth careless enough to leave it behind last night.\"\n\nA flash passed over the Spaniard's face, which disclosed terrible depths\nof fury and hatred beneath that quiet mask, as the summer lightning\ndisplays the black abysses of the thunder-storm; but like the summer\nlightning it passed almost unseen; and blandly as ever, he answered:\n\n\"I can forgive you for such a neglect, most valiant sir, more easily\nthan I can forgive myself. Farewell, sir! One who has lost his sword is\nno fit company for you.\" And as Amyas and the rest departed, he plunged\ninto the inner tent, stamping and writhing, gnawing his hands with rage\nand shame.\n\nAs Amyas came out on the battery, Yeo hailed him:\n\n\"Master Amyas! Hillo, sir! For the love of Heaven, tell me!\"\n\n\"What, then?\"\n\n\"Is his lordship stanch? Will he do the Lord's work faithfully, root and\nbranch: or will he spare the Amalekites?\"\n\n\"The latter, I think, old hip-and-thigh,\" said Amyas, hurrying forward\nto hear the news from Raleigh, who appeared in sight once more.\n\n\"They ask to depart with bag and baggage,\" said he, when he came up.\n\n\"God do so to me, and more also, if they carry away a straw!\" said Lord\nGrey. \"Make short work of it, sir!\"\n\n\"I do not know how that will be, my lord; as I came up a captain shouted\nto me off the walls that there were mutineers; and, denying that he\nsurrendered, would have pulled down the flag of truce, but the soldiers\nbeat him off.\"\n\n\"A house divided against itself will not stand long, gentlemen. Tell\nthem that I give no conditions. Let them lay down their arms, and trust\nin the Bishop of Rome who sent them hither, and may come to save them\nif he wants them. Gunners, if you see the white flag go down, open your\nfire instantly. Captain Raleigh, we need your counsel here. Mr. Cary,\nwill you be my herald this time?\"\n\n\"A better Protestant never went on a pleasanter errand, my lord.\"\n\nSo Cary went, and then ensued an argument, as to what should be done\nwith the prisoners in case of a surrender.\n\nI cannot tell whether my Lord Grey meant, by offering conditions which\nthe Spaniards would not accept, to force them into fighting the quarrel\nout, and so save himself the responsibility of deciding on their\nfate; or whether his mere natural stubbornness, as well as his just\nindignation, drove him on too far to retract: but the council of war\nwhich followed was both a sad and a stormy one, and one which he had\nreason to regret to his dying day. What was to be done with the enemy?\nThey already outnumbered the English; and some fifteen hundred of\nDesmond's wild Irish hovered in the forests round, ready to side with\nthe winning party, or even to attack the English at the least sign of\nvacillation or fear. They could not carry the Spaniards away with them,\nfor they had neither shipping nor food, not even handcuffs enough for\nthem; and as Mackworth told Winter when he proposed it, the only plan\nwas for him to make San Josepho a present of his ships, and swim home\nhimself as he could. To turn loose in Ireland, as Captain Touch urged,\non the other hand, seven hundred such monsters of lawlessness, cruelty,\nand lust, as Spanish and Italian condottieri were in those days, was\nas fatal to their own safety as cruel to the wretched Irish. All the\ncaptains, without exception, followed on the same side. \"What was to be\ndone, then?\" asked Lord Grey, impatiently. \"Would they have him murder\nthem all in cold blood?\"\n\nAnd for a while every man, knowing that it must come to that, and yet\nnot daring to say it; till Sir Warham St. Leger, the marshal of Munster,\nspoke out stoutly: \"Foreigners had been scoffing them too long and too\ntruly with waging these Irish wars as if they meant to keep them alive,\nrather than end them. Mercy and faith to every Irishman who would show\nmercy and faith, was his motto; but to invaders, no mercy. Ireland was\nEngland's vulnerable point; it might be some day her ruin; a terrible\nexample must be made of those who dare to touch the sore. Rather pardon\nthe Spaniards for landing in the Thames than in Ireland!\"--till Lord\nGrey became much excited, and turning as a last hope to Raleigh, asked\nhis opinion: but Raleigh's silver tongue was that day not on the side\nof indulgence. He skilfully recapitulated the arguments of his\nfellow-captains, improving them as he went on, till each worthy soldier\nwas surprised to find himself so much wiser a man than he had thought;\nand finished by one of his rapid and passionate perorations upon his\nfavorite theme--the West Indian cruelties of the Spaniards, \". . .\nby which great tracts and fair countries are now utterly stripped of\ninhabitants by heavy bondage and torments unspeakable. Oh, witless\nIslanders!\" said he, apostrophizing the Irish, \"would to Heaven that you\nwere here to listen to me! What other fate awaits you, if this viper,\nwhich you are so ready to take into your bosom, should be warmed to\nlife, but to groan like the Indians, slaves to the Spaniard; but to\nperish like the Indians, by heavy burdens, cruel chains, plunder and\nravishment; scourged, racked, roasted, stabbed, sawn in sunder, cast to\nfeed the dogs, as simple and more righteous peoples have perished ere\nnow by millions? And what else, I say, had been the fate of Ireland\nhad this invasion prospered, which God has now, by our weak hands,\nconfounded and brought to naught? Shall we then answer it, my lord,\neither to our conscience, our God, or our queen, if we shall set loose\nmen (not one of whom, I warrant, but is stained with murder on murder)\nto go and fill up the cup of their iniquity among these silly sheep?\nHave not their native wolves, their barbarous chieftains, shorn, peeled,\nand slaughtered them enough already, but we must add this pack of\nforeign wolves to the number of their tormentors, and fit the Desmond\nwith a body-guard of seven, yea, seven hundred devils worse than\nhimself? Nay, rather let us do violence to our own human nature, and\nshow ourselves in appearance rigorous, that we may be kind indeed; lest\nwhile we presume to be over-merciful to the guilty, we prove ourselves\nto be over-cruel to the innocent.\"\n\n\"Captain Raleigh, Captain Raleigh,\" said Lord Grey, \"the blood of these\nmen be on your head!\"\n\n\"It ill befits your lordship,\" answered Raleigh, \"to throw on your\nsubordinates the blame of that which your reason approves as necessary.\"\n\n\"I should have thought, sir, that one so noted for ambition as Captain\nRaleigh would have been more careful of the favor of that queen for\nwhose smiles he is said to be so longing a competitor. If you have not\nyet been of her counsels, sir, I can tell you you are not likely to be.\nShe will be furious when she hears of this cruelty.\"\n\nLord Grey had lost his temper: but Raleigh kept his, and answered\nquietly--\n\n\"Her majesty shall at least not find me among the number of those who\nprefer her favor to her safety, and abuse to their own profit that\nover-tenderness and mercifulness of heart which is the only blemish\n(and yet, rather like a mole on a fair cheek, but a new beauty) in her\nmanifold perfections.\"\n\nAt this juncture Cary returned.\n\n\"My lord,\" said he, in some confusion, \"I have proposed your terms; but\nthe captains still entreat for some mitigation; and, to tell you truth,\none of them has insisted on accompanying me hither to plead his cause\nhimself.\"\n\n\"I will not see him, sir. Who is he?\"\n\n\"His name is Sebastian of Modena, my lord.\"\n\n\"Sebastian of Modena? What think you, gentlemen? May we make an\nexception in favor of so famous a soldier?\"\n\n\"So villainous a cut-throat,\" said Zouch to Raleigh, under his breath.\n\nAll, however, were for speaking with so famous a man; and in came, in\nfull armor, a short, bull-necked Italian, evidently of immense strength,\nof the true Caesar Borgia stamp.\n\n\"Will you please to be seated, sir?\" said Lord Grey, coldly.\n\n\"I kiss your hands, most illustrious: but I do not sit in an enemy's\ncamp. Ha, my friend Zouch! How has your signoria fared since we fought\nside by side at Lepanto? So you too are here, sitting in council on the\nhanging of me.\"\n\n\"What is your errand, sir? Time is short,\" said the lord deputy.\n\n\"Corpo di Bacco! It has been long enough all the morning, for my\nrascals have kept me and my friend the Colonel Hercules (whom you know,\ndoubtless) prisoners in our tents at the pike's point. My lord deputy,\nI have but a few words. I shall thank you to take every soldier in the\nfort--Italian, Spaniard, and Irish--and hang them up as high as Haman,\nfor a set of mutinous cowards, with the arch-traitor San Josepho at\ntheir head.\"\n\n\"I am obliged to you for your offer, sir, and shall deliberate presently\nas to whether I shall not accept it.\"\n\n\"But as for us captains, really your excellency must consider that we\nare gentlemen born, and give us either buena querra, as the Spaniards\nsay, or a fair chance for life; and so to my business.\"\n\n\"Stay, sir. Answer this first. Have you or yours any commission to show\neither from the King of Spain or any other potentate?\"\n\n\"Never a one but the cause of Heaven and our own swords. And with them,\nmy lord, we are ready to meet any gentlemen of your camp, man to man,\nwith our swords only, half-way between your leaguer and ours; and I\ndoubt not that your lordship will see fair play. Will any gentleman\naccept so civil an offer? There sits a tall youth in that corner\nwho would suit me very well. Will any fit my gallant comrades with\nhalf-an-hour's punto and stoccado?\"\n\nThere was a silence, all looking at the lord deputy, whose eyes were\nkindling in a very ugly way.\n\n\"No answer? Then I must proceed to exhortation. So! Will that be\nsufficient?\"\n\nAnd walking composedly across the tent, the fearless ruffian quietly\nstooped down, and smote Amyas Leigh full in the face.\n\nUp sprang Amyas, heedless of all the august assembly, and with a single\nbuffet felled him to the earth.\n\n\"Excellent!\" said he, rising unabashed. \"I can always trust my instinct.\nI knew the moment I saw him that he was a cavalier worth letting blood.\nNow, sir, your sword and harness, and I am at your service outside!\"\n\nThe solemn and sententious Englishmen were altogether taken aback by the\nItalian's impudence; but Zouch settled the matter.\n\n\"Most noble captain, will you be pleased to recollect a certain little\noccurrence at Messina, in the year 1575? For if you do not, I do; and\nbeg to inform this gentleman that you are unworthy of his sword, and\nhad you, unluckily for you, been an Englishman, would have found the\nfashions of our country so different from your own that you would have\nbeen then hanged, sir, and probably may be so still.\"\n\nThe Italian's sword flashed out in a moment: but Lord Grey interfered.\n\n\"No fighting here, gentlemen. That may wait; and, what is more, shall\nwait till--Strike their swords down, Raleigh, Mackworth! Strike their\nswords down! Colonel Sebastian, you will be pleased to return as you\ncame, in safety, having lost nothing, as (I frankly tell you) you\nhave gained nothing, by your wild bearing here. We shall proceed to\ndeliberate on your fate.\"\n\n\"I trust, my lord,\" said Amyas, \"that you will spare this braggart's\nlife, at least for a day or two. For in spite of Captain Zouch's\nwarning, I must have to do with him yet, or my cheek will rise up in\njudgment against me at the last day.\"\n\n\"Well spoken, lad,\" said the colonel, as he swung out. \"So! worth a\nreprieve, by this sword, to have one more rapier-rattle before the\ngallows! Then I take back no further answer, my lord deputy? Not even\nour swords, our virgin blades, signor, the soldier's cherished bride?\nShall we go forth weeping widowers, and leave to strange embrace the\nlovely steel?\"\n\n\"None, sir, by heaven!\" said he, waxing wroth. \"Do you come hither,\npirates as you are, to dictate terms upon a foreign soil? Is it not\nenough to have set up here the Spanish flag, and claimed the land\nof Ireland as the Pope's gift to the Spaniard; violated the laws of\nnations, and the solemn treaties of princes, under color of a mad\nsuperstition?\"\n\n\"Superstition, my lord? Nothing less. Believe a philosopher who has not\nsaid a pater or an ave for seven years past at least. Quod tango\ncredo, is my motto; and though I am bound to say, under pain of the\nInquisition, that the most holy Father the Pope has given this land of\nIreland to his most Catholic Majesty the King of Spain, Queen Elizabeth\nhaving forfeited her title to it by heresy,--why, my lord, I believe it\nas little as you do. I believe that Ireland would have been mine, if I\nhad won it; I believe religiously that it is not mine, now I have lost\nit. What is, is, and a fig for priests; to-day to thee, to-morrow to me.\nAddio!\" And out he swung.\n\n\"There goes a most gallant rascal,\" said the lord deputy.\n\n\"And a most rascally gallant,\" said Zouch. \"The murder of his own page,\nof which I gave him a remembrancer, is among the least of his sins.\"\n\n\"And now, Captain Raleigh,\" said Lord Grey, \"as you have been so earnest\nin preaching this butchery, I have a right to ask none but you to\npractise it.\"\n\nRaleigh bit his lip, and replied by the \"quip courteous--\"\n\n\"I am at least a man, my lord, who thinks it shame to allow others to do\nthat which I dare not do myself.\"\n\nLord Grey might probably have returned \"the countercheck quarrelsome,\"\nhad not Mackworth risen--\n\n\"And I, my lord, being in that matter at least one of Captain Raleigh's\nkidney, will just go with him to see that he takes no harm by being bold\nenough to carry out an ugly business, and serving these rascals as their\ncountrymen served Mr. Oxenham.\"\n\n\"I bid you good morning, then, gentlemen, though I cannot bid you God\nspeed,\" said Lord Grey; and sitting down again, covered his face with\nhis hands, and, to the astonishment of all bystanders, burst, say the\nchroniclers, into tears.\n\nAmyas followed Raleigh out. The latter was pale, but determined, and\nvery wroth against the deputy.\n\n\"Does the man take me for a hangman,\" said he, \"that he speaks to me\nthus? But such is the way of the great. If you neglect your duty,\nthey haul you over the coals; if you do it, you must do it on your\nown responsibility. Farewell, Amyas; you will not shrink from me as a\nbutcher when I return?\"\n\n\"God forbid! But how will you do it?\"\n\n\"March one company in, and drive them forth, and let the other cut them\ndown as they come out.--Pah!\"\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nIt was done. Right or wrong, it was done. The shrieks and curses had\ndied away, and the Fort del Oro was a red shambles, which the soldiers\nwere trying to cover from the sight of heaven and earth, by dragging the\nbodies into the ditch, and covering them with the ruins of the rampart;\nwhile the Irish, who had beheld from the woods that awful warning, fled\ntrembling into the deepest recesses of the forest. It was done; and\nit never needed to be done again. The hint was severe, but it was\nsufficient. Many years passed before a Spaniard set foot again in\nIreland.\n\nThe Spanish and Italian officers were spared, and Amyas had Don Guzman\nMaria Magdalena Sotomayor de Soto duly adjudged to him, as his prize\nby right of war. He was, of course, ready enough to fight Sebastian\nof Modena: but Lord Grey forbade the duel: blood enough had been shed\nalready. The next question was, where to bestow Don Guzman till his\nransom should arrive; and as Amyas could not well deliver the gallant\nDon into the safe custody of Mrs. Leigh at Burrough, and still less into\nthat of Frank at Court, he was fain to write to Sir Richard Grenville,\nand ask his advice, and in the meanwhile keep the Spaniard with him upon\nparole, which he frankly gave,--saying that as for running away, he had\nnowhere to run to; and as for joining the Irish he had no mind to turn\npig; and Amyas found him, as shall be hereafter told, pleasant company\nenough. But one morning Raleigh entered--\n\n\"I have done you a good turn, Leigh, if you think it one. I have talked\nSt. Leger into making you my lieutenant, and giving you the custody of\na right pleasant hermitage--some castle Shackatory or other in the midst\nof a big bog, where time will run swift and smooth with you, between\nhunting wild Irish, snaring snipes, and drinking yourself drunk with\nusquebaugh over a turf fire.\"\n\n\"I'll go,\" quoth Amyas; \"anything for work.\" So he went and took\npossession of his lieutenancy and his black robber tower, and there\npassed the rest of the winter, fighting or hunting all day, and chatting\nand reading all the evening, with Senor Don Guzman, who, like a good\nsoldier of fortune, made himself thoroughly at home, and a general\nfavorite with the soldiers.\n\nAt first, indeed, his Spanish pride and stateliness, and Amyas's English\ntaciturnity, kept the two apart somewhat; but they soon began, if not\nto trust, at least to like each other; and Don Guzman told Amyas, bit by\nbit, who he was, of what an ancient house, and of what a poor one; and\nlaughed over the very small chance of his ransom being raised, and\nthe certainty that, at least, it could not come for a couple of years,\nseeing that the only De Soto who had a penny to spare was a fat old dean\nat St. Yago de Leon, in the Caracas, at which place Don Guzman had been\nborn. This of course led to much talk about the West Indies, and the\nDon was as much interested to find that Amyas had been one of Drake's\nworld-famous crew, as Amyas was to find that his captive was the\ngrandson of none other than that most terrible of man-hunters, Don\nFerdinando de Soto, the conqueror of Florida, of whom Amyas had read\nmany a time in Las Casas, \"as the captain of tyrants, the notoriousest\nand most experimented amongst them that have done the most hurts,\nmischiefs, and destructions in many realms.\" And often enough his blood\nboiled, and he had much ado to recollect that the speaker was his guest,\nas Don Guzman chatted away about his grandfather's hunts of innocent\nwomen and children, murders of caciques and burnings alive of guides,\n\"pour encourager les autres,\" without, seemingly, the least feeling that\nthe victims were human beings or subjects for human pity; anything, in\nshort, but heathen dogs, enemies of God, servants of the devil, to be\nused by the Christian when he needed, and when not needed killed down\nas cumberers of the ground. But Don Guzman was a most finished gentleman\nnevertheless; and told many a good story of the Indies, and told it\nwell; and over and above his stories, he had among his baggage two\nbooks,--the one Antonio Galvano's \"Discoveries of the World,\" a mine\nof winter evening amusement to Amyas; and the other, a manuscript book,\nwhich, perhaps, it had been well for Amyas had he never seen. For it was\nnone other than a sort of rough journal which Don Guzman had kept as a\nlad, when he went down with the Adelantado Gonzales Ximenes de Casada,\nfrom Peru to the River of Amazons, to look for the golden country of El\nDorado, and the city of Manoa, which stands in the midst of the White\nLake, and equals or surpasses in glory even the palace of the Inca\nHuaynacapac; \"all the vessels of whose house and kitchen are of gold\nand silver, and in his wardrobe statues of gold which seemed giants, and\nfigures in proportion and bigness of all the beasts, birds, trees, and\nherbs of the earth, and the fishes of the water; and ropes, budgets,\nchests, and troughs of gold: yea, and a garden of pleasure in an Island\nnear Puna, where they went to recreate themselves when they would take\nthe air of the sea, which had all kind of garden herbs, flowers, and\ntrees of gold and silver of an invention and magnificence till then\nnever seen.\"\n\nNow the greater part of this treasure (and be it remembered that these\nwonders were hardly exaggerated, and that there were many men alive then\nwho had beheld them, as they had worse things, \"with their corporal and\nmortal eyes\") was hidden by the Indians when Pizarro conquered Peru and\nslew Atahuallpa, son of Huaynacapac; at whose death, it was said, one\nof the Inca's younger brothers fled out of Peru, and taking with him\na great army, vanquished all that tract which lieth between the great\nRivers of Amazons and Baraquan, otherwise called Maranon and Orenoque.\n\nThere he sits to this day, beside the golden lake, in the golden city,\nwhich is in breadth a three days' journey, covered, he and his court,\nwith gold dust from head to foot, waiting for the fulfilment of the\nancient prophecy which was written in the temple of Caxamarca, where his\nancestors worshipped of old; that heroes shall come out of the West, and\nlead him back across the forests to the kingdom of Peru, and restore him\nto the glory of his forefathers.\n\nGolden phantom! so possible, so probable, to imaginations which were yet\nreeling before the actual and veritable prodigies of Peru, Mexico, and\nthe East Indies. Golden phantom! which has cost already the lives\nof thousands, and shall yet cost more; from Diego de Ordas, and Juan\nCorteso, and many another, who went forth on the quest by the Andes, and\nby the Orinoco, and by the Amazons; Antonio Sedenno, with his ghastly\ncaravan of manacled Indians, \"on whose dead carcasses the tigers being\nfleshed, assaulted the Spaniards;\" Augustine Delgado, who \"came to a\ncacique, who entertained him with all kindness, and gave him beside much\ngold and slaves, three nymphs very beautiful, which bare the names\nof three provinces, Guanba, Gotoguane, and Maiarare. To requite which\nmanifold courtesies, he carried off, not only all the gold, but all the\nIndians he could seize, and took them in irons to Cubagua, and sold them\nfor slaves; after which, Delgado was shot in the eye by an Indian, of\nwhich hurt he died;\" Pedro d'Orsua, who found the cinnamon forests of\nLoxas, \"whom his men murdered, and afterwards beheaded Lady Anes his\nwife, who forsook not her lord in all his travels unto death,\" and many\nanother, who has vanished with valiant comrades at his back into the\ngreen gulfs of the primaeval forests, never to emerge again. Golden\nphantom! man-devouring, whose maw is never satiate with souls of heroes;\nfatal to Spain, more fatal still to England upon that shameful day, when\nthe last of Elizabeth's heroes shall lay down his head upon the block,\nnominally for having believed what all around him believed likewise\ntill they found it expedient to deny it in order to curry favor with the\ncrowned cur who betrayed him, really because he alone dared to make one\nlast protest in behalf of liberty and Protestantism against the incoming\nnight of tyranny and superstition. Little thought Amyas, as he devoured\nthe pages of that manuscript, that he was laying a snare for the life of\nthe man whom, next to Drake and Grenville, he most admired on earth.\n\nBut Don Guzman, on the other hand, seemed to have an instinct that that\nbook might be a fatal gift to his captor; for one day ere Amyas had\nlooked into it, he began questioning the Don about El Dorado. Whereon\nDon Guzman replied with one of those smiles of his, which (as Amyas said\nafterwards) was so abominably like a sneer, that he had often hard work\nto keep his hands off the man--\n\n\"Ah! You have been eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, senor?\nWell; if you have any ambition to follow many another brave captain\nto the pit, I know no shorter or easier path than is contained in that\nlittle book.\"\n\n\"I have never opened your book,\" said Amyas; \"your private manuscripts\nare no concern of mine: but my man who recovered your baggage read\npart of it, knowing no better; and now you are at liberty to tell me as\nlittle as you like.\"\n\nThe \"man,\" it should be said, was none other than Salvation Yeo, who\nhad attached himself by this time inseparably to Amyas, in quality of\nbody-guard: and, as was common enough in those days, had turned soldier\nfor the nonce, and taken under his patronage two or three rusty bases\n(swivels) and falconets (four-pounders), which grinned harmlessly enough\nfrom the tower top across the cheerful expanse of bog.\n\nAmyas once asked him, how he reconciled this Irish sojourn with his vow\nto find his little maid? Yeo shook his head.\n\n\"I can't tell, sir, but there's something that makes me always to think\nof you when I think of her; and that's often enough, the Lord knows.\nWhether it is that I ben't to find the dear without your help; or\nwhether it is your pleasant face puts me in mind of hers; or what, I\ncan't tell; but don't you part me from you, sir, for I'm like Ruth,\nand where you lodge I lodge; and where you go I go; and where you\ndie--though I shall die many a year first--there I'll die, I hope and\ntrust; for I can't abear you out of my sight; and that's the truth\nthereof.\"\n\nSo Yeo remained with Amyas, while Cary went elsewhere with Sir Warham\nSt. Leger, and the two friends met seldom for many months; so that\nAmyas's only companion was Don Guzman, who, as he grew more familiar,\nand more careless about what he said and did in his captor's presence,\noften puzzled and scandalized him by his waywardness. Fits of deep\nmelancholy alternated with bursts of Spanish boastfulness, utterly\nastonishing to the modest and sober-minded Englishman, who would often\nhave fancied him inspired by usquebaugh, had he not had ocular proof of\nhis extreme abstemiousness.\n\n\"Miserable?\" said he, one night in one of these fits. \"And have I not\na right to be miserable? Why should I not curse the virgin and all the\nsaints, and die? I have not a friend, not a ducat on earth; not even a\nsword--hell and the furies! It was my all: the only bequest I ever had\nfrom my father, and I lived by it and earned by it. Two years ago I had\nas pretty a sum of gold as cavalier could wish--and now!\"--\n\n\"What is become of it, then? I cannot hear that our men plundered you of\nany.\"\n\n\"Your men? No, senor! What fifty men dared not have done, one woman did!\na painted, patched, fucused, periwigged, bolstered, Charybdis, cannibal,\nMegaera, Lamia! Why did I ever go near that cursed Naples, the common\nsewer of Europe? whose women, I believe, would be swallowed up by\nVesuvius to-morrow, if it were not that Belphegor is afraid of their\nmaking the pit itself too hot to hold him. Well, sir, she had all of\nmine and more; and when all was gone in wine and dice, woodcocks' brains\nand ortolans' tongues, I met the witch walking with another man. I had\na sword and a dagger; I gave him the first (though the dog fought well\nenough, to give him his due), and her the second; left them lying across\neach other, and fled for my life,--and here I am! after twenty years of\nfighting, from the Levant to the Orellana--for I began ere I had a\nhair on my chin--and this is the end!--No, it is not! I'll have that El\nDorado yet! the Adelantado made Berreo, when he gave him his daughter,\nswear that he would hunt for it, through life and death.--We'll see\nwho finds it first, he or I. He's a bungler; Orsua was a bungler--Pooh!\nCortes and Pizarro? we'll see whether there are not as good Castilians\nas they left still. I can do it, senor. I know a track, a plan; over the\nLlanos is the road; and I'll be Emperor of Manoa yet--possess the jewels\nof all the Incas; and gold, gold! Pizarro was a beggar to what I will\nbe!\"\n\nConceive, sir, he broke forth during another of these peacock fits,\nas Amyas and he were riding along the hill-side; \"conceive! with forty\nchosen cavaliers (what need of more?) I present myself before the golden\nking, trembling amid his myriad guards at the new miracle of the mailed\ncentaurs of the West; and without dismounting, I approach his throne,\nlift the crucifix which hangs around my neck, and pressing it to my\nlips, present it for the adoration of the idolater, and give him his\nalternative; that which Gayferos and the Cid, my ancestors, offered\nthe Soldan and the Moor--baptism or death! He hesitates; perhaps\nsmiles scornfully upon my little band; I answer him by deeds, as Don\nFerdinando, my illustrious grandfather, answered Atahuallpa at Peru, in\nsight of all his court and camp.\"\n\n\"With your lance-point, as Gayferos did the Soldan?\" asked Amyas,\namused.\n\n\"No, sir; persuasion first, for the salvation of a soul is at stake. Not\nwith the lance-point, but the spur, sir, thus!\"--\n\nAnd striking his heels into his horse's flanks, he darted off at full\nspeed.\n\n\"The Spanish traitor!\" shouted Yeo. \"He's going to escape! Shall we\nshoot, sir? Shall we shoot?\"\n\n\"For Heaven's sake, no!\" said Amyas, looking somewhat blank,\nnevertheless, for he much doubted whether the whole was not a ruse on\nthe part of the Spaniard, and he knew how impossible it was for his\nfifteen stone of flesh to give chase to the Spaniard's twelve. But he\nwas soon reassured; the Spaniard wheeled round towards him, and began to\nput the rough hackney through all the paces of the manege with a grace\nand skill which won applause from the beholders.\n\n\"Thus!\" he shouted, waving his hand to Amyas, between his curvets and\ncaracoles, \"did my illustrious grandfather exhibit to the Paynim emperor\nthe prowess of a Castilian cavalier! Thus!--and thus!--and thus, at\nlast, he dashed up to his very feet, as I to yours, and bespattering\nthat unbaptized visage with his Christian bridle foam, pulled up his\ncharger on his haunches, thus!\"\n\nAnd (as was to be expected from a blown Irish garron on a peaty Irish\nhill-side) down went the hapless hackney on his tail, away went his\nheels a yard in front of him, and ere Don Guzman could \"avoid his\nselle,\" horse and man rolled over into neighboring bog-hole.\n\n\"After pride comes a fall,\" quoth Yeo with unmoved visage, as he lugged\nhim out.\n\n\"And what would you do with the emperor at last?\" asked Amyas when the\nDon had been scrubbed somewhat clean with a bunch of rushes. \"Kill him,\nas your grandfather did Atahuallpa?\"\n\n\"My grandfather,\" answered the Spaniard, indignantly, \"was one of those\nwho, to their eternal honor, protested to the last against that most\ncruel and unknightly massacre. He could be terrible to the heathen; but\nhe kept his plighted word, sir, and taught me to keep mine, as you have\nseen to-day.\"\n\n\"I have, senor,\" said Amyas. \"You might have given us the slip easily\nenough just now, and did not. Pardon me, if I have offended you.\"\n\nThe Spaniard (who, after all, was cross principally with himself and the\n\"unlucky mare's son,\" as the old romances have it, which had played him\nso scurvy a trick) was all smiles again forthwith; and Amyas, as they\nchatted on, could not help asking him next--\n\n\"I wonder why you are so frank about your own intentions to an enemy\nlike me, who will surely forestall you if he can.\"\n\n\"Sir, a Spaniard needs no concealment, and fears no rivalry. He is the\nsoldier of the Cross, and in it he conquers, like Constantine of old.\nNot that you English are not very heroes; but you have not, sir, and\nyou cannot have, who have forsworn our Lady and the choir of saints, the\nsame divine protection, the same celestial mission, which enables the\nCatholic cavalier single-handed to chase a thousand Paynims.\"\n\nAnd Don Guzman crossed himself devoutly, and muttered half-a-dozen Ave\nMarias in succession, while Amyas rode silently by his side, utterly\npuzzled at this strange compound of shrewdness with fanaticism, of\nperfect high-breeding with a boastfulness which in an Englishman would\nhave been the sure mark of vulgarity.\n\nAt last came a letter from Sir Richard Grenville, complimenting Amyas\non his success and promotion, bearing a long and courtly message to Don\nGuzman (whom Grenville had known when he was in the Mediterranean, at\nthe battle of Lepanto), and offering to receive him as his own guest\nat Bideford, till his ransom should arrive; a proposition which the\nSpaniard (who of course was getting sufficiently tired of the Irish\nbogs) could not but gladly accept; and one of Winter's ships, returning\nto England in the spring of 1581, delivered duly at the quay of Bideford\nthe body of Don Guzman Maria Magdalena. Raleigh, after forming for\nthat summer one of the triumvirate by which Munster was governed after\nOrmond's departure, at last got his wish and departed for England and\nthe Court; and Amyas was left alone with the snipes and yellow mantles\nfor two more weary years.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nHOW THE MAYOR OF BIDEFORD BAITED HIS HOOK WITH HIS OWN FLESH\n\n     \"And therewith he blent, and cried ha!\n     As though he had been stricken to the harte.\"\n\n                              Palamon and Arcite.\n\nSo it befell to Chaucer's knight in prison; and so it befell also to Don\nGuzman; and it befell on this wise.\n\nHe settled down quietly enough at Bideford on his parole, in better\nquarters than he had occupied for many a day, and took things as they\ncame, like a true soldier of fortune; till, after he had been with\nGrenville hardly a month, old Salterne the Mayor came to supper.\n\nNow Don Guzman, however much he might be puzzled at first at our strange\nEnglish ways of asking burghers and such low-bred folk to eat and drink\nabove the salt, in the company of noble persons, was quite gentleman\nenough to know that Richard Grenville was gentleman enough to do only\nwhat was correct, and according to the customs and proprieties. So after\nshrugging the shoulders of his spirit, he submitted to eat and drink at\nthe same board with a tradesman who sat at a desk, and made up ledgers,\nand took apprentices; and hearing him talk with Grenville neither\nunwisely nor in a vulgar fashion, actually before the evening was out\ncondescended to exchange words with him himself. Whereon he found him\na very prudent and courteous person, quite aware of the Spaniard's\nsuperior rank, and making him feel in every sentence that he was aware\nthereof; and yet holding his own opinion, and asserting his own rights\nas a wise elder in a fashion which the Spaniard had only seen before\namong the merchant princes of Genoa and Venice.\n\nAt the end of supper, Salterne asked Grenville to do his humble roof the\nhonor, etc. etc., of supping with him the next evening, and then turning\nto the Don, said quite frankly, that he knew how great a condescension\nit would be on the part of a nobleman of Spain to sit at the board of\na simple merchant: but that if the Spaniard deigned to do him such\na favor, he would find that the cheer was fit enough for any rank,\nwhatsoever the company might be; which invitation Don Guzman, being on\nthe whole glad enough of anything to amuse him, graciously condescended\nto accept, and gained thereby an excellent supper, and, if he had chosen\nto drink it, much good wine.\n\nNow Mr. Salterne was, of course, as a wise merchant, as ready as any man\nfor an adventure to foreign parts, as was afterwards proved by his great\nexertions in the settlement of Virginia; and he was, therefore, equally\nready to rack the brains of any guest whom he suspected of knowing\nanything concerning strange lands; and so he thought no shame, first to\ntry to loose his guest's tongue by much good sack, and next, to ask him\nprudent and well-concocted questions concerning the Spanish Main, Peru,\nthe Moluccas, China, the Indies, and all parts.\n\nThe first of which schemes failed; for the Spaniard was as abstemious\nas any monk, and drank little but water; the second succeeded not over\nwell, for the Spaniard was as cunning as any fox, and answered little\nbut wind.\n\nIn the midst of which tongue-fence in came the Rose of Torridge, looking\nas beautiful as usual; and hearing what they were upon, added, artlessly\nenough, her questions to her father's: to her Don Guzman could not but\nanswer; and without revealing any very important commercial secrets,\ngave his host and his host's daughter a very amusing evening.\n\nNow little Eros, though spirits like Frank Leigh's may choose to call\nhim (as, perhaps, he really is to them) the eldest of the gods, and\nthe son of Jove and Venus, yet is reported by other equally good\nauthorities, as Burton has set forth in his \"Anatomy of Melancholy,\" to\nbe after all only the child of idleness and fulness of bread. To which\nscandalous calumny the thoughts of Don Guzman's heart gave at least a\ncertain color; for he being idle (as captives needs must be), and also\nfull of bread (for Sir Richard kept a very good table), had already\nlooked round for mere amusement's sake after some one with whom to fall\nin love. Lady Grenville, as nearest, was, I blush to say, thought of\nfirst; but the Spaniard was a man of honor, and Sir Richard his host; so\nhe put away from his mind (with a self-denial on which he plumed himself\nmuch) the pleasure of a chase equally exciting to his pride and his love\nof danger. As for the sinfulness of the said chase, he of course thought\nno more of that than other Southern Europeans did then, or than (I blush\nagain to have to say it) the English did afterwards in the days of the\nStuarts. Nevertheless, he had put Lady Grenville out of his mind; and so\nleft room to take Rose Salterne into it, not with any distinct purpose\nof wronging her: but, as I said before, half to amuse himself, and half,\ntoo, because he could not help it. For there was an innocent freshness\nabout the Rose of Torridge, fond as she was of being admired, which was\nnew to him and most attractive. \"The train of the peacock,\" as he\nsaid to himself, \"and yet the heart of the dove,\" made so charming a\ncombination, that if he could have persuaded her to love no one but him,\nperhaps he might become fool enough to love no one but her. And at that\nthought he was seized with a very panic of prudence, and resolved to\nkeep out of her way; and yet the days ran slowly, and Lady Grenville\nwhen at home was stupid enough to talk and think about nothing but her\nhusband; and when she went to Stow, and left the Don alone in one corner\nof the great house at Bideford, what could he do but lounge down to the\nbutt-gardens to show off his fine black cloak and fine black feather,\nsee the shooting, have a game or two of rackets with the youngsters, a\ngame or two of bowls with the elders, and get himself invited home to\nsupper by Mr. Salterne?\n\nAnd there, of course, he had it all his own way, and ruled the roast\n(which he was fond enough of doing) right royally, not only on account\nof his rank, but because he had something to say worth hearing, as a\ntravelled man. For those times were the day-dawn of English commerce;\nand not a merchant in Bideford, or in all England, but had his\nimagination all on fire with projects of discoveries, companies,\nprivileges, patents, and settlements; with gallant rivalry of the brave\nadventures of Sir Edward Osborne and his new London Company of Turkey\nMerchants; with the privileges just granted by the Sultan Murad Khan\nto the English; with the worthy Levant voyages of Roger Bodenham in\nthe great bark Aucher, and of John Fox, and Lawrence Aldersey, and John\nRule; and with hopes from the vast door for Mediterranean trade, which\nthe crushing of the Venetian power at Famagusta in Cyprus, and the\nalliance made between Elizabeth and the Grand Turk, had just thrown\nopen. So not a word could fall from the Spaniard about the Mediterranean\nbut took root at once in right fertile soil. Besides, Master Edmund\nHogan had been on a successful embassy to the Emperor of Morocco; John\nHawkins and George Fenner had been to Guinea (and with the latter Mr.\nWalter Wren, a Bideford man), and had traded there for musk and civet,\ngold and grain; and African news was becoming almost as valuable as West\nIndian. Moreover, but two months before had gone from London Captain\nHare in the bark Minion, for Brazil, and a company of adventurers with\nhim, with Sheffield hardware, and \"Devonshire and Northern kersies,\"\nhollands and \"Manchester cottons,\" for there was a great opening for\nEnglish goods by the help of one John Whithall, who had married a\nSpanish heiress, and had an ingenio and slaves in Santos. (Don't smile,\nreader, or despise the day of small things, and those who sowed the seed\nwhereof you reap the mighty harvest.) In the meanwhile, Drake had proved\nnot merely the possibility of plundering the American coasts, but\nof establishing an East Indian trade; Frobisher and Davis, worthy\nforefathers of our Parrys and Franklins, had begun to bore their way\nupward through the Northern ice, in search of a passage to China which\nshould avoid the dangers of the Spanish seas; and Anthony Jenkinson, not\nthe least of English travellers, had, in six-and-twenty years of travel\nin behalf of the Muscovite Company, penetrated into not merely Russia\nand the Levant, but Persia and Armenia, Bokhara, Tartary, Siberia, and\nthose waste Arctic shores where, thirty years before, the brave Sir Hugh\nWilloughby,\n\n          \"In Arzina caught,\n     Perished with all his crew.\"\n\nEverywhere English commerce, under the genial sunshine of Elizabeth's\nwise rule, was spreading and taking root; and as Don Guzman talked\nwith his new friends, he soon saw (for he was shrewd enough) that they\nbelonged to a race which must be exterminated if Spain intended to\nbecome (as she did intend) the mistress of the world; and that it was\nnot enough for Spain to have seized in the Pope's name the whole new\nworld, and claimed the exclusive right to sail the seas of America; not\nenough to have crushed the Hollanders; not enough to have degraded the\nVenetians into her bankers, and the Genoese into her mercenaries; not\nenough to have incorporated into herself, with the kingdom of Portugal,\nthe whole East Indian trade of Portugal, while these fierce islanders\nremained to assert, with cunning policy and texts of Scripture, and, if\nthey failed, with sharp shot and cold steel, free seas and free trade\nfor all the nations upon earth. He saw it, and his countrymen saw it\ntoo: and therefore the Spanish Armada came: but of that hereafter. And\nDon Guzman knew also, by hard experience, that these same islanders, who\nsat in Salterne's parlor, talking broad Devon through their noses, were\nno mere counters of money and hucksters of goods: but men who, though\nthey thoroughly hated fighting, and loved making money instead, could\nfight, upon occasion, after a very dogged and terrible fashion, as well\nas the bluest blood in Spain; and who sent out their merchant ships\narmed up to the teeth, and filled with men who had been trained from\nchildhood to use those arms, and had orders to use them without mercy\nif either Spaniard, Portugal, or other created being dared to stop their\nmoney-making. And one evening he waxed quite mad, when, after having\ncivilly enough hinted that if Englishmen came where they had no right to\ncome, they might find themselves sent back again, he was answered by a\nvolley of--\n\n\"We'll see that, sir.\"\n\n\"Depends on who says 'No right.'\"\n\n\"You found might right,\" said another, \"when you claimed the Indian\nseas; we may find right might when we try them.\"\n\n\"Try them, then, gentlemen, by all means, if it shall so please your\nworships; and find the sacred flag of Spain as invincible as ever was\nthe Roman eagle.\"\n\n\"We have, sir. Did you ever hear of Francis Drake?\"\n\n\"Or of George Fenner and the Portugals at the Azores, one against\nseven?\"\n\n\"Or of John Hawkins, at St. Juan d'Ulloa?\"\n\n\"You are insolent burghers,\" said Don Guzman, and rose to go.\n\n\"Sir,\" said old Salterne, \"as you say, we are burghers and plain men,\nand some of us have forgotten ourselves a little, perhaps; we must beg\nyou to forgive our want of manners, and to put it down to the strength\nof my wine; for insolent we never meant to be, especially to a noble\ngentleman and a foreigner.\"\n\nBut the Don would not be pacified; and walked out, calling himself\nan ass and a blinkard for having demeaned himself to such a company,\nforgetting that he had brought it on himself.\n\nSalterne (prompted by the great devil Mammon) came up to him next day,\nand begged pardon again; promising, moreover, that none of those who had\nbeen so rude should be henceforth asked to meet him, if he would deign\nto honor his house once more. And the Don actually was appeased, and\nwent there the very next evening, sneering at himself the whole time for\ngoing.\n\n\"Fool that I am! that girl has bewitched me, I believe. Go I must, and\neat my share of dirt, for her sake.\"\n\nSo he went; and, cunningly enough, hinted to old Salterne that he\nhad taken such a fancy to him, and felt so bound by his courtesy and\nhospitality, that he might not object to tell him things which he would\nnot mention to every one; for that the Spaniards were not jealous of\nsingle traders, but of any general attempt to deprive them of their\nhard-earned wealth: that, however, in the meanwhile, there were plenty\nof opportunities for one man here and there to enrich himself, etc.\n\nOld Salterne, shrewd as he was, had his weak point, and the Spaniard had\ntouched it; and delighted at this opportunity of learning the mysteries\nof the Spanish monopoly, he often actually set Rose on to draw out the\nDon, without a fear (so blind does money make men) lest she might be\nherself drawn in. For, first, he held it as impossible that she would\nthink of marrying a Popish Spaniard as of marrying the man in the moon;\nand, next, as impossible that he would think of marrying a burgher's\ndaughter as of marrying a negress; and trusted that the religion of the\none, and the family pride of the other, would keep them as separate as\nbeings of two different species. And as for love without marriage, if\nsuch a possibility ever crossed him, the thought was rendered absurd;\non Rose's part by her virtue, on which the old roan (and rightly) would\nhave staked every farthing he had on earth; and on the Don's part, by a\ncertain human fondness for the continuity of the carotid artery and the\nparts adjoining, for which (and that not altogether justly, seeing\nthat Don Guzman cared as little for his own life as he did for his\nneighbor's) Mr. Salterne gave him credit. And so it came to pass, that\nfor weeks and months the merchant's house was the Don's favorite haunt,\nand he saw the Rose of Torridge daily, and the Rose of Torridge heard\nhim.\n\nAnd as for her, poor child, she had never seen such a man. He had, or\nseemed to have, all the high-bred grace of Frank, and yet he was cast in\na manlier mould; he had just enough of his nation's proud self-assertion\nto make a woman bow before him as before a superior, and yet tact enough\nto let it very seldom degenerate into that boastfulness of which the\nSpaniards were then so often and so justly accused. He had marvels to\ntell by flood and field as many and more than Amyas; and he told\nthem with a grace and an eloquence of which modest, simple, old Amyas\npossessed nothing. Besides, he was on the spot, and the Leighs were not,\nnor indeed were any of her old lovers; and what could she do but amuse\nherself with the only person who came to hand?\n\nSo thought, in time, more ladies than she; for the country, the north of\nit at least, was all but bare just then of young gallants, what with the\nNetherland wars and the Irish wars; and the Spaniard became soon welcome\nat every house for many a mile round, and made use of his welcome so\nfreely, and received so much unwonted attention from fair young dames,\nthat his head might have been a little turned, and Rose Salterne have\nthereby escaped, had not Sir Richard delicately given him to understand\nthat in spite of the free and easy manners of English ladies, brothers\nwere just as jealous, and ladies' honors at least as inexpugnable, as\nin the land of demureness and duennas. Don Guzman took the hint well\nenough, and kept on good terms with the country gentlemen as with their\ndaughters; and to tell the truth, the cunning soldier of fortune found\nhis account in being intimate with all the ladies he could, in order to\nprevent old Salterne from fancying that he had any peculiar predilection\nfor Mistress Rose.\n\nNevertheless, Mr. Salterne's parlor being nearest to him, still remained\nhis most common haunt; where, while he discoursed for hours about\n\n     \"Antres vast and deserts idle,\n     And of the cannibals that each other eat,\n     Of Anthropophagi, and men whose heads\n     Do grow beneath their shoulders,\"\n\nto the boundless satisfaction of poor Rose's fancy, he took care to\nseason his discourse with scraps of mercantile information, which kept\nthe old merchant always expectant and hankering for more, and made it\nworth his while to ask the Spaniard in again and again.\n\nAnd his stories, certainly, were worth hearing. He seemed to have been\neverywhere, and to have seen everything: born in Peru, and sent home to\nSpain at ten years old; brought up in Italy; a soldier in the Levant; an\nadventurer to the East Indies; again in America, first in the islands,\nand then in Mexico. Then back again to Spain, and thence to Rome, and\nthence to Ireland. Shipwrecked; captive among savages; looking down the\ncraters of volcanoes; hanging about all the courts of Europe; fighting\nTurks, Indians, lions, elephants, alligators, and what not? At\nfive-and-thirty he had seen enough for three lives, and knew how to make\nthe best of what he had seen.\n\nHe had shared, as a lad, in the horrors of the memorable siege of\nFamagusta, and had escaped, he hardly knew himself how, from the hands\nof the victorious Turks, and from the certainty (if he escaped being\nflayed alive or impaled, as most of the captive officers were) of ending\nhis life as a Janissary at the Sultan's court. He had been at the Battle\nof the Three Kings; had seen Stukely borne down by a hundred lances,\nunconquered even in death; and had held upon his knee the head of the\ndying King of Portugal.\n\nAnd now, as he said to Rose one evening, what had he left on earth, but\na heart trampled as hard as the pavement? Whom had he to love? Who loved\nhim? He had nothing for which to live but fame: and even that was denied\nto him, a prisoner in a foreign land.\n\nHad he no kindred, then? asked pitying Rose.\n\n\"My two sisters are in a convent;--they had neither money nor beauty;\nso they are dead to me. My brother is a Jesuit, so he is dead to me. My\nfather fell by the hands of Indians in Mexico; my mother, a penniless\nwidow, is companion, duenna--whatsoever they may choose to call\nit--carrying fans and lapdogs for some princess or other there in\nSeville, of no better blood than herself; and I--devil! I have lost even\nmy sword--and so fares the house of De Soto.\"\n\nDon Guzman, of course, intended to be pitied, and pitied he was\naccordingly. And then he would turn the conversation, and begin telling\nItalian stories, after the Italian fashion, according to his auditory:\nthe pathetic ones when Rose was present, the racy ones when she was\nabsent; so that Rose had wept over the sorrows of Juliet and Desdemona,\nand over many another moving tale, long before they were ever enacted\non an English stage, and the ribs of the Bideford worthies had shaken to\nmany a jest which Cinthio and Bandello's ghosts must come and make for\nthemselves over again if they wish them to be remembered, for I shall\nlend them no shove toward immortality.\n\nAnd so on, and so on. What need of more words? Before a year was out,\nRose Salterne was far more in love with Don Guzman than he with her; and\nboth suspected each other's mind, though neither hinted at the truth;\nshe from fear, and he, to tell the truth, from sheer Spanish pride of\nblood. For he soon began to find out that he must compromise that blood\nby marrying the heretic burgher's daughter, or all his labor would be\nthrown away.\n\nHe had seen with much astonishment, and then practised with much\npleasure, that graceful old English fashion of saluting every lady on\nthe cheek at meeting, which (like the old Dutch fashion of asking young\nladies out to feasts without their mothers) used to give such cause of\nbrutal calumny and scandal to the coarse minds of Romish visitors from\nthe Continent; and he had seen, too, fuming with jealous rage, more than\none Bideford burgher, redolent of onions, profane in that way the velvet\ncheek of Rose Salterne.\n\nSo, one day, he offered his salute in like wise; but he did it when she\nwas alone; for something within (perhaps a guilty conscience) whispered\nthat it might be hardly politic to make the proffer in her father's\npresence: however, to his astonishment, he received a prompt though\nquiet rebuff.\n\n\"No, sir; you should know that my cheek is not for you.\"\n\n\"Why,\" said he, stifling his anger, \"it seems free enough to every\ncounter-jumper in the town!\"\n\nWas it love, or simple innocence, which made her answer apologetically?\n\n\"True, Don Guzman; but they are my equals.\"\n\n\"And I?\"\n\n\"You are a nobleman, sir; and should recollect that you are one.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said he, forcing a sneer, \"it is a strange taste to prefer the\nshopkeeper!\"\n\n\"Prefer?\" said she, forcing a laugh in her turn; \"it is a mere form\namong us. They are nothing to me, I can tell you.\"\n\n\"And I, then, less than nothing?\"\n\nRose turned very red; but she had nerve to answer--\n\n\"And why should you be anything to me? You have condescended too much,\nsir, already to us, in giving us many a--many a pleasant evening. You\nmust condescend no further. You wrong yourself, sir, and me too. No,\nsir; not a step nearer!--I will not! A salute between equals means\nnothing: but between you and me--I vow, sir, if you do not leave me this\nmoment, I will complain to my father.\"\n\n\"Do so, madam! I care as little for your father's anger, as you for my\nmisery.\"\n\n\"Cruel!\" cried Rose, trembling from head to foot.\n\n\"I love you, madam!\" cried he, throwing himself at her feet. \"I adore\nyou! Never mention differences of rank to me more; for I have forgotten\nthem; forgotten all but love, all but you, madam! My light, my lodestar,\nmy princess, my goddess! You see where my pride is gone; remember I\nplead as a suppliant, a beggar--though one who may be one day a prince,\na king! ay, and a prince now, a very Lucifer of pride to all except to\nyou; to you a wretch who grovels at your feet, and cries, 'Have mercy\non me, on my loneliness, my homelessness, my friendlessness.' Ah, Rose\n(madam I should have said, forgive the madness of my passion), you know\nnot the heart which you break. Cold Northerns, you little dream how a\nSpaniard can love. Love? Worship, rather; as I worship you, madam; as\nI bless the captivity which brought me the sight of you, and the ruin\nwhich first made me rich. Is it possible, saints and Virgin! do my own\ntears deceive my eyes, or are there tears, too, in those radiant orbs?\"\n\n\"Go, sir!\" cried poor Rose, recovering herself suddenly; \"and let me\nnever see you more.\" And, as a last chance for life, she darted out of\nthe room.\n\n\"Your slave obeys you, madam, and kisses your hands and feet forever\nand a day,\" said the cunning Spaniard, and drawing himself up, walked\nserenely out of the house; while she, poor fool, peeped after him out\nof her window upstairs, and her heart sank within her as she watched his\njaunty and careless air.\n\nHow much of that rhapsody of his was honest, how much premeditated, I\ncannot tell: though she, poor child, began to fancy that it was all a\nset speech, when she found that he had really taken her at her word, and\nset foot no more within her father's house. So she reproached herself\nfor the cruelest of women; settled, that if he died, she should be his\nmurderess; watched for him to pass at the window, in hopes that he might\nlook up, and then hid herself in terror the moment he appeared round\nthe corner; and so forth, and so forth:--one love-making is very like\nanother, and has been so, I suppose, since that first blessed marriage\nin Paradise, when Adam and Eve made no love at all, but found it\nready-made for them from heaven; and really it is fiddling while Rome\nis burning, to spend more pages over the sorrows of poor little Rose\nSalterne, while the destinies of Europe are hanging on the marriage\nbetween Elizabeth and Anjou: and Sir Humphrey Gilbert is stirring heaven\nand earth, and Devonshire, of course, as the most important portion\nof the said earth, to carry out his dormant patent, which will give to\nEngland in due time (we are not jesting now) Newfoundland, Nova Scotia,\nand Canada, and the Northern States; and to Humphrey Gilbert himself\nsomething better than a new world, namely another world, and a crown of\nglory therein which never fades away.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nHOW EUSTACE LEIGH MET THE POPE'S LEGATE\n\n     \"Misguided, rash, intruding fool, farewell!\n     Thou see'st to be too busy is some danger.\"\n\n                                        Hamlet.\n\nIt is the spring of 1582-3. The gray March skies are curdling hard and\nhigh above black mountain peaks. The keen March wind is sweeping harsh\nand dry across a dreary sheet of bog, still red and yellow with the\nstains of winter frost. One brown knoll alone breaks the waste, and on\nit a few leafless wind-clipt oaks stretch their moss-grown arms, like\ngiant hairy spiders, above a desolate pool which crisps and shivers in\nthe biting breeze, while from beside its brink rises a mournful cry, and\nsweeps down, faint and fitful, amid the howling of the wind.\n\nAlong the brink of the bog, picking their road among crumbling rocks and\ngreen spongy springs, a company of English soldiers are pushing fast,\nclad cap-a-pie in helmet and quilted jerkin, with arquebus on shoulder,\nand pikes trailing behind them; stern steadfast men, who, two years\nsince, were working the guns at Smerwick fort, and have since then seen\nmany a bloody fray, and shall see more before they die. Two captains\nride before them on shaggy ponies, the taller in armor, stained and\nrusted with many a storm and fray, the other in brilliant inlaid cuirass\nand helmet, gaudy sash and plume, and sword hilt glittering with gold,\na quaint contrast enough to the meager garron which carries him and his\nfinery. Beside them, secured by a cord which a pikeman has fastened to\nhis own wrist, trots a bare-legged Irish kerne, whose only clothing is\nhis ragged yellow mantle, and the unkempt \"glib\" of hair, through which\nhis eyes peer out, right and left, in mingled fear and sullenness. He is\nthe guide of the company, in their hunt after the rebel Baltinglas; and\nwoe to him if he play them false.\n\n\"A pleasant country, truly, Captain Raleigh,\" says the dingy officer to\nthe gay one. \"I wonder how, having once escaped from it to Whitehall,\nyou have the courage to come back and spoil that gay suit with bog-water\nand mud.\"\n\n\"A very pleasant country, my friend Amyas; what you say in jest, I say\nin earnest.\"\n\n\"Hillo! Our tastes have changed places. I am sick of it already, as you\nforetold. Would Heaven that I could hear of some adventure Westward-ho!\nand find these big bones swinging in a hammock once more. Pray what has\nmade you so suddenly in love with bog and rock, that you come back to\ntramp them with us? I thought you had spied out the nakedness of the\nland long ago.\"\n\n\"Bog and rock? Nakedness of the land? What is needed here but prudence\nand skill, justice and law? This soil, see, is fat enough, if men were\nhere to till it. These rocks--who knows what minerals they may hold? I\nhear of gold and jewels found already in divers parts; and Daniel, my\nbrother Humphrey's German assayer, assures me that these rocks are of\nthe very same kind as those which yield the silver in Peru. Tut, man!\nif her gracious majesty would but bestow on me some few square miles of\nthis same wilderness, in seven years' time I would make it blossom like\nthe rose, by God's good help.\"\n\n\"Humph! I should be more inclined to stay here, then.\"\n\n\"So you shall, and be my agent, if you will, to get in my mine-rents and\nmy corn-rents, and my fishery-rents, eh? Could you keep accounts, old\nknight of the bear's-paw?\"\n\n\"Well enough for such short reckonings as yours would be, on the profit\nside at least. No, no--I'd sooner carry lime all my days from Cauldy to\nBideford, than pass another twelve-month in the land of Ire, among\nthe children of wrath. There is a curse upon the face of the earth, I\nbelieve.\"\n\n\"There is no curse upon it, save the old one of man's sin--'Thorns and\nthistles it shall bring forth to thee.' But if you root up the thorns\nand thistles, Amyas, I know no fiend who can prevent your growing wheat\ninstead; and if you till the ground like a man, you plough and barrow\naway nature's curse, and other fables of the schoolmen beside,\" added\nhe, in that daring fashion which afterwards obtained for him (and never\ndid good Christian less deserve it) the imputation of atheism.\n\n\"It is sword and bullet, I think, that are needed here, before plough\nand harrow, to clear away some of the curse. Until a few more of these\nIrish lords are gone where the Desmonds are, there is no peace for\nIreland.\"\n\n\"Humph! not so far wrong, I fear. And yet--Irish lords? These very\ntraitors are better English blood than we who hunt them down. When Yeo\nhere slew the Desmond the other day, he no more let out a drop of Irish\nblood, than if he had slain the lord deputy himself.\"\n\n\"His blood be on his own head,\" said Yeo, \"He looked as wild a savage as\nthe worst of them, more shame to him; and the ancient here had nigh cut\noff his arm before he told us who he was: and then, your worship, having\na price upon his head, and like to bleed to death too--\"\n\n\"Enough, enough, good fellow,\" said Raleigh. \"Thou hast done what was\ngiven thee to do. Strange, Amyas, is it not? Noble Normans sunk into\nsavages--Hibernis ipsis hiberniores! Is there some uncivilizing venom in\nthe air?\"\n\n\"Some venom, at least, which makes English men traitors. But the Irish\nthemselves are well enough, if their tyrants would let them be. See now,\nwhat more faithful liegeman has her majesty than the Inchiquin, who,\nthey say, is Prince of Themond, and should be king of all Ireland, if\nevery man had his right?\"\n\n\"Don't talk of rights in the land of wrongs, man. But the Inchiquin\nknows well that the true Irish Esau has no worse enemy than his\nsupplanter, the Norman Jacob. And yet, Amyas are even these men worse\nthan we might be, if we had been bred up masters over the bodies and\nsouls of men, in some remote land where law and order had never come?\nLook at this Desmond, brought up a savage among savages, a Papist among\nPapists, a despot among slaves; a thousand easy maidens deeming it honor\nto serve his pleasure, a thousand wild ruffians deeming it piety to\nfulfil his revenge: and let him that is without sin among us cast the\nfirst stone.\"\n\n\"Ay,\" went on Raleigh to himself, as the conversation dropped. \"What\nhadst thou been, Raleigh, hadst thou been that Desmond whose lands thou\nnow desirest? What wilt thou be when thou hast them? Will thy children\nsink downwards, as these noble barons sank? Will the genius of tyranny\nand falsehood find soil within thy heart to grow and ripen fruit? What\nguarantee hast thou for doing better here than those who went before\nthee? And yet, cannot I do justice and love mercy? Can I not establish\nplantations, build and sow, and make the desert valleys laugh with corn?\nShall I not have my Spenser with me, to fill me with all noble thoughts,\nand raise my soul to his heroic pitch? Is not this true knight-errantry,\nto redeem to peace and use, and to the glory of that glorious queen whom\nGod has given to me, a generous soil and a more generous race? Trustful\nand tenderhearted they are--none more; and if they be fickle and\npassionate, will not that very softness of temper, which makes them so\neasily led to evil, make them as easy to be led towards good? Yes--here,\naway from courts, among a people who should bless me as their benefactor\nand deliverer--what golden days might be mine! And yet--is this but\nanother angel's mask from that same cunning fiend ambition's stage? And\nwill my house be indeed the house of God, the foundations of which are\nloyalty, and its bulwarks righteousness, and not the house of fame,\nwhose walls are of the soap-bubble, and its floor a sea of glass mingled\nwith fire? I would be good and great--When will the day come when I\nshall be content to be good, and yet not great, like this same simple\nLeigh, toiling on by my side to do his duty, with no more thought for\nthe morrow than the birds of God? Greatness? I have tasted that cup\nwithin the last twelve months; do I not know that it is sweet in the\nmouth, but bitter in the belly? Greatness? And was not Essex great, and\nJohn of Austria great, and Desmond great, whose race, but three\nshort years ago, had stood for ages higher than I shall ever hope to\nclimb--castles, and lands, and slaves by thousands, and five hundred\ngentlemen of his name, who had vowed to forswear God before they\nforswore him and well have they kept their vow! And now, dead in a\nturf-hovel, like a coney in a burrow! Leigh, what noise was that?\"\n\n\"An Irish howl, I fancied: but it came from off the bog; it may be only\na plover's cry.\"\n\n\"Something not quite right, sir captain, to my mind,\" said the ancient.\n\"They have ugly stories here of pucks and banshees, and what not of\nghosts. There it was again, wailing just like a woman. They say the\nbanshee cried all night before Desmond was slain.\"\n\n\"Perhaps, then, this one may be crying for Baltinglas; for his turn is\nlikely to come next--not that I believe in such old wives' tales.\"\n\n\"Shamus, my man,\" said Amyas to the guide, \"do you hear that cry in the\nbog?\"\n\nThe guide put on the most stolid of faces, and answered in broken\nEnglish--\n\n\"Shamus hear naught. Perhaps--what you call him?--fishing in ta pool.\"\n\n\"An otter, he means, and I believe he is right. Stay, no! Did you not\nhear it then, Shamus? It was a woman's voice.\"\n\n\"Shamus is shick in his ears ever since Christmas.\"\n\n\"Shamus will go after Desmond if he lies,\" said Amyas. \"Ancient, we had\nbetter send a few men to see what it is; there may be a poor soul taken\nby robbers, or perhaps starving to death, as I have seen many a one.\"\n\n\"And I too, poor wretches; and by no fault of their own or ours either:\nbut if their lords will fall to quarrelling, and then drive each other's\ncattle, and waste each other's lands, sir, you know--\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Amyas, impatiently; \"why dost not take the men, and go?\"\n\n\"Cry you mercy, noble captain, but--I fear nothing born of woman.\"\n\n\"Well, what of that?\" said Amyas, with a smile.\n\n\"But these pucks, sir. The wild Irish do say that they haunt the pools;\nand they do no manner of harm, sir, when you are coming up to them; but\nwhen you are past, sir, they jump on your back like to apes, sir,--and\nwho can tackle that manner of fiend?\"\n\n\"Why, then, by thine own showing, ancient,\" said Raleigh, \"thou may'st\ngo and see all safely enough, and then if the puck jumps on thee as thou\ncomest back, just run in with him here, and I'll buy him of thee for a\nnoble; or thou may'st keep him in a cage, and make money in London by\nshowing him for a monster.\"\n\n\"Good heavens forefend, Captain Raleigh! but you talk rashly! But if I\nmust, Captain Leigh--\n\n           'Where duty calls\n            To brazen walls,\n     How base the slave who flinches'\n\nLads, who'll follow me?\"\n\n\"Thou askest for volunteers, as if thou wert to lead a forlorn hope.\nPull away at the usquebaugh, man, and swallow Dutch courage, since thine\nEnglish is oozed away. Stay, I'll go myself.\"\n\n\"And I with you,\" said Raleigh. \"As the queen's true knight-errant, I\nam bound to be behindhand in no adventure. Who knows but we may find a\nwicked magician, just going to cut off the head of some saffron-mantled\nprincess?\" and he dismounted.\n\n\"Oh, sirs, sirs, to endanger your precious--\"\n\n\"Pooh,\" said Raleigh. \"I wear an amulet, and have a spell of art-magic\nat my tongue's end, whereby, sir ancient, neither can a ghost see me,\nnor I see them. Come with us, Yeo, the Desmond-slayer, and we will shame\nthe devil, or be shamed by him.\"\n\n\"He may shame me, sir, but he will never frighten me,\" quoth Yeo; \"but\nthe bog, captains?\"\n\n\"Tut! Devonshire men, and heath-trotters born, and not know our way over\na peat moor!\"\n\nAnd the three strode away.\n\nThey splashed and scrambled for some quarter of a mile to the knoll,\nwhile the cry became louder and louder as they neared.\n\n\"That's neither ghost nor otter, sirs, but a true Irish howl, as Captain\nLeigh said; and I'll warrant Master Shamus knew as much long ago,\" said\nYeo.\n\nAnd in fact, they could now hear plainly the \"Ochone, Ochonorie,\" of\nsome wild woman; and scrambling over the boulders of the knoll, in\nanother minute came full upon her.\n\nShe was a young girl, sluttish and unkempt, of course, but fair enough:\nher only covering, as usual, was the ample yellow mantle. There she sat\nupon a stone, tearing her black dishevelled hair, and every now and then\nthrowing up her head, and bursting into a long mournful cry, \"for all\nthe world,\" as Yeo said, \"like a dumb four-footed hound, and not a\nChristian soul.\"\n\nOn her knees lay the head of a man of middle age, in the long soutane of\na Romish priest. One look at the attitude of his limbs told them that he\nwas dead.\n\nThe two paused in awe; and Raleigh's spirit, susceptible of all poetical\nimages, felt keenly that strange scene,--the bleak and bitter sky, the\nshapeless bog, the stunted trees, the savage girl alone with the corpse\nin that utter desolation. And as she bent her head over the still face,\nand called wildly to him who heard her not, and then, utterly unmindful\nof the intruders, sent up again that dreary wail into the dreary air,\nthey felt a sacred horror, which almost made them turn away, and leave\nher unquestioned: but Yeo, whose nerves were of tougher fibre, asked\nquietly--\n\n\"Shall I go and search the fellow, captain?\"\n\n\"Better, I think,\" said Amyas.\n\nRaleigh went gently to the girl, and spoke to her in English. She looked\nup at him, his armor and his plume, with wide and wondering eyes, and\nthen shook her head, and returned to her lamentation.\n\nRaleigh gently laid his hand on her arm, and lifted her up, while Yeo\nand Amyas bent over the corpse.\n\nIt was the body of a large and coarse-featured man, but wasted and\nshrunk as if by famine to a very skeleton. The hands and legs were\ncramped up, and the trunk bowed together, as if the man had died of cold\nor famine. Yeo drew back the clothes from the thin bosom, while the girl\nscreamed and wept, but made no effort to stop him.\n\n\"Ask her who it is? Yeo, you know a little Irish,\" said Amyas.\n\nHe asked, but the girl made no answer. \"The stubborn jade won't tell, of\ncourse, sir. If she were but a man, I'd make her soon enough.\"\n\n\"Ask her who killed him?\"\n\n\"No one, she says; and I believe she says true, for I can find no wound.\nThe man has been starved, sirs, as I am a sinful man. God help him,\nthough he is a priest; and yet he seems full enough down below. What's\nhere? A big pouch, sirs, stuffed full of somewhat.\"\n\n\"Hand it hither.\"\n\nThe two opened the pouch; papers, papers, but no scrap of food. Then a\nparchment. They unrolled it.\n\n\"Latin,\" said Amyas; \"you must construe, Don Scholar.\"\n\n\"Is it possible?\" said Raleigh, after reading a moment. \"This is indeed\na prize! This is Saunders himself!\"\n\nYeo sprang up from the body as if he had touched an adder. \"Nick\nSaunders, the Legacy, sir?\"\n\n\"Nicholas Saunders, the legate.\"\n\n\"The villain! why did not he wait for me to have the comfort of killing\nhim? Dog!\" and he kicked the corpse with his foot.\n\n\"Quiet! quiet! Remember the poor girl,\" said Amyas, as she shrieked at\nthe profanation, while Raleigh went on, half to himself:\n\n\"Yes, this is Saunders. Misguided fool, and this is the end! To this\nthou hast come with thy plotting and thy conspiring, thy lying and thy\nboasting, consecrated banners and Pope's bulls, Agnus Deis and holy\nwaters, the blessing of all saints and angels, and thy Lady of the\nImmaculate Conception! Thou hast called on the heavens to judge between\nthee and us, and here is their answer! What is that in his hand, Amyas?\nGive it me. A pastoral epistle to the Earl of Ormond, and all nobles of\nthe realm of Ireland; 'To all who groan beneath the loathsome tyranny\nof an illegitimate adulteress, etc., Nicholas Saunders, by the grace\nof God, Legate, etc.' Bah! and this forsooth was thy last meditation!\nIncorrigible pedant! Victrix causa Diis placuit, sed victa Catoni!\"\n\nHe ran his eye through various other documents, written in the usual\nstrain: full of huge promises from the Pope and the king of Spain;\nfrantic and filthy slanders against Elizabeth, Burghley, Leicester,\nEssex (the elder), Sidney, and every great and good man (never mind\nof which party) who then upheld the commonweal; bombastic attempts to\nterrify weak consciences, by denouncing endless fire against those who\nopposed the true faith; fulsome ascriptions of martyrdom and sanctity to\nevery rebel and traitor who had been hanged for the last twenty\nyears; wearisome arguments about the bull In Caena Domini, Elizabeth's\nexcommunication, the nullity of English law, the sacred duty of\nrebellion, the right to kill a prince impenitently heretical, and the\nlike insanities and villainies, which may be read at large in Camden,\nthe Phoenix Britannicus, Fox's Martyrs, or, surest of all, in the\nwritings of the worthies themselves.\n\nWith a gesture of disgust, Raleigh crammed the foul stuff back again\ninto the pouch. Taking it with them, they walked back to the company,\nand then remounting, marched away once more towards the lands of the\nDesmonds; and the girl was left alone with the dead.\n\nAn hour had passed, when another Englishman was standing by the wailing\ngirl, and round him a dozen shockheaded kernes, skene on thigh and\njavelin in hand, were tossing about their tawny rags, and adding their\nlamentations to those of the lonely watcher.\n\nThe Englishman was Eustace Leigh; a layman still, but still at his old\nwork. By two years of intrigue and labor from one end of Ireland to the\nother, he had been trying to satisfy his conscience for rejecting \"the\nhigher calling\" of the celibate; for mad hopes still lurked within that\nfiery heart. His brow was wrinkled now; his features harshened; the\nscar upon his face, and the slight distortion which accompanied it, was\nhidden by a bushy beard from all but himself; and he never forgot it for\na day, nor forgot who had given it to him.\n\nHe had been with Desmond, wandering in moor and moss for many a month\nin danger of his life; and now he was on his way to James Fitz-Eustace,\nLord Baltinglas, to bring him the news of Desmond's death; and with\nhim a remnant of the clan, who were either too stout-hearted, or too\ndesperately stained with crime, to seek peace from the English, and, as\ntheir fellows did, find it at once and freely.\n\nThere Eustace stood, looking down on all that was left of the most\nsacred personage of Ireland; the man who, as he once had hoped, was to\nregenerate his native land, and bring the proud island of the West once\nmore beneath that gentle yoke, in which united Christendom labored for\nthe commonweal of the universal Church. There he was, and with him all\nEustace's dreams, in the very heart of that country which he had vowed,\nand believed as he vowed, was ready to rise in arms as one man, even to\nthe baby at the breast (so he had said), in vengeance against the Saxon\nheretic, and sweep the hated name of Englishman into the deepest abysses\nof the surge which walled her coasts; with Spain and the Pope to back\nhim, and the wealth of the Jesuits at his command; in the midst\nof faithful Catholics, valiant soldiers, noblemen who had pledged\nthemselves to die for the cause, serfs who worshipped him as a\ndemigod--starved to death in a bog! It was a pretty plain verdict on the\nreasonableness of his expectations; but not to Eustace Leigh.\n\nIt was a failure, of course; but it was an accident; indeed, to have\nbeen expected, in a wicked world whose prince and master, as all\nknew, was the devil himself; indeed, proof of the righteousness of\nthe cause--for when had the true faith been other than persecuted and\ntrampled under foot? If one came to think of it with eyes purified from\nthe tears of carnal impatience, what was it but a glorious martyrdom?\n\n\"Blest Saunders!\" murmured Eustace Leigh; \"let me die the death of the\nrighteous, and let my last end he like this! Ora pro me, most excellent\nmartyr, while I dig thy grave upon this lonely moor, to wait there for\nthy translation to one of those stately shrines, which, cemented by the\nblood of such as thee, shall hereafter rise restored toward heaven, to\nmake this land once more 'The Isle of Saints.'\"\n\nThe corpse was buried; a few prayers said hastily; and Eustace Leigh was\naway again, not now to find Baltinglas; for it was more than his life\nwas worth. The girl had told him of the English soldiers who had passed,\nand he knew that they would reach the earl probably before he did. The\ngame was up; all was lost. So he retraced his steps, as a desperate\nresource, to the last place where he would be looked for, and after a\nmonth of disguising, hiding, and other expedients, found himself again\nin his native county of Devon, while Fitz-Eustace Viscount Baltinglas\nhad taken ship for Spain, having got little by his famous argument\nto Ormond in behalf of his joining the Church of Rome, \"Had not thine\nancestor, blessed Thomas of Canterbury, died for the Church of Rome,\nthou hadst never been Earl of Ormond.\" The premises were certainly\nsounder than those of his party were wont to be; for it was to expiate\nthe murder of that turbulent hero that the Ormond lands had been granted\nby Henry II.: but as for the conclusion therefrom, it was much on a par\nwith the rest.\n\nAnd now let us return to Raleigh and Amyas, as they jog along their\nweary road. They have many things to talk of; for it is but three days\nsince they met.\n\nAmyas, as you see, is coming fast into Raleigh's old opinion of Ireland.\nRaleigh, under the inspiration of a possible grant of Desmond's lands,\nlooks on bogs and rocks transfigured by his own hopes and fancy, as if\nby the glory of a rainbow. He looked at all things so, noble fellow,\neven thirty years after, when old, worn out, and ruined; well for him\nhad it been otherwise, and his heart had grown old with his head! Amyas,\nwho knows nothing about Desmond's lands, is puzzled at the change.\n\n\"Why, what is this, Raleigh? You are like children sitting in the\nmarket-place, and nothing pleases you. You wanted to get to Court, and\nyou have got there; and are lord and master, I hear, or something very\nlike it, already--and as soon as fortune stuffs your mouth full of\nsweet-meats, do you turn informer on her?\"\n\nRaleigh laughed insignificantly, but was silent.\n\n\"And how is your friend Mr. Secretary Spenser, who was with us at\nSmerwick?\"\n\n\"Spenser? He has thriven even as I have; and he has found, as I have,\nthat in making one friend at Court you make ten foes; but 'Oderint dum\nmetuant' is no more my motto than his, Leigh. I want to be great--great\nI am already, they say, if princes' favor can swell the frog into an ox;\nbut I want to be liked, loved--I want to see people smile when I enter.\"\n\n\"So they do, I'll warrant,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"So do hyenas,\" said Raleigh; \"grin because they are hungry, and I may\nthrow them a bone; I'll throw you one now, old lad, or rather a good\nsirloin of beef, for the sake of your smile. That's honest, at least,\nI'll warrant, whosoever's else is not. Have you heard of my brother\nHumphrey's new project?\"\n\n\"How should I hear anything in this waste howling wilderness?\"\n\n\"Kiss hands to the wilderness, then, and come with me to Newfoundland!\"\n\n\"You to Newfoundland?\"\n\n\"Yes. I to Newfoundland, unless my little matter here is settled at\nonce. Gloriana don't know it, and sha'n't till I'm off. She'd send me to\nthe Tower, I think, if she caught me playing truant. I could hardly get\nleave to come hither; but I must out, and try my fortune. I am over ears\nin debt already, and sick of courts and courtiers. Humphrey must go next\nspring and take possession of his kingdom beyond seas, or his patent\nexpires; and with him I go, and you too, my circumnavigating giant.\"\n\nAnd then Raleigh expounded to Amyas the details of the great\nNewfoundland scheme, which whoso will may read in the pages of Hakluyt.\n\nSir Humphrey Gilbert, Raleigh's half-brother, held a patent for\n\"planting\" the lands of Newfoundland and \"Meta Incognita\" (Labrador).\nHe had attempted a voyage thither with Raleigh in 1578, whereof I never\ncould find any news, save that he came back again, after a heavy brush\nwith some Spanish ships (in which his best captain, Mr. Morgan, was\nkilled), having done nothing, and much impaired his own estate: but now\nhe had collected a large sum; Sir Gilbert Peckham of London, Mr. Hayes\nof South Devon, and various other gentlemen, of whom more hereafter, had\nadventured their money; and a considerable colony was to be sent out the\nnext year, with miners, assayers, and, what was more, Parmenius Budaeus,\nFrank's old friend, who had come to England full of thirst to see the\nwonders of the New World; and over and above this, as Raleigh told Amyas\nin strictest secrecy, Adrian Gilbert, Humphrey's brother, was turning\nevery stone at Court for a patent of discovery in the North-West;\nand this Newfoundland colony, though it was to produce gold, silver,\nmerchandise, and what not, was but a basis of operations, a halfway\nhouse from whence to work out the North-West passage to the Indies--that\ngolden dream, as fatal to English valor as the Guiana one to\nSpanish--and yet hardly, hardly to be regretted, when we remember the\nseamanship, the science, the chivalry, the heroism, unequalled in the\nhistory of the English nation, which it has called forth among those\nour later Arctic voyagers, who have combined the knight-errantry of the\nmiddle age with the practical prudence of the modern, and dared for duty\nmore than Cortez or Pizarro dared for gold.\n\nAmyas, simple fellow, took all in greedily; he knew enough of the\ndangers of the Magellan passage to appreciate the boundless value of a\nroad to the East Indies which would (as all supposed then) save half the\ndistance, and be as it were a private possession of the English, safe\nfrom Spanish interference; and he listened reverently to Sir Humphrey's\nquaint proofs, half true, half fantastic, of such a passage, which\nRaleigh detailed to him--of the Primum Mobile, and its diurnal motion\nfrom east to west, in obedience to which the sea-current flowed westward\never round the Cape of Good Hope, and being unable to pass through the\nnarrow strait between South America and the Antarctic Continent, rushed\nup the American shore, as the Gulf Stream, and poured northwestward\nbetween Greenland and Labrador towards Cathay and India; of that most\ncrafty argument of Sir Humphrey's--how Aristotle in his book \"De Mundo,\"\nand Simon Gryneus in his annotations thereon, declare that the world\n(the Old World) is an island, compassed by that which Homer calls the\nriver Oceanus; ergo, the New World is an island also, and there is\na North-West passage; of the three brothers (names unknown) who had\nactually made the voyage, and named what was afterwards called Davis's\nStrait after themselves; of the Indians who were cast ashore in Germany\nin the reign of Frederic Barbarossa who, as Sir Humphrey had learnedly\nproved per modum tollendi, could have come only by the North-West; and\nabove all, of Salvaterra, the Spaniard, who in 1568 had told Sir Henry\nSidney (Philip's father), there in Ireland, how he had spoken with a\nMexican friar named Urdaneta, who had himself come from Mar del Zur (the\nPacific) into Germany by that very North-West passage; at which last\nAmyas shook his head, and said that friars were liars, and seeing\nbelieving; \"but if you must needs have an adventure, you insatiable soul\nyou, why not try for the golden city of Manoa?\"\n\n\"Manoa?\" asked Raleigh, who had heard, as most had, dim rumors of the\nplace. \"What do you know of it?\"\n\nWhereon Amyas told him all that he had gathered from the Spaniard; and\nRaleigh, in his turn, believed every word.\n\n\"Humph!\" said he after a long silence. \"To find that golden emperor;\noffer him help and friendship from the queen of England; defend him\nagainst the Spaniards; if we became strong enough, conquer back all Peru\nfrom the Popish tyrants, and reinstate him on the throne of the Incas,\nwith ourselves for his body-guard, as the Norman Varangians were to\nthe effeminate emperors of Byzant--Hey, Amyas? You would make a gallant\nchieftain of Varangs. We'll do it, lad!\"\n\n\"We'll try,\" said Amyas; \"but we must be quick, for there's one Berreo\nsworn to carry out the quest to the death; and if the Spaniards once get\nthither, their plan of works will be much more like Pizarro's than like\nyours; and by the time we come, there will be neither gold nor city\nleft.\"\n\n\"Nor Indians either, I'll warrant the butchers; but, lad, I am promised\nto Humphrey; I have a bark fitting out already, and all I have, and\nmore, adventured in her; so Manoa must wait.\"\n\n\"It will wait well enough, if the Spaniards prosper no better on the\nAmazon than they have done; but must I come with you? To tell the truth,\nI am quite shore-sick, and to sea I must go. What will my mother say?\"\n\n\"I'll manage thy mother,\" said Raleigh; and so he did; for, to cut a\nlong story short, he went back the month after, and he not only took\nhome letters from Amyas to his mother, but so impressed on that good\nlady the enormous profits and honors to be derived from Meta Incognita,\nand (which was most true) the advantage to any young man of sailing\nwith such a general as Humphrey Gilbert, most pious and most learned of\nseamen and of cavaliers, beloved and honored above all his compeers by\nQueen Elizabeth, that she consented to Amyas's adventuring in the\nvoyage some two hundred pounds which had come to him as his share of\nprize-money, after the ever memorable circumnavigation. For Mrs.\nLeigh, be it understood, was no longer at Burrough Court. By Frank's\npersuasion, she had let the old place, moved up to London with her\neldest son, and taken for herself a lodging somewhere by Palace Stairs,\nwhich looked out upon the silver Thames (for Thames was silver then),\nwith its busy ferries and gliding boats, across to the pleasant fields\nof Lambeth, and the Archbishop's palace, and the wooded Surrey hills;\nand there she spent her peaceful days, close to her Frank and to the\nCourt. Elizabeth would have had her re-enter it, offering her a small\nplace in the household: but she declined, saying that she was too old\nand heart-weary for aught but prayer. So by prayer she lived, under the\nsheltering shadow of the tall minster where she went morn and even to\nworship, and to entreat for the two in whom her heart was bound up; and\nFrank slipped in every day if but for five minutes, and brought with him\nSpenser, or Raleigh, or Dyer, or Budaeus or sometimes Sidney's self: and\nthere was talk of high and holy things, of which none could speak better\nthan could she; and each guest went from that hallowed room a humbler\nand yet a loftier man. So slipped on the peaceful months, and few\nand far between came Irish letters, for Ireland was then farther from\nWestminster than is the Black Sea now; but those were days in which\nwives and mothers had learned (as they have learned once more, sweet\nsouls!) to walk by faith and not by sight for those they love: and Mrs.\nLeigh was content (though when was she not content?) to hear that Amyas\nwas winning a good report as a brave and prudent officer, sober, just,\nand faithful, beloved and obeyed alike by English soldiers and Irish\nkernes.\n\nThose two years, and the one which followed, were the happiest which she\nhad known since her husband's death. But the cloud was fast coming up\nthe horizon, though she saw it not. A little longer, and the sun would\nbe hid for many a wintry day.\n\nAmyas went to Plymouth (with Yeo, of course, at his heels), and there\nbeheld, for the first time, the majestic countenance of the philosopher\nof Compton castle. He lodged with Drake, and found him not over-sanguine\nas to the success of the voyage.\n\n\"For learning and manners, Amyas, there's not his equal; and the queen\nmay well love him, and Devon be proud of him: but book-learning is not\nbusiness: book-learning didn't get me round the world; book-learning\ndidn't make Captain Hawkins, nor his father neither, the best\nship-builders from Hull to Cadiz; and book-learning, I very much fear,\nwon't plant Newfoundland.\"\n\nHowever, the die was cast, and the little fleet of five sail assembled\nin Cawsand Bay. Amyas was to go as a gentleman adventurer on board of\nRaleigh's bark; Raleigh himself, however, at the eleventh hour, had been\nforbidden by the queen to leave England. Ere they left, Sir Humphrey\nGilbert's picture was painted by some Plymouth artist, to be sent up to\nElizabeth in answer to a letter and a gift sent by Raleigh, which, as a\nspecimen of the men and of the time, I here transcribe*--\n\n\n\"BROTHER--I have sent you a token from her Majesty, an anchor guided\nby a lady, as you see. And further, her Highness willed me to send you\nword, that she wisheth you as great good hap and safety to your ship as\nif she were there in person, desiring you to have care of yourself as of\nthat which she tendereth and, therefore, for her sake, you must provide\nfor it accordingly. Furthermore, she commandeth that you leave your\npicture with her. For the rest I leave till our meeting, or to the\nreport of the bearer, who would needs be the messenger of this good\nnews. So I commit you to the will and protection of God, who send us\nsuch life and death as he shall please, or hath appointed.\n\n\"Richmond, this Friday morning,\n\n\"Your true Brother,\n\n\"W. RALEIGH.\"\n\n     * This letter was a few years since in the possession of Mr.\n     Pomeroy Gilbert, fort-major at Dartmouth, a descendant of\n     the admiral's.\n\n\"Who would not die, sir, for such a woman?\" said Sir Humphrey (and he\nsaid truly), as he showed that letter to Amyas.\n\n\"Who would not? But she bids you rather live for her.\"\n\n\"I shall do both, young man; and for God too, I trust. We are going in\nGod's cause; we go for the honor of God's Gospel, for the deliverance of\npoor infidels led captive by the devil; for the relief of my distressed\ncountrymen unemployed within this narrow isle; and to God we commit our\ncause. We fight against the devil himself; and stronger is He that is\nwithin us than he that is against us.\"\n\nSome say that Raleigh himself came down to Plymouth, accompanied the\nfleet a day's sail to sea, and would have given her majesty the slip,\nand gone with them Westward-ho, but for Sir Humphrey's advice. It is\nlikely enough: but I cannot find evidence for it. At all events, on the\n11th June the fleet sailed out, having, says Mr. Hayes, \"in number about\n260 men, among whom we had of every faculty good choice, as shipwrights,\nmasons, carpenters, smiths, and such like, requisite for such an action;\nalso mineral men and refiners. Beside, for solace of our people and\nallurement of the savages, we were provided of musique in good variety;\nnot omitting the least toys, as morris-dancers, hobby-horses, and\nMay-like conceits, to delight the savage people, whom we intended to win\nby all fair means possible.\" An armament complete enough, even to that\ntenderness towards the Indians, which is so striking a feature of\nthe Elizabethan seamen (called out in them, perhaps, by horror at the\nSpanish cruelties, as well as by their more liberal creed), and to the\ndaily service of God on board of every ship, according to the simple\nold instructions of Captain John Hawkins to one of his little squadrons,\n\"Keep good company; beware of fire; serve God daily; and love one\nanother\"--an armament, in short, complete in all but men. The sailors\nhad been picked up hastily and anywhere, and soon proved themselves a\nmutinous, and, in the case of the bark Swallow, a piratical set. The\nmechanics were little better. The gentlemen-adventurers, puffed up with\nvain hopes of finding a new Mexico, became soon disappointed and surly\nat the hard practical reality; while over all was the head of a sage and\nan enthusiast, a man too noble to suspect others, and too pure to\nmake allowances for poor dirty human weaknesses. He had got his scheme\nperfect upon paper; well for him, and for his company, if he had asked\nFrancis Drake to translate it for him into fact! As early as the second\nday, the seeds of failure began to sprout above ground. The men of\nRaleigh's bark, the Vice-Admiral, suddenly found themselves seized, or\nsupposed themselves seized, with a contagious sickness, and at midnight\nforsook the fleet, and went back to Plymouth; whereto Mr. Hayes can only\nsay, \"The reason I never could understand. Sure I am that Mr. Raleigh\nspared no cost in setting them forth. And so I leave it unto God!\"\n\nBut Amyas said more. He told Butler the captain plainly that, if the\nbark went back, he would not; that he had seen enough of ships deserting\ntheir consorts; that it should never be said of him that he had followed\nWinter's example, and that, too, on a fair easterly wind; and finally\nthat he had seen Doughty hanged for trying to play such a trick; and\nthat he might see others hanged too before he died. Whereon Captain\nButler offered to draw and fight, to which Amyas showed no repugnance;\nwhereon the captain, having taken a second look at Amyas's thews and\nsinews, reconsidered the matter, and offered to put Amyas on board of\nSir Humphrey's Delight, if he could find a crew to row him.\n\nAmyas looked around.\n\n\"Are there any of Sir Francis Drake's men on board?\"\n\n\"Three, sir,\" said Yeo. \"Robert Drew, and two others.\"\n\n\"Pelicans!\" roared Amyas, \"you have been round the world, and will you\nturn back from Westward-ho?\"\n\nThere was a moment's silence, and then Drew came forward.\n\n\"Lower us a boat, captain, and lend us a caliver to make signals with,\nwhile I get my kit on deck; I'll after Captain Leigh, if I row him\naboard all alone to my own hands.\"\n\n\"If I ever command a ship, I will not forget you,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Nor us either, sir, we hope; for we haven't forgotten you and your\nhonest conditions,\" said both the other Pelicans; and so away over the\nside went all the five, and pulled away after the admiral's lantern,\nfiring shots at intervals as signals. Luckily for the five desperadoes,\nthe night was all but calm. They got on board before the morning, and so\naway into the boundless West.*\n\n     * The Raleigh, the largest ship of the squadron, was of only\n     200 tons burden; The Golden Hind, Hayes' ship, which\n     returned safe, of 40; and The Squirrel (whereof more\n     hereafter), of 10 tons!  In such cockboats did these old\n     heroes brave the unknown seas.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nHOW BIDEFORD BRIDGE DINED AT ANNERY HOUSE\n\n     \"Three lords sat drinking late yestreen,\n     And ere they paid the lawing,\n     They set a combat them between,\n     To fight it in the dawing\"--Scotch Ballad.\n\nEvery one who knows Bideford cannot but know Bideford bridge; for it is\nthe very omphalos, cynosure, and soul, around which the town, as a body,\nhas organized itself; and as Edinburgh is Edinburgh by virtue of its\ncastle, Rome Rome by virtue of its capitol, and Egypt Egypt by virtue of\nits pyramids, so is Bideford Bideford by virtue of its bridge. But all\ndo not know the occult powers which have advanced and animated the\nsaid wondrous bridge for now five hundred years, and made it the chief\nwonder, according to Prince and Fuller, of this fair land of Devon:\nbeing first an inspired bridge, a soul-saving bridge, an alms-giving\nbridge, an educational bridge, a sentient bridge, and last, but not\nleast, a dinner-giving bridge. All do not know how, when it began to\nbe built some half mile higher up, hands invisible carried the stones\ndown-stream each night to the present site; until Sir Richard Gurney,\nparson of the parish, going to bed one night in sore perplexity and fear\nof the evil spirit who seemed so busy in his sheepfold, beheld a vision\nof an angel, who bade build the bridge where he himself had so kindly\ntransported the materials; for there alone was sure foundation amid the\nbroad sheet of shifting sand. All do not know how Bishop Grandison of\nExeter proclaimed throughout his diocese indulgences, benedictions, and\n\"participation in all spiritual blessings for ever,\" to all who would\npromote the bridging of that dangerous ford; and so, consulting alike\nthe interests of their souls and of their bodies, \"make the best of both\nworlds.\"\n\nAll do not know, nor do I, that \"though the foundation of the bridge\nis laid upon wool, yet it shakes at the slightest step of a horse;\" or\nthat, \"though it has twenty-three arches, yet one Wm. Alford (another\nMilo) carried on his back for a wager four bushels salt-water measure,\nall the length thereof;\" or that the bridge is a veritable esquire,\nbearing arms of its own (a ship and bridge proper on a plain field),\nand owning lands and tenements in many parishes, with which the said\nmiraculous bridge has, from time to time, founded charities, built\nschools, waged suits at law, and finally (for this concerns us most)\ngiven yearly dinners, and kept for that purpose (luxurious and liquorish\nbridge that it was) the best stocked cellar of wines in all Devon.\n\nTo one of these dinners, as it happened, were invited in the year 1583\nall the notabilities of Bideford, and beside them Mr. St. Leger\nof Annery close by, brother of the marshal of Munster, and of Lady\nGrenville; a most worthy and hospitable gentleman, who, finding riches\na snare, parted with them so freely to all his neighbors as long as he\nlived, that he effectually prevented his children after him from falling\ninto the temptations thereunto incident.\n\nBetween him and one of the bridge trustees arose an argument, whether\na salmon caught below the bridge was better or worse than one caught\nabove; and as that weighty question could only be decided by practical\nexperiment, Mr. St. Leger vowed that as the bridge had given him a good\ndinner, he would give the bridge one; offered a bet of five pounds that\nhe would find them, out of the pool below Annery, as firm and flaky a\nsalmon as the Appledore one which they had just eaten; and then, in the\nfulness of his heart, invited the whole company present to dine with him\nat Annery three days after, and bring with them each a wife or daughter;\nand Don Guzman being at table, he was invited too.\n\nSo there was a mighty feast in the great hall at Annery, such as had\nseldom been since Judge Hankford feasted Edward the Fourth there; and\nwhile every one was eating their best and drinking their worst, Rose\nSalterne and Don Guzman were pretending not to see each other, and\nwatching each other all the more. But Rose, at least, had to be very\ncareful of her glances; for not only was her father at the table, but\njust opposite her sat none other than Messrs. William Cary and Arthur\nSt. Leger, lieutenants in her majesty's Irish army, who had returned on\nfurlough a few days before.\n\nRose Salterne and the Spaniard had not exchanged a word in the last six\nmonths, though they had met many times. The Spaniard by no means avoided\nher company, except in her father's house; he only took care to obey\nher carefully, by seeming always unconscious of her presence, beyond the\nstateliest of salutes at entering and departing. But he took care, at\nthe same time, to lay himself out to the very best advantage whenever\nhe was in her presence; to be more witty, more eloquent, more romantic,\nmore full of wonderful tales than he ever yet had been. The cunning\nDon had found himself foiled in his first tactic; and he was now\ntrying another, and a far more formidable one. In the first place, Rose\ndeserved a very severe punishment, for having dared to refuse the love\nof a Spanish nobleman; and what greater punishment could he inflict than\nwithdrawing the honor of his attentions, and the sunshine of his smiles?\nThere was conceit enough in that notion, but there was cunning too;\nfor none knew better than the Spaniard, that women, like the world, are\npretty sure to value a man (especially if there be any real worth in\nhim) at his own price; and that the more he demands for himself, the\nmore they will give for him.\n\nAnd now he would put a high price on himself, and pique her pride, as\nshe was too much accustomed to worship, to be won by flattering it. He\nmight have done that by paying attention to some one else: but he was\ntoo wise to employ so coarse a method, which might raise indignation, or\ndisgust, or despair in Rose's heart, but would have never brought her to\nhis feet--as it will never bring any woman worth bringing. So he quietly\nand unobtrusively showed her that he could do without her; and she, poor\nfool, as she was meant to do, began forthwith to ask herself--why? What\nwas the hidden treasure, what was the reserve force, which made him\nindependent of her, while she could not say that she was independent of\nhim? Had he a secret? how pleasant to know it! Some huge ambition? how\npleasant to share in it! Some mysterious knowledge? how pleasant to\nlearn it! Some capacity of love beyond the common? how delicious to have\nit all for her own! He must be greater, wiser, richer-hearted than she\nwas, as well as better-born. Ah, if his wealth would but supply her\npoverty! And so, step by step, she was being led to sue in forma\npauperis to the very man whom she had spurned when he sued in like form\nto her. That temptation of having some mysterious private treasure, of\nbeing the priestess of some hidden sanctuary, and being able to thank\nHeaven that she was not as other women are, was becoming fast too much\nfor Rose, as it is too much for most. For none knew better than the\nSpaniard how much more fond women are, by the very law of their sex,\nof worshipping than of being worshipped, and of obeying than of being\nobeyed; how their coyness, often their scorn, is but a mask to hide\ntheir consciousness of weakness; and a mask, too, of which they\nthemselves will often be the first to tire.\n\nAnd Rose was utterly tired of that same mask as she sat at table at\nAnnery that day; and Don Guzman saw it in her uneasy and downcast looks,\nand thinking (conceited coxcomb) that she must be by now sufficiently\npunished, stole a glance at her now and then, and was not abashed when\nhe saw that she dropped her eyes when they met his, because he saw her\nsilence and abstraction increase, and something like a blush steal into\nher cheeks. So he pretended to be as much downcast and abstracted as she\nwas, and went on with his glances, till he once found her, poor thing,\nlooking at him to see if he was looking at her; and then he knew his\nprey was safe, and asked her, with his eyes, \"Do you forgive me?\" and\nsaw her stop dead in her talk to her next neighbor, and falter, and drop\nher eyes, and raise them again after a minute in search of his, that\nhe might repeat the pleasant question. And then what could she do but\nanswer with all her face and every bend of her pretty neck, \"And do you\nforgive me in turn?\"\n\nWhereon Don Guzman broke out jubilant, like nightingale on bough, with\nstory, and jest, and repartee; and became forthwith the soul of the\nwhole company, and the most charming of all cavaliers. And poor Rose\nknew that she was the cause of his sudden change of mood, and blamed\nherself for what she had done, and shuddered and blushed at her own\ndelight, and longed that the feast was over, that she might hurry home\nand hide herself alone with sweet fancies about a love the reality of\nwhich she felt she dared not face.\n\nIt was a beautiful sight, the great terrace at Annery that afternoon;\nwith the smart dames in their gaudy dresses parading up and down in twos\nand threes before the stately house; or looking down upon the park, with\nthe old oaks, and the deer, and the broad land-locked river spread out\nlike a lake beneath, all bright in the glare of the midsummer sun; or\nlistening obsequiously to the two great ladies who did the honors, Mrs.\nSt. Leger the hostess, and her sister-in-law, fair Lady Grenville. All\nchatted, and laughed, and eyed each other's dresses, and gossiped about\neach other's husbands and servants: only Rose Salterne kept apart, and\nlonged to get into a corner and laugh or cry, she knew not which.\n\n\"Our pretty Rose seems sad,\" said Lady Grenville, coming up to her.\n\"Cheer up, child! we want you to come and sing to us.\"\n\nRose answered she knew not what, and obeyed mechanically.\n\nShe took the lute, and sat down on a bench beneath the house, while the\nrest grouped themselves round her.\n\n\"What shall I sing?\"\n\n\"Let us have your old song, 'Earl Haldan's Daughter.'\"\n\nRose shrank from it. It was a loud and dashing ballad, which chimed in\nbut little with her thoughts; and Frank had praised it too, in happier\ndays long since gone by. She thought of him, and of others, and of her\npride and carelessness; and the song seemed ominous to her: and yet for\nthat very reason she dared not refuse to sing it, for fear of suspicion\nwhere no one suspected; and so she began per force--\n\n\nI.\n\n\"It was Earl Haldan's daughter, She look'd across the sea; She look'd\nacross the water, And long and loud laugh'd she; 'The locks of six\nprincesses Must be my marriage-fee, So hey bonny boat, and ho bonny\nboat! Who comes a wooing me?'\n\nII.\n\n\"It was Earl Haldan's daughter, She walk'd along the sand; When she was\naware of a knight so fair, Come sailing to the land. His sails were all\nof velvet, His mast of beaten gold, And 'hey bonny boat, and ho bonny\nboat, Who saileth here so bold?'\n\nIII.\n\n\"'The locks of five princesses I won beyond the sea; I shore their\ngolden tresses, To fringe a cloak for thee. One handful yet is wanting,\nBut one of all the tale; So hey bonny boat, and ho bonny boat! Furl up\nthy velvet sail!'\n\nIV.\n\n\"He leapt into the water, That rover young and bold; He gript Earl\nHaldan's daughter, He shore her locks of gold; 'Go weep, go weep, proud\nmaiden, The tale is full to-day. Now hey bonny boat, and ho bonny boat!\nSail Westward-ho, and away!'\"\n\n\nAs she ceased, a measured voice, with a foreign accent, thrilled through\nher.\n\n\"In the East, they say the nightingale sings to the rose; Devon, more\nhappy, has nightingale and rose in one.\"\n\n\"We have no nightingales in Devon, Don Guzman,\" said Lady Grenville;\n\"but our little forest thrushes sing, as you hear, sweetly enough to\ncontent any ear. But what brings you away from the gentlemen so early?\"\n\n\"These letters,\" said he, \"which have just been put into my hand; and\nas they call me home to Spain, I was loath to lose a moment of that\ndelightful company from which I must part so soon.\"\n\n\"To Spain?\" asked half-a-dozen voices: for the Don was a general\nfavorite.\n\n\"Yes, and thence to the Indies. My ransom has arrived, and with it\nthe promise of an office. I am to be Governor of La Guayra in Caracas.\nCongratulate me on my promotion.\"\n\nA mist was over Rose's eyes. The Spaniard's voice was hard and flippant.\nDid he care for her, after all? And if he did, was it nevertheless\nhopeless? How her cheeks glowed! Everybody must see it! Anything to turn\naway their attention from her, and in that nervous haste which makes\npeople speak, and speak foolishly too, just because they ought to be\nsilent, she asked--\n\n\"And where is La Guayra?\"\n\n\"Half round the world, on the coast of the Spanish Main. The loveliest\nplace on earth, and the loveliest governor's house, in a forest of palms\nat the foot of a mountain eight thousand feet high: I shall only want a\nwife there to be in paradise.\"\n\n\"I don't doubt that you may persuade some fair lady of Seville to\naccompany you thither,\" said Lady Grenville.\n\n\"Thanks, gracious madam: but the truth is, that since I have had the\nbliss of knowing English ladies, I have begun to think that they are the\nonly ones on earth worth wooing.\"\n\n\"A thousand thanks for the compliment; but I fear none of our free\nEnglish maidens would like to submit to the guardianship of a duenna.\nEh, Rose? how should you like to be kept under lock and key all day by\nan ugly old woman with a horn on her forehead?\"\n\nPoor Rose turned so scarlet that Lady Grenville knew her secret on the\nspot, and would have tried to turn the conversation: but before she\ncould speak, some burgher's wife blundered out a commonplace about\nthe jealousy of Spanish husbands; and another, to make matters better,\ngiggled out something more true than delicate about West Indian masters\nand fair slaves.\n\n\"Ladies,\" said Don Guzman, reddening, \"believe me that these are but the\ncalumnies of ignorance. If we be more jealous than other nations, it is\nbecause we love more passionately. If some of us abroad are profligate,\nit is because they, poor men, have no helpmate, which, like the\namethyst, keeps its wearer pure. I could tell you stories, ladies, of\nthe constancy and devotion of Spanish husbands, even in the Indies, as\nstrange as ever romancer invented.\"\n\n\"Can you? Then we challenge you to give us one at least.\"\n\n\"I fear it would be too long, madam.\"\n\n\"The longer the more pleasant, senor. How can we spend an hour better\nthis afternoon, while the gentlemen within are finishing their wine?\"\n\nStory-telling, in those old times, when books (and authors also, lucky\nfor the public) were rarer than now, was a common amusement; and as the\nSpaniard's accomplishments in that line were well known, all the ladies\ncrowded round him; the servants brought chairs and benches; and Don\nGuzman, taking his seat in the midst, with a proud humility, at Lady\nGrenville's feet, began--\n\n\"Your perfections, fair and illustrious ladies, must doubtless have\nheard, ere now, how Sebastian Cabota, some forty-five years ago, sailed\nforth with a commission from my late master, the Emperor Charles the\nFifth, to discover the golden lands of Tarshish, Ophir, and Cipango; but\nbeing in want of provisions, stopped short at the mouth of that mighty\nSouth American river to which he gave the name of Rio de la Plata, and\nsailing up it, discovered the fair land of Paraguay. But you may not\nhave heard how, on the bank of that river, at the mouth of the Rio\nTerceiro, he built a fort which men still call Cabot's Tower; nor have\nyou, perhaps, heard of the strange tale which will ever make the tower a\nsacred spot to all true lovers.\n\n\"For when he returned to Spain the year after, he left in his tower a\ngarrison of a hundred and twenty men, under the command of Nuno de Lara,\nRuiz Moschera, and Sebastian da Hurtado, old friends and fellow-soldiers\nof my invincible grandfather Don Ferdinando da Soto; and with them\na jewel, than which Spain never possessed one more precious, Lucia\nMiranda, the wife of Hurtado, who, famed in the court of the emperor\nno less for her wisdom and modesty than for her unrivalled beauty,\nhad thrown up all the pomp and ambition of a palace, to marry a poor\nadventurer, and to encounter with him the hardships of a voyage round\nthe world. Mangora, the cacique of the neighboring Timbuez Indians (with\nwhom Lara had contrived to establish a friendship), cast his eyes on\nthis fair creature, and no sooner saw than he coveted; no sooner coveted\nthan he plotted, with the devilish subtilty of a savage, to seize by\nforce what he knew he could never gain by right. She soon found out his\npassion (she was wise enough--what every woman is not--to know when she\nis loved), and telling her husband, kept as much as she could out of her\nnew lover's sight; while the savage pressed Hurtado to come and visit\nhim, and to bring his lady with him. Hurtado, suspecting the snare, and\nyet fearing to offend the cacique, excused himself courteously on\nthe score of his soldier's duty; and the savage, mad with desire and\ndisappointment, began plotting against Hurtado's life.\n\n\"So went on several weeks, till food grew scarce, and Don Hurtado and\nDon Ruiz Moschera, with fifty soldiers, were sent up the river on a\nforaging party. Mangora saw his opportunity, and leapt at it forthwith.\n\n\"The tower, ladies, as I have heard from those who have seen it, stands\non a knoll at the meeting of the two rivers, while on the land side\nstretches a dreary marsh, covered with tall grass and bushes; a fit\nplace for the ambuscade of four thousand Indians, which Mangora, with\ndevilish cunning, placed around the tower, while he himself went boldly\nup to it, followed by thirty men, laden with grain, fruit, game, and all\nthe delicacies which his forests could afford.\n\n\"There, with a smiling face, he told the unsuspecting Lara his sorrow\nfor the Spaniards' want of food; besought him to accept the provision he\nhad brought, and was, as he had expected, invited by Lara to come in and\ntaste the wines of Spain.\n\n\"In went he and his thirty fellow-bandits, and the feast continued,\nwith songs and libations, far into the night, while Mangora often looked\nround, and at last boldly asked for the fair Miranda: but she had shut\nherself into her lodging, pleading illness.\n\n\"A plea, fair ladies, which little availed that hapless dame, for no\nsooner had the Spaniards retired to rest, leaving (by I know not what\nmadness) Mangora and his Indians within, than they were awakened by the\ncry of fire, the explosion of their magazine, and the inward rush of the\nfour thousand from the marsh outside.\n\n\"Why pain your gentle ears with details of slaughter? A few fearful\nminutes sufficed to exterminate my bewildered and unarmed countrymen, to\nbind the only survivors, Miranda (innocent cause of the whole tragedy)\nand four other women with their infants, and to lead them away in\ntriumph across the forest towards the Indian town.\n\n\"Stunned by the suddenness of the evils which had passed, and still\nmore by the thought of those worse which were to come (as she too\nwell foresaw), Miranda travelled all night through the forest, and was\nbrought in triumph at day-dawn before the Indian king to receive her\ndoom. Judge of her astonishment, when, on looking up, she saw that he\nwas not Mangora.\n\n\"A ray of hope flashed across her, and she asked where he was.\n\n\"'He was slain last night,' said the king; 'and I, his brother Siripa,\nam now cacique of the Timbuez.'\n\n\"It was true; Lara, maddened with drink, rage, and wounds, had caught up\nhis sword, rushed into the thick of the fight, singled out the traitor,\nand slain him on the spot; and then, forgetting safety in revenge, had\ncontinued to plunge his sword into the corpse, heedless of the blows of\nthe savages, till he fell pierced with a hundred wounds.\n\n\"A ray of hope, as I said, flashed across the wretched Miranda for a\nmoment; but the next she found that she had been freed from one bandit\nonly to be delivered to another.\n\n\"'Yes,' said the new king, in broken Spanish; 'my brother played a bold\nstake, and lost it; but it was well worth the risk, and he showed his\nwisdom thereby. You cannot be his queen now: you must content yourself\nwith being mine.'\n\n\"Miranda, desperate, answered him with every fierce taunt which she\ncould invent against his treachery and his crime; and asked him, how he\ncame to dream that the wife of a Christian Spaniard would condescend\nto become the mistress of a heathen savage; hoping, unhappy lady, to\nexasperate him into killing her on the spot. But in vain; she only\nprolonged thereby her own misery. For, whether it was, ladies, that the\nnovel sight of divine virtue and beauty awed (as it may have awed me ere\nnow), where it had just before maddened; or whether some dream crossed\nthe savage (as it may have crossed me ere now), that he could make the\nwisdom of a mortal angel help his ambition, as well as her beauty his\nhappiness; or whether (which I will never believe of one of those dark\nchildren of the devil, though I can boldly assert it of myself) some\nspark of boldness within him made him too proud to take by force what\nhe could not win by persuasion, certain it is, as the Indians themselves\nconfessed afterwards, that the savage only answered her by smiles; and\nbidding his men unbind her, told her that she was no slave of his, and\nthat it only lay with her to become the sovereign of him and all\nhis vassals; assigned her a hut to herself, loaded her with savage\nornaments, and for several weeks treated her with no less courtesy\n(so miraculous is the power of love) than if he had been a cavalier of\nCastile.\n\n\"Three months and more, ladies, as I have heard, passed in this misery,\nand every day Miranda grew more desperate of all deliverance, and saw\nstaring her in the face, nearer and nearer, some hideous and shameful\nend; when one day going down with the wives of the cacique to draw water\nin the river, she saw on the opposite bank a white man in a tattered\nSpanish dress, with a drawn sword in his hand; who had no sooner espied\nher, than shrieking her name, he plunged into the stream, swam across,\nlanded at her feet, and clasped her in his arms. It was no other,\nladies, incredible as it may seem, than Don Sebastian himself, who had\nreturned with Ruiz Moschera to the tower, and found it only a charred\nand bloodstained heap of ruins.\n\n\"He guessed, as by inspiration, what had passed, and whither his lady\nwas gone; and without a thought of danger, like a true Spanish gentleman\nand a true Spanish lover, darted off alone into the forest, and\nguided only by the inspiration of his own loyal heart, found again his\ntreasure, and found it still unstained and his own.\n\n\"Who can describe the joy, and who again the terror, of their meeting?\nThe Indian women had fled in fear, and for the short ten minutes that\nthe lovers were left together, life, to be sure, was one long kiss.\nBut what to do they knew not. To go inland was to rush into the enemy's\narms. He would have swum with her across the river, and attempted it;\nbut his strength, worn out with hunger and travel, failed him; he drew\nher with difficulty on shore again, and sat down by her to await their\ndoom with prayer, the first and last resource of virtuous ladies, as\nweapons are of cavaliers.\n\n\"Alas for them! May no true lovers ever have to weep over joys so soon\nlost, after having been so hardly found! For, ere a quarter of an hour\nwas passed, the Indian women, who had fled at his approach, returned\nwith all the warriors of the tribe. Don Sebastian, desperate, would\nfain have slain his wife and himself on the spot; but his hand sank\nagain--and whose would not but an Indian's?--as he raised it against\nthat fair and faithful breast; in a few minutes he was surrounded,\nseized from behind, disarmed, and carried in triumph into the village.\nAnd if you cannot feel for him in that misery, fair ladies, who have\nknown no sorrow, yet I, a prisoner, can.\"\n\nDon Guzman paused a moment, as if overcome by emotion; and I will not\nsay that, as he paused, he did not look to see if Rose Salterne's eyes\nwere on him, as indeed they were.\n\n\"Yes, I can feel with him; I can estimate, better than you, ladies, the\ngreatness of that love which could submit to captivity; to the loss of\nhis sword; to the loss of that honor, which, next to god and his mother,\nis the true Spaniard's deity. There are those who have suffered that\nshame at the hands of valiant gentlemen\" (and again Don Guzman looked\nup at Rose), \"and yet would have sooner died a thousand deaths; but he\ndared to endure it from the hands of villains, savages, heathens; for he\nwas a true Spaniard, and therefore a true lover: but I will go on with\nmy tale.\n\n\"This wretched pair, then, as I have been told by Ruiz Moschera himself,\nstood together before the cacique. He, like a true child of the devil,\ncomprehending in a moment who Don Sebastian was, laughed with delight at\nseeing his rival in his power, and bade bind him at once to a tree, and\nshoot him to death with arrows.\n\n\"But the poor Miranda sprang forward, and threw herself at his feet, and\nwith piteous entreaties besought for mercy from him who knew no mercy.\n\n\"And yet love and the sight of her beauty, and the terrible eloquence of\nher words, while she invoked on his head the just vengeance of Heaven,\nwrought even on his heart: nevertheless the pleasure of seeing her, who\nhad so long scorned him, a suppliant at his feet, was too delicate to\nbe speedily foregone; and not till she was all but blind with tears,\nand dumb with agony of pleading, did he make answer, that if she would\nconsent to become his wife, her husband's life should be spared. She, in\nher haste and madness, sobbed out desperately I know not what consent.\nDon Sebastian, who understood, if not the language, still the meaning\n(so had love quickened his understanding), shrieked to her not to lose\nher precious soul for the sake of his worthless body; that death was\nnothing compared to the horror of that shame; and such other words as\nbecame a noble and valiant gentleman. She, shuddering now at her own\nfrailty, would have recalled her promise; but Siripa kept her to it,\nvowing, if she disappointed him again, such a death to her husband as\nmade her blood run cold to hear of; and the wretched woman could only\nescape for the present by some story, that it was not the custom of her\nrace to celebrate nuptials till a month after the betrothment; that the\nanger of Heaven would be on her, unless she first performed in solitude\ncertain religious rites; and lastly, that if he dared to lay hands\non her husband, she would die so resolutely, that every drop of water\nshould be deep enough to drown her, every thorn sharp enough to stab\nher to the heart: till fearing lest by demanding too much he should lose\nall, and awed too, as he had been at first by a voice and looks which\nseemed to be, in comparison with his own, divine, Siripa bade her go\nback to her hut, promising her husband life; but promising too, that\nif he ever found the two speaking together, even for a moment, he would\npour out on them both all the cruelty of those tortures in which the\ndevil, their father, has so perfectly instructed the Indians.\n\n\"So Don Sebastian, being stripped of his garments, and painted after\nthe Indian fashion, was set to all mean and toilsome work, amid the\nbuffetings and insults of the whole village. And this, ladies, he\nendured without a murmur, ay, took delight in enduring it, as he would\nhave endured things worse a thousand times, only for the sake, like a\ntrue lover as he was, of being near the goddess whom he worshipped, and\nof seeing her now and then afar off, happy enough to be repaid even by\nthat for all indignities.\n\n\"And yet, you who have loved may well guess, as I can, that ere a week\nhad passed, Don Sebastian and the Lady Miranda had found means, in spite\nof all spiteful eyes, to speak to each other once and again; and to\nassure each other of their love; even to talk of escape, before the\nmonth's grace should be expired. And Miranda, whose heart was full of\ncourage as long as she felt her husband near her, went so far as to plan\na means of escape which seemed possible and hopeful.\n\n\"For the youngest wife of the cacique, who, till Miranda's coming,\nhad been his favorite, often talked with the captive, insulting and\ntormenting her in her spite and jealousy, and receiving in return only\ngentle and conciliatory words. And one day when the woman had been\nthreatening to kill her, Miranda took courage to say, 'Do you fancy that\nI shall not be as glad to be rid of your husband, as you to be rid of\nme? Why kill me needlessly, when all that you require is to get me forth\nof the place? Out of sight, out of mind. When I am gone, your husband\nwill soon forget me, and you will be his favorite as before.' Soon,\nseeing that the girl was inclined to listen, she went on to tell her\nof her love to Don Sebastian, entreating and adjuring her, by the love\nwhich she bore the cacique, to pity and help her; and so won upon the\ngirl, that she consented to be privy to Miranda's escape, and even\noffered to give her an opportunity of speaking to her husband about it;\nand at last was so won over by Miranda, that she consented to keep all\nintruders out of the way, while Don Sebastian that very night visited\nMiranda in her hut.\n\n\"The hapless husband, thirsting for his love, was in that hut, be sure,\nthe moment that kind darkness covered his steps:--and what cheer these\ntwo made of each other, when they once found themselves together,\nlovers must fancy for themselves: but so it was, that after many a\nleave-taking, there was no departure; and when the night was well-nigh\npast, Sebastian and Miranda were still talking together as if they had\nnever met before, and would never meet again.\n\n\"But it befell, ladies (would that I was not speaking truth, but\ninventing, that I might have invented something merrier for your ears),\nit befell that very night, that the young wife of the cacique, whose\nheart was lifted up with the thought that her rival was now at last\ndisposed of, tried all her wiles to win back her faithless husband;\nbut in vain. He only answered her caresses by indifference, then by\ncontempt, then insults, then blows (for with the Indians, woman is\nalways a slave, or rather a beast of burden), and went on to draw such\ncruel comparisons between her dark skin and the glorious fairness of the\nSpanish lady, that the wretched girl, beside herself with rage, burst\nout at last with her own secret. 'Fool that you are to madden yourself\nabout a stranger who prizes one hair of her Spanish husband's head more\nthan your whole body! Much does your new bride care for you! She is at\nthis moment in her husband's arms!'\n\n\"The cacique screamed furiously to know what she meant; and she, her\njealousy and hate of the guiltless lady boiling over once for all, bade\nhim, if he doubted her, go see for himself.\n\n\"What use of many words? They were taken. Love, or rather lust,\nrepelled, turned in a moment into devilish hate; and the cacique,\nsummoning his Indians, bade them bind the wretched Don Sebastian to a\ntree, and there inflicted on him the lingering death to which he had at\nfirst been doomed. For Miranda he had more exquisite cruelty in store.\nAnd shall I tell it? Yes, ladies, for the honor of love and of Spain,\nand for a justification of those cruelties against the Indians which are\nso falsely imputed to our most Christian nation, it shall be told: he\ndelivered the wretched lady over to the tender mercies of his wives; and\nwhat they were is neither fit for me to tell, nor you to hear.\n\n\"The two wretched lovers cast themselves upon each other's neck; drank\neach other's salt tears with the last kisses; accused themselves as\nthe cause of each other's death; and then, rising above fear and grief,\nbroke out into triumph at thus dying for and with each other; and\nproclaiming themselves the martyrs of love, commended their souls to\nGod, and then stepped joyfully and proudly to their doom.\"\n\n\"And what was that?\" asked half-a-dozen trembling voices.\n\n\"Don Sebastian, as I have said, was shot to death with arrows; but as\nfor the Lady Miranda, the wretches themselves confessed afterwards, when\nthey received due vengeance for their crimes (as they did receive it),\nthat after all shameful and horrible indignities, she was bound to\na tree, and there burned slowly in her husband's sight, stifling her\nshrieks lest they should wring his heart by one additional pang, and\nnever taking her eyes, to the last, off that beloved face. And so died\n(but not unavenged) Sebastian de Hurtado and Lucia Miranda,--a Spanish\nhusband and a Spanish wife.\"\n\nThe Don paused, and the ladies were silent awhile, for, indeed, there\nwas many a gentle tear to be dried; but at last Mrs. St. Leger spoke,\nhalf, it seemed, to turn off the too painful impression of the over-true\ntale, the outlines whereof may be still read in old Charlevoix.\n\n\"You have told a sad and a noble tale, sir, and told it well; but,\nthough your story was to set forth a perfect husband, it has ended\nrather by setting forth a perfect wife.\"\n\n\"And if I have forgotten, madam, in praising her to praise him also,\nhave I not done that which would have best pleased his heroical and\nchivalrous spirit? He, be sure, would have forgotten his own virtue in\nthe light of hers; and he would have wished me, I doubt not, to do the\nsame also. And beside, madam, where ladies are the theme, who has time\nor heart to cast one thought upon their slaves?\" And the Don made one of\nhis deliberate and highly-finished bows.\n\n\"Don Guzman is courtier enough, as far as compliments go,\" said one of\nthe young ladies; \"but it was hardly courtier-like of him to find us so\nsad an entertainment, upon a merry evening.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said another; \"we must ask him for no more stories.\"\n\n\"Or songs either,\" said a third. \"I fear he knows none but about\nforsaken maidens and despairing lovers.\"\n\n\"I know nothing at all about forsaken ladies, madam; because ladies are\nnever forsaken in Spain.\"\n\n\"Nor about lovers despairing there, I suppose?\"\n\n\"That good opinion of ourselves, madam, with which you English are\npleased to twit us now and then, always prevents so sad a state of mind.\nFor myself, I have had little to do with love; but I have had still less\nto do with despair, and intend, by help of Heaven, to have less.\"\n\n\"You are valiant, sir.\"\n\n\"You would not have me a coward, madam?\" and so forth.\n\nNow all this time Don Guzman had been talking at Rose Salterne, and\ngiving her the very slightest hint, every now and then, that he was\ntalking at her; till the poor girl's face was almost crimson with\npleasure, and she gave herself up to the spell. He loved her still;\nperhaps he knew that she loved him: he must know some day. She felt now\nthat there was no escape; she was almost glad to think that there was\nnone.\n\nThe dark, handsome, stately face; the melodious voice, with its rich\nSpanish accent; the quiet grace of the gestures; the wild pathos of\nthe story; even the measured and inflated style, as of one speaking of\nanother and a loftier world; the chivalrous respect and admiration for\nwoman, and for faithfulness to woman--what a man he was! If he had been\npleasant heretofore, he was now enchanting. All the ladies round felt\nthat, she could see, as much as she herself did; no, not quite as much,\nshe hoped. She surely understood him, and felt for his loneliness more\nthan any of them. Had she not been feeling for it through long and sad\nmonths? But it was she whom he was thinking of, she whom he was speaking\nto, all along. Oh, why had the tale ended so soon? She would gladly have\nsat and wept her eyes out till midnight over one melodious misery after\nanother; but she was quite wise enough to keep her secret to herself;\nand sat behind the rest, with greedy eyes and demure lips, full of\nstrange and new happiness--or misery; she knew not which to call it.\n\nIn the meanwhile, as it was ordained, Cary could see and hear through\nthe window of the hall a good deal of what was going on.\n\n\"How that Spanish crocodile ogles the Rose!\" whispered he to young St.\nLeger.\n\n\"What wonder? He is not the first by many a one.\"\n\n\"Ay--but--By heaven, she is making side-shots at him with those\nlanguishing eyes of hers, the little baggage!\"\n\n\"What wonder? He is not the first, say I, and won't be the last. Pass\nthe wine, man.\"\n\n\"I have had enough; between sack and singing, my head is as mazed as a\ndizzy sheep. Let me slip out.\"\n\n\"Not yet, man; remember you are bound for one song more.\"\n\nSo Cary, against his will, sat and sang another song; and in the\nmeanwhile the party had broken up, and wandered away by twos and threes,\namong trim gardens and pleasaunces, and clipped yew-walks--\n\n     Where west-winds with musky wing\n     About the cedarn alleys fling\n     Nard and cassia's balmy smells--\"\n\nadmiring the beauty of that stately place, long since passed into other\nhands, and fallen to decay, but then (if old Prince speaks true) one of\nthe noblest mansions of the West.\n\nAt last Cary got away and out; sober, but just enough flushed with wine\nto be ready for any quarrel; and luckily for him, had not gone twenty\nyards along the great terrace before he met Lady Grenville.\n\n\"Has your ladyship seen Don Guzman?\"\n\n\"Yes--why, where is he? He was with me not ten minutes ago. You know he\nis going back to Spain.\"\n\n\"Going! Has his ransom come?\"\n\n\"Yes, and with it a governorship in the Indies.\"\n\n\"Governorship! Much good may it do the governed.\"\n\n\"Why not, then? He is surely a most gallant gentleman.\"\n\n\"Gallant enough--yes,\" said Cary, carelessly. \"I must find him, and\ncongratulate him on his honors.\"\n\n\"I will help you to find him,\" said Lady Grenville, whose woman's eye\nand ear had already suspected something. \"Escort me, sir.\"\n\n\"It is but too great an honor to squire the Queen of Bideford,\" said\nCary, offering his hand.\n\n\"If I am your queen, sir, I must be obeyed,\" answered she, in a meaning\ntone. Cary took the hint, and went on chattering cheerfully enough.\n\nBut Don Guzman was not to be found in garden or in pleasaunce.\n\n\"Perhaps,\" at last said a burgher's wife, with a toss of her head, \"your\nladyship may meet with him at Hankford's oak.\"\n\n\"At Hankford's oak! what should take him there?\"\n\n\"Pleasant company, I reckon\" (with another toss). \"I heard him and\nMistress Salterne talking about the oak just now.\"\n\nCary turned pale and drew in his breath.\n\n\"Very likely,\" said Lady Grenville, quietly. \"Will you walk with me so\nfar, Mr. Cary?\"\n\n\"To the world's end, if your ladyship condescends so far.\" And off they\nwent, Lady Grenville wishing that they were going anywhere else, but\nafraid to let Cary go alone; and suspecting, too, that some one or other\nought to go.\n\nSo they went down past the herds of deer, by a trim-kept path into\nthe lonely dell where stood the fatal oak; and, as they went, Lady\nGrenville, to avoid more unpleasant talk, poured into Cary's unheeding\nears the story (which he probably had heard fifty times before) how old\nChief-justice Hankford (whom some contradictory myths make the man who\ncommitted Prince Henry to prison for striking him on the bench), weary\nof life and sickened at the horrors and desolations of the Wars of the\nRoses, went down to his house at Annery there, and bade his keeper shoot\nany man who, passing through the deer-park at night, should refuse to\nstand when challenged; and then going down into that glen himself, and\nhiding himself beneath that oak, met willingly by his keeper's hand the\ndeath which his own dared not inflict: but ere the story was half done,\nCary grasped Lady Grenville's hand so tightly that she gave a little\nshriek of pain.\n\n\"There they are!\" whispered he, heedless of her; and pointed to the oak,\nwhere, half hidden by the tall fern, stood Rose and the Spaniard.\n\nHer head was on his bosom. She seemed sobbing, trembling; he talking\nearnestly and passionately; but Lady Grenville's little shriek made them\nboth look up. To turn and try to escape was to confess all; and the\ntwo, collecting themselves instantly, walked towards her, Rose wishing\nherself fathoms deep beneath the earth.\n\n\"Mind, sir,\" whispered Lady Grenville as they came up; \"you have seen\nnothing.\"\n\n\"Madam?\"\n\n\"If you are not on my ground, you are on my brother's. Obey me!\"\n\nCary bit his lip, and bowed courteously to the Don.\n\n\"I have to congratulate you, I hear, senor, on your approaching\ndeparture.\"\n\n\"I kiss your hands, senor, in return; but I question whether it be a\nmatter of congratulation, considering all that I leave behind.\"\n\n\"So do I,\" answered Cary, bluntly enough, and the four walked back to\nthe house, Lady Grenville taking everything for granted with the most\ncharming good humor, and chatting to her three silent companions\ntill they gained the terrace once more, and found four or five of\nthe gentlemen, with Sir Richard at their head, proceeding to the\nbowling-green.\n\nLady Grenville, in an agony of fear about the quarrel which she knew\nmust come, would have gladly whispered five words to her husband: but\nshe dared not do it before the Spaniard, and dreaded, too, a faint or\na scream from the Rose, whose father was of the party. So she walked\non with her fair prisoner, commanding Cary to escort them in, and the\nSpaniard to go to the bowling-green.\n\nCary obeyed: but he gave her the slip the moment she was inside the\ndoor, and then darted off to the gentlemen.\n\nHis heart was on fire: all his old passion for the Rose had flashed up\nagain at the sight of her with a lover;--and that lover a Spaniard! He\nwould cut his throat for him, if steel could do it! Only he recollected\nthat Salterne was there, and shrank from exposing Rose; and shrank, too,\nas every gentleman should, from making a public quarrel in another man's\nhouse. Never mind. Where there was a will there was a way. He could get\nhim into a corner, and quarrel with him privately about the cut of\nhis beard, or the color of his ribbon. So in he went; and, luckily or\nunluckily, found standing together apart from the rest, Sir Richard, the\nDon, and young St. Leger.\n\n\"Well, Don Guzman, you have given us wine-bibbers the slip this\nafternoon. I hope you have been well employed in the meanwhile?\"\n\n\"Delightfully to myself, senor,\" said the Don, who, enraged at being\ninterrupted, if not discovered, was as ready to fight as Cary, but\ndisliked, of course, an explosion as much as he did; \"and to others, I\ndoubt not.\"\n\n\"So the ladies say,\" quoth St. Leger. \"He has been making them all cry\nwith one of his stories, and robbing us meanwhile of the pleasure we had\nhoped for from some of his Spanish songs.\"\n\n\"The devil take Spanish songs!\" said Cary, in a low voice, but loud\nenough for the Spaniard. Don Guzman clapt his hand on his sword-hilt\ninstantly.\n\n\"Lieutenant Cary,\" said Sir Richard, in a stern voice, \"the wine has\nsurely made you forget yourself!\"\n\n\"As sober as yourself, most worshipful knight; but if you want a Spanish\nsong, here's one; and a very scurvy one it is, like its subject--\n\n       \"Don Desperado\n        Walked on the Prado,\n     And there he met his enemy.\n        He pulled out a knife, a,\n        And let out his life, a,\n     And fled for his own across the sea.\"\n\nAnd he bowed low to the Spaniard.\n\nThe insult was too gross to require any spluttering.\n\n\"Senor Cary, we meet?\"\n\n\"I thank your quick apprehension, Don Guzman Maria Magdalena Sotomayor\nde Soto. When, where, and with what weapons?\"\n\n\"For God's sake, gentlemen! Nephew Arthur, Cary is your guest; do you\nknow the meaning of this?\"\n\nSt. Leger was silent. Cary answered for him.\n\n\"An old Irish quarrel, I assure you, sir. A matter of years' standing.\nIn unlacing the senor's helmet, the evening that he was taken prisoner,\nI was unlucky enough to twitch his mustachios. You recollect the fact,\nof course, senor?\"\n\n\"Perfectly,\" said the Spaniard; and then, half-amused and half-pleased,\nin spite of his bitter wrath, at Cary's quickness and delicacy in\nshielding Rose, he bowed, and--\n\n\"And it gives me much pleasure to find that he whom I trust to have the\npleasure of killing tomorrow morning is a gentleman whose nice sense of\nhonor renders him thoroughly worthy of the sword of a De Soto.\"\n\nCary bowed in return, while Sir Richard, who saw plainly enough that the\nexcuse was feigned, shrugged his shoulders.\n\n\"What weapons, senor?\" asked Will again.\n\n\"I should have preferred a horse and pistols,\" said Don Guzman after\na moment, half to himself, and in Spanish; \"they make surer work of it\nthan bodkins; but\" (with a sigh and one of his smiles) \"beggars must not\nbe choosers.\"\n\n\"The best horse in my stable is at your service, senor,\" said Sir\nRichard Grenville, instantly.\n\n\"And in mine also, senor,\" said Cary; \"and I shall be happy to allow you\na week to train him, if he does not answer at first to a Spanish hand.\"\n\n\"You forget in your courtesy, gentle sir, that the insult being with me,\nthe time lies with me also. We wipe it off to-morrow morning with simple\nrapiers and daggers. Who is your second?\"\n\n\"Mr. Arthur St. Leger here, senor: who is yours?\"\n\nThe Spaniard felt himself alone in the world for one moment; and then\nanswered with another of his smiles,--\n\n\"Your nation possesses the soul of honor. He who fights an Englishman\nneeds no second.\"\n\n\"And he who fights among Englishmen will always find one,\" said Sir\nRichard. \"I am the fittest second for my guest.\"\n\n\"You only add one more obligation, illustrious cavalier, to a two-years'\nprodigality of favors, which I shall never be able to repay.\"\n\n\"But, Nephew Arthur,\" said Grenville, \"you cannot surely be second\nagainst your father's guest, and your own uncle.\"\n\n\"I cannot help it, sir; I am bound by an oath, as Will can tell you. I\nsuppose you won't think it necessary to let me blood?\"\n\n\"You half deserve it, sirrah!\" said Sir Richard, who was very angry: but\nthe Don interposed quickly.\n\n\"Heaven forbid, senors! We are no French duellists, who are mad enough\nto make four or six lives answer for the sins of two. This gentleman\nand I have quarrel enough between us, I suspect, to make a right bloody\nencounter.\"\n\n\"The dependence is good enough, sir,\" said Cary, licking his sinful\nlips at the thought. \"Very well. Rapiers and shirts at three tomorrow\nmorning--Is that the bill of fare? Ask Sir Richard where, Atty? It is\nagainst punctilio now for me to speak to him till after I am killed.\"\n\n\"On the sands opposite. The tide will be out at three. And now, gallant\ngentlemen, let us join the bowlers.\"\n\nAnd so they went back and spent a merry evening, all except poor Rose,\nwho, ere she went back, had poured all her sorrows into Lady Grenville's\near. For the kind woman, knowing that she was motherless and guileless,\ncarried her off into Mrs. St. Leger's chamber, and there entreated her\nto tell the truth, and heaped her with pity but with no comfort. For\nindeed, what comfort was there to give?\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nThree o'clock, upon a still pure bright midsummer morning. A broad\nand yellow sheet of ribbed tide-sands, through which the shallow river\nwanders from one hill-foot to the other, whispering round dark knolls\nof rock, and under low tree-fringed cliffs, and banks of golden broom.\nA mile below, the long bridge and the white walled town, all sleeping\npearly in the soft haze, beneath a cloudless vault of blue. The\nwhite glare of dawn, which last night hung high in the northwest, has\ntravelled now to the northeast, and above the wooded wall of the hills\nthe sky is flushing with rose and amber.\n\nA long line of gulls goes wailing up inland; the rooks from Annery come\ncawing and sporting round the corner at Landcross, while high above them\nfour or five herons flap solemnly along to find their breakfast on the\nshallows. The pheasants and partridges are clucking merrily in the long\nwet grass; every copse and hedgerow rings with the voice of birds, but\nthe lark, who has been singing since midnight in the \"blank height of\nthe dark,\" suddenly hushes his carol and drops headlong among the corn,\nas a broad-winged buzzard swings from some wooded peak into the abyss of\nthe valley, and hangs high-poised above the heavenward songster. The air\nis full of perfume; sweet clover, new-mown hay, the fragrant breath of\nkine, the dainty scent of sea-weed wreaths and fresh wet sand. Glorious\nday, glorious place, \"bridal of earth and sky,\" decked well with bridal\ngarlands, bridal perfumes, bridal songs,--What do those four cloaked\nfigures there by the river brink, a dark spot on the fair face of the\nsummer morn?\n\nYet one is as cheerful as if he too, like all nature round him, were\ngoing to a wedding; and that is Will Cary. He has been bathing down\nbelow, to cool his brain and steady his hand; and he intends to stop Don\nGuzman Maria Magdalena Sotomayor de Soto's wooing for ever and a day.\nThe Spaniard is in a very different mood; fierce and haggard, he is\npacing up and down the sand. He intends to kill Will Cary; but then?\nWill he be the nearer to Rose by doing so? Can he stay in Bideford?\nWill she go with him? Shall he stoop to stain his family by marrying a\nburgher's daughter? It is a confused, all but desperate business; and\nDon Guzman is certain but of one thing, that he is madly in love with\nthis fair witch, and that if she refuse him, then, rather than see her\naccept another man, he would kill her with his own hands.\n\nSir Richard Grenville too is in no very pleasant humor, as St. Leger\nsoon discovers, when the two seconds begin whispering over their\narrangements.\n\n\"We cannot have either of them killed, Arthur.\"\n\n\"Mr. Cary swears he will kill the Spaniard, sir.\"\n\n\"He sha'n't. The Spaniard is my guest. I am answerable for him to Leigh,\nand for his ransom too. And how can Leigh accept the ransom if the man\nis not given up safe and sound? They won't pay for a dead carcass, boy!\nThe man's life is worth two hundred pounds.\"\n\n\"A very bad bargain, sir, for those who pay the said two hundred for\nthe rascal; but what if he kills Cary?\"\n\n\"Worse still. Cary must not be killed. I am very angry with him, but he\nis too good a lad to be lost; and his father would never forgive us. We\nmust strike up their swords at the first scratch.\"\n\n\"It will make them very mad, sir.\"\n\n\"Hang them! let them fight us then, if they don't like our counsel. It\nmust be, Arthur.\"\n\n\"Be sure, sir,\" said Arthur, \"that whatsoever you shall command I shall\nperform. It is only too great an honor to a young man as I am to find\nmyself in the same duel with your worship, and to have the advantage of\nyour wisdom and experience.\"\n\nSir Richard smiles, and says--\"Now, gentlemen! are you ready?\"\n\nThe Spaniard pulls out a little crucifix, and kisses it devoutly,\nsmiting on his breast; crosses himself two or three times, and\nsays--\"Most willingly, senor.\"\n\nCary kisses no crucifix, but says a prayer nevertheless.\n\nCloaks and doublets are tossed off, the men placed, the rapiers measured\nhilt and point; Sir Richard and St. Leger place themselves right and\nleft of the combatants, facing each other, the points of their drawn\nswords on the sand. Cary and the Spaniard stand for a moment quite\nupright, their sword-arms stretched straight before them, holding the\nlong rapier horizontally, the left hand clutching the dagger close to\ntheir breasts. So they stand eye to eye, with clenched teeth and pale\ncrushed lips, while men might count a score; St. Leger can hear the\nbeating of his own heart; Sir Richard is praying inwardly that no life\nmay be lost. Suddenly there is a quick turn of Cary's wrist and a leap\nforward. The Spaniard's dagger flashes, and the rapier is turned aside;\nCary springs six feet back as the Spaniard rushes on him in turn. Parry,\nthrust, parry--the steel rattles, the sparks fly, the men breathe fierce\nand loud; the devil's game is begun in earnest.\n\nFive minutes have the two had instant death a short six inches off from\nthose wild sinful hearts of theirs, and not a scratch has been given.\nYes! the Spaniard's rapier passes under Cary's left arm; he bleeds.\n\n\"A hit! a hit! Strike up, Atty!\" and the swords are struck up instantly.\n\nCary, nettled by the smart, tries to close with his foe, but the seconds\ncross their swords before him.\n\n\"It is enough, gentlemen. Don Guzman's honor is satisfied!\"\n\n\"But not my revenge, senor,\" says the Spaniard, with a frown. \"This duel\nis a l'outrance, on my part; and, I believe, on Mr. Cary's also.\"\n\n\"By heaven, it is!\" says Will, trying to push past. \"Let me go, Arthur\nSt. Leger; one of us must down. Let me go, I say!\"\n\n\"If you stir, Mr. Cary, you have to do with Richard Grenville!\" thunders\nthe lion voice. \"I am angry enough with you for having brought on this\nduel at all. Don't provoke me still further, young hot-head!\"\n\nCary stops sulkily.\n\n\"You do not know all, Sir Richard, or you would not speak in this way.\"\n\n\"I do, sir, all; and I shall have the honor of talking it over with Don\nGuzman myself.\"\n\n\"Hey!\" said the Spaniard. \"You came here as my second, Sir Richard, as I\nunderstood, but not as my counsellor.\"\n\n\"Arthur, take your man away! Cary! obey me as you would your father,\nsir! Can you not trust Richard Grenville?\"\n\n\"Come away, for God's sake!\" says poor Arthur, dragging Cary's sword\nfrom him; \"Sir Richard must know best!\"\n\nSo Cary is led off sulking, and Sir Richard turns to the Spaniard,\n\n\"And now, Don Guzman, allow me, though much against my will, to speak to\nyou as a friend to a friend. You will pardon me if I say that I cannot\nbut have seen last night's devotion to--\"\n\n\"You will be pleased, senor, not to mention the name of any lady to whom\nI may have shown devotion. I am not accustomed to have my little affairs\ntalked over by any unbidden counsellors.\"\n\n\"Well, senor, if you take offence, you take that which is not given.\nOnly I warn you, with all apologies for any seeming forwardness, that\nthe quest on which you seem to be is one on which you will not be\nallowed to proceed.\"\n\n\"And who will stop me?\" asked the Spaniard, with a fierce oath.\n\n\"You are not aware, illustrious senor,\" said Sir Richard, parrying the\nquestion, \"that our English laity look upon mixed marriages with full as\nmuch dislike as your own ecclesiastics.\"\n\n\"Marriage, sir? Who gave you leave to mention that word to me?\"\n\nSir Richard's brow darkened; the Spaniard, in his insane pride, had\nforced upon the good knight a suspicion which was not really just.\n\n\"Is it possible, then, Senor Don Guzman, that I am to have the shame of\nmentioning a baser word?\"\n\n\"Mention what you will, sir. All words are the same to me; for, just or\nunjust, I shall answer them alike only by my sword.\"\n\n\"You will do no such thing, sir. You forget that I am your host.\"\n\n\"And do you suppose that you have therefore a right to insult me? Stand\non your guard, sir!\"\n\nGrenville answered by slapping his own rapier home into the sheath with\na quiet smile.\n\n\"Senor Don Guzman must be well enough aware of who Richard Grenville is,\nto know that he may claim the right of refusing duel to any man, if he\nshall so think fit.\"\n\n\"Sir!\" cried the Spaniard, with an oath, \"this is too much! Do you dare\nto hint that I am unworthy of your sword? Know, insolent Englishman, I\nam not merely a De Soto, though that, by St. James, were enough for you\nor any man. I am a Sotomayor, a Mendoza, a Bovadilla, a Losada, a--sir!\nI have blood royal in my veins, and you dare to refuse my challenge?\"\n\n\"Richard Grenville can show quarterings, probably, against even Don\nGuzman Maria Magdalena Sotomayor de Soto, or against (with no offence to\nthe unquestioned nobility of your pedigree) the bluest blood of Spain.\nBut he can show, moreover, thank God, a reputation which raises him\nas much above the imputation of cowardice, as it does above that of\ndiscourtesy. If you think fit, senor, to forget what you have just, in\nvery excusable anger, vented, and to return with me, you will find me\nstill, as ever, your most faithful servant and host. If otherwise, you\nhave only to name whither you wish your mails to be sent, and I shall,\nwith unfeigned sorrow, obey your commands concerning them.\"\n\nThe Spaniard bowed stiffly, answered, \"To the nearest tavern, senor,\"\nand then strode away. His baggage was sent thither. He took a boat down\nto Appledore that very afternoon, and vanished, none knew whither. A\nvery courteous note to Lady Grenville, enclosing the jewel which he had\nbeen used to wear round his neck, was the only memorial he left behind\nhim: except, indeed, the scar on Cary's arm, and poor Rose's broken\nheart.\n\nNow county towns are scandalous places at best; and though all parties\ntried to keep the duel secret, yet, of course, before noon all Bideford\nknew what had happened, and a great deal more; and what was even worse,\nRose, in an agony of terror, had seen Sir Richard Grenville enter her\nfather's private room, and sit there closeted with him for an hour and\nmore; and when he went, upstairs came old Salterne, with his stick in\nhis hand, and after rating her soundly for far worse than a flirt, gave\nher (I am sorry to have to say it, but such was the mild fashion of\npaternal rule in those times, even over such daughters as Lady Jane\nGrey, if Roger Ascham is to be believed) such a beating that her poor\nsides were black and blue for many a day; and then putting her on a\npillion behind him, carried her off twenty miles to her old prison at\nStow mill, commanding her aunt to tame down her saucy blood with bread\nof affliction and water of affliction. Which commands were willingly\nenough fulfilled by the old dame, who had always borne a grudge against\nRose for being rich while she was poor, and pretty while her daughter\nwas plain; so that between flouts, and sneers, and watchings, and pretty\nopen hints that she was a disgrace to her family, and no better than she\nshould be, the poor innocent child watered her couch with her tears for\na fortnight or more, stretching out her hands to the wide Atlantic, and\ncalling wildly to Don Guzman to return and take her where he would, and\nshe would live for him and die for him; and perhaps she did not call in\nvain.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nHOW THE GOLDEN HIND CAME HOME AGAIN\n\n     \"The spirits of your fathers\n       Shall start from every wave;\n     For the deck it was their field of fame,\n       And ocean was their grave.\"\n\n                                CAMPBELL.\n\n\"So you see, my dear Mrs. Hawkins, having the silver, as your own eyes\nshow you, beside the ores of lead, manganese, and copper, and above all\nthis gossan (as the Cornish call it), which I suspect to be not merely\nthe matrix of the ore, but also the very crude form and materia prima\nof all metals--you mark me?--If my recipes, which I had from Doctor Dee,\nsucceed only half so well as I expect, then I refine out the luna, the\nsilver, lay it by, and transmute the remaining ores into sol, gold.\nWhereupon Peru and Mexico become superfluities, and England the mistress\nof the globe. Strange, no doubt; distant, no doubt: but possible, my\ndear madam, possible!\"\n\n\"And what good to you if it be, Mr. Gilbert? If you could find a\nphilosopher's stone to turn sinners into saints, now--but naught save\nGod's grace can do that; and that last seems ofttimes over long in\ncoming.\" And Mrs. Hawkins sighed.\n\n\"But indeed, my dear madam, conceive now.--The Comb Martin mine thus\nbecomes a gold mine, perhaps inexhaustible; yields me wherewithal to\ncarry out my North-West patent; meanwhile my brother Humphrey holds\nNewfoundland, and builds me fresh ships year by year (for the forests of\npine are boundless) for my China voyage.\"\n\n\"Sir Humphrey has better thoughts in his dear heart than gold, Mr.\nAdrian; a very close and gracious walker he has been this seven year. I\nwish my Captain John were so too.\"\n\n\"And how do you know I have naught better in my mind's eye than gold?\nOr, indeed, what better could I have? Is not gold the Spaniard's\nstrength--the very mainspring of Antichrist? By gold only, therefore,\ncan we out-wrestle him. You shake your head, but say, dear madam (for\ngold England must have), which is better, to make gold bloodlessly at\nhome, or take it bloodily abroad?\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Gilbert, Mr. Gilbert! is it not written, that those who make\nhaste to be rich, pierce themselves through with many sorrows? Oh, Mr.\nGilbert! God's blessing is not on it all.\"\n\n\"Not on you, madam? Be sure that brave Captain John Hawkins's star\ntold me a different tale, when I cast his nativity for him.--Born under\nstormy planets, truly, but under right royal and fortunate ones.\"\n\n\"Ah, Mr. Adrian! I am a simple body, and you a great philosopher, but\nI hold there is no star for the seaman like the Star of Bethlehem; and\nthat goes with 'peace on earth and good will to men,' and not with such\narms as that, Mr. Adrian. I can't abide to look upon them.\"\n\nAnd she pointed up to one of the bosses of the ribbed oak-roof, on which\nwas emblazoned the fatal crest which Clarencieux Hervey had granted\nyears before to her husband, the \"Demi-Moor proper, bound.\"\n\n\"Ah, Mr. Gilbert! since first he went to Guinea after those poor\nnegroes, little lightness has my heart known; and the very day that that\ncrest was put up in our grand new house, as the parson read the first\nlesson, there was this text in it, Mr. Gilbert, 'Woe to him that\nbuildeth his house by iniquity, and his chambers by wrong. Shalt thou\nlive because thou closest thyself in cedar?' And it went into my ears\nlike fire, Mr. Gilbert, and into my heart like lead; and when the parson\nwent on, 'Did not thy father eat and drink, and do judgment and justice?\nThen it was well with him,' I thought of good old Captain Will; and--I\ntell you, Mr. Gilbert, those negroes are on my soul from morning until\nnight! We are all mighty grand now, and money comes in fast, but the\nLord will require the blood of them at our hands yet, He will!\"\n\n\"My dearest madam, who can prosper more than you? If your husband copied\nthe Dons too closely once or twice in the matter of those negroes (which\nI do not deny,) was he not punished at once when he lost ships, men, all\nbut life, at St. Juan d'Ulloa?\"\n\n\"Ay, yes,\" she said; \"and that did give me a bit of comfort, especially\nwhen the queen--God save her tender heart!--was so sharp with him for\npity of the poor wretches, but it has not mended him. He is growing fast\nlike the rest now, Mr. Gilbert, greedy to win, and niggardly to spend\n(God forgive him!) and always fretting and plotting for some new gain,\nand envying and grudging at Drake, and all who are deeper in the\nsnare of prosperity than he is. Gold, gold, nothing but gold in\nevery mouth--there it is! Ah! I mind when Plymouth was a quiet little\nGod-fearing place as God could smile upon: but ever since my John, and\nSir Francis, and poor Mr. Oxenham found out the way to the Indies, it's\nbeen a sad place. Not a sailor's wife but is crying 'Give, give,' like\nthe daughters of the horse-leech; and every woman must drive her\nhusband out across seas to bring her home money to squander on hoods and\nfarthingales, and go mincing with outstretched necks and wanton eyes;\nand they will soon learn to do worse than that, for the sake of gain.\nBut the Lord's hand will be against their tires and crisping-pins, their\nmufflers and farthingales, as it was against the Jews of old. Ah, dear\nme!\"\n\nThe two interlocutors in this dialogue were sitting in a low\noak-panelled room in Plymouth town, handsomely enough furnished, adorned\nwith carving and gilding and coats of arms, and noteworthy for many\nstrange knickknacks, Spanish gold and silver vessels on the sideboard;\nstrange birds and skins, and charts and rough drawings of coast which\nhung about the room; while over the fireplace, above the portrait of old\nCaptain Will Hawkins, pet of Henry the Eighth, hung the Spanish ensign\nwhich Captain John had taken in fair fight at Rio de la Hacha fifteen\nyears before, when, with two hundred men, he seized the town in despite\nof ten hundred Spanish soldiers, and watered his ship triumphantly at\nthe enemy's wells.\n\nThe gentleman was a tall fair man, with a broad and lofty forehead,\nwrinkled with study, and eyes weakened by long poring over the crucible\nand the furnace.\n\nThe lady had once been comely enough, but she was aged and worn, as\nsailors' wives are apt to be, by many sorrows. Many a sad day had she\nhad already; for although John Hawkins, port-admiral of Plymouth, and\npatriarch of British shipbuilders, was a faithful husband enough, and\nas ready to forgive as he was to quarrel, yet he was obstinate and\nruthless, and in spite of his religiosity (for all men were religious\nthen) was by no means a \"consistent walker.\"\n\nAnd sadder days were in store for her, poor soul. Nine years hence she\nwould be asked to name her son's brave new ship, and would christen it\nThe Repentance, giving no reason in her quiet steadfast way (so says\nher son Sir Richard) but that \"Repentance was the best ship in which\nwe could sail to the harbor of heaven;\" and she would hear that Queen\nElizabeth, complaining of the name for an unlucky one, had re-christened\nher The Dainty, not without some by-quip, perhaps, at the character\nof her most dainty captain, Richard Hawkins, the complete seaman and\nEuphuist afloat, of whom, perhaps, more hereafter.\n\nWith sad eyes Mrs. (then Lady) Hawkins would see that gallant bark sail\nWestward-ho, to go the world around, as many another ship sailed; and\nthen wait, as many a mother beside had waited, for the sail which never\nreturned; till, dim and uncertain, came tidings of her boy fighting for\nfour days three great Armadas (for the coxcomb had his father's heart in\nhim after all), a prisoner, wounded, ruined, languishing for weary years\nin Spanish prisons. And a sadder day than that was in store, when a\ngallant fleet should round the Ram Head, not with drum and trumpet, but\nwith solemn minute-guns, and all flags half-mast high, to tell her\nthat her terrible husband's work was done, his terrible heart broken by\nfailure and fatigue, and his body laid by Drake's beneath the far-off\ntropic seas.\n\nAnd if, at the close of her eventful life, one gleam of sunshine opened\nfor a while, when her boy Richard returned to her bosom from his Spanish\nprison, to be knighted for his valor, and made a privy councillor for\nhis wisdom; yet soon, how soon, was the old cloud to close in again\nabove her, until her weary eyes should open in the light of Paradise.\nFor that son dropped dead, some say at the very council-table, leaving\nbehind him naught but broken fortunes, and huge purposes which never\nwere fulfilled; and the stormy star of that bold race was set forever,\nand Lady Hawkins bowed her weary head and died, the groan of those\nstolen negroes ringing in her ears, having lived long enough to see her\nhusband's youthful sin become a national institution, and a national\ncurse for generations yet unborn.\n\nI know not why she opened her heart that night to Adrian Gilbert, with\na frankness which she would hardly have dared to use to her own family.\nPerhaps it was that Adrian, like his great brothers, Humphrey and\nRaleigh, was a man full of all lofty and delicate enthusiasms, tender\nand poetical, such as women cling to when their hearts are lonely; but\nso it was; and Adrian, half ashamed of his own ambitious dreams, sate\nlooking at her a while in silence; and then--\n\n\"The Lord be with you, dearest lady. Strange, how you women sit at home\nto love and suffer, while we men rush forth to break our hearts and\nyours against rocks of our own seeking! Ah well! were it not for\nScripture, I should have thought that Adam, rather than Eve, had been\nthe one who plucked the fruit of the forbidden tree.\"\n\n\"We women, I fear; did the deed nevertheless; for we bear the doom of it\nour lives long.\"\n\n\"You always remind me, madam, of my dear Mrs. Leigh of Burrough, and her\ncounsels.\"\n\n\"Do you see her often? I hear of her as one of the Lord's most precious\nvessels.\"\n\n\"I would have done more ere now than see her,\" said he with a blush,\n\"had she allowed me: but she lives only for the memory of her husband\nand the fame of her noble sons.\"\n\nAs he spoke the door opened, and in walked, wrapped in his rough\nsea-gown, none other than one of those said noble sons.\n\nAdrian turned pale.\n\n\"Amyas Leigh! What brings you hither? how fares my brother? Where is the\nship?\"\n\n\"Your brother is well, Mr. Gilbert. The Golden Hind is gone on to\nDartmouth, with Mr. Hayes. I came ashore here, meaning to go north to\nBideford, ere I went to London. I called at Drake's just now, but he was\naway.\"\n\n\"The Golden Hind? What brings her home so soon?\"\n\n\"Yet welcome ever, sir,\" said Mrs. Hawkins. \"This is a great surprise,\nthough. Captain John did not look for you till next year.\"\n\nAmyas was silent.\n\n\"Something is wrong!\" cried Adrian. \"Speak!\"\n\nAmyas tried, but could not.\n\n\"Will you drive a man mad, sir? Has the adventure failed? You said my\nbrother was well.\"\n\n\"He is well.\"\n\n\"Then what--Why do you look at me in that fashion, sir?\" and springing\nup, Adrian rushed forward, and held the candle to Amyas's face.\n\nAmyas's lip quivered, as he laid his hand on Adrian's shoulder.\n\n\"Your great and glorious brother, sir, is better bestowed than in\nsettling Newfoundland.\"\n\n\"Dead?\" shrieked Adrian.\n\n\"He is with the God whom he served!\"\n\n\"He was always with Him, like Enoch: parable me no parables, if you love\nme, sir!\"\n\n\"And, like Enoch, he was not; for God took him.\"\n\nAdrian clasped his hands over his forehead, and leaned against the\ntable.\n\n\"Go on, sir, go on. God will give me strength to hear all.\"\n\nAnd gradually Amyas opened to Adrian that tragic story, which Mr. Hayes\nhas long ago told far too well to allow a second edition of it from me:\nof the unruliness of the men, ruffians, as I said before, caught up at\nhap-hazard; of conspiracies to carry off the ships, plunder of fishing\nvessels, desertions multiplying daily; licenses from the general to the\nlazy and fearful to return home: till Adrian broke out with a groan--\n\n\"From him? Conspired against him? Deserted from him? Dotards, buzzards!\nWhere would they have found such another leader?\"\n\n\"Your illustrious brother, sir,\" said Amyas, \"if you will pardon me, was\na very great philosopher, but not so much of a general.\"\n\n\"General, sir? Where was braver man?\"\n\n\"Not on God's earth, but that does not make a general, sir. If Cortez\nhad been brave and no more, Mexico would have been Mexico still. The\ntruth is, sir, Cortez, like my Captain Drake, knew when to hang a man;\nand your great brother did not.\"\n\nAmyas, as I suppose, was right. Gilbert was a man who could be angry\nenough at baseness or neglect, but who was too kindly to punish it; he\nwas one who could form the wisest and best-digested plans, but who could\nnot stoop to that hail-fellow-well-met drudgery among his subordinates\nwhich has been the talisman of great captains.\n\nThen Amyas went on to tell the rest of his story; the setting sail from\nSt. John's to discover the southward coast; Sir Humphrey's chivalrous\ndetermination to go in the little Squirrel of only ten tons, and\n\"overcharged with nettings, fights, and small ordnance,\" not only\nbecause she was more fit to examine the creeks, but because he had heard\nof some taunt against him among the men, that he was afraid of the sea.\n\nAfter that, woe on woe; how, seven days after they left Cape Raz, their\nlargest ship, the Delight, after she had \"most part of the night\" (I\nquote Hayes), \"like the swan that singeth before her death, continued in\nsounding of trumpets, drums, and fifes, also winding of the comets and\nhautboys, and, in the end of their jollity, left off with the battle and\ndoleful knells,\" struck the next day (the Golden Hind and the Squirrel\nsheering off just in time) upon unknown shoals; where were lost all but\nfourteen, and among them Frank's philosopher friend, poor Budaeus; and\nthose who escaped, after all horrors of cold and famine, were cast on\nshore in Newfoundland. How, worn out with hunger and want of clothes,\nthe crews of the two remaining ships persuaded Sir Humphrey to sail\ntoward England on the 31st of August; and on \"that very instant, even in\nwinding about,\" beheld close alongside \"a very lion in shape, hair, and\ncolor, not swimming, but sliding on the water, with his whole body; who\npassed along, turning his head to and fro, yawning and gaping wide,\nwith ugly demonstration of long teeth and glaring eyes; and to bid us\nfarewell (coming right against the Hind) he sent forth a horrible voice,\nroaring or bellowing as doth a lion.\" \"What opinion others had thereof,\nand chiefly the general himself, I forbear to deliver; but he took it\nfor bonum omen, rejoicing that he was to war against such an enemy, if\nit were the devil.\"\n\n\"And the devil it was, doubtless,\" said Adrian, \"the roaring lion who\ngoes about seeking whom he may devour.\"\n\n\"He has not got your brother, at least,\" quoth Amyas.\n\n\"No,\" rejoined Mrs. Hawkins (smile not, reader, for those were days in\nwhich men believed in the devil); \"he roared for joy to think how many\npoor souls would be left still in heathen darkness by Sir Humphrey's\ndeath. God be with that good knight, and send all mariners where he is\nnow!\"\n\nThen Amyas told the last scene; how, when they were off the Azores, the\nstorms came on heavier than ever, with \"terrible seas, breaking short\nand pyramid-wise,\" till, on the 9th September, the tiny Squirrel nearly\nfoundered and yet recovered; \"and the general, sitting abaft with a\nbook in his hand, cried out to us in the Hind so oft as we did approach\nwithin hearing, 'We are as near heaven by sea as by land,' reiterating\nthe same speech, well beseeming a soldier resolute in Jesus Christ, as I\ncan testify he was.\n\n\"The same Monday, about twelve of the clock, or not long after, the\nfrigate (the Squirrel) being ahead of us in the Golden Hind, suddenly\nher lights were out; and withal our watch cried, the general was cast\naway, which was true; for in that moment the frigate was devoured and\nswallowed up of the sea.\"\n\nAnd so ended (I have used Hayes' own words) Amyas Leigh's story.\n\n\"Oh, my brother! my brother!\" moaned poor Adrian; \"the glory of his\nhouse, the glory of Devon!\"\n\n\"Ah! what will the queen say?\" asked Mrs. Hawkins through her tears.\n\n\"Tell me,\" asked Adrian, \"had he the jewel on when he died?\"\n\n\"The queen's jewel? He always wore that, and his own posy too, 'Mutare\nvel timere sperno.' He wore it; and he lived it.\"\n\n\"Ay,\" said Adrian, \"the same to the last!\"\n\n\"Not quite that,\" said Amyas. \"He was a meeker man latterly than he used\nto be. As he said himself once, a better refiner than any whom he had on\nboard had followed him close all the seas over, and purified him in the\nfire. And gold seven times tried he was, when God, having done His work\nin him, took him home at last.\"\n\nAnd so the talk ended. There was no doubt that the expedition had\nbeen an utter failure; Adrian was a ruined man; and Amyas had lost his\nventure.\n\nAdrian rose, and begged leave to retire; he must collect himself.\n\n\"Poor gentleman!\" said Mrs. Hawkins; \"it is little else he has left to\ncollect.\"\n\n\"Or I either,\" said Amyas. \"I was going to ask you to lend me one of\nyour son's shirts, and five pounds to get myself and my men home.\"\n\n\"Five? Fifty, Mr. Leigh! God forbid that John Hawkins's wife should\nrefuse her last penny to a distressed mariner, and he a gentleman born.\nBut you must eat and drink.\"\n\n\"It's more than I have done for many a day worth speaking of.\"\n\nAnd Amyas sat down in his rags to a good supper, while Mrs. Hawkins told\nhim all the news which she could of his mother, whom Adrian Gilbert had\nseen a few months before in London; and then went on, naturally enough,\nto the Bideford news.\n\n\"And by the by, Captain Leigh, I've sad news for you from your place;\nand I had it from one who was there at the time. You must know a Spanish\ncaptain, a prisoner--\"\n\n\"What, the one I sent home from Smerwick?\"\n\n\"You sent? Mercy on us! Then, perhaps, you've heard--\"\n\n\"How can I have heard? What?\"\n\n\"That he's gone off, the villain?\"\n\n\"Without paying his ransom?\"\n\n\"I can't say that; but there's a poor innocent young maid gone off with\nhim, one Salterne's daughter--the Popish serpent!\"\n\n\"Rose Salterne, the mayor's daughter, the Rose of Torridge!\"\n\n\"That's her. Bless your dear soul, what ails you?\"\n\nAmyas had dropped back in his seat as if he had been shot; but he\nrecovered himself before kind Mrs. Hawkins could rush to the cupboard\nfor cordials.\n\n\"You'll forgive me, madam; but I'm weak from the sea; and your good ale\nhas turned me a bit dizzy, I think.\"\n\n\"Ay, yes, 'tis too, too heavy, till you've been on shore a while. Try\nthe aqua vitae; my Captain John has it right good; and a bit too fond of\nit too, poor dear soul, between whiles, Heaven forgive him!\"\n\nSo she poured some strong brandy and water down Amyas's throat, in spite\nof his refusals, and sent him to bed, but not to sleep; and after a\nnight of tossing, he started for Bideford, having obtained the means for\nso doing from Mrs. Hawkins.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nHOW SALVATION YEO SLEW THE KING OF THE GUBBINGS\n\n     \"Ignorance and evil, even in full flight, deal terrible backhanded\n     strokes at their pursuers.\"--HELPS.\n\nNow I am sorry to say, for the honor of my country, that it was by no\nmeans a safe thing in those days to travel from Plymouth to the north of\nDevon; because, to get to your journey's end, unless you were minded to\nmake a circuit of many miles, you must needs pass through the territory\nof a foreign and hostile potentate, who had many times ravaged the\ndominions, and defeated the forces of her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, and\nwas named (behind his back at least) the King of the Gubbings. \"So now\nI dare call them,\" says Fuller, \"secured by distance, which one of more\nvalor durst not do to their face, for fear their fury fall upon him. Yet\nhitherto have I met with none who could render a reason of their name.\nWe call the shavings of fish (which are little worth) gubbings; and sure\nit is that they are sensible that the word importeth shame and disgrace.\n\n\"As for the suggestion of my worthy and learned friend, Mr. Joseph\nMaynard, that such as did inhabitare montes gibberosos, were called\nGubbings, such will smile at the ingenuity who dissent from the truth of\nthe etymology.\n\n\"I have read of an England beyond Wales, but the Gubbings land is a\nScythia within England, and they pure heathens therein. It lieth nigh\nBrent. For in the edge of Dartmoor it is reported that, some two hundred\nyears since, two bad women, being with child, fled thither to hide\nthemselves; to whom certain lewd fellows resorted, and this was their\nfirst original. They are a peculiar of their own making, exempt from\nbishop, archdeacon, and all authority, either ecclesiastical or civil.\nThey live in cots (rather holes than houses) like swine, having all in\ncommon, multiplied without marriage into many hundreds. Their language\nis the dross of the dregs of the vulgar Devonian; and the more learned\na man is, the worse he can understand them. During our civil wars no\nsoldiers were quartered upon them, for fear of being quartered amongst\nthem. Their wealth consisteth in other men's goods; they live by\nstealing the sheep on the moors; and vain is it for any to search their\nhouses, being a work beneath the pains of any sheriff, and above the\npower of any constable. Such is their fleetness, they will outrun many\nhorses; vivaciousness, they outlive most men; living in an ignorance of\nluxury, the extinguisher of life. They hold together like bees; offend\none, and all will revenge his quarrel.\n\n\"But now I am informed that they begin to be civilized, and tender their\nchildren to baptism, and return to be men, yea, Christians again. I hope\nno CIVIL people amongst us will turn barbarians, now these barbarians\nbegin to be civilized.\"*\n\n     * Fuller, p. 398.\n\nWith which quip against the Anabaptists of his day, Fuller ends his\nstory; and I leave him to set forth how Amyas, in fear of these same\nScythians and heathens, rode out of Plymouth on a right good horse, in\nhis full suit of armor, carrying lance and sword, and over and above two\ngreat dags, or horse-pistols; and behind him Salvation Yeo, and five\nor six north Devon men (who had served with him in Ireland, and were\nreturning on furlough), clad in head-pieces and quilted jerkins, each\nman with his pike and sword, and Yeo with arquebuse and match, while two\nsumpter ponies carried the baggage of this formidable troop.\n\nThey pushed on as fast as they could, through Tavistock, to reach before\nnightfall Lydford, where they meant to sleep; but what with buying the\nhorses, and other delays, they had not been able to start before\nnoon; and night fell just as they reached the frontiers of the enemy's\ncountry. A dreary place enough it was, by the wild glare of sunset. A\nhigh tableland of heath, banked on the right by the crags and hills of\nDartmoor, and sloping away to the south and west toward the foot of the\ngreat cone of Brent-Tor, which towered up like an extinct volcano (as\nsome say that it really is), crowned with the tiny church, the votive\noffering of some Plymouth merchant of old times, who vowed in sore\ndistress to build a church to the Blessed Virgin on the first point of\nEnglish land which he should see. Far away, down those waste slopes,\nthey could see the tiny threads of blue smoke rising from the dens of\nthe Gubbings; and more than once they called a halt, to examine whether\ndistant furze-bushes and ponies might not be the patrols of an advancing\narmy. It is all very well to laugh at it now, in the nineteenth century,\nbut it was no laughing matter then; as they found before they had gone\ntwo miles farther.\n\nOn the middle of the down stood a wayside inn; a desolate and\nvillainous-looking lump of lichen-spotted granite, with windows\npaper-patched, and rotting thatch kept down by stones and straw-banks;\nand at the back a rambling court-ledge of barns and walls, around which\npigs and barefoot children grunted in loving communion of dirt. At the\ndoor, rapt apparently in the contemplation of the mountain peaks which\nglowed rich orange in the last lingering sun-rays, but really watching\nwhich way the sheep on the moor were taking, stood the innkeeper, a\nbrawny, sodden-visaged, blear-eyed six feet of brutishness, holding up\nhis hose with one hand, for want of points, and clawing with the other\nhis elf-locks, on which a fair sprinkling of feathers might denote:\nfirst, that he was just out of bed, having been out sheep-stealing\nall the night before; and secondly, that by natural genius he had\nanticipated the opinion of that great apostle of sluttishness,\nFridericus Dedekind, and his faithful disciple Dekker, which last speaks\nthus to all gulls and grobians: \"Consider that as those trees of cobweb\nlawn, woven by spinners in the fresh May mornings, do dress the curled\nheads of the mountains, and adorn the swelling bosoms of the valleys; or\nas those snowy fleeces, which the naked briar steals from the innocent\nsheep to make himself a warm winter livery, are, to either of them\nboth, an excellent ornament; so make thou account, that to have feathers\nsticking here and there on thy head will embellish thee, and set thy\ncrown out rarely. None dare upbraid thee, that like a beggar thou hast\nlain on straw, or like a travelling pedlar upon musty flocks; for those\nfeathers will rise up as witnesses to choke him that says so, and to\nprove thy bed to have been of the softest down.\" Even so did those\nfeathers bear witness that the possessor of Rogues' Harbor Inn, on\nBrent-Tor Down, whatever else he lacked, lacked not geese enough to keep\nhim in soft lying.\n\nPresently he spies Amyas and his party coming slowly over the hill,\npricks up his ears, and counts them; sees Amyas's armor; shakes his head\nand grunts; and then, being a man of few words, utters a sleepy howl--\n\n\"Mirooi!--Fushing pooale!\"\n\nA strapping lass--whose only covering (for country women at work in\nthose days dispensed with the ornament of a gown) is a green bodice and\nred petticoat, neither of them over ample--brings out his fishing-rod\nand basket, and the man, having tied up his hose with some ends of\nstring, examines the footlink.\n\n\"Don vlies' gone!\"\n\n\"May be,\" says Mary; \"shouldn't hay' left mun out to coort. May be old\nhen's ate mun off. I see her chocking about a while agone.\"\n\nThe host receives this intelligence with an oath, and replies by a\nviolent blow at Mary's head, which she, accustomed to such slight\nmatters, dodges, and then returns the blow with good effect on the shock\nhead.\n\nWhereon mine host, equally accustomed to such slight matters, quietly\nshambles off, howling as he departs--\n\n\"Tell Patrico!\"\n\nMary runs in, combs her hair, slips a pair of stockings and her best\ngown over her dirt, and awaits the coming guests, who make a few long\nfaces at the \"mucksy sort of a place,\" but prefer to spend the night\nthere than to bivouac close to the enemy's camp.\n\nSo the old hen who has swallowed the dun fly is killed, plucked, and\nroasted, and certain \"black Dartmoor mutton\" is put on the gridiron, and\nbeing compelled to confess the truth by that fiery torment, proclaims\nitself to all noses as red-deer venison. In the meanwhile Amyas has put\nhis horse and the ponies into a shed, to which he can find neither\nlock nor key, and therefore returns grumbling, not without fear for his\nsteed's safety. The baggage is heaped in a corner of the room, and Amyas\nstretches his legs before a turf fire; while Yeo, who has his notions\nabout the place, posts himself at the door, and the men are seized with\na desire to superintend the cooking, probably to be attributed to the\nfact that Mary is cook.\n\nPresently Yeo comes in again.\n\n\"There's a gentleman just coming up, sir, all alone.\"\n\n\"Ask him to make one of our party, then, with my compliments.\" Yeo goes\nout, and returns in five minutes.\n\n\"Please, sir, he's gone in back ways, by the court.\"\n\n\"Well, he has an odd taste, if he makes himself at home here.\"\n\nOut goes Yeo again, and comes back once more after five minutes, in high\nexcitement.\n\n\"Come out, sir; for goodness' sake come out. I've got him. Safe as a rat\nin a trap, I have!\"\n\n\"Who?\"\n\n\"A Jesuit, sir.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, man!\"\n\n\"I tell you truth, sir. I went round the house, for I didn't like the\nlooks of him as he came up. I knew he was one of them villains the\nminute he came up, by the way he turned in his toes, and put down his\nfeet so still and careful, like as if he was afraid of offending God at\nevery step. So I just put my eye between the wall and the dern of the\ngate, and I saw him come up to the back door and knock, and call 'Mary!'\nquite still, like any Jesuit; and the wench flies out to him ready to\neat him; and 'Go away,' I heard her say, 'there's a dear man;' and then\nsomething about a 'queer cuffin' (that's a justice in these canters'\nthieves' Latin); and with that he takes out a somewhat--I'll swear it\nwas one of those Popish Agnuses--and gives it her; and she kisses it,\nand crosses herself, and asks him if that's the right way, and then puts\nit into her bosom, and he says, 'Bless you, my daughter;' and then I was\nsure of the dog: and he slips quite still to the stable, and peeps in,\nand when he sees no one there, in he goes, and out I go, and shut to the\ndoor, and back a cart that was there up against it, and call out one of\nthe men to watch the stable, and the girl's crying like mad.\"\n\n\"What a fool's trick, man! How do you know that he is not some honest\ngentleman, after all?\"\n\n\"Fool or none, sir; honest gentlemen don't give maidens Agnuses. I've\nput him in; and if you want him let out again, you must come and do it\nyourself, for my conscience is against it, sir. If the Lord's enemies\nare delivered into my hand, I'm answerable, sir,\" went on Yeo as Amyas\nhurried out with him. \"'Tis written, 'If any let one of them go, his\nlife shall be for the life of him.'\"\n\nSo Amyas ran out, pulled back the cart grumbling, opened the door, and\nbegan a string of apologies to--his cousin Eustace.\n\nYes, here he was, with such a countenance, half foolish, half venomous,\nas reynard wears when the last spadeful of earth is thrown back, and\nhe is revealed sitting disconsolately on his tail within a yard of the\nterriers' noses.\n\nNeither cousin spoke for a minute or two. At last Amyas--\n\n\"Well, cousin hide-and-seek, how long have you added horse-stealing to\nyour other trades?\"\n\n\"My dear Amyas,\" said Eustace, very meekly, \"I may surely go into an inn\nstable without intending to steal what is in it.\"\n\n\"Of course, old fellow,\" said Amyas, mollified, \"I was only in jest. But\nwhat brings you here? Not prudence, certainly.\"\n\n\"I am bound to know no prudence save for the Lord's work.\"\n\n\"That's giving away Agnus Deis, and deceiving poor heathen wenches, I\nsuppose,\" said Yeo.\n\nEustace answered pretty roundly--\n\n\"Heathens? Yes, truly; you Protestants leave these poor wretches\nheathens, and then insult and persecute those who, with a devotion\nunknown to you, labor at the danger of their lives to make them\nChristians. Mr. Amyas Leigh, you can give me up to be hanged at Exeter,\nif it shall so please you to disgrace your own family; but from this\nspot neither you, no, nor all the myrmidons of your queen, shall drive\nme, while there is a soul here left unsaved.\"\n\n\"Come out of the stable, at least,\" said Amyas; \"you don't want to make\nthe horses Papists, as well as the asses, do you? Come out, man, and go\nto the devil your own way. I sha'n't inform against you; and Yeo here\nwill hold his tongue if I tell him, I know.\"\n\n\"It goes sorely against my conscience, sir; but being that he is your\ncousin, of course--\"\n\n\"Of course; and now come in and eat with me; supper's just ready, and\nbygones shall be bygones, if you will have them so.\"\n\nHow much forgiveness Eustace felt in his heart, I know not: but he knew,\nof course, that he ought to forgive; and to go in and eat with Amyas was\nto perform an act of forgiveness, and for the best of motives, too, for\nby it the cause of the Church might be furthered; and acts and motives\nbeing correct, what more was needed? So in he went; and yet he never\nforgot that scar upon his cheek; and Amyas could not look him in the\nface but Eustace must fancy that his eyes were on the scar, and peep\nup from under his lids to see if there was any smile of triumph on that\nhonest visage. They talked away over the venison, guardedly enough at\nfirst; but as they went on, Amyas's straightforward kindliness warmed\npoor Eustace's frozen heart; and ere they were aware, they found\nthemselves talking over old haunts and old passages of their\nboyhood--uncles, aunts, and cousins; and Eustace, without any sinister\nintention, asked Amyas why he was going to Bideford, while Frank and his\nmother were in London.\n\n\"To tell you the truth, I cannot rest till I have heard the whole story\nabout poor Rose Salterne.\"\n\n\"What about her?\" cried Eustace.\n\n\"Do you not know?\"\n\n\"How should I know anything here? For heaven's sake, what has happened?\"\n\nAmyas told him, wondering at his eagerness, for he had never had the\nleast suspicion of Eustace's love.\n\nEustace shrieked aloud.\n\n\"Fool, fool that I have been! Caught in my own trap! Villain, villain\nthat he is! After all he promised me at Lundy!\"\n\nAnd springing up, Eustace stamped up and down the room, gnashing\nhis teeth, tossing his head from side to side, and clutching with\noutstretched hands at the empty air, with the horrible gesture (Heaven\ngrant that no reader has ever witnessed it!) of that despair which still\nseeks blindly for the object which it knows is lost forever.\n\nAmyas sat thunderstruck. His first impulse was to ask, \"Lundy? What\nknew you of him? What had he or you to do at Lundy?\" but pity conquered\ncuriosity.\n\n\"Oh, Eustace! And you then loved her too?\"\n\n\"Don't speak to me! Loved her? Yes, sir, and had as good a right to love\nher as any one of your precious Brotherhood of the Rose. Don't speak to\nme, I say, or I shall do you a mischief!\"\n\nSo Eustace knew of the brotherhood too! Amyas longed to ask him how; but\nwhat use in that? If he knew it, he knew it; and what harm? So he only\nanswered:\n\n\"My good cousin, why be wroth with me? If you really love her, now is\nthe time to take counsel with me how best we shall--\"\n\nEustace did not let him finish his sentence. Conscious that he had\nbetrayed himself upon more points than one, he stopped short in his\nwalk, suddenly collected himself by one great effort, and eyed Amyas\nfrom underneath his brows with the old down look.\n\n\"How best we shall do what, my valiant cousin?\" said he, in a meaning\nand half-scornful voice. \"What does your most chivalrous Brotherhood of\nthe Rose purpose in such a case?\"\n\nAmyas, a little nettled, stood on his guard in return, and answered\nbluntly--\n\n\"What the Brotherhood of the Rose will do, I can't yet say. What it\nought to do, I have a pretty sure guess.\"\n\n\"So have I. To hunt her down as you would an outlaw, because forsooth\nshe has dared to love a Catholic; to murder her lover in her arms, and\ndrag her home again stained with his blood, to be forced by threats and\npersecution to renounce that Church into whose maternal bosom she has\ndoubtless long since found rest and holiness!\"\n\n\"If she has found holiness, it matters little to me where she has found\nit, Master Eustace, but that is the very point that I should be glad to\nknow for certain.\"\n\n\"And you will go and discover for yourself?\"\n\n\"Have you no wish to discover it also?\"\n\n\"And if I had, what would that be to you?\"\n\n\"Only,\" said Amyas, trying hard to keep his temper, \"that, if we had the\nsame purpose, we might sail in the same ship.\"\n\n\"You intend to sail, then?\"\n\n\"I mean simply, that we might work together.\"\n\n\"Our paths lie on very different roads, sir!\"\n\n\"I am afraid you never spoke a truer word, sir. In the meanwhile, ere we\npart, be so kind as to tell me what you meant by saying that you had met\nthis Spaniard at Lundy?\"\n\n\"I shall refuse to answer that.\"\n\n\"You will please to recollect, Eustace, that however good friends we\nhave been for the last half-hour, you are in my power. I have a right to\nknow the bottom of this matter; and, by heaven, I will know it.\"\n\n\"In your power? See that you are not in mine! Remember, sir, that you\nare within a--within a few miles, at least, of those who will obey me,\ntheir Catholic benefactor, but who owe no allegiance to those Protestant\nauthorities who have left them to the lot of the beasts which perish.\"\n\nAmyas was very angry. He wanted but little more to make him catch\nEustace by the shoulders, shake the life out of him, and deliver him\ninto the tender guardianship of Yeo; but he knew that to take him at\nall was to bring certain death on him, and disgrace on the family; and\nremembering Frank's conduct on that memorable night at Clovelly, he kept\nhimself down.\n\n\"Take me,\" said Eustace, \"if you will, sir. You, who complain of us that\nwe keep no faith with heretics, will perhaps recollect that you asked me\ninto this room as your guest, and that in your good faith I trusted when\nI entered it.\"\n\nThe argument was a worthless one in law; for Eustace had been a prisoner\nbefore he was a guest, and Amyas was guilty of something very like\nmisprision of treason in not handing him over to the nearest justice.\nHowever, all he did was, to go to the door, open it, and bowing to his\ncousin, bid him walk out and go to the devil, since he seemed to have\nset his mind on ending his days in the company of that personage.\n\nWhereon Eustace vanished.\n\n\"Pooh!\" said Amyas to himself, \"I can find out enough, and too much, I\nfear, without the help of such crooked vermin. I must see Cary; I must\nsee Salterne; and I suppose, if I am ready to do my duty, I shall learn\nsomehow what it is. Now to sleep; to-morrow up and away to what God\nsends.\"\n\n\"Come in hither, men,\" shouted he down the passage, \"and sleep here.\nHaven't you had enough of this villainous sour cider?\"\n\nThe men came in yawning, and settled themselves to sleep on the floor.\n\n\"Where's Yeo?\"\n\nNo one knew; he had gone out to say his prayers, and had not returned.\n\n\"Never mind,\" said Amyas, who suspected some plot on the old man's part.\n\"He'll take care of himself, I'll warrant him.\"\n\n\"No fear of that, sir;\" and the four tars were soon snoring in concert\nround the fire, while Amyas laid himself on the settle, with his saddle\nfor a pillow.\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\n\nIt was about midnight, when Amyas leaped to his feet, or rather fell\nupon his back, upsetting saddle, settle, and finally, table, under the\nnotion that ten thousand flying dragons were bursting in the window\nclose to his ear, with howls most fierce and fell. The flying dragons\npast, however, being only a flock of terror-stricken geese, which flew\nflapping and screaming round the corner of the house; but the noise\nwhich had startled them did not pass; and another minute made it evident\nthat a sharp fight was going on in the courtyard, and that Yeo was\nhallooing lustily for help.\n\nOut turned the men, sword in hand, burst the back door open, stumbling\nover pails and pitchers, and into the courtyard, where Yeo, his back\nagainst the stable-door, was holding his own manfully with sword and\nbuckler against a dozen men.\n\nDire and manifold was the screaming; geese screamed, chickens screamed,\npigs screamed, donkeys screamed, Mary screamed from an upper window;\nand to complete the chorus, a flock of plovers, attracted by the noise,\nwheeled round and round overhead, and added their screams also to that\nDutch concert.\n\nThe screaming went on, but the fight ceased; for, as Amyas rushed into\nthe yard, the whole party of ruffians took to their heels, and vanished\nover a low hedge at the other end of the yard.\n\n\"Are you hurt, Yeo?\"\n\n\"Not a scratch, thank Heaven! But I've got two of them, the ringleaders,\nI have. One of them's against the wall. Your horse did for t'other.\"\n\nThe wounded man was lifted up; a huge ruffian, nearly as big as Amyas\nhimself. Yeo's sword had passed through his body. He groaned and choked\nfor breath.\n\n\"Carry him indoors. Where is the other?\"\n\n\"Dead as a herring, in the straw. Have a care, men, have a care how you\ngo in! the horses are near mad!\"\n\nHowever, the man was brought out after a while. With him all was over.\nThey could feel neither pulse nor breath.\n\n\"Carry him in too, poor wretch. And now, Yeo, what is the meaning of all\nthis?\"\n\nYeo's story was soon told. He could not get out of his Puritan head the\nnotion (quite unfounded, of course) that Eustace had meant to steal\nthe horses. He had seen the inn-keeper sneak off at their approach; and\nexpecting some night-attack, he had taken up his lodging for the night\nin the stable.\n\nAs he expected, an attempt was made. The door was opened (how, he could\nnot guess, for he had fastened it inside), and two fellows came in, and\nbegan to loose the beasts. Yeo's account was, that he seized the big\nfellow, who drew a knife on him, and broke loose; the horses, terrified\nat the scuffle, kicked right and left; one man fell, and the other\nran out, calling for help, with Yeo at his heels; \"Whereon,\" said\nYeo, \"seeing a dozen more on me with clubs and bows, I thought best to\nshorten the number while I could, ran the rascal through, and stood on\nmy ward; and only just in time I was, what's more; there's two arrows in\nthe house wall, and two or three more in my buckler, which I caught up\nas I went out, for I had hung it close by the door, you see, sir, to be\nall ready in case,\" said the cunning old Philistine-slayer, as they went\nin after the wounded man.\n\nBut hardly had they stumbled through the low doorway into the\nback-kitchen when a fresh hubbub arose inside--more shouts for help.\nAmyas ran forward breaking his head against the doorway, and beheld, as\nsoon as he could see for the flashes in his eyes, an old acquaintance,\nheld on each side by a sturdy sailor.\n\nWith one arm in the sleeve of his doublet, and the other in a not over\nspotless shirt; holding up his hose with one hand, and with the other\na candle, whereby he had lighted himself to his own confusion; foaming\nwith rage, stood Mr. Evan Morgans, alias Father Parsons, looking,\nbetween his confused habiliments and his fiery visage (as Yeo told him\nto his face), \"the very moral of a half-plucked turkey-cock.\" And behind\nhim, dressed, stood Eustace Leigh.\n\n\"We found the maid letting these here two out by the front door,\" said\none of the captors.\n\n\"Well, Mr. Parsons,\" said Amyas; \"and what are you about here? A pretty\nnest of thieves and Jesuits we seem to have routed out this evening.\"\n\n\"About my calling, sir,\" said Parsons, stoutly. \"By your leave, I\nshall prepare this my wounded lamb for that account to which your man's\ncruelty has untimely sent him.\"\n\nThe wounded man, who lay upon the floor, heard Parsons' voice, and\nmoaned for the \"Patrico.\"\n\n\"You see, sir,\" said he, pompously, \"the sheep know their shepherd's\nvoice.\"\n\n\"The wolves you mean, you hypocritical scoundrel!\" said Amyas, who could\nnot contain his disgust. \"Let the fellow truss up his points, lads, and\ndo his work. After all, the man is dying.\"\n\n\"The requisite matters, sir, are not at hand,\" said Parsons, unabashed.\n\n\"Eustace, go and fetch his matters for him; you seem to be in all his\nplots.\"\n\nEustace went silently and sullenly.\n\n\"What's that fresh noise at the back, now?\"\n\n\"The maid, sir, a wailing over her uncle; the fellow that we saw sneak\naway when we came up. It was him the horse killed.\"\n\nIt was true. The wretched host had slipped off on their approach, simply\nto call the neighboring outlaws to the spoil; and he had been filled\nwith the fruit of his own devices.\n\n\"His blood be on his own head,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"I question, sir,\" said Yeo, in a low voice, \"whether some of it will\nnot be on the heads of those proud prelates who go clothed in purple\nand fine linen, instead of going forth to convert such as he, and then\nwonder how these Jesuits get hold of them. If they give place to the\ndevil in their sheepfolds, sure he'll come in and lodge there. Look,\nsir, there's a sight in a gospel land!\"\n\nAnd, indeed, the sight was curious enough. For Parsons was kneeling by\nthe side of the dying man, listening earnestly to the confession which\nthe man sobbed out in his gibberish, between the spasms of his wounded\nchest. Now and then Parsons shook his head; and when Eustace returned\nwith the holy wafer, and the oil for extreme unction, he asked him, in a\nlow voice, \"Ballard, interpret for me.\"\n\nAnd Eustace knelt down on the other side of the sufferer, and\ninterpreted his thieves' dialect into Latin; and the dying man held\na hand of each, and turned first to one and then to the other stupid\neyes,--not without affection, though, and gratitude.\n\n\"I can't stand this mummery any longer,\" said Yeo. \"Here's a soul\nperishing before my eyes, and it's on my conscience to speak a word in\nseason.\"\n\n\"Silence!\" whispered Amyas, holding him back by the arm; \"he knows them,\nand he don't know you; they are the first who ever spoke to him as if\nhe had a soul to be saved, and first come, first served; you can do no\ngood. See, the man's face is brightening already.\"\n\n\"But, sir, 'tis a false peace.\"\n\n\"At all events he is confessing his sins, Yeo; and if that's not good\nfor him, and you, and me, what is?\"\n\n\"Yea, Amen! sir; but this is not to the right person.\"\n\n\"How do you know his words will not go to the right person, after all,\nthough he may not send them there? By heaven! the man is dead!\"\n\nIt was so. The dark catalogue of brutal deeds had been gasped out; but\nere the words of absolution could follow, the head had fallen back, and\nall was over.\n\n\"Confession in extremis is sufficient,\" said Parsons to Eustace\n(\"Ballard,\" as Parsons called him, to Amyas's surprise), as he rose. \"As\nfor the rest, the intention will be accepted instead of the act.\"\n\n\"The Lord have mercy on his soul!\" said Eustace.\n\n\"His soul is lost before our very eyes,\" said Yeo.\n\n\"Mind your own business,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Humph; but I'll tell you, sir, what our business is, if you'll step\naside with me. I find that poor fellow that lies dead is none other than\nthe leader of the Gubbings; the king of them, as they dare to call him.\"\n\n\"Well, what of that?\"\n\n\"Mark my words, sir, if we have not a hundred stout rogues upon us\nbefore two hours are out; forgive us they never will; and if we get off\nwith our lives, which I don't much expect, we shall leave our horses\nbehind; for we can hold the house, sir, well enough till morning, but\nthe courtyard we can't, that's certain!\"\n\n\"We had better march at once, then.\"\n\n\"Think, sir; if they catch us up--as they are sure to do, knowing the\ncountry better than we--how will our shot stand their arrows?\"\n\n\"True, old wisdom; we must keep the road; and we must keep together; and\nso be a mark for them, while they will be behind every rock and bank;\nand two or three flights of arrows will do our business for us. Humph!\nstay, I have a plan.\" And stepping forward he spoke--\n\n\"Eustace, you will be so kind as to go back to your lambs; and tell\nthem, that if they meddle with us cruel wolves again to-night, we are\nready and willing to fight to the death, and have plenty of shot and\npowder at their service. Father Parsons, you will be so kind as to\naccompany us; it is but fitting that the shepherd should be hostage for\nhis sheep.\"\n\n\"If you carry me off this spot, sir, you carry my corpse only,\" said\nParsons. \"I may as well die here as be hanged elsewhere, like my\nmartyred brother Campian.\"\n\n\"If you take him, you must take me too,\" said Eustace.\n\n\"What if we won't?\"\n\n\"How will you gain by that? you can only leave me here. You cannot make\nme go to the Gubbings, if I do not choose.\"\n\nAmyas uttered sotto voce an anathema on Jesuits, Gubbings, and things in\ngeneral. He was in a great hurry to get to Bideford, and he feared that\nthis business would delay him, as it was, a day or two. He wanted to\nhang Parsons, he did not want to hang Eustace; and Eustace, he knew,\nwas well aware of that latter fact, and played his game accordingly; but\ntime ran on, and he had to answer sulkily enough:\n\n\"Well then; if you, Eustace, will go and give my message to your\nconverts, I will promise to set Mr. Parsons free again before we come to\nLydford town; and I advise you, if you have any regard for his life,\nto see that your eloquence be persuasive enough; for as sure as I am\nan Englishman, and he none, if the Gubbings attack us, the first\nbullet that I shall fire at them will have gone through his scoundrelly\nbrains.\"\n\nParsons still kicked.\n\n\"Very well, then, my merry men all. Tie this gentleman's hands behind\nhis back, get the horses out, and we'll right away up into Dartmoor,\nfind a good high tor, stand our ground there till morning, and then\ncarry him into Okehampton to the nearest justice. If he chooses to delay\nme in my journey, it is fair that I should make him pay for it.\"\n\nWhereon Parsons gave in, and being fast tied by his arm to Amyas's\nsaddle, trudged alongside his horse for several weary miles, while Yeo\nwalked by his side, like a friar by a condemned criminal; and in order\nto keep up his spirits, told him the woful end of Nicholas Saunders the\nLegate, and how he was found starved to death in a bog.\n\n\"And if you wish, sir, to follow in his blessed steps, which I heartily\nhope you will do, you have only to go over that big cow-backed hill\nthere on your right hand, and down again the other side to Crawmere\npool, and there you'll find as pretty a bog to die in as ever Jesuit\nneeded; and your ghost may sit there on a grass tummock, and tell your\nbeads without any one asking for you till the day of judgment; and much\ngood may it do you!\"\n\nAt which imagination Yeo was actually heard, for the first and last time\nin this history, to laugh most heartily.\n\nHis ho-ho's had scarcely died away when they saw shining under the moon\nthe old tower of Lydford castle.\n\n\"Cast the fellow off now,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Ay, ay, sir!\" and Yeo and Simon Evans stopped behind, and did not come\nup for ten minutes after.\n\n\"What have you been about so long?\"\n\n\"Why, sir,\" said Evans, \"you see the man had a very fair pair of hose\non, and a bran-new kersey doublet, very warm-lined; and so, thinking it\na pity good clothes should be wasted on such noxious trade, we've just\nbrought them along with us.\"\n\n\"Spoiling the Egyptians,\" said Yeo as comment.\n\n\"And what have you done with the man?\"\n\n\"Hove him over the bank, sir; he pitched into a big furze-bush, and for\naught I know, there he'll bide.\"\n\n\"You rascal, have you killed him?\n\n\"Never fear, sir,\" said Yeo, in his cool fashion. \"A Jesuit has as many\nlives as a cat, and, I believe, rides broomsticks post, like a witch. He\nwould be at Lydford now before us, if his master Satan had any business\nfor him there.\"\n\nLeaving on their left Lydford and its ill-omened castle (which, a\ncentury after, was one of the principal scenes of Judge Jeffreys's\ncruelty), Amyas and his party trudged on through the mire toward\nOkehampton till sunrise; and ere the vapors had lifted from the mountain\ntops, they were descending the long slopes from Sourton down, while\nYestor and Amicombe slept steep and black beneath their misty pall; and\nroaring far below unseen,\n\n     \"Ockment leapt from crag and cloud\n     Down her cataracts, laughing loud.\"\n\nThe voice of the stream recalled these words to Amyas's mind. The nymph\nof Torridge had spoken them upon the day of his triumph. He recollected,\ntoo, his vexation on that day at not seeing Rose Salterne. Why, he had\nnever seen her since. Never seen her now for six years and more! Of her\nripened beauty he knew only by hearsay; she was still to him the lovely\nfifteen years' girl for whose sake he had smitten the Barnstaple draper\nover the quay. What a chain of petty accidents had kept them from\nmeeting, though so often within a mile of each other! \"And what a lucky\none!\" said practical old Amyas to himself. \"If I had seen her as she is\nnow, I might have loved her as Frank does--poor Frank! what will he\nsay? What does he say, for he must know it already? And what ought I to\nsay--to do rather, for talking is no use on this side the grave, nor on\nthe other either, I expect!\" And then he asked himself whether his old\noath meant nothing or something; whether it was a mere tavern frolic, or\na sacred duty. And he held, the more that he looked at it, that it meant\nthe latter.\n\nBut what could he do? He had nothing on earth but his sword, so he could\nnot travel to find her. After all, she might not be gone far. Perhaps\nnot gone at all. It might be a mistake, an exaggerated scandal. He\nwould hope so. And yet it was evident that there had been some passages\nbetween her and Don Guzman. Eustace's mysterious words about the promise\nat Lundy proved that. The villain! He had felt all along that he was a\nvillain; but just the one to win a woman's heart, too. Frank had been\naway--all the Brotherhood away. What a fool he had been, to turn the\nwolf loose into the sheepfold! And yet who would have dreamed of\nit? . . .\n\n\"At all events,\" said Amyas, trying to comfort himself, \"I need not\ncomplain. I have lost nothing. I stood no more chance of her against\nFrank than I should have stood against the Don. So there is no use for\nme to cry about the matter.\" And he tried to hum a tune concerning the\ngeneral frailty of women, but nevertheless, like Sir Hugh, felt that \"he\nhad a great disposition to cry.\"\n\nHe never had expected to win her, and yet it seemed bitter to know that\nshe was lost to him forever. It was not so easy for a heart of his make\nto toss away the image of a first love; and all the less easy because\nthat image was stained and ruined.\n\n\"Curses on the man who had done that deed! I will yet have his heart's\nblood somehow, if I go round the world again to find him. If there's no\nlaw for it on earth, there's law in heaven, or I'm much mistaken.\"\n\nWith which determination he rode into the ugly, dirty, and stupid town\nof Okehampton, with which fallen man (by some strange perversity) has\nchosen to defile one of the loveliest sites in the pleasant land of\nDevon. And heartily did Amyas abuse the old town that day; for he was\ndetained there, as he expected, full three hours, while the Justice\nShallow of the place was sent for from his farm (whither he had gone\nat sunrise, after the early-rising fashion of those days) to take Yeo's\ndeposition concerning last night's affray. Moreover, when Shallow came,\nhe refused to take the depositions, because they ought to have been made\nbefore a brother Shallow at Lydford; and in the wrangling which ensued,\nwas very near finding out what Amyas (fearing fresh loss of time and\nworse evils beside) had commanded to be concealed, namely, the presence\nof Jesuits in that Moorland Utopia. Then, in broadest Devon--\n\n\"And do you call this Christian conduct, sir, to set a quiet man like me\nupon they Gubbings, as if I was going to risk my precious life--no, nor\never a constable to Okehampton neither? Let Lydfor' men mind Lydfor'\nroogs, and by Lydfor' law if they will, hang first and try after; but\nas for me, I've rade my Bible, and 'He that meddleth with strife is like\nhim that taketh a dog by the ears.' So if you choose to sit down and ate\nyour breakfast with me, well and good: but depositions I'll have none.\nIf your man is enquired for, you'll be answerable for his appearing, in\ncourse; but I expect mortally\" (with a wink), \"you wain't hear much more\nof the matter from any hand. 'Leave well alone is a good rule, but leave\nill alone is a better.'--So we says round about here; and so you'll say,\ncaptain, when you be so old as I.\"\n\nSo Amyas sat down and ate his breakfast, and went on afterwards a long\nand weary day's journey, till he saw at last beneath him the broad\nshining river, and the long bridge, and the white houses piled up the\nhill-side; and beyond, over Raleigh downs, the dear old tower of Northam\nChurch.\n\nAlas! Northam was altogether a desert to him then; and Bideford, as it\nturned out, hardly less so. For when he rode up to Sir Richard's door,\nhe found that the good knight was still in Ireland, and Lady Grenville\nat Stow. Whereupon he rode back again down the High Street to that same\nbow-windowed Ship Tavern where the Brotherhood of the Rose made their\nvow, and settled himself in the very room where they had supped.\n\n\"Ah! Mr. Leigh--Captain Leigh now, I beg pardon,\" quoth mine host.\n\"Bideford is an empty place now-a-days, and nothing stirring, sir. What\nwith Sir Richard to Ireland, and Sir John to London, and all the young\ngentlemen to the wars, there's no one to buy good liquor, and no one to\ncourt the young ladies, neither. Sack, sir? I hope so. I haven't brewed\na gallon of it this fortnight, if you'll believe me; ale, sir, and aqua\nvitae, and such low-bred trade, is all I draw now-a-days. Try a pint of\nsherry, sir, now, to give you an appetite. You mind my sherry of old?\nJane! Sherry and sugar, quick, while I pull off the captain's boots.\"\n\nAmyas sat weary and sad, while the innkeeper chattered on.\n\n\"Ah, sir! two or three like you would set the young ladies all alive\nagain. By-the-by, there's been strange doings among them since you were\nhere last. You mind Mistress Salterne!\"\n\n\"For God's sake, don't let us have that story, man! I heard enough of it\nat Plymouth!\" said Amyas, in so disturbed a tone that mine host looked\nup, and said to himself--\n\n\"Ah, poor young gentleman, he's one of the hard-hit ones.\"\n\n\"How is the old man?\" asked Amyas, after a pause.\n\n\"Bears it well enough, sir; but a changed man. Never speaks to a soul,\nif he can help it. Some folk say he's not right in his head; or turned\nmiser, or somewhat, and takes naught but bread and water, and sits up\nall night in the room as was hers, turning over her garments. Heaven\nknows what's on his mind--they do say he was over hard on her, and that\ndrove her to it. All I know is, he has never been in here for a drop\nof liquor (and he came as regular every evening as the town clock, sir)\nsince she went, except a ten days ago, and then he met young Mr. Cary at\nthe door, and I heard him ask Mr. Cary when you would be home, sir.\"\n\n\"Put on my boots again. I'll go and see him.\"\n\n\"Bless you, sir! What, without your sack?\"\n\n\"Drink it yourself, man.\"\n\n\"But you wouldn't go out again this time o' night on an empty stomach,\nnow?\"\n\n\"Fill my men's stomachs for them, and never mind mine. It's market-day,\nis it not? Send out, and see whether Mr. Cary is still in town;\" and\nAmyas strode out, and along the quay to Bridgeland Street, and knocked\nat Mr. Salterne's door.\n\nSalterne himself opened it, with his usual stern courtesy.\n\n\"I saw you coming up the street, sir. I have been expecting this honor\nfrom you for some time past. I dreamt of you only last night, and many\na night before that too. Welcome, sir, into a lonely house. I trust the\ngood knight your general is well.\"\n\n\"The good knight my general is with God who made him, Mr. Salterne.\"\n\n\"Dead, sir?\"\n\n\"Foundered at sea on our way home; and the Delight lost too.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" growled Salterne, after a minute's silence. \"I had a venture in\nher. I suppose it's gone. No matter--I can afford it, sir, and more,\nI trust. And he was three years younger than I! And Draper Heard was\nburied yesterday, five years younger.--How is it that every one can die,\nexcept me? Come in, sir, come in; I have forgotten my manners.\"\n\nAnd he led Amyas into his parlor, and called to the apprentices to run\none way, and to the cook to run another.\n\n\"You must not trouble yourself to get me supper, indeed.\"\n\n\"I must though, sir, and the best of wine too; and old Salterne had a\ngood tap of Alicant in old time, old time, old time, sir! and you must\ndrink it now, whether he does or not!\" and out he bustled.\n\nAmyas sat still, wondering what was coming next, and puzzled at the\nsudden hilarity of the man, as well as his hospitality, so different\nfrom what the innkeeper had led him to expect.\n\nIn a minute more one of the apprentices came in to lay the cloth, and\nAmyas questioned him about his master.\n\n\"Thank the Lord that you are come, sir,\" said the lad.\n\n\"Why, then?\"\n\n\"Because there'll be a chance of us poor fellows getting a little broken\nmeat. We'm half-starved this three months--bread and dripping, bread and\ndripping, oh dear, sir! And now he's sent out to the inn for chickens,\nand game, and salads, and all that money can buy, and down in the cellar\nhaling out the best of wine.\"--And the lad smacked his lips audibly at\nthe thought.\n\n\"Is he out of his mind?\"\n\n\"I can't tell; he saith as how he must save mun's money now-a-days; for\nhe've a got a great venture on hand: but what a be he tell'th no man.\nThey call'th mun 'bread and dripping' now, sir, all town over,\" said the\nprentice, confidentially, to Amyas.\n\n\"They do, do they, sirrah! Then they will call me bread and no dripping\nto-morrow!\" and old Salterne, entering from behind, made a dash at the\npoor fellow's ears: but luckily thought better of it, having a couple of\nbottles in each hand.\n\n\"My dear sir,\" said Amyas, \"you don't mean us to drink all that wine?\"\n\n\"Why not, sir?\" answered Salterne, in a grim, half-sneering tone,\nthrusting out his square-grizzled beard and chin. \"Why not, sir? why\nshould I not make merry when I have the honor of a noble captain in my\nhouse? one who has sailed the seas, sir, and cut Spaniards' throats; and\nmay cut them again too; eh, sir? Boy, where's the kettle and the sugar?\"\n\n\"What on earth is the man at?\" quoth Amyas to himself--\"flattering me,\nor laughing at me?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he ran on, half to himself, in a deliberate tone, evidently\nintending to hint more than he said, as he began brewing the sack--in\nplain English, hot negus; \"Yes, bread and dripping for those who can't\nfight Spaniards; but the best that money can buy for those who can. I\nheard of you at Smerwick, sir--Yes, bread and dripping for me too--I\ncan't fight Spaniards: but for such as you. Look here, sir; I should\nlike to feed a crew of such up, as you'd feed a main of fighting-cocks,\nand then start them with a pair of Sheffield spurs a-piece--you've a\ngood one there to your side, sir: but don't you think a man might carry\ntwo now, and fight as they say those Chineses do, a sword to each hand?\nYou could kill more that way, Captain Leigh, I reckon?\"\n\nAmyas half laughed.\n\n\"One will do, Mr. Salterne, if one is quick enough with it.\"\n\n\"Humph!--Ah--No use being in a hurry. I haven't been in a hurry. No--I\nwaited for you; and here you are and welcome, sir! Here comes supper, a\nlight matter, sir, you see. A capon and a brace of partridges. I had no\ntime to feast you as you deserve.\"\n\nAnd so he ran on all supper-time, hardly allowing Amyas to get a word\nin edge-ways; but heaping him with coarse flattery, and urging him to\ndrink, till after the cloth was drawn, and the two left alone, he grew\nso outrageous that Amyas was forced to take him to task good-humoredly.\n\n\"Now, my dear sir, you have feasted me royally, and better far than I\ndeserve, but why will you go about to make me drunk twice over, first\nwith vainglory and then with wine?\"\n\nSalterne looked at him a while fixedly, and then, sticking out his\nchin--\"Because, Captain Leigh, I am a man who has all his life tried the\ncrooked road first, and found the straight one the safer after all.\"\n\n\"Eh, sir? That is a strange speech for one who bears the character of\nthe most upright man in Bideford.\"\n\n\"Humph. So I thought myself once, sir; and well I have proved it. But\nI'll be plain with you, sir. You've heard how--how I've fared since you\nsaw me last?\"\n\nAmyas nodded his head.\n\n\"I thought so. Shame rides post. Now then, Captain Leigh, listen to me.\nI, being a plain man and a burgher, and one that never drew iron in my\nlife except to mend a pen, ask you, being a gentleman and a captain\nand a man of honor, with a weapon to your side, and harness to your\nback--what would you do in my place?\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Amyas, \"that would very much depend on whether 'my place'\nwas my own fault or not.\"\n\n\"And what if it were, sir? What if all that the charitable folks of\nBideford--(Heaven reward them for their tender mercies!)--have been\ntelling you in the last hour be true, sir,--true! and yet not half the\ntruth?\"\n\nAmyas gave a start.\n\n\"Ah, you shrink from me! Of course a man is too righteous to forgive\nthose who repent, though God is not.\"\n\n\"God knows, sir--\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, God does know--all; and you shall know a little--as much as I\ncan tell--or you understand. Come upstairs with me, sir, as you'll drink\nno more; I have a liking for you. I have watched you from your boyhood,\nand I can trust you, and I'll show you what I never showed to mortal man\nbut one.\"\n\nAnd, taking up a candle, he led the way upstairs, while Amyas followed\nwondering.\n\nHe stopped at a door, and unlocked it.\n\n\"There, come in. Those shutters have not been opened since she--\" and\nthe old man was silent.\n\nAmyas looked round the room. It was a low wainscoted room, such as one\nsees in old houses: everything was in the most perfect neatness.\nThe snow-white sheets on the bed were turned down as if ready for an\noccupant. There were books arranged on the shelves, fresh flowers on the\ntable; the dressing-table had all its woman's mundus of pins, and rings,\nand brushes; even the dressing-gown lay over the chair-back. Everything\nwas evidently just as it had been left.\n\n\"This was her room, sir,\" whispered the old man.\n\nAmyas nodded silently, and half drew back.\n\n\"You need not be modest about entering it now, sir,\" whispered he, with\na sort of sneer. \"There has been no frail flesh and blood in it for many\na day.\"\n\nAmyas sighed.\n\n\"I sweep it out myself every morning, and keep all tidy. See here!\"\nand he pulled open a drawer. \"Here are all her gowns, and there are her\nhoods; and there--I know 'em all by heart now, and the place of every\none. And there, sir--\"\n\nAnd he opened a cupboard, where lay in rows all Rose's dolls, and the\nworn-out playthings of her childhood.\n\n\"That's the pleasantest place of all in the room to me,\" said he,\nwhispering still, \"for it minds me of when--and maybe, she may become a\nlittle child once more, sir; it's written in the Scripture, you know--\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said Amyas, who felt, to his own wonder, a big tear stealing\ndown each cheek.\n\n\"And now,\" he whispered, \"one thing more. Look here!\"--and pulling out a\nkey, he unlocked a chest, and lifted up tray after tray of necklaces\nand jewels, furs, lawns, cloth of gold. \"Look there! Two thousand pound\nwon't buy that chest. Twenty years have I been getting those things\ntogether. That's the cream of many a Levant voyage, and East Indian\nvoyage, and West Indian voyage. My Lady Bath can't match those pearls in\nher grand house at Tawstock; I got 'em from a Genoese, though, and paid\nfor 'em. Look at that embroidered lawn! There's not such a piece in\nLondon; no, nor in Alexandria, I'll warrant; nor short of Calicut, where\nit came from. . . . Look here again, there's a golden cup! I bought that\nof one that was out with Pizarro in Peru. And look here, again!\"--and\nthe old man gloated over the treasure.\n\n\"And whom do you think I kept all these for? These were for her\nwedding-day--for her wedding-day. For your wedding-day, if you'd been\nminded, sir! Yes, yours, sir! And yet, I believe, I was so ambitious\nthat I would not have let her marry under an earl, all the while I was\npretending to be too proud to throw her at the head of a squire's son.\nAh, well! There was my idol, sir. I made her mad, I pampered her up with\ngewgaws and vanity; and then, because my idol was just what I had made\nher, I turned again and rent her.\n\n\"And now,\" said he, pointing to the open chest, \"that was what I meant;\nand that\" (pointing to the empty bed) \"was what God meant. Never mind.\nCome downstairs and finish your wine. I see you don't care about it all.\nWhy should you! you are not her father, and you may thank God you are\nnot. Go, and be merry while you can, young sir! . . . And yet, all this\nmight have been yours. And--but I don't suppose you are one to be won\nby money--but all this may be yours still, and twenty thousand pounds to\nboot.\"\n\n\"I want no money, sir, but what I can earn with my own sword.\"\n\n\"Earn my money, then!\"\n\n\"What on earth do you want of me!\"\n\n\"To keep your oath,\" said Salterne, clutching his arm, and looking up\ninto his face with searching eyes.\n\n\"My oath! How did you know that I had one?\"\n\n\"Ah! you were well ashamed of it, I suppose, next day! A drunken frolic\nall about a poor merchant's daughter! But there is nothing hidden that\nshall not be revealed, nor done in the closet that is not proclaimed on\nthe house-tops.\"\n\n\"Ashamed of it, sir, I never was: but I have a right to ask how you came\nto know it?\"\n\n\"What if a poor fat squinny rogue, a low-born fellow even as I am,\nwhom you had baffled and made a laughing-stock, had come to me in my\nloneliness and sworn before God that if you honorable gentlemen would\nnot keep your words, he the clown would?\"\n\n\"John Brimblecombe?\"\n\n\"And what if I had brought him where I have brought you, and shown\nhim what I have shown you, and, instead of standing as stiff as any\nSpaniard, as you do, he had thrown himself on his knees by that bedside,\nand wept and prayed, sir, till he opened my hard heart for the first\nand last time, and I fell down on my sinful knees and wept and prayed by\nhim?\"\n\n\"I am not given to weeping, Mr. Salterne,\" said Amyas; \"and as for\npraying, I don't know yet what I have to pray for, on her account: my\nbusiness is to work. Show me what I can do; and when you have done that,\nit will be full time to upbraid me with not doing it.\"\n\n\"You can cut that fellow's throat.\"\n\n\"It will take a long arm to reach him.\"\n\n\"I suppose it is as easy to sail to the Spanish Main as it was to sail\nround the world.\"\n\n\"My good sir,\" said Amyas, \"I have at this moment no more worldly goods\nthan my clothes and my sword, so how to sail to the Spanish Main, I\ndon't quite see.\"\n\n\"And do you suppose, sir, that I should hint to you of such a voyage if\nI meant you to be at the charge of it? No, sir; if you want two thousand\npounds, or five, to fit a ship, take it! Take it, sir! I hoarded money\nfor my child: and now I will spend it to avenge her.\"\n\nAmyas was silent for a while; the old man still held his arm, still\nlooked up steadfastly and fiercely in his face.\n\n\"Bring me home that man's head, and take ship, prizes--all! Keep the\ngain, sir, and give me the revenge!\"\n\n\"Gain? Do you think I need bribing, sir? What kept me silent was the\nthought of my mother. I dare not go without her leave.\"\n\nSalterne made a gesture of impatience.\n\n\"I dare not, sir; I must obey my parent, whatever else I do.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said he. \"If others had obeyed theirs as well!--But you are\nright, Captain Leigh, right. You will prosper, whoever else does not.\nNow, sir, good-night, if you will let me be the first to say so. My old\neyes grow heavy early now-a-days. Perhaps it's old age, perhaps it's\nsorrow.\"\n\nSo Amyas departed to the inn, and there, to his great joy, found Cary\nwaiting for him, from whom he learnt details, which must be kept for\nanother chapter, and which I shall tell, for convenience' sake, in my\nown words and not in his.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nHOW MR. JOHN BRIMBLECOMBE UNDERSTOOD THE NATURE OF AN OATH\n\n     \"The Kynge of Spayn is a foul paynim,\n     And lieveth on Mahound;\n     And pity it were that lady fayre\n     Should marry a heathen hound.\"\n\n                           Kyng Estmere.\n\nAbout six weeks after the duel, the miller at Stow had come up to\nthe great house in much tribulation, to borrow the bloodhounds. Rose\nSalterne had vanished in the night, no man knew whither.\n\nSir Richard was in Bideford: but the old steward took on himself to send\nfor the keepers, and down went the serving-men to the mill with all the\nidle lads of the parish at their heels, thinking a maiden-hunt very good\nsport; and of course taking a view of the case as favorable as possible\nto Rose.\n\nThey reviled the miller and his wife roundly for hard-hearted old\nheathens; and had no doubt that they had driven the poor maid to throw\nherself over cliff, or drown herself in the sea; while all the women of\nStow, on the other hand, were of unanimous opinion that the hussy had\n\"gone off\" with some bad fellow; and that pride was sure to have a fall,\nand so forth.\n\nThe facts of the case were, that all Rose's trinkets were left behind,\nso that she had at least gone off honestly; and nothing seemed to be\nmissing, but some of her linen, which old Anthony the steward broadly\nhinted was likely to be found in other people's boxes. The only trace\nwas a little footmark under her bedroom window. On that the bloodhound\nwas laid (of course in leash), and after a premonitory whimper, lifted\nup his mighty voice, and started bell-mouthed through the garden gate,\nand up the lane, towing behind him the panting keeper, till they reached\nthe downs above, and went straight away for Marslandmouth, where the\nwhole posse comitatus pulled up breathless at the door of Lucy Passmore.\n\nLucy, as perhaps I should have said before, was now a widow, and found\nher widowhood not altogether contrary to her interest. Her augury about\nher old man had been fulfilled; he had never returned since the night on\nwhich he put to sea with Eustace and the Jesuits.\n\n     *\"Some natural tears she shed, but dried them soon\"\n\nas many of them, at least, as were not required for purposes of\nbusiness; and then determined to prevent suspicion by a bold move; she\nstarted off to Stow, and told Lady Grenville a most pathetic tale: how\nher husband had gone out to pollock fishing, and never returned: but how\nshe had heard horsemen gallop past her window in the dead of night, and\nwas sure they must have been the Jesuits, and that they had carried off\nher old man by main force, and probably, after making use of his\nservices, had killed and salted him down for provision on their voyage\nback to the Pope at Rome; after which she ended by entreating protection\nagainst those \"Popish skulkers up to Chapel,\" who were sworn to do her a\nmischief; and by an appeal to Lady Grenville's sense of justice, as to\nwhether the queen ought not to allow her a pension, for having had her\nheart's love turned into a sainted martyr by the hands of idolatrous\ntraitors.\n\nLady Grenville (who had a great opinion of Lucy's medical skill, and\nalways sent for her if one of the children had a \"housty,\" i. e. sore\nthroat) went forth and pleaded the case before Sir Richard with such\neffect, that Lucy was on the whole better off than ever for the next two\nor three years.  But now--what had she to do with Rose's disappearance?\nand, indeed, where was she herself?  Her door was fast; and round it her\nflock of goats stood, crying in vain for her to come and milk them;\nwhile from the down above, her donkeys, wandering at their own sweet\nwill, answered the bay of the bloodhound with a burst of harmony.\n\n\"They'm laughing at us, keper, they neddies; sure enough, we'm lost our\nlabor here.\"\n\nBut the bloodhound, after working about the door a while, turned down\nthe glen, and never stopped till he reached the margin of the sea.\n\n\"They'm taken water.  Let's go back, and rout out the old witch's\nhouse.\"\n\n\"'Tis just like that old Lucy, to lock a poor maid into shame.\"\n\nAnd returning, they attacked the cottage, and by a general plebiscitum,\nransacked the little dwelling, partly in indignation, and partly, if the\ntruth be told, in the hope of plunder; but plunder there was none.  Lucy\nhad decamped with all her movable wealth, saving the huge black cat\namong the embers, who at the sight of the bloodhound vanished up the\nchimney (some said with a strong smell of brimstone), and being viewed\noutside, was chased into the woods, where she lived, I doubt not, many\nhappy years, a scourge to all the rabbits of the glen.\n\nThe goats and donkeys were driven off up to Stow; and the mob returned,\na little ashamed of themselves when their brief wrath was past; and a\nlittle afraid, too, of what Sir Richard might say.\n\nHe, when he returned, sold the donkeys and goats, and gave the money to\nthe poor, promising to refund the same, if Lucy returned and gave\nherself up to justice.  But Lucy did not return; and her cottage, from\nwhich the neighbors shrank as from a haunted place, remained as she had\nleft it, and crumbled slowly down to four fern-covered walls, past which\nthe little stream went murmuring on from pool to pool--the only voice,\nfor many a year to come, which broke the silence of that lonely glen.\n\nA few days afterwards, Sir Richard, on his way from Bideford to Stow,\nlooked in at Clovelly Court, and mentioned, with a \"by the by,\" news\nwhich made Will Cary leap from his seat almost to the ceiling.  What it\nwas we know already.\n\n\"And there is no clue?\" asked old Cary; for his son was speechless.\n\n\"Only this; I hear that some fellow prowling about the cliffs that night\nsaw a pinnace running for Lundy.\"\n\nWill rose, and went hastily out of the room.\n\nIn half an hour he and three or four armed servants were on board a\ntrawling-skiff, and away to Lundy.  He did not return for three days,\nand then brought news: that an elderly man, seemingly a foreigner, had\nbeen lodging for some months past in a part of the ruined Moresco\nCastle, which was tenanted by one John Braund; that a few weeks since a\nyounger man, a foreigner also, had joined him from on board a ship: the\nship a Flushinger, or Easterling of some sort.  The ship came and went\nmore than once; and the young man in her.  A few days since, a lady and\nher maid, a stout woman, came with him up to the castle, and talked with\nthe elder man a long while in secret; abode there all night; and then\nall three sailed in the morning.  The fishermen on the beach had heard\nthe young man call the other father.  He was a very still man, much as a\nmass-priest might be.  More they did not know, or did not choose to\nknow.\n\nWhereon old Cary and Sir Richard sent Will on a second trip with the\nparish constable of Hartland (in which huge parish, for its sins, is\nsituate the Isle of Lundy, ten miles out at sea); who returned with the\nbody of the hapless John Braund, farmer, fisherman, smuggler, etc.;\nwhich worthy, after much fruitless examination (wherein examinate was\nafflicted with extreme deafness and loss of memory), departed to Exeter\ngaol, on a charge of \"harboring priests, Jesuits, gipsies, and other\nsuspect and traitorous persons.\"\n\nPoor John Braund, whose motive for entertaining the said ugly customers\nhad probably been not treason, but a wife, seven children, and arrears\nof rent, did not thrive under the change from the pure air of Lundy to\nthe pestiferous one of Exeter gaol, made infamous, but two years after\n(if I recollect right), by a \"black assizes,\" nearly as fatal as that\nmore notorious one at Oxford; for in it, \"whether by the stench of the\nprisoners, or by a stream of foul air,\" judge, jury, counsel, and\nbystanders, numbering among them many members of the best families in\nDevon, sickened in court, and died miserably within a few days.\n\nJohn Braund, then, took the gaol-fever in a week, and died raving in\nthat noisome den: his secret, if he had one, perished with him, and\nnothing but vague suspicion was left as to Rose Salterne's fate.  That\nshe had gone off with the Spaniard, few doubted; but whither, and in\nwhat character?  On that last subject, be sure, no mercy was shown to\nher by many a Bideford dame, who had hated the poor girl simply for her\nbeauty; and by many a country lady, who had \"always expected that the\ngirl would be brought to ruin by the absurd notice, beyond what her\nstation had a right to, which was taken of her,\" while every young\nmaiden aspired to fill the throne which Rose had abdicated.  So that, on\nthe whole, Bideford considered itself as going on as well without poor\nRose as it had done with her, or even better.  And though she lingered\nin some hearts still as a fair dream, the business and the bustle of\neach day soon swept that dream away, and her place knew her no more.\n\nAnd Will Cary?\n\nHe was for a while like a man distracted.  He heaped himself with all\nmanner of superfluous reproaches, for having (as he said) first brought\nthe Rose into disgrace, and then driven her into the arms of the\nSpaniard; while St. Leger, who was a sensible man enough, tried in vain\nto persuade him that the fault was not his at all; that the two must\nhave been attached to each other long before the quarrel; that it must\nhave ended so, sooner or later; that old Salterne's harshness, rather\nthan Cary's wrath, had hastened the catastrophe; and finally, that the\nRose and her fortunes were, now that she had eloped with a Spaniard, not\nworth troubling their heads about.  Poor Will would not be so comforted.\nHe wrote off to Frank at Whitehall, telling him the whole truth, calling\nhimself all fools and villains, and entreating Frank's forgiveness; to\nwhich he received an answer, in which Frank said that Will had no reason\nto accuse himself; that these strange attachments were due to a\nsynastria, or sympathy of the stars, which ruled the destinies of each\nperson, to fight against which was to fight against the heavens\nthemselves; that he, as a brother of the Rose, was bound to believe,\nnay, to assert at the sword's point if need were, that the incomparable\nRose of Torridge could make none but a worthy and virtuous choice; and\nthat to the man whom she had honored by her affection was due on their\npart, Spaniard and Papist though he might be, all friendship, worship,\nand loyal faith for evermore.\n\nAnd honest Will took it all for gospel, little dreaming what agony of\ndespair, what fearful suspicions, what bitter prayers, this letter had\ncost to the gentle heart of Francis Leigh.\n\nHe showed the letter triumphantly to St. Leger; and he was quite wise\nenough to gainsay no word of it, at least aloud; but quite wise enough,\nalso, to believe in secret that Frank looked on the matter in quite a\ndifferent light; however, he contented himself with saying:\n\n\"The man is an angel as his mother is!\" and there the matter dropped for\na few days, till one came forward who had no mind to let it drop, and\nthat was Jack Brimblecombe, now curate of Hartland town, and \"passing\nrich on forty pounds a year.\n\n\"I hope no offence, Mr. William; but when are you and the rest going\nafter--after her?\"  The name stuck in his throat.\n\nCary was taken aback.\n\n\"What's that to thee, Catiline the blood-drinker?\" asked he, trying to\nlaugh it off.\n\n\"What?  Don't laugh at me, sir, for it's no laughing matter.  I drank\nthat night naught worse, I expect, than red wine.  Whatever it was, we\nswore our oaths, Mr. Cary; and oaths are oaths, say I.\"\n\n\"Of course, Jack, of course; but to go to look for her--and when we've\nfound her, cut her lover's throat.  Absurd, Jack, even if she were worth\nlooking for, or his throat worth cutting.  Tut, tut, tut--\"\n\nBut Jack looked steadfastly in his face, and after some silence:\n\nHow far is it to the Caracas, then, sir?\"\n\n\"What is that to thee, man?\"\n\n\"Why, he was made governor thereof, I hear; so that would be the place\nto find her?\"\n\n\"You don't mean to go thither to seek her?\" shouted Cary, forcing a\nlaugh.\n\n\"That depends on whether I can go, sir; but if I can scrape the money\ntogether, or get a berth on board some ship, why, God's will must be\ndone.\"\n\nWill looked at him, to see if he had been drinking, or gone mad; but the\nlittle pigs' eyes were both sane and sober.\n\nWill knew no answer.  To laugh at the poor fellow was easy enough; to\ndeny that he was right, that he was a hero and cavalier, outdoing\nromance itself in faithfulness, not so easy; and Cary, in the first\nimpulse, wished him at the bottom of the bay for shaming him.  Of\ncourse, his own plan of letting ill alone was the rational, prudent,\nirreproachable plan, and just what any gentleman in his senses would\nhave done; but here was a vulgar, fat curate, out of his senses,\ndetermined not to let ill alone, but to do something, as Cary felt in\nhis heart, of a far diviner stamp.\n\n\"Well,\" said Jack, in his stupid steadfast way, \"it's a very bad\nlook-out; but mother's pretty well off, if father dies, and the maidens\nare stout wenches enough, and will make tidy servants, please the Lord.\nAnd you'll see that they come to no harm, Mr. William, for old\nacquaintance' sake, if I never come back.\"\n\nCary was silent with amazement.\n\n\"And, Mr. William, you know me for an honest man, I hope.  Will you lend\nme a five pound, and take my books in pawn for them, just to help me\nout?\"\n\n\"Are you mad, or in a dream?  You will never find her!\"\n\n\"That's no reason why I shouldn't do my duty in looking for her, Mr.\nWilliam.\"\n\n\"But, my good fellow, even if you get to the Indies, you will be clapt\ninto the Inquisition, and burnt alive, as sure as your name is Jack.\"\n\n\"I know that,\" said he, in a doleful tone; \"and a sore struggle of the\nflesh I have had about it; for I am a great coward, Mr. William, a dirty\ncoward, and always was, as you know: but maybe the Lord will take care\nof me, as He does of little children and drunken men; and if not, Mr.\nWill, I'd sooner burn, and have it over, than go on this way any longer,\nI would!\" and Jack burst out blubbering.\n\n\"What way, my dear old lad?\" said Will, softened as he well might be.\n\n\"Why, not--not to know whether--whether--whether she's married to him or\nnot--her that I looked up to as an angel of God, as pure as the light of\nday; and knew she was too good for a poor pot-head like me; and prayed\nfor her every night, God knows, that she might marry a king, if there\nwas one fit for her--and I not to know whether she's living in sin or\nnot, Mr. William.--It's more than I can bear, and there's an end of it.\nAnd if she is married to him they keep no faith with heretics; they can\ndissolve the marriage, or make away with her into the Inquisition; burn\nher, Mr. Cary, as soon as burn me, the devils incarnate!\"\n\nCary shuddered; the fact, true and palpable as it was, had never struck\nhim before.\n\n\"Yes! or make her deny her God by torments, if she hasn't done it\nalready for love to that--I know how love will make a body sell his\nsoul, for I've been in love.  Don't you laugh at me, Mr. Will, or I\nshall go mad!\"\n\n\"God knows, I was never less inclined to laugh at you in my life, my\nbrave old Jack.\"\n\n\"Is it so, then?  Bless you for that word!\" and Jack held out his hand.\n\"But what will become of my soul, after my oath, if I don't seek her\nout, just to speak to her, to warn her, for God's sake, even if it did\nno good; just to set before her the Lord's curse on idolatry and\nAntichrist, and those who deny Him for the sake of any creature, though\nI can't think he would be hard on her,--for who could?  But I must speak\nall the same.  The Lord has laid the burden on me, and done it must be.\nGod help me!\"\n\n\"Jack,\" said Cary, \"if this is your duty, it is others'.\"\n\n\"No, sir, I don't say that; you're a layman, but I am a deacon, and the\nchaplain of you all, and sworn to seek out Christ's sheep scattered up\nand down this naughty world, and that innocent lamb first of all.\"\n\n\"You have sheep at Hartland, Jack, already.\"\n\n\"There's plenty better than I will tend them, when I am gone; but none\nthat will tend her, because none love her like me, and they won't\nventure.  Who will?  It can't be expected, and no shame to them?\"\n\n\"I wonder what Amyas Leigh would say to all this, if he were at home?\"\n\n\"Say?  He'd do.  He isn't one for talking.  He'd go through fire and\nwater for her, you trust him, Will Cary; and call me an ass if he\nwon't.\"\n\n\"Will you wait, then, till he comes back, and ask him?\"\n\n\"He may not be back for a year and more.\"\n\n\"Hear reason, Jack.  If you will wait like a rational and patient man,\ninstead of rushing blindfold on your ruin, something may be done.\"\n\n\"You think so!\"\n\n\"I cannot promise; but--\"\n\n\"But promise me one thing.  Do you tell Mr. Frank what I say--or rather,\nI'll warrant, if I knew the truth, he has said the very same thing\nhimself already.\"\n\n\"You are out there, old man; for here is his own handwriting.\"\n\nJack read the letter and sighed bitterly.  \"Well, I did take him for\nanother guess sort of fine gentleman.  Still, if my duty isn't his, it's\nmine all the same.  I judge no man; but I go, Mr. Cary.\"\n\n\"But go you shall not till Amyas returns.  As I live, I will tell your\nfather, Jack, unless you promise; and you dare not disobey him.\"\n\n\"I don't know even that, for conscience' sake,\" said Jack, doubtfully.\n\n\"At least, you stay and dine here, old fellow, and we will settle\nwhether you are to break the fifth commandment or not, over good brewed\nsack.\"\n\nNow a good dinner was (as we know) what Jack loved, and loved too oft in\nvain; so he submitted for the nonce, and Cary thought, ere he went, that\nhe had talked him pretty well round.  At least he went home, and was\nseen no more for a week.\n\nBut at the end of that time he returned, and said with a joyful voice--\n\n\"I have settled all, Mr. Will.  The parson of Welcombe will serve my\nchurch for two Sundays, and I am away for London town, to speak to Mr.\nFrank.\"\n\n\"To London?  How wilt get there?\"\n\n\"On Shanks his mare,\" said Jack, pointing to his bandy legs.  \"But I\nexpect I can get a lift on board of a coaster so far as Bristol, and\nit's no way on to signify, I hear.\"\n\nCary tried in vain to dissuade him; and then forced on him a small loan,\nwith which away went Jack, and Cary heard no more of him for three\nweeks.\n\nAt last he walked into Clovelly Court again just before supper-time,\nthin and leg-weary, and sat himself down among the serving-men till Will\nappeared.\n\nWill took him up above the salt, and made much of him (which indeed the\nhonest fellow much needed), and after supper asked him in private how he\nhad sped.\n\n\"I have learnt a lesson, Mr. William.  I've learnt that there is one on\nearth loves her better than I, if she had but had the wit to have taken\nhim.\"\n\n\"But what says he of going to seek her?\"\n\n\"He says what I say, Go! and he says what you say, Wait.\"\n\n\"Go?  Impossible!  How can that agree with his letter?\"\n\n\"That's no concern of mine.  Of course, being nearer heaven than I am,\nhe sees clearer what he should say and do than I can see for him.  Oh,\nMr. Will, that's not a man, he's an angel of God; but he's dying, Mr.\nWill.\"\n\n\"Dying?\"\n\n\"Yes, faith, of love for her.  I can see it in his eyes, and hear it in\nhis voice; but I am of tougher hide and stiffer clay, and so you see I\ncan't die even if I tried.  But I'll obey my betters, and wait.\"\n\nAnd so Jack went home to his parish that very evening, weary as he was,\nin spite of all entreaties to pass the night at Clovelly.  But he had\nleft behind him thoughts in Cary's mind, which gave their owner no rest\nby day or night, till the touch of a seeming accident made them all\nstart suddenly into shape, as a touch of the freezing water covers it in\nan instant with crystals of ice.\n\nHe was lounging (so he told Amyas) one murky day on Bideford quay, when\nup came Mr. Salterne.  Cary had shunned him of late, partly from\ndelicacy, partly from dislike of his supposed hard-heartedness.  But\nthis time they happened to meet full; and Cary could not pass without\nspeaking to him.\n\n\"Well, Mr. Salterne, and how goes on the shipping trade?\"\n\n\"Well enough, sir, if some of you young gentlemen would but follow Mr.\nLeigh's example, and go forth to find us stay-at-homes new markets for\nour ware.\"\n\n\"What? you want to be rid of us, eh?\"\n\n\"I don't know why I should, sir.  We sha'n't cross each other now, sir,\nwhatever might have been once.  But if I were you, I should be in the\nIndies about now, if I were not fighting the queen's battles nearer\nhome.\"\n\n\"In the Indies?  I should make but a poor hand of Drake's trade.\" And so\nthe conversation dropped; but Cary did not forget the hint.\n\n\"So, lad, to make an end of a long story,\" said he to Amyas; \"if you are\nminded to take the old man's offer, so am I: and Westward-ho with you,\ncome foul come fair.\"\n\n\"It will be but a wild-goose chase, Will.\"\n\n\"If she is with him, we shall find her at La Guayra.  If she is not, and\nthe villain has cast her off down the wind, that will be only an\nadditional reason for making an example of him.\"\n\n\"And if neither of them are there, Will, the Plate-fleets will be; so it\nwill be our own shame if we come home empty-handed.  But will your\nfather let you run such a risk?\"\n\n\"My father!\" said Cary, laughing.  \"He has just now so good hope of a\nlong string of little Carys to fill my place, that he will be in no lack\nof an heir, come what will.\"\n\n\"Little Carys?\"\n\n\"I tell you truth.  I think he must have had a sly sup of that fountain\nof perpetual youth, which our friend Don Guzman's grandfather went to\nseek in Florida; for some twelvemonth since, he must needs marry a\ntenant's buxom daughter; and Mistress Abishag Jewell has brought him one\nfat baby already.  So I shall go, back to Ireland, or with you: but\nsomewhere.  I can't abide the thing's squalling, any more than I can\nseeing Mistress Abishag sitting in my poor dear mother's place, and\ninforming me every other day that she is come of an illustrious house,\nbecause she is (or is not) third cousin seven times removed to my\nfather's old friend, Bishop Jewell of glorious memory.  I had\nthree-parts of a quarrel with the dear old man the other day; for after\none of her peacock-bouts, I couldn't for the life of me help saying,\nthat as the Bishop had written an Apology for the people of England, my\nfather had better conjure up his ghost to write an apology for him, and\nhead it, 'Why green heads should grow on gray shoulders.'\"\n\n\"You impudent villain!  And what did he say?\"\n\nLaughed till he cried again, and told me if I did not like it I might\nleave it; which is just what I intend to do.  Only mind, if we go, we\nmust needs take Jack Brimblecombe with us, or he will surely heave\nhimself over Harty Point, and his ghost will haunt us to our dying day.\"\n\n\"Jack shall go.  None deserves it better.\"\n\nAfter which there was a long consultation on practical matters, and it\nwas concluded that Amyas should go up to London and sound Frank and his\nmother before any further steps were taken.  The other brethren of the\nRose were scattered far and wide, each at his post, and St. Leger had\nreturned to his uncle, so that it would be unfair to them, as well as a\nconsiderable delay, to demand of them any fulfilment of their vow.\nAnd, as Amyas sagely remarked, \"Too many cooks spoil the broth, and\nhalf-a-dozen gentlemen aboard one ship are as bad as two kings of\nBrentford.\"\n\nWith which maxim he departed next morning for London, leaving Yeo with\nCary.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nTHE MOST CHIVALROUS ADVENTURE OF THE GOOD SHIP ROSE\n\n     \"He is brass within, and steel without,\n     With beams on his topcastle strong;\n     And eighteen pieces of ordinance\n     He carries on either side along.\"\n\n                         Sir Andrew Barton.\n\nLet us take boat, as Amyas did, at Whitehall-stairs, and slip down ahead\nof him under old London Bridge, and so to Deptford Creek, where remains,\nas it were embalmed, the famous ship Pelican, in which Drake had sailed\nround the world. There she stands, drawn up high and dry upon the sedgy\nbank of Thames, like an old warrior resting after his toil. Nailed upon\nher mainmast are epigrams and verses in honor of her and of her captain,\nthree of which, by the Winchester scholar, Camden gives in his History;\nand Elizabeth's self consecrated her solemnly, and having banqueted on\nboard, there and then honored Drake with the dignity of knighthood. \"At\nwhich time a bridge of planks, by which they came on board, broke under\nthe press of people, and fell down with a hundred men upon it, who,\nnotwithstanding, had none of them any harm. So as that ship may seem to\nhave been built under a lucky planet.\"\n\nThere she has remained since as a show, and moreover as a sort of\ndining-hall for jovial parties from the city; one of which would seem\nto be on board this afternoon, to judge from the flags which bedizen the\nmasts, the sounds of revelry and savory steams which issue from those\nwindows which once were portholes, and the rushing to and fro along the\nriver brink, and across that lucky bridge, of white-aproned waiters from\nthe neighboring Pelican Inn. A great feast is evidently toward, for\nwith those white-aproned waiters are gay serving men, wearing on their\nshoulders the city-badge. The lord mayor is giving a dinner to certain\ngentlemen of the Leicester house party, who are interested in foreign\ndiscoveries; and what place so fit for such a feast as the Pelican\nitself?\n\nLook at the men all round; a nobler company you will seldom see.\nEspecially too, if you be Americans, look at their faces, and reverence\nthem; for to them and to their wisdom you owe the existence of your\nmighty fatherland.\n\nAt the head of the table sits the lord mayor; whom all readers will\nrecognize at once, for he is none other than that famous Sir Edward\nOsborne, clothworker, and ancestor of the dukes of Leeds, whose romance\nnow-a-days is in every one's hands. He is aged, but not changed, since\nhe leaped from the window upon London Bridge into the roaring tide\nbelow, to rescue the infant who is now his wife. The chivalry and\npromptitude of the 'prentice boy have grown and hardened into the\nthoughtful daring of the wealthy merchant adventurer. There he sits, a\nright kingly man, with my lord Earl of Cumberland on his right hand, and\nWalter Raleigh on his left; the three talk together in a low voice on\nthe chance of there being vast and rich countries still undiscovered\nbetween Florida and the River of Canada. Raleigh's half-scientific\ndeclamation and his often quotations of Doctor Dee the conjuror, have\nless effect on Osborne than on Cumberland (who tried many an adventure\nto foreign parts, and failed in all of them; apparently for the simple\nreason that, instead of going himself, he sent other people), and\nRaleigh is fain to call to his help the quiet student who sits on his\nleft hand, Richard Hakluyt, of Oxford. But he is deep in talk with a\nreverend elder, whose long white beard flows almost to his waist, and\nwhose face is furrowed by a thousand storms; Anthony Jenkinson by name,\nthe great Asiatic traveller, who is discoursing to the Christ-church\nvirtuoso of reindeer sledges and Siberian steppes, and of the fossil\nivory, plain proof of Noah's flood, which the Tungoos dig from the\nice-cliffs of the Arctic sea. Next to him is Christopher Carlile,\nWalsingham's son-in-law (as Sidney also is now), a valiant captain,\nafterwards general of the soldiery in Drake's triumphant West Indian\nraid of 1585, with whom a certain Bishop of Carthagena will hereafter\ndrink good wine. He is now busy talking with Alderman Hart the\ngrocer, Sheriff Spencer the clothworker, and Charles Leigh (Amyas's\nmerchant-cousin), and with Aldworth the mayor of Bristol, and William\nSalterne, alderman thereof, and cousin of our friend at Bideford. For\nCarlile, and Secretary Walsingham also, have been helping them heart\nand soul for the last two years to collect money for Humphrey and Adrian\nGilbert's great adventures to the North-West, on one of which Carlile\nwas indeed to have sailed himself, but did not go after all; I never\ncould discover for what reason.\n\nOn the opposite side of the table is a group, scarcely less interesting.\nMartin Frobisher and John Davis, the pioneers of the North-West passage,\nare talking with Alderman Sanderson, the great geographer and \"setter\nforth of globes;\" with Mr. Towerson, Sir Gilbert Peckham, our old\nacquaintance Captain John Winter, and last, but not least, with Philip\nSidney himself, who, with his accustomed courtesy; has given up his\nrightful place toward the head of the table that he may have a knot of\nvirtuosi all to himself; and has brought with him, of course, his two\nespecial intimates, Mr. Edward Dyer and Mr. Francis Leigh. They too are\ntalking of the North-West passage: and Sidney is lamenting that he is\ntied to diplomacy and courts, and expressing his envy of old Martin\nFrobisher in all sorts of pretty compliments; to which the other replies\nthat,\n\n\"It's all very fine to talk of here, a sailing on dry land with a\ngood glass of wine before you; but you'd find it another guess sort of\nbusiness, knocking about among the icebergs with your beard frozen fast\nto your ruff, Sir Philip, specially if you were a bit squeamish about\nthe stomach.\"\n\n\"That were a slight matter to endure, my dear sir, if by it I could win\nthe honor which her majesty bestowed on you, when her own ivory hand\nwaved a farewell 'kerchief to your ship from the windows of Greenwich\nPalace.\"\n\n\"Well, sir, folks say you have no reason to complain of lack of favors,\nas you have no reason to deserve lack; and if you can get them by\nstaying ashore, don't you go to sea to look for more, say I. Eh, Master\nTowerson?\"\n\nTowerson's gray beard, which has stood many a foreign voyage, both fair\nand foul, wags grim assent. But at this moment a Waiter enters, and--\n\n\"Please my lord mayor's worship, there is a tall gentleman outside,\nwould speak with the Right Honorable Sir Walter Raleigh.\"\n\n\"Show him in, man. Sir Walter's friends are ours.\"\n\nAmyas enters, and stands hesitating in the doorway.\n\n\"Captain Leigh!\" cry half a-dozen voices.\n\n\"Why did you not walk in, sir?\" says Osborne. \"You should know your way\nwell enough between these decks.\"\n\n\"Well enough, my lords and gentlemen. But, Sir Walter--you will excuse\nme\"--and he gave Raleigh a look which was enough for his quick wit.\nTurning pale as death, he rose, and followed Amyas into an adjoining\ncabin. They were five minutes together; and then Amyas came out alone.\n\nIn few words he told the company the sad story which we already know.\nEre it was ended, noble tears were glistening on some of those stern\nfaces.\n\n\"The old Egyptians,\" said Sir Edward Osborne, \"when they banqueted, set\na corpse among their guests, for a memorial of human vanity. Have we\nforgotten God and our own weakness in this our feast, that He Himself\nhas sent us thus a message from the dead?\"\n\n\"Nay, my lord mayor,\" said Sidney, \"not from the dead, but from the\nrealm of everlasting life.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" answered Osborne. \"But, gentlemen, our feast is at an end. There\nare those here who would drink on merrily, as brave men should, in spite\nof the private losses of which they have just had news; but none here\nwho can drink with the loss of so great a man still ringing in his\nears.\"\n\nIt was true. Though many of the guests had suffered severely by the\nfailure of the expedition, they had utterly forgotten that fact in the\nawful news of Sir Humphrey's death; and the feast broke up sadly and\nhurriedly, while each man asked his neighbor, \"What will the queen say?\"\n\nRaleigh re-entered in a few minutes, but was silent, and pressing many\nan honest hand as he passed, went out to call a wherry, beckoning Amyas\nto follow him. Sidney, Cumberland, and Frank went with them in another\nboat, leaving the two to talk over the sad details.\n\nThey disembarked at Whitehall-stairs; Raleigh, Sidney, and Cumberland\nwent to the palace; and the two brothers to their mother's lodgings.\n\nAmyas had prepared his speech to Frank about Rose Salterne, but now that\nit was come to the point, he had not courage to begin, and longed that\nFrank would open the matter. Frank, too, shrank from what he knew must\ncome, and all the more because he was ignorant that Amyas had been to\nBideford, or knew aught of the Rose's disappearance.\n\nSo they went upstairs; and it was a relief to both of them to find that\ntheir mother was at the Abbey; for it was for her sake that both dreaded\nwhat was coming. So they went and stood in the bay-window which looked\nout upon the river, and talked of things indifferent, and looked\nearnestly at each other's faces by the fading light, for it was now\nthree years since they had met.\n\nYears and events had deepened the contrast between the two brothers; and\nFrank smiled with affectionate pride as he looked up in Amyas's face,\nand saw that he was no longer merely the rollicking handy sailor-lad,\nbut the self-confident and stately warrior, showing in every look and\ngesture,\n\n     \"The reason firm, the temperate will,\n     Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill,\"\n\nworthy of one whose education had been begun by such men as Drake and\nGrenville, and finished by such as Raleigh and Gilbert. His long locks\nwere now cropped close to the head; but as a set-off, the lips and chin\nwere covered with rich golden beard; his face was browned by a thousand\nsuns and storms; a long scar, the trophy of some Irish fight, crossed\nhis right temple; his huge figure had gained breadth in proportion to\nits height; and his hand, as it lay upon the window-sill, was hard and\nmassive as a smith's. Frank laid his own upon it, and sighed; and Amyas\nlooked down, and started at the contrast between the two--so slender,\nbloodless, all but transparent, were the delicate fingers of the\ncourtier. Amyas looked anxiously into his brother's face. It was\nchanged, indeed, since they last met. The brilliant red was still on\neither cheek, but the white had become dull and opaque; the lips were\npale, the features sharpened; the eyes glittered with unnatural fire:\nand when Frank told Amyas that he looked aged, Amyas could not help\nthinking that the remark was far more true of the speaker himself.\n\nTrying to shut his eyes to the palpable truth, he went on with his chat,\nasking the names of one building after another.\n\n\"And so this is old Father Thames, with his bank of palaces?\"\n\n\"Yes. His banks are stately enough; yet, you see, he cannot stay to look\nat them. He hurries down to the sea; and the sea into the ocean; and the\nocean Westward-ho, forever. All things move Westward-ho. Perhaps we may\nmove that way ourselves some day, Amyas.\"\n\n\"What do you mean by that strange talk?\"\n\n\"Only that the ocean follows the primum mobile of the heavens, and flows\nforever from east to west. Is there anything so strange in my thinking\nof that, when I am just come from a party where we have been drinking\nsuccess to Westward-ho?\"\n\n\"And much good has come of it! I have lost the best friend and the\nnoblest captain upon earth, not to mention all my little earnings, in\nthat same confounded gulf of Westward-ho.\"\n\n\"Yes, Sir Humphrey Gilbert's star has set in the West--why not? Sun,\nmoon, and planets sink into the West: why not the meteors of this lower\nworld? why not a will-o'-the-wisp like me, Amyas?\"\n\n\"God forbid, Frank!\"\n\n\"Why, then? Is not the West the land of peace, and the land of dreams?\nDo not our hearts tell us so each time we look upon the setting sun, and\nlong to float away with him upon the golden-cushioned clouds? They bury\nmen with their faces to the East. I should rather have mine turned\nto the West, Amyas, when I die; for I cannot but think it some divine\ninstinct which made the ancient poets guess that Elysium lay beneath the\nsetting sun. It is bound up in the heart of man, that longing for the\nWest. I complain of no one for fleeing away thither beyond the utmost\nsea, as David wished to flee, and be at peace.\"\n\n\"Complain of no one for fleeing thither?\" asked Amyas. \"That is more\nthan I do.\"\n\nFrank looked inquiringly at him; and then--\n\n\"No. If I had complained of any one, it would have been of you just now,\nfor seeming to be tired of going Westward-ho.\"\n\n\"Do you wish me to go, then?\"\n\n\"God knows,\" said Frank, after a moment's pause. \"But I must tell you\nnow, I suppose, once and for all. That has happened at Bideford which--\"\n\n\"Spare us both, Frank; I know all. I came through Bideford on my way\nhither; and came hither not merely to see you and my mother, but to ask\nyour advice and her permission.\"\n\n\"True heart! noble heart!\" cried Frank. \"I knew you would be stanch!\"\n\n\"Westward-ho it is, then?\"\n\n\"Can we escape?\"\n\n\"We?\"\n\n\"Amyas, does not that which binds you bind me?\"\n\nAmyas started back, and held Frank by the shoulders at arm's length; as\nhe did so, he could feel through, that his brother's arms were but skin\nand bone.\n\n\"You? Dearest man, a month of it would kill you!\"\n\nFrank smiled, and tossed his head on one side in his pretty way.\n\n\"I belong to the school of Thales, who held that the ocean is the mother\nof all life; and feel no more repugnance at returning to her bosom again\nthan Humphrey Gilbert did.\"\n\n\"But, Frank,--my mother?\"\n\n\"My mother knows all; and would not have us unworthy of her.\"\n\n\"Impossible! She will never give you up!\"\n\n\"All things are possible to them that believe in God, my brother; and\nshe believes. But, indeed, Doctor Dee, the wise man, gave her but this\nsummer I know not what of prognostics and diagnostics concerning me. I\nam born, it seems, under a cold and watery planet, and need, if I am to\nbe long-lived, to go nearer to the vivifying heat of the sun, and there\nbask out my little life, like fly on wall. To tell truth, he has bidden\nme spend no more winters here in the East; but return to our native\nsea-breezes, there to warm my frozen lungs; and has so filled my\nmother's fancy with stories of sick men, who were given up for lost in\nGermany and France, and yet renewed their youth, like any serpent or\neagle, by going to Italy, Spain, and the Canaries, that she herself will\nbe more ready to let me go than I to leave her all alone. And yet I must\ngo, Amyas. It is not merely that my heart pants, as Sidney's does, as\nevery gallant's ought, to make one of your noble choir of Argonauts,\nwho are now replenishing the earth and subduing it for God and for the\nqueen; it is not merely, Amyas, that love calls me,--love tyrannous and\nuncontrollable, strengthened by absence, and deepened by despair; but\nhonor, Amyas--my oath--\"\n\nAnd he paused for lack of breath, and bursting into a violent fit of\ncoughing, leaned on his brother's shoulder, while Amyas cried,\n\n\"Fools, fools that we were--that I was, I mean--to take that fantastical\nvow!\"\n\n\"Not so,\" answered a gentle voice from behind: \"you vowed for the\nsake of peace on earth, and good-will toward men, and 'Blessed are the\npeacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.' No my sons,\nbe sure that such self-sacrifice as you have shown will meet its full\nreward at the hand of Him who sacrificed Himself for you.\"\n\n\"Oh, mother! mother!\" said Amyas, \"and do you not hate the very sight of\nme--come here to take away your first-born?\"\n\n\"My boy, God takes him, and not you. And if I dare believe in such\npredictions, Doctor Dee assured me that some exceeding honor awaited you\nboth in the West, to each of you according to your deserts.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Amyas. \"My blessing, I suppose, will be like Esau's, to live\nby my sword; while Jacob here, the spiritual man, inherits the kingdom\nof heaven, and an angel's crown.\"\n\n\"Be it what it may, it will surely be a blessing, as long as you are\nsuch, my children, as you have been. At least my Frank will be safe from\nthe intrigues of court, and the temptations of the world. Would that I\ntoo could go with you, and share in your glory! Come, now,\" said she,\nlaying her head upon Amyas's breast, and looking up into his face with\none of her most winning smiles, \"I have heard of heroic mothers ere\nnow who went forth with their sons to battle, and cheered them on to\nvictory. Why should I not go with you on a more peaceful errand? I could\nnurse the sick, if there were any; I could perhaps have speech of that\npoor girl, and win her back more easily than you. She might listen to\nwords from a woman--a woman, too, who has loved--which she could not\nhear from men. At least I could mend and wash for you. I suppose it is\nas easy to play the good housewife afloat as on shore? Come, now!\"\n\nAmyas looked from one to the other.\n\n\"God only knows which of the two is less fit to go. Mother! mother! you\nknow not what you ask. Frank! Frank! I do not want you with me. This\nis a sterner matter than either of you fancy it to be; one that must be\nworked out, not with kind words, but with sharp shot and cold steel.\"\n\n\"How?\" cried both together, aghast.\n\n\"I must pay my men, and pay my fellow-adventurers; and I must pay them\nwith Spanish gold. And what is more, I cannot, as a loyal subject of\nthe queen's, go to the Spanish Main with a clear conscience on my own\nprivate quarrel, unless I do all the harm that my hand finds to do, by\nday and night, to her enemies, and the enemies of God.\"\n\n\"What nobler knight-errantry?\" said Frank, cheerfully; but Mrs. Leigh\nshuddered.\n\n\"What! Frank too?\" she said, half to herself; but her sons knew what she\nmeant. Amyas's warlike life, honorable and righteous as she knew it\nto be, she had borne as a sad necessity: but that Frank as well should\nbecome \"a man of blood,\" was more than her gentle heart could face at\nfirst sight. That one youthful duel of his he had carefully concealed\nfrom her, knowing her feeling on such matters. And it seemed too\ndreadful to her to associate that gentle spirit with all the ferocities\nand the carnage of a battlefield. \"And yet,\" said she to herself, \"is\nthis but another of the self-willed idols which I must renounce one by\none?\" And then, catching at a last hope, she answered--\n\n\"Frank must at least ask the queen's leave to go; and if she permits,\nhow can I gainsay her wisdom?\"\n\nAnd so the conversation dropped, sadly enough.\n\nBut now began a fresh perplexity in Frank's soul, which amused Amyas at\nfirst, when it seemed merely jest, but nettled him a good deal when\nhe found it earnest. For Frank looked forward to asking the queen's\npermission for his voyage with the most abject despondency and terror.\nTwo or three days passed before he could make up his mind to ask for\nan interview with her; and he spent the time in making as much interest\nwith Leicester, Hatton, and Sidney, as if he were about to sue for a\nreprieve from the scaffold.\n\nSo said Amyas, remarking, further, that the queen could not cut his head\noff for wanting to go to sea.\n\n\"But what axe so sharp as her frown?\" said Frank in most lugubrious\ntone.\n\nAmyas began to whistle in a very rude way.\n\n\"Ah, my brother, you cannot comprehend the pain of parting from her.\"\n\n\"No, I can't. I would die for the least hair of her royal head, God\nbless it! but I could live very well from now till Doomsday without ever\nsetting eyes on the said head.\"\n\n\"Plato's Troglodytes regretted not that sunlight which they had never\nbeheld.\"\n\nAmyas, not understanding this recondite conceit, made no answer to it,\nand there the matter ended for the time. But at last Frank obtained his\naudience; and after a couple of hours' absence returned quite pale and\nexhausted.\n\n\"Thank Heaven, it is over! She was very angry at first--what else could\nshe be?--and upbraided me with having set my love so low. I could only\nanswer, that my fatal fault was committed before the sight of her had\ntaught me what was supremely lovely, and only worthy of admiration. Then\nshe accused me of disloyalty in having taken an oath which bound me to\nthe service of another than her. I confessed my sin with tears, and when\nshe threatened punishment, pleaded that the offence had avenged itself\nheavily already,--for what worse punishment than exile from the sunlight\nof her presence, into the outer darkness which reigns where she is not?\nThen she was pleased to ask me, how I could dare, as her sworn servant,\nto desert her side in such dangerous times as these; and asked me how I\nshould reconcile it to my conscience, if on my return I found her dead\nby the assassin's knife? At which most pathetic demand I could only\nthrow myself at once on my own knees and her mercy, and so awaited\nmy sentence. Whereon, with that angelic pity which alone makes her\nawfulness endurable, she turned to Hatton and asked, 'What say you,\nMouton? Is he humbled sufficiently?' and so dismissed me.\"\n\n\"Heigh-ho!\" yawned Amyas;\n\n     \"If the bridge had been stronger,\n     My tale had been longer.\"\n\n\"Amyas! Amyas!\" quoth Frank, solemnly, \"you know not what power over the\nsoul has the native and God-given majesty of royalty (awful enough in\nitself) when to it is superadded the wisdom of the sage, and therewithal\nthe tenderness of the woman. Had I my will, there should be in every\nrealm not a salique, but an anti-salique law: whereby no kings, but only\nqueens should rule mankind. Then would weakness and not power be to man\nthe symbol of divinity; love, and not cunning, would be the arbiter of\nevery cause; and chivalry, not fear, the spring of all obedience.\"\n\n\"Humph! There's some sense in that,\" quoth Amyas. \"I'd run a mile for\na woman when I would not walk a yard for a man; and--Who is this our\nmother is bringing in? The handsomest fellow I ever saw in my life!\"\n\nAmyas was not far wrong; for Mrs. Leigh's companion was none other than\nMr. Secretary, Amyas's Smerwick Fort acquaintance; alias Colin Clout,\nalias Immerito, alias Edmund Spenser. Some half-jesting conversation had\nseemingly been passing between the poet and the saint; for as they came\nin she said with a smile (which was somewhat of a forced one)--\"Well,\nmy dear sons, you are sure of immortality, at least on earth; for Mr.\nSpenser has been vowing to me to give your adventure a whole canto to\nitself in his 'Faerie Queene'.\"\n\n\"And you no less, madam,\" said Spenser. \"What were the story of the\nGracchi worth without the figure of Cornelia? If I honor the fruit, I\nmust not forget the stem which bears it. Frank, I congratulate you.\"\n\n\"Then you know the result of my interview, mother?\"\n\n\"I know everything, and am content,\" said Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"Mrs. Leigh has reason to be content,\" said Spenser, \"with that which is\nbut her own likeness.\"\n\nSpare your flattery to an old woman, Mr. Spenser. When, pray, did I\"\n(with a most loving look at Frank) \"refuse knighthood for duty's sake?\"\n\n\"Knighthood?\" cried Amyas. \"You never told me that, Frank!\"\n\n\"That may well be, Captain Leigh,\" said Spenser; \"but believe me, her\nmajesty (so Hatton assures me) told him this day, no less than that by\ngoing on this quest he deprived himself of that highest earthly honor,\nwhich crowned heads are fain to seek from their own subjects.\"\n\nSpenser did not exaggerate. Knighthood was then the prize of merit only;\nand one so valuable, that Elizabeth herself said, when asked why she did\nnot bestow a peerage upon some favorite, that having already knighted\nhim, she had nothing better to bestow. It remained for young Essex to\nbegin the degradation of the order in his hapless Irish campaign, and\nfor James to complete that degradation by his novel method of raising\nmoney by the sale of baronetcies; a new order of hereditary knighthood\nwhich was the laughing-stock of the day, and which (however venerable\nit may have since become) reflects anything but honor upon its first\npossessors.\n\n\"I owe you no thanks, Colin,\" said Frank, \"for having broached my\nsecret: but I have lost nothing after all. There is still an order of\nknighthood in which I may win my spurs, even though her majesty refuse\nme the accolade.\"\n\n\"What, then? you will not take it from a foreign prince?\"\n\nFrank smiled.\n\n\"Have you never read of that knighthood which is eternal in the heavens,\nand of those true cavaliers whom John saw in Patmos, riding on white\nhorses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, knights-errant in the\neverlasting war against the False Prophet and the Beast? Let me but\nbecome worthy of their ranks hereafter, what matter whether I be called\nSir Frank on earth?\"\n\n\"My son,\" said Mrs. Leigh, \"remember that they follow One whose vesture\nis dipped, not in the blood of His enemies, but in His own.\"\n\n\"I have remembered it for many a day; and remembered, too, that the\ngarments of the knights may need the same tokens as their captain's.\"\n\n\"Oh, Frank! Frank! is not His precious blood enough to cleanse all sin,\nwithout the sacrifice of our own?\"\n\n\"We may need no more than His blood, mother, and yet He may need ours,\"\nsaid Frank.\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nHow that conversation ended I know not, nor whether Spenser fulfilled\nhis purpose of introducing the two brothers and their mother into his\n\"Faerie Queene.\" If so, the manuscripts must have been lost among those\nwhich perished (along with Spenser's baby) in the sack of Kilcolman by\nthe Irish in 1598. But we need hardly regret the loss of them; for the\ntemper of the Leighs and their mother is the same which inspires every\ncanto of that noblest of poems; and which inspired, too, hundreds in\nthose noble days, when the chivalry of the Middle Ages was wedded to the\nfree thought and enterprise of the new.\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nSo mother and sons returned to Bideford, and set to work. Frank\nmortgaged a farm; Will Cary did the same (having some land of his own\nfrom his mother). Old Salterne grumbled at any man save himself spending\na penny on the voyage, and forced on the adventurers a good ship of two\nhundred tons burden, and five hundred pounds toward fitting her out;\nMrs. Leigh worked day and night at clothes and comforts of every kind;\nAmyas had nothing to give but his time and his brains: but, as Salterne\nsaid, the rest would have been of little use without them; and day after\nday he and the old merchant were on board the ship, superintending\nwith their own eyes the fitting of every rope and nail. Cary went about\nbeating up recruits; and made, with his jests and his frankness, the\nbest of crimps: while John Brimblecombe, beside himself with joy,\ntoddled about after him from tavern to tavern, and quay to quay, exalted\nfor the time being (as Cary told him) into a second Peter the Hermit;\nand so fiercely did he preach a crusade against the Spaniards, through\nBideford and Appledore, Clovelly and Ilfracombe, that Amyas might have\nhad a hundred and fifty loose fellows in the first fortnight. But he\nknew better: still smarting from the effects of a similar haste in the\nNewfoundland adventure, he had determined to take none but picked men;\nand by dint of labor he obtained them.\n\nOnly one scapegrace did he take into his crew, named Parracombe; and\nby that scapegrace hangs a tale. He was an old schoolfellow of his\nat Bideford, and son of a merchant in that town--one of those unlucky\nmembers who are \"nobody's enemy but their own\"--a handsome, idle,\nclever fellow, who used his scholarship, of which he had picked up some\nsmattering, chiefly to justify his own escapades, and to string songs\ntogether. Having drunk all that he was worth at home, he had in a\npenitent fit forsworn liquor, and tormented Amyas into taking him to\nsea, where he afterwards made as good a sailor as any one else,\nbut sorely scandalized John Brimblecombe by all manner of heretical\narguments, half Anacreontic, half smacking of the rather loose doctrines\nof that \"Family of Love\" which tormented the orthodoxy and morality of\nmore than one Bishop of Exeter. Poor Will Parracombe! he was born a few\ncenturies too early. Had he but lived now, he might have published\na volume or two of poetry, and then settled down on the staff of a\nnewspaper. Had he even lived thirty years later than he did, he might\nhave written frantic tragedies or filthy comedies for the edification of\nJames's profligate metropolis, and roistered it in taverns with Marlowe,\nto die as Marlowe did, by a footman's sword in a drunken brawl. But in\nthose stern days such weak and hysterical spirits had no fair vent for\ntheir \"humors,\" save in being reconciled to the Church of Rome, and\nplotting with Jesuits to assassinate the queen, as Parry and Somerville,\nand many other madmen, did.\n\nSo, at least, some Jesuit or other seems to have thought, shortly after\nAmyas had agreed to give the spendthrift a berth on board. For one day\nAmyas, going down to Appledore about his business, was called into the\nlittle Mariners' Rest inn, to extract therefrom poor Will Parracombe,\nwho (in spite of his vow) was drunk and outrageous, and had vowed the\ndeath of the landlady and all her kin. So Amyas fetched him out by the\ncollar, and walked him home thereby to Bideford; during which walk Will\ntold him a long and confused story; how an Egyptian rogue had met him\nthat morning on the sands by Boathythe, offered to tell his fortune,\nand prophesied to him great wealth and honor, but not from the Queen of\nEngland; had coaxed him to the Mariners' Rest, and gambled with him\nfor liquor, at which it seemed Will always won, and of course drank his\nwinnings on the spot; whereon the Egyptian began asking him all sorts of\nquestions about the projected voyage of the Rose--a good many of which,\nWill confessed, he had answered before he saw the fellow's drift;\nafter which the Egyptian had offered him a vast sum of money to do some\ndesperate villainy; but whether it was to murder Amyas or the queen,\nwhether to bore a hole in the bottom of the good ship Rose or to set the\nTorridge on fire by art-magic, he was too drunk to recollect exactly.\nWhereon Amyas treated three-quarters of the story as a tipsy dream,\nand contented himself by getting a warrant against the landlady for\nharboring \"Egyptians,\" which was then a heavy offence--a gipsy disguise\nbeing a favorite one with Jesuits and their emissaries. She of course\ndenied that any gipsy had been there; and though there were some who\nthought they had seen such a man come in, none had seen him go out\nagain. On which Amyas took occasion to ask, what had become of the\nsuspicious Popish ostler whom he had seen at the Mariners' Rest three\nyears before; and discovered, to his surprise, that the said ostler\nhad vanished from the very day of Don Guzman's departure from Bideford.\nThere was evidently a mystery somewhere: but nothing could be proved;\nthe landlady was dismissed with a reprimand, and Amyas soon forgot the\nwhole matter, after rating Parracombe soundly. After all, he could not\nhave told the gipsy (if one existed) anything important; for the special\ndestination of the voyage (as was the custom in those times, for fear of\nJesuits playing into the hands of Spain) had been carefully kept secret\namong the adventurers themselves, and, except Yeo and Drew, none of the\nmen had any suspicion that La Guayra was to be their aim.\n\nAnd Salvation Yeo?\n\nSalvation was almost wild for a few days, at the sudden prospect of\ngoing in search of his little maid, and of fighting Spaniards once more\nbefore he died. I will not quote the texts out of Isaiah and the Psalms\nwith which his mouth was filled from morning to night, for fear of\nseeming irreverent in the eyes of a generation which does not believe,\nas Yeo believed, that fighting the Spaniards was as really fighting in\nGod's battle against evil as were the wars of Joshua or David. But the\nold man had his practical hint too, and entreated to be sent back to\nPlymouth to look for men.\n\n\"There's many a man of the old Pelican, sir, and of Captain Hawkins's\nMinion that knows the Indies as well as I, and longs to be back again.\nThere's Drew, sir, that we left behind (and no better sailing-master for\nus in the West-country, and has accounts against the Spaniards, too; for\nit was his brother, the Barnstaple man, that was factor aboard of poor\nMr. Andrew Barker, and got clapt into the Inquisition at the Canaries);\nyou promised him, sir, that night he stood by you on board the Raleigh:\nand if you'll be as good as your word, he'll be as good as his; and\nbring a score more brave fellows with him.\"\n\nSo off went Yeo to Plymouth, and returned with Drew and a score of old\nnever-strikes. One look at their visages, as Yeo proudly ushered them\ninto the Ship Tavern, showed Amyas that they were of the metal which he\nwanted, and that, with the four North-Devon men who had gone round the\nworld with him in the Pelican (who all joined in the first week), he had\na reserve-force on which he could depend in utter need; and that utter\nneed might come he knew as well as any.\n\nNor was this all which Yeo had brought; for he had with him a letter\nfrom Sir Francis Drake, full of regrets that he had not seen \"his dear\nlad\" as he went through Plymouth. \"But indeed I was up to Dartmoor,\nsurveying with cross-staff and chain, over my knees in bog for a three\nweeks or more. For I have a project to bring down a leat of fair water\nfrom the hill-tops right into Plymouth town, cutting off the heads\nof Tavy, Meavy, Wallcomb, and West Dart, and thereby purging Plymouth\nharbor from the silt of the mines whereby it has been choked of late\nyears, and giving pure drink not only to the townsmen, but to the fleets\nof the queen's majesty; which if I do, I shall both make some poor\nreturn to God for all His unspeakable mercies, and erect unto myself a\nmonument better than of brass or marble, not merely honorable to me, but\nuseful to my countrymen.\"* Whereon Frank sent Drake a pretty epigram,\ncomparing Drake's projected leat to that river of eternal life whereof\nthe just would drink throughout eternity, and quoting (after the fashion\nof those days) John vii. 38; while Amyas took more heed of a practical\nappendage to the same letter, which was a list of hints scrawled for\nhis use by Captain John Hawkins himself, on all sea matters, from\nthe mounting of ordnance to the use of vitriol against the scurvy, in\ndefault of oranges and \"limmons;\" all which stood Amyas in good stead\nduring the ensuing month, while Frank grew more and more proud of his\nbrother, and more and more humble about himself.\n\n     * This noble monument of Drake's piety and public spirit\n     still remains in full use.\n\nFor he watched with astonishment how the simple sailor, without genius,\nscholarship, or fancy, had gained, by plain honesty, patience, and\ncommon sense, a power over the human heart, and a power over his work,\nwhatsoever it might be, which Frank could only admire afar off. The men\nlooked up to him as infallible, prided themselves on forestalling his\nwishes, carried out his slightest hint, worked early and late to win\na smile from him; while as for him, no detail escaped him, no drudgery\nsickened him, no disappointment angered him, till on the 15th of\nNovember, 1583, dropped down from Bideford Quay to Appledore Pool the\ntall ship Rose, with a hundred men on board (for sailors packed close\nin those days), beef, pork, biscuit, and good ale (for ale went to sea\nalways then) in abundance, four culverins on her main deck, her poop and\nforecastle well fitted with swivels of every size, and her racks so full\nof muskets, calivers, long bows, pikes, and swords, that all agreed so\nwell-appointed a ship had never sailed \"out over Bar.\"\n\nThe next day being Sunday, the whole crew received the Communion\ntogether at Northam Church, amid a mighty crowd; and then going on board\nagain, hove anchor and sailed out over the Bar before a soft east wind,\nto the music of sacbut, fife, and drum, with discharge of all ordnance,\ngreat and small, with cheering of young and old from cliff and strand\nand quay, and with many a tearful prayer and blessing upon that gallant\nbark, and all brave hearts on board.\n\nAnd Mrs. Leigh who had kissed her sons for the last time after the\nCommunion at the altar-steps (and what more fit place for a mother's\nkiss?) went to the rocky knoll outside the churchyard wall, and watched\nthe ship glide out between the yellow denes, and lessen slowly hour by\nhour into the boundless West, till her hull sank below the dim horizon,\nand her white sails faded away into the gray Atlantic mist, perhaps\nforever.\n\nAnd Mrs. Leigh gathered her cloak about her, and bowed her head and\nworshipped; and then went home to loneliness and prayer.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nHOW THEY CAME TO BARBADOS, AND FOUND NO MEN THEREIN\n\n     \"The sun's rim dips; the stars rush out;\n     At one stride comes the dark.\"\n\n                                   COLERIDGE.\n\nLand! land! land! Yes, there it was, far away to the south and west,\nbeside the setting sun, a long blue bar between the crimson sea and\ngolden sky. Land at last, with fresh streams, and cooling fruits, and\nfree room for cramped and scurvy-weakened limbs. And there, too, might\nbe gold, and gems, and all the wealth of Ind. Who knew? Why not? The old\nworld of fact and prose lay thousands of miles behind them, and before\nthem and around them was the realm of wonder and fable, of boundless\nhope and possibility. Sick men crawled up out of their stifling\nhammocks; strong men fell on their knees and gave God thanks; and all\neyes and hands were stretched eagerly toward the far blue cloud, fading\nas the sun sank down, yet rising higher and broader as the ship rushed\non before the rich trade-wind, which whispered lovingly round brow\nand sail, \"I am the faithful friend of those who dare!\" \"Blow freshly,\nfreshlier yet, thou good trade-wind, of whom it is written that He makes\nthe winds His angels, ministering breaths to the heirs of His salvation.\nBlow freshlier yet, and save, if not me from death, yet her from worse\nthan death. Blow on, and land me at her feet, to call the lost lamb\nhome, and die!\"\n\nSo murmured Frank to himself, as with straining eyes he gazed upon that\nfirst outlier of the New World which held his all. His cheeks were thin\nand wasted, and the hectic spot on each glowed crimson in the crimson\nlight of the setting sun. A few minutes more, and the rainbows of the\nWest were gone; emerald and topaz, amethyst and ruby, had faded into\nsilver-gray; and overhead, through the dark sapphire depths, the Moon\nand Venus reigned above the sea.\n\n\"That should be Barbados, your worship,\" said Drew, the master; \"unless\nmy reckoning is far out, which, Heaven knows, it has no right to be,\nafter such a passage, and God be praised.\"\n\n\"Barbados? I never heard of it.\"\n\n\"Very like, sir: but Yeo and I were here with Captain Drake, and I was\nhere after, too, with poor Captain Barlow; and there is good harborage\nto the south and west of it, I remember.\"\n\n\"And neither Spaniard, cannibal, or other evil beast,\" said Yeo. \"A very\ngarden of the Lord, sir, hid away in the seas, for an inheritance to\nthose who love Him. I heard Captain Drake talk of planting it, if ever\nhe had a chance.\"\n\n\"I recollect now,\" said Amyas, \"some talk between him and poor Sir\nHumphrey about an island here. Would God he had gone thither instead of\nto Newfoundland!\"\n\n\"Nay, then,\" said Yeo, \"he is in bliss now with the Lord; and you would\nnot have kept him from that, sir?\"\n\n\"He would have waited as willingly as he went, if he could have served\nhis queen thereby. But what say you, my masters? How can we do better\nthan to spend a few days here, to get our sick round, before we make the\nMain, and set to our work?\"\n\nAll approved the counsel except Frank, who was silent.\n\n\"Come, fellow-adventurer,\" said Cary, \"we must have your voice too.\"\n\n\"To my impatience, Will,\" said he, aside in a low voice, \"there is but\none place on earth, and I am all day longing for wings to fly thither:\nbut the counsel is right. I approve it.\"\n\nSo the verdict was announced, and received with a hearty cheer by the\ncrew; and long before morning they had run along the southern shore of\nthe island, and were feeling their way into the bay where Bridgetown now\nstands. All eyes were eagerly fixed on the low wooded hills which slept\nin the moonlight, spangled by fireflies, with a million dancing stars;\nall nostrils drank greedily the fragrant air, which swept from the land,\nladen with the scent of a thousand flowers; all ears welcomed, as a\ngrateful change from the monotonous whisper and lap of the water, the\nhum of insects, the snore of the tree-toads, the plaintive notes of the\nshore-fowl, which fill a tropic night with noisy life.\n\nAt last she stopped; at last the cable rattled through the hawsehole;\nand then, careless of the chance of lurking Spaniard or Carib, an\ninstinctive cheer burst from every throat. Poor fellows! Amyas had much\nado to prevent them going on shore at once, dark as it was, by reminding\nthem that it wanted but two hours of day.\n\n\"Never were two such long hours,\" said one young lad, fidgeting up and\ndown.\n\n\"You never were in the Inquisition,\" said Yeo, \"or you'd know better how\nslow time can run. Stand you still, and give God thanks you're where you\nare.\"\n\n\"I say, Gunner, be there goold to that island?\"\n\n\"Never heard of none; and so much the better for it,\" said Yeo, dryly.\n\n\"But, I say, Gunner,\" said a poor scurvy-stricken cripple, licking his\nlips, \"be there oranges and limmons there?\"\n\n\"Not of my seeing; but plenty of good fruit down to the beach, thank the\nLord. There comes the dawn at last.\"\n\nUp flushed the rose, up rushed the sun, and the level rays glittered on\nthe smooth stems of the palm-trees, and threw rainbows across the foam\nupon the coral-reefs, and gilded lonely uplands far away, where now\nstands many a stately country-seat and busy engine-house. Long lines of\npelicans went clanging out to sea; the hum of the insects hushed, and a\nthousand birds burst into jubilant song; a thin blue mist crept upward\ntoward the inner downs, and vanished, leaving them to quiver in the\nburning glare; the land-breeze, which had blown fresh out to sea all\nnight, died away into glassy calm, and the tropic day was begun.\n\nThe sick were lifted over the side, and landed boat-load after boat-load\non the beach, to stretch themselves in the shade of the palms; and in\nhalf-an-hour the whole crew were scattered on the shore, except some\ndozen worthy men, who had volunteered to keep watch and ward on board\ntill noon.\n\nAnd now the first instinctive cry of nature was for fruit! fruit! fruit!\nThe poor lame wretches crawled from place to place plucking greedily the\nviolet grapes of the creeping shore vine, and staining their mouths\nand blistering their lips with the prickly pears, in spite of Yeo's\nentreaties and warnings against the thorns. Some of the healthy began\nhewing down cocoa-nut trees to get at the nuts, doing little thereby but\nblunt their hatchets; till Yeo and Drew, having mustered half-a-dozen\nreasonable men, went off inland, and returned in an hour laden with the\ndainties of that primeval orchard,--with acid junipa-apples, luscious\nguavas, and crowned ananas, queen of all the fruits, which they had\nfound by hundreds on the broiling ledges of the low tufa-cliffs;\nand then all, sitting on the sandy turf, defiant of galliwasps and\njackspaniards, and all the weapons of the insect host, partook of the\nequal banquet, while old blue land-crabs sat in their house-doors and\nbrandished their fists in defiance at the invaders, and solemn cranes\nstood in the water on the shoals with their heads on one side, and\nmeditated how long it was since they had seen bipeds without feathers\nbreaking the solitude of their isle.\n\nAnd Frank wandered up and down, silent, but rather in wonder than\nin sadness, while great Amyas walked after him, his mouth full\nof junipa-apples, and enacted the part of showman, with a sort of\npatronizing air, as one who had seen the wonders already, and was above\nbeing astonished at them.\n\n\"New, new; everything new!\" said Frank, meditatively. \"Oh, awful\nfeeling! All things changed around us, even to the tiniest fly and\nflower; yet we the same, the same forever!\"\n\nAmyas, to whom such utterances were altogether sibylline and\nunintelligible, answered by:\n\n\"Look, Frank, that's a colibri. You 've heard of colibris?\"\n\nFrank looked at the living gem, which hung, loud humming, over some\nfantastic bloom, and then dashed away, seemingly to call its mate, and\nwhirred and danced with it round and round the flower-starred bushes,\nflashing fresh rainbows at every shifting of the lights.\n\nFrank watched solemnly awhile, and then:\n\n\"Qualis Natura formatrix, si talis formata? Oh my God, how fair must be\nThy real world, if even Thy phantoms are so fair!\"\n\n\"Phantoms?\" asked Amyas, uneasily. \"That's no ghost, Frank, but a jolly\nlittle honey-sucker, with a wee wife, and children no bigger than peas,\nbut yet solid greedy little fellows enough, I'll warrant.\"\n\n\"Not phantoms in thy sense, good fellow, but in the sense of those who\nknow the worthlessness of all below.\"\n\n\"I'll tell you what, brother Frank, you are a great deal wiser than me,\nI know; but I can't abide to see you turn up your nose as it were at\nGod's good earth. See now, God made all these things; and never a man,\nperhaps, set eyes on them till fifty years agone; and yet they were as\npretty as they are now, ever since the making of the world. And why\ndo you think God could have put them here, then, but to please\nHimself\"--and Amyas took off his hat--\"with the sight of them? Now, I\nsay, brother Frank, what's good enough to please God, is good enough to\nplease you and me.\"\n\n\"Your rebuke is just, dear old simple-hearted fellow; and God forgive\nme, if with all my learning, which has brought me no profit, and my\nlongings, which have brought me no peace, I presume at moments, sinner\nthat I am, to be more dainty than the Lord Himself. He walked in\nParadise among the trees of the garden, Amyas; and so will we, and\nbe content with what He sends. Why should we long for the next world,\nbefore we are fit even for this one?\"\n\n\"And in the meanwhile,\" said Amyas, \"this earth's quite good enough, at\nleast here in Barbados.\"\n\n\"Do you believe,\" asked Frank, trying to turn his own thoughts, \"in\nthose tales of the Spaniards, that the Sirens and Tritons are heard\nsinging in these seas?\"\n\n\"I can't tell. There's more fish in the water than ever came out of it,\nand more wonders in the world, I'll warrant, than we ever dreamt of; but\nI was never in these parts before; and in the South Sea, I must say, I\nnever came across any, though Yeo says he has heard fair music at night\nup in the Gulf, far away from land.\"\n\n\"The Spaniards report that at certain seasons choirs of these nymphs\nassemble in the sea, and with ravishing music sing their watery loves.\nIt may be so. For Nature, which has peopled the land with rational\nsouls, may not have left the sea altogether barren of them; above all,\nwhen we remember that the ocean is as it were the very fount of all\nfertility, and its slime (as the most learned hold with Thales of\nMiletus) that prima materia out of which all things were one by one\nconcocted. Therefore, the ancients feigned wisely that Venus, the mother\nof all living things, whereby they designed the plastic force of nature,\nwas born of the sea-foam, and rising from the deep, floated ashore upon\nthe isles of Greece.\"\n\n\"I don't know what plastic force is; but I wish I had had the luck to be\nby when the pretty poppet came up: however, the nearest thing I ever saw\nto that was maidens swimming alongside of us when we were in the South\nSeas, and would have come aboard, too; but Drake sent them all off again\nfor a lot of naughty packs, and I verily believe they were no better.\nLook at the butterflies, now! Don't you wish you were a boy again, and\nnot too proud to go catching them in your cap?\"\n\nAnd so the two wandered on together through the glorious tropic woods,\nand then returned to the beach to find the sick already grown cheerful,\nand many who that morning could not stir from their hammocks, pacing up\nand down, and gaining strength with every step.\n\n\"Well done, lads!\" cried Amyas, \"keep a cheerful mind. We will have the\nmusic ashore after dinner, for want of mermaids to sing to us, and those\nthat can dance may.\"\n\nAnd so those four days were spent; and the men, like schoolboys on\na holiday, gave themselves up to simple merriment, not forgetting,\nhowever, to wash the clothes, take in fresh water, and store up a\ngood supply of such fruit as seemed likely to keep; until, tired with\nfruitless rambles after gold, which they expected to find in every bush,\nin spite of Yeo's warnings that none had been heard of on the island,\nthey were fain to lounge about, full-grown babies, picking up shells and\nsea-fans to take home to their sweethearts, smoking agoutis out of the\nhollow trees, with shout and laughter, and tormenting every living thing\nthey could come near, till not a land-crab dare look out of his hole, or\nan armadillo unroll himself, till they were safe out of the bay, and\noff again to the westward, unconscious pioneers of all the wealth, and\ncommerce, and beauty, and science which has in later centuries made that\nlovely isle the richest gem of all the tropic seas.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nHOW THEY TOOK THE PEARLS AT MARGARITA\n\n     P. Henry.  Why, what a rascal art thou, then, to praise him so for\n     running!\n     Falstaff.  O' horseback, ye cuckoo! but a-foot, he will not budge a\n     foot.\n     P. Henry.  Yes, Jack, upon instinct.\n     Falstaff.  I grant ye, upon instinct.\n\n                                                  Henry IV.  Pt. I.\n\nThey had slipped past the southern point of Grenada in the night, and\nwere at last within that fairy ring of islands, on which nature had\nconcentrated all her beauty, and man all his sin. If Barbados had been\ninvested in the eyes of the newcomers with some strange glory, how much\nmore the seas on which they now entered, which smile in almost perpetual\ncalm, untouched by the hurricane which roars past them far to northward!\nSky, sea, and islands were one vast rainbow; though little marked,\nperhaps, by those sturdy practical sailors, whose main thought was of\nSpanish gold and pearls; and as little by Amyas, who, accustomed to the\nscenery of the tropics, was speculating inwardly on the possibility of\nextirpating the Spaniards, and annexing the West Indies to the domains\nof Queen Elizabeth. And yet even their unpoetic eyes could not behold\nwithout awe and excitement lands so famous and yet so new, around\nwhich all the wonder, all the pity, and all the greed of the age had\nconcentrated itself. It was an awful thought, and yet inspiriting, that\nthey were entering regions all but unknown to Englishmen, where the\npenalty of failure would be worse than death--the torments of the\nInquisition. Not more than five times before, perhaps, had those\nmysterious seas been visited by English keels; but there were those\non board who knew them well, and too well; who, first of all British\nmariners, had attempted under Captain John Hawkins to trade along those\nvery coasts, and, interdicted from the necessaries of life by Spanish\njealousy, had, in true English fashion, won their markets at the sword's\npoint, and then bought and sold honestly and peaceably therein. The old\nmariners of the Pelican and the Minion were questioned all day long for\nthe names of every isle and cape, every fish and bird; while Frank stood\nby, listening serious and silent.\n\nA great awe seemed to have possessed his soul; yet not a sad one: for\nhis face seemed daily to drink in glory from the glory round him; and\nmurmuring to himself at whiles, \"This is the gate of heaven,\" he stood\nwatching all day long, careless of food and rest, as every forward\nplunge of the ship displayed some fresh wonder. Islands and capes hung\nhigh in air, with their inverted images below them; long sand-hills\nrolled and weltered in the mirage; and the yellow flower-beds, and huge\nthorny cacti like giant candelabra, which clothed the glaring slopes,\ntwisted, tossed, and flickered, till the whole scene seemed one blazing\nphantom-world, in which everything was as unstable as it was fantastic,\neven to the sun itself, distorted into strange oval and pear-shaped\nfigures by the beds of crimson mist through which he sank to rest. But\nwhile Frank wondered, Yeo rejoiced; for to the southward of that setting\nsun a cluster of tall peaks rose from the sea; and they, unless his\nreckonings were wrong, were the mountains of Macanao, at the western end\nof Margarita, the Isle of Pearls, then famous in all the cities of\nthe Mediterranean, and at the great German fairs, and second only in\nrichness to that pearl island in the gulf of Panama, which fifteen years\nbefore had cost John Oxenham his life.\n\nThe next day saw them running along the north side of the island, having\npassed undiscovered (as far as they could see) the castle which the\nSpaniards had built at the eastern end for the protection of the pearl\nfisheries.\n\nAt last they opened a deep and still bight, wooded to the water's edge;\nand lying in the roadstead a caravel, and three boats by her. And at\nthat sight there was not a man but was on deck at once, and not a mouth\nbut was giving its opinion of what should be done. Some were for sailing\nright into the roadstead, the breeze blowing fresh toward the shore (as\nit usually does throughout those islands in the afternoon). However,\nseeing the billows break here and there off the bay's mouth, they\nthought it better, for fear of rocks, to run by quietly, and then\nsend in the pinnace and the boat. Yeo would have had them show Spanish\ncolors, for fear of alarming the caravel; but Amyas stoutly refused,\n\"counting it,\" he said, \"a mean thing to tell a lie in that way, unless\nin extreme danger, or for great ends of state.\"\n\nSo holding on their course till they were shut out by the next point,\nthey started; Cary in the largest boat with twenty men, and Amyas in\nthe smaller one with fifteen more; among whom was John Brimblecombe,\nwho must needs come in his cassock and bands, with an old sword of his\nuncle's which he prized mightily.\n\nWhen they came to the bight's mouth, they found, as they had expected,\ncoral rocks, and too many of them; so that they had to run along the\nedge of the reef a long way before they could find a passage for the\nboats. While they were so doing, and those of them who were new to the\nIndies were admiring through the clear element those living flower-beds,\nand subaqueous gardens of Nereus and Amphitrite, there suddenly appeared\nbelow what Yeo called \"a school of sharks,\" some of them nearly as long\nas the boat, who looked up at them wistfully enough out of their wicked\nscowling eyes.\n\n\"Jack,\" said Amyas, who sat next to him, \"look how that big fellow\neyes thee: he has surely taken a fancy to that plump hide of thine, and\nthinks thou wouldst eat as tender as any sucking porker.\"\n\nJack turned very pale, but said nothing.\n\nNow, as it befell, just then that very big fellow, seeing a parrot-fish\ncome out of a cleft of the coral, made at him from below, as did two or\nthree more; the poor fish finding no other escape, leaped clean into the\nair, and almost aboard the boat; while just where he had come out of\nthe water, three or four great brown shagreened noses clashed together\nwithin two yards of Jack as he sat, each showing its horrible rows of\nsaw teeth, and then sank sulkily down again, to watch for a fresh bait.\nAt which Jack said very softly, \"In manus tuas, Domine!\" and turning his\neyes in board, had no lust to look at sharks any more.\n\nSo having got through the reef, in they ran with a fair breeze, the\ncaravel not being now a musket-shot off. Cary laid her aboard before\nthe Spaniards had time to get to their ordnance; and standing up in the\nstern-sheets, shouted to them to yield. The captain asked boldly enough,\nin whose name? \"In the name of common sense, ye dogs,\" cries Will; \"do\nyou not see that you are but fifty strong to our twenty?\" Whereon up the\nside he scrambled, and the captain fired a pistol at him. Cary knocked\nhim over, unwilling to shed needless blood; on which all the crew\nyielded, some falling on their knees, some leaping overboard; and the\nprize was taken.\n\nIn the meanwhile, Amyas had pulled round under her stern, and boarded\nthe boat which was second from her, for the nearest was fast alongside,\nand so a sure prize. The Spaniards in her yielded without a blow, crying\n\"Misericordia;\" and the negroes, leaping overboard, swam ashore like\nsea-dogs. Meanwhile, the third boat, which was not an oar's length\noff, turned to pull away. Whereby befell a notable adventure: for John\nBrimblecombe, casting about in a valiant mind how he should distinguish\nhimself that day, must needs catch up a boat-hook, and claw on to her\nstern, shouting, \"Stay, ye Papists! Stay, Spanish dogs!\"--by which, as\nwas to be expected, they being ten to his one, he was forthwith pulled\noverboard, and fell all along on his nose in the sea, leaving the hook\nfast in her stern.\n\nWhere, I know not how, being seized with some panic fear (his lively\nimagination filling all the sea with those sharks which he had just\nseen), he fell a-roaring like any town-bull, and in his confusion never\nthought to turn and get aboard again, but struck out lustily after the\nSpanish boat, whether in hope of catching hold of the boat-hook which\ntrailed behind her, or from a very madness of valor, no man could\ndivine; but on he swam, his cassock afloat behind him, looking for all\nthe world like a great black monk-fish, and howling and puffing, with\nhis mouth full of salt water, \"Stay, ye Spanish dogs! Help, all good\nfellows! See you not that I am a dead man? They are nuzzling already at\nmy toes! He hath hold of my leg! My right thigh is bitten clean off!\nOh that I were preaching in Hartland pulpit! Stay, Spanish dogs! Yield,\nPapist cowards, least I make mincemeat of you; and take me aboard!\nYield, I say, or my blood be on your heads! I am no Jonah; if he swallow\nme, he will never cast me up again! it is better to fall into the hands\nof man, than into the hands of devils with three rows of teeth apiece.\nIn manus tuas. Orate pro anima--!\"\n\nAnd so forth, in more frantic case than ever was Panurge in that his\never-memorable seasickness; till the English, expecting him every minute\nto be snapped up by sharks, or brained by the Spaniard's oars, let fly a\nvolley into the fugitives, on which they all leaped overboard like their\nfellows; whereon Jack scrambled into the boat, and drawing sword with\none hand, while he wiped the water out of his eyes with the other, began\nto lay about him like a very lion, cutting the empty air, and crying,\n\"Yield, idolaters! Yield, Spanish dogs!\" However, coming to himself\nafter a while, and seeing that there was no one on whom to flesh his\nmaiden steel, he sits down panting in the sternsheets, and begins\nstripping off his hose. On which Amyas, thinking surely that the good\nfellow had gone mad with some stroke of the sun, or by having fallen\ninto the sea after being overheated with his rowing, bade pull\nalongside, and asked him in heaven's name what he was doing with his\nnether tackle. On which Jack, amid such laughter as may be conceived,\nvowed and swore that his right thigh was bitten clean through, and to\nthe bone; yea, and that he felt his hose full of blood; and so would\nhave swooned away for imaginary loss of blood (so strong was the\ndelusion on him) had not his friends, after much arguing on their part,\nand anger on his, persuaded him that he was whole and sound.\n\nAfter which they set to work to overhaul their maiden prize, which they\nfound full of hides and salt-pork; and yet not of that alone; for in\nthe captain's cabin, and also in the sternsheets of the boat which\nBrimblecombe had so valorously boarded, were certain frails of leaves\npacked neatly enough, which being opened were full of goodly pearls,\nthough somewhat brown (for the Spaniards used to damage the color in\ntheir haste and greediness, opening the shells by fire, instead of\nleaving them to decay gradually after the Arabian fashion); with which\nprize, though they could not guess its value very exactly, they went off\ncontent enough, after some malicious fellow had set the ship on fire,\nwhich, being laden with hides, was no nosegay as it burnt.\n\nAmyas was very angry at this wanton damage, in which his model,\nDrake, had never indulged; but Cary had his jest ready. \"Ah!\" said he,\n\"'Lutheran devils' we are, you know; so we are bound to vanish, like\nother fiends, with an evil savor.\"\n\nAs soon, however, as Amyas was on board again, he rounded his friend\nMr. Brimblecombe in the ear, and told him he had better play the man a\nlittle more, roaring less before he was hurt, and keeping his breath\nto help his strokes, if he wished the crew to listen much to his\ndiscourses. Frank, hearing this, bade Amyas leave the offender to him,\nand so began upon him with--\n\n\"Come hither, thou recreant Jack, thou lily-livered Jack, thou\nhysterical Jack. Tell me now, thou hast read Plato's Dialogues, and\nAristotle's Logic?\"\n\nTo which Jack very meekly answered, \"Yes.\"\n\n\"Then I will deal with thee after the manner of those ancient sages, and\nask whether the greater must not contain the less?\"\n\nJack. Yes, sure.\n\nFrank. And that which is more than a part, contain that part, more than\nwhich it is?\n\nJack. Yes, sure.\n\nFrank. Then tell me, is not a priest more than a layman?\n\nJack (who was always very loud about the dignity of the priesthood,\nas many of his cloth are, who have no other dignity whereon to stand)\nanswered very boldly, \"Of course.\"\n\nFrank. Then a priest containeth a man, and is a man, and something\nover--viz, his priesthood?\n\nJack (who saw whither this would lead). I suppose so.\n\nFrank. Then, if a priest show himself no man, he shows himself all the\nmore no priest?\n\n\"I'll tell you what, Master Frank,\" says Jack, \"you may be right by\nlogic; but sharks aren't logic, nor don't understand it neither.\"\n\nFrank. Nay but, my recalcitrant Jack, my stiff-necked Jack, is it the\npart of a man to howl like a pig in a gate, because he thinks that is\nthere which is not there?\n\nJack had not a word to say.\n\nFrank. And still more, when if that had been there, it had been the duty\nof a brave man to have kept his mouth shut, if only to keep salt water\nout, and not add the evil of choking to that of being eaten?\n\n\"Ah!\" says Jack, \"that's all very fine; but you know as well as I that\nit was not the Spaniards I was afraid of. They were Heaven's handiwork,\nand I knew how to deal with them; but as for those fiends' spawn of\nsharks, when I saw that fellow take the fish alongside, it upset me\nclean, and there's an end of it!\"\n\nFrank. Oh, Jack, Jack, behold how one sin begets another! Just now thou\nwert but a coward, and now thou art a Manichee. For thou hast imputed\nto an evil creator that which was formed only for a good end, namely,\nsharks, which were made on purpose to devour useless carcasses like\nthine. Moreover, as a brother of the Rose, thou wert bound by the vow of\nthy brotherhood to have leaped joyfully down that shark's mouth.\n\nJack. Ay, very likely, if Mistress Rose had been in his stomach; but I\nwanted to fight Spaniards just then, not to be shark-bitten.\n\nFrank. Jack, thy answer savors of self-will. If it is ordained that thou\nshouldst advance the ends of the Brotherhood by being shark-bitten,\nor flea-bitten, or bitten by sharpers, to the detriment of thy carnal\nwealth, or, shortly, to suffer any shame or torment whatsoever, even to\nstrappado and scarpines, thou art bound to obey thy destiny, and not,\nafter that vain Roman conceit, to choose the manner of thine own death,\nwhich is indeed only another sort of self-murder. We therefore consider\nthee as a cause of scandal, and a rotten and creaking branch, to be\nexcised by the spiritual arm, and do hereby excise thee, and cut thee\noff.\n\nJack. Nay faith, that's a little too much, Master Frank. How long have\nyou been Bishop of Exeter?\n\nFrank. Jack, thy wit being blinded, and full of gross vapors, by reason\nof the perturbations of fear (which, like anger, is a short madness,\nand raises in the phantasy vain spectres,--videlicet, of sharks and\nSpaniards), mistakes our lucidity. For thy Manicheeism, let his lordship\nof Exeter deal with it. For thy abominable howling and caterwauling,\noffensive in a chained cur, but scandalous in a preacher and a brother\nof the Rose, we do hereby deprive thee of thine office of chaplain to\nthe Brotherhood; and warn thee, that unless within seven days thou do\nsome deed equal to the Seven Champions, or Ruggiero and Orlando's self,\nthou shalt be deprived of sword and dagger, and allowed henceforth to\ncarry no more iron about thee than will serve to mend thy pen.\n\n\"And now, Jack,\" said Amyas, \"I will give thee a piece of news. No\nwonder that young men, as the parsons complain so loudly, will not\nlisten to the Gospel, while it is preached to them by men on whom they\ncannot but look down; a set of softhanded fellows who cannot dig, and\nare ashamed to beg; and, as my brother has it, must needs be parsons\nbefore they are men.\n\n\"Frank. Ay, and even though we may excuse that in Popish priests and\nfriars, who are vowed not to be men, and get their bread shamefully\nand rascally by telling sinners who owe a hundred measures to sit down\nquickly and take their bill and write fifty: yet for a priest of the\nChurch of England (whose business is not merely to smuggle sinful souls\nup the backstairs into heaven, but to make men good Christians by making\nthem good men, good gentlemen, and good Englishmen) to show the white\nfeather in the hour of need, is to unpreach in one minute all that he\nhad been preaching his life long.\n\n\"I tell thee,\" says Amyas, \"if I had not taken thee for another guess\nsort of man, I had never let thee have the care of a hundred brave lads'\nimmortal souls--\"\n\nAnd so on, both of them boarding him at once with their heavy shot,\nlarboard and starboard, till he fairly clapped his hands to his ears\nand ran for it, leaving poor Frank laughing so heartily, that Amyas was\nafter all glad the thing had happened, for the sake of the smile which\nit put into his sad and steadfast countenance.\n\nThe next day was Sunday; on which, after divine service (which they\ncould hardly persuade Jack to read, so shamefaced was he; and as for\npreaching after it, he would not hear of such a thing), Amyas read\naloud, according to custom, the articles of their agreement; and then\nseeing abreast of them a sloping beach with a shoot of clear water\nrunning into the sea, agreed that they should land there, wash the\nclothes, and again water the ship; for they had found water somewhat\nscarce at Barbados. On this party Jack Brimblecombe must needs go,\ntaking with him his sword and a great arquebuse; for he had dreamed last\nnight (he said) that he was set upon by Spaniards, and was sure that the\ndream would come true; and moreover, that he did not very much care if\nthey did, or if he ever got back alive; \"for it was better to die than\nbe made an ape, and a scarecrow, and laughed at by the men, and badgered\nwith Ramus his logic, and Plato his dialectical devilries, to confess\nhimself a Manichee, and, for aught he knew, a turbaned Turk, or Hebrew\nJew,\" and so flung into the boat like a man desperate.\n\nSo they went ashore, after Amyas had given strict commands against\nletting off firearms, for fear of alarming the Spaniards. There they\nwashed their clothes, and stretched their legs with great joy, admiring\nthe beauty of the place, and then began to shoot the seine which they\nhad brought on shore with them. \"In which,\" says the chronicler, \"we\ncaught many strange fishes, and beside them, a sea-cow full seven feet\nlong, with limpets and barnacles on her back, as if she had been a stick\nof drift-timber. This is a fond and foolish beast: and yet pious withal;\nfor finding a corpse, she watches over it day and night until it decay\nor be buried. The Indians call her manati; who carries her young\nunder her arm, and gives it suck like a woman; and being wounded, she\nlamenteth aloud with a human voice, and is said at certain seasons to\nsing very melodiously; which melody, perhaps, having been heard in those\nseas, is that which Mr. Frank reported to be the choirs of the Sirens\nand Tritons. The which I do not avouch for truth, neither rashly deny,\nhaving seen myself such fertility of Nature's wonders that I hold him\nwho denieth aught merely for its strangeness to be a ribald and an\nignoramus. Also one of our men brought in two great black fowls which\nhe had shot with a crossbow, bodied and headed like a capon, but bigger\nthan any eagle, which the Spaniards call curassos; which, with that\nsea-cow, afterwards made us good cheer, both roast and sodden, for the\ncow was very dainty meat, as good as a four-months' calf, and tender and\nfat withal.\"\n\nAfter that they set to work filling the casks and barricos, having laid\nthe boat up to the outflow of the rivulet. And lucky for them it was,\nas it fell out, that they were all close together at that work, and not\nabroad skylarking as they had been half-an-hour before.\n\nNow John Brimblecombe had gone apart as soon as they landed, with a\nshamefaced and doleful countenance; and sitting down under a great tree,\nplucked a Bible from his bosom, and read steadfastly, girded with his\ngreat sword, and his arquebuse lying by him. This too was well for him,\nand for the rest; for they had not yet finished their watering, when\nthere was a cry that the enemy was on them; and out of the wood,\nnot twenty yards from the good parson, came full fifty shot, with a\nmultitude of negroes behind them, and an officer in front on horseback,\nwith a great plume of feathers in his hat, and his sword drawn in his\nhand.\n\n\"Stand, for your lives!\" shouted Amyas: and only just in time; for there\nwas ten good minutes lost in running up and down before he could get his\nmen into some order of battle. But when Jack beheld the Spaniards, as if\nhe had expected their coming, he plucked a leaf and put it into the\npage of his book for a mark, laid the book down soberly, caught up his\narquebuse, ran like a mad dog right at the Spanish captain, shot him\nthrough the body stark dead, and then, flinging the arquebuse at the\nhead of him who stood next, fell on with his sword like a very Colbrand,\nbreaking in among the arquebuses, and striking right and left such ugly\nstrokes, that the Spaniards (who thought him a very fiend, or Luther's\nself come to life to plague them) gave back pell-mell, and shot at him\nfive or six at once with their arquebuses: but whether from fear of him,\nor of wounding each other, made so bad play with their pieces, that he\nonly got one shrewd gall in his thigh, which made him limp for many a\nday. But as fast as they gave back he came on; and the rest by this time\nran up in good order, and altogether nearly forty men well armed. On\nwhich the Spaniards turned, and went as fast as they had come, while\nCary hinted that, \"The dogs had had such a taste of the parson, that\nthey had no mind to wait for the clerk and people.\"\n\n\"Come back, Jack! are you mad?\" shouted Amyas.\n\nBut Jack (who had not all this time spoken one word) followed them\nas fiercely as ever, till, reaching a great blow at one of the\narquebusiers, he caught his foot in a root; on which down he went, and\nstriking his head against the ground, knocked out of himself all the\nbreath he had left (which between fatness and fighting was not much),\nand so lay. Amyas, seeing the Spaniards gone, did not care to pursue\nthem: but picked up Jack, who, staring about, cried, \"Glory be! glory\nbe!--How many have I killed? How many have I killed?\"\n\n\"Nineteen, at the least,\" quoth Cary, \"and seven with one back\nstroke;\" and then showed Brimblecombe the captain lying dead, and two\narquebusiers, one of which was the fugitive by whom he came to his fall,\nbeside three or four more who were limping away wounded, some of them by\ntheir fellows' shot.\n\n\"There!\" said Jack, pausing and blowing, \"will you laugh at me any more,\nMr. Cary; or say that I cannot fight, because I am a poor parson's son?\"\n\nCary took him by the hand, and asked pardon of him for his scoffing,\nsaying that he had that day played the best man of all of them; and\nJack, who never bore malice, began laughing in his turn, and--\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Cary, we have all known your pleasant ways, ever since you used\nto put drumble-drones into my desk to Bideford school.\" And so they went\nto the boats, and pulled off, thanking God (as they had need to do) for\ntheir great deliverance: while all the boats' crew rejoiced over Jack,\nwho after a while grew very faint (having bled a good deal without\nknowing it), and made as little of his real wound as he made much the\nday before of his imaginary one.\n\nFrank asked him that evening how he came to show so cool and approved a\nvalor in so sudden a mishap.\n\n\"Well, my masters,\" said Jack, \"I don't deny that I was very downcast on\naccount of what you said, and the scandal which I had given to the crew;\nbut as it happened, I was reading there under the tree, to fortify my\nspirits, the history of the ancient worthies, in St. Paul his eleventh\nchapter to the Hebrews; and just as I came to that, 'out of weakness\nwere made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies\nof the aliens,' arose the cry of the Spaniards. At which, gentlemen,\nthinking in myself that I fought in just so good a cause as they, and,\nas I hoped, with like faith, there came upon me so strange an assurance\nof victory, that I verily believed in myself that if there had been\na ten thousand of them, I should have taken no hurt. Wherefore,\" said\nJack, modestly, \"there is no credit due to me, for there was no valor\nin me whatsoever, but only a certainty of safety; and any coward would\nfight if he knew that he were to have all the killing and none of the\nscratches.\"\n\nWhich words he next day, being Sunday, repeated in his sermon which he\nmade on that chapter, with which all, even Salvation Yeo himself, were\nwell content and edified, and allowed him to be as godly a preacher as\nhe was (in spite of his simple ways) a valiant and true-hearted comrade.\n\nThey brought away the Spanish officer's sword (a very good blade), and\nalso a great chain of gold which he wore about his neck; both of which\nwere allotted to Brimblecombe as his fair prize; but he, accepting the\nsword, steadfastly refused the chain, entreating Amyas to put it into\nthe common stock; and when Amyas refused, he cut it into links and\ndistributed it among those of the boat's crew who had succored him,\nwinning thereby much good-will. \"And indeed\" (says the chronicler),\n\"I never saw in that worthy man, from the first day of our\nschool-fellowship till he was laid in his parish church of Hartland\n(where he now sleeps in peace), any touch of that sin of covetousness\nwhich has in all ages, and in ours no less than others, beset especially\n(I know not why) them who minister about the sanctuary. But this man,\nthough he was ugly and lowly in person, and in understanding simple, and\nof breeding but a poor parson's son, had yet in him a spirit so loving\nand cheerful, so lifted from base and selfish purposes to the worship\nof duty, and to a generosity rather knightly than sacerdotal, that all\nthrough his life he seemed to think only that it was more blessed to\ngive than to receive. And all that wealth which he gained in the wars he\ndispersed among his sisters and the poor of his parish, living unmarried\ntill his death like a true lover and constant mourner (as shall be said\nin place), and leaving hardly wherewith to bring his body to the\ngrave. At whom if we often laughed once, we should now rather envy him,\ndesiring to be here what he was, that we may be hereafter where he is.\nAmen.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nWHAT BEFELL AT LA GUAYRA\n\n       \"Great was the crying, the running and riding,\n     Which at that season was made in the place;\n        The beacons were fired, as need then required,\n     To save their great treasure they had little space.\"\n\n                                       Winning of Cales.\n\nThe men would gladly have hawked awhile round Margarita and Cubagua for\nanother pearl prize. But Amyas having, as he phrased it, \"fleshed his\ndogs,\" was loth to hang about the islands after the alarm had been\ngiven. They ran, therefore, south-west across the mouth of that great\nbay which stretches from the Peninsula of Paria to Cape Codera, leaving\non their right hand Tortuga, and on their left the meadow-islands of the\nPiritoos, two long green lines but a few inches above the tideless sea.\nYeo and Drew knew every foot of the way, and had good reason to know it;\nfor they, the first of all English mariners, had tried to trade along\nthis coast with Hawkins. And now, right ahead, sheer out of the sea from\nbase to peak, arose higher and higher the mighty range of the Caracas\nmountains; beside which all hills which most of the crew had ever seen\nseemed petty mounds. Frank, of course, knew the Alps; and Amyas the\nAndes; but Cary's notions of height were bounded by M'Gillicuddy's\nReeks, and Brimblecombe's by Exmoor; and the latter, to Cary's infinite\namusement, spent a whole day holding on by the rigging, and staring\nupwards with his chin higher than his nose, till he got a stiff neck.\nSoon the sea became rough and chopping, though the breeze was fair and\ngentle; and ere they were abreast of the Cape, they became aware of\nthat strong eastward current which, during the winter months, so often\nbaffles the mariner who wishes to go to the westward. All night long\nthey struggled through the billows, with the huge wall of Cape Codera a\nthousand feet above their heads to the left, and beyond it again, bank\nupon bank of mountain, bathed in the yellow moonlight.\n\nMorning showed them a large ship, which had passed them during the night\nupon the opposite course, and was now a good ten miles to the eastward.\nYeo was for going back and taking her. Of the latter he made a matter of\ncourse; and the former was easy enough, for the breeze blowing dead off\nthe land, was a \"soldier's wind, there and back again,\" for either ship;\nbut Amyas and Frank were both unwilling.\n\n\"Why, Yeo, you said that one day more would bring us to La Guayra.\"\n\n\"All the more reason, sir, for doing the Lord's work thoroughly, when He\nhas brought us safely so far on our journey.\"\n\n\"She can pass well enough, and no loss.\"\n\n\"Ah, sirs, sirs, she is delivered into your hands, and you will have to\ngive an account of her.\"\n\n\"My good Yeo,\" said Frank, \"I trust we shall give good account enough\nof many a tall Spaniard before we return: but you know surely that La\nGuayra, and the salvation of one whom we believe dwells there, was our\nfirst object in this adventure.\"\n\nYeo shook his head sadly. \"Ah, sirs, a lady brought Captain Oxenham to\nruin.\"\n\n\"You do not dare to compare her with this one?\" said Frank and Cary,\nboth in a breath.\n\n\"God forbid, gentlemen: but no adventure will prosper, unless there is a\nsingle eye to the Lord's work; and that is, as I take it, to cripple\nthe Spaniard, and exalt her majesty the queen. And I had thought that\nnothing was more dear than that to Captain Leigh's heart.\"\n\nAmyas stood somewhat irresolute. His duty to the queen bade him follow\nthe Spanish vessel: his duty to his vow, to go on to La Guayra. It may\nseem a far-fetched dilemma. He found it a practical one enough.\n\nHowever, the counsel of Frank prevailed, and on to La Guayra he went. He\nhalf hoped that the Spaniard would see and attack them. However, he went\non his way to the eastward; which if he had not done, my story had had a\nvery different ending.\n\nAbout mid-day a canoe, the first which they had seen, came staggering\ntoward them under a huge three-cornered sail. As it came near, they\ncould see two Indians on board.\n\n\"Metal floats in these seas, you see,\" quoth Cary. \"There's a fresh\nmarvel, for you, Frank.\"\n\n\"Expound,\" quoth Frank, who was really ready to swallow any fresh\nmarvel, so many had he seen already.\n\n\"Why, how else would those two bronze statues dare to go to sea in such\na cockleshell, eh? Have I given you the dor now, master courtier!\"\n\n\"I am long past dors, Will. But what noble creatures they are! and how\nfearlessly they are coming alongside! Can they know that we are English,\nand the avengers of the Indians?\"\n\n\"I suspect they just take us for Spaniards, and want to sell their\ncocoa-nuts. See, the canoe is laden with vegetables.\"\n\n\"Hail them, Yeo!\" said Amyas. \"You talk the best Spanish, and I want\nspeech of one of them.\"\n\nYeo did so; the canoe, without more ado, ran alongside, and lowered her\nfelucca sail, while a splendid Indian scrambled on board like a cat.\n\nHe was full six feet high, and as bold and graceful of bearing as Frank\nor Amyas's self. He looked round for the first moment smilingly, showing\nhis white teeth; but the next, his countenance changed; and springing to\nthe side, he shouted to his comrade in Spanish--\n\n\"Treachery! No Spaniard,\" and would have leaped overboard, but a dozen\nstrong fellows caught him ere he could do so.\n\nIt required some trouble to master him, so strong was he, and so\nslippery his naked limbs; Amyas, meanwhile, alternately entreated the\nmen not to hurt the Indian, and the Indian to be quiet, and no harm\nshould happen to him; and so, after five minutes' confusion, the\nstranger gave in sulkily.\n\n\"Don't bind him. Let him loose, and make a ring round him. Now, my man,\nthere's a dollar for you.\"\n\nThe Indian's eyes glistened, and he took the coin.\n\n\"All I want of you is, first, to tell me what ships are in La Guayra,\nand next, to go thither on board of me, and show me which is the\ngovernor's house, and which the custom-house.\"\n\nThe Indian laid the coin down on the deck, and crossing himself, looked\nAmyas in the face.\n\n\"No, senor! I am a freeman and a cavalier, a Christian Guayqueria,\nwhose forefathers, first of all the Indians, swore fealty to the King of\nSpain, and whom he calls to this day in all his proclamations his most\nfaithful, loyal, and noble Guayquerias. God forbid, therefore, that I\nshould tell aught to his enemies, who are my enemies likewise.\"\n\nA growl arose from those of the men who understood him; and more than\none hinted that a cord twined round the head, or a match put between the\nfingers, would speedily extract the required information.\n\n\"God forbid!\" said Amyas; \"a brave and loyal man he is, and as such\nwill I treat him. Tell me, my brave fellow, how do you know us to be his\nCatholic majesty's enemies?\"\n\nThe Indian, with a shrewd smile, pointed to half-a-dozen different\nobjects, saying to each, \"Not Spanish.\"\n\n\"Well, and what of that?\"\n\n\"None but Spaniards and free Guayquerias have a right to sail these\nseas.\"\n\nAmyas laughed.\n\n\"Thou art a right valiant bit of copper. Pick up thy dollar, and go thy\nway in peace. Make room for him, men. We can learn what we want without\nhis help.\"\n\nThe Indian paused, incredulous and astonished. \"Overboard with you!\"\nquoth Amyas. \"Don't you know when you are well off?\"\n\n\"Most illustrious senor,\" began the Indian, in the drawling sententious\nfashion of his race (when they take the trouble to talk at all), \"I\nhave been deceived. I heard that you heretics roasted and ate all true\nCatholics (as we Guayquerias are), and that all your padres had tails.\"\n\n\"Plague on you, sirrah!\" squeaked Jack Brimblecombe. \"Have I a tail?\nLook here!\"\n\n\"Quien sabe? Who knows?\" quoth the Indian through his nose.\n\n\"How do you know we are heretics?\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Humph! But in repayment for your kindness, I would warn you,\nillustrious senor, not to go on to La Guayra. There are ships of war\nthere waiting for you; and moreover, the governor Don Guzman sailed to\nthe eastward only yesterday to look for you; and I wonder much that you\ndid not meet him.\"\n\n\"To look for us! On the watch for us!\" said Cary. \"Impossible; lies!\nAmyas, this is some trick of the rascal's to frighten us away.\"\n\n\"Don Guzman came out but yesterday to look for us? Are you sure you\nspoke truth?\"\n\n\"As I live, senor, he and another ship, for which I took yours.\"\n\nAmyas stamped upon the deck: that then was the ship which they had\npassed!\n\n\"Fool that I was to have been close to my enemy, and let my opportunity\nslip! If I had but done my duty, all would have gone right!\"\n\nBut it was too late to repine; and after all, the Indian's story was\nlikely enough to be false.\n\n\"Off with you!\" said he; and the Indian bounded over the side into his\ncanoe, leaving the whole crew wondering at the stateliness and courtesy\nof this bold sea-cavalier.\n\nSo Westward-ho they ran, beneath the mighty northern wall, the highest\ncliff on earth, some seven thousand feet of rock parted from the sea\nby a narrow strip of bright green lowland. Here and there a patch of\nsugar-cane, or a knot of cocoa-nut trees, close to the water's edge,\nreminded them that they were in the tropics; but above, all was savage,\nrough, and bare as an Alpine precipice. Sometimes deep clefts allowed\nthe southern sun to pour a blaze of light down to the sea marge, and\ngave glimpses far above of strange and stately trees lining the glens,\nand of a veil of perpetual mist which shrouded the inner summits; while\nup and down, between them and the mountain side, white fleecy clouds\nhung motionless in the burning air, increasing the impression of\nvastness and of solemn rest, which was already overpowering.\n\n\"Within those mountains, three thousand feet above our heads,\" said\nDrew, the master, \"lies Saint Yago de Leon, the great city which the\nSpaniards founded fifteen years agone.\"\n\n\"Is it a rich place?\" asked Cary.\n\n\"Very, they say.\"\n\n\"Is it a strong place?\" asked Amyas.\n\n\"No forts to it at all, they say. The Spaniards boast, that Heaven has\nmade such good walls to it already, that man need make none.\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" quoth Amyas. \"Lads, could you climb those hills, do you\nthink?\"\n\n\"Rather higher than Harty Point, sir: but it depends pretty much on\nwhat's behind them.\"\n\nAnd now the last point is rounded, and they are full in sight of the\nspot in quest of which they have sailed four thousand miles of sea. A\nlow black cliff, crowned by a wall; a battery at either end. Within, a\nfew narrow streets of white houses, running parallel with the sea, upon\na strip of flat, which seemed not two hundred yards in breadth; and\nbehind, the mountain wall, covering the whole in deepest shade. How that\nwall was ever ascended to the inland seemed the puzzle; but Drew, who\nhad been off the place before, pointed out to them a narrow path, which\nwound upwards through a glen, seemingly sheer perpendicular. That was\nthe road to the capital, if any man dare try it. In spite of the shadow\nof the mountain, the whole place wore a dusty and glaring look. The\nbreaths of air which came off the land were utterly stifling; and no\nwonder, for La Guayra, owing to the radiation of that vast fire-brick\nof heated rock, is one of the hottest spots upon the face of the whole\nearth.\n\nWhere was the harbor? There was none. Only an open roadstead, wherein\nlay tossing at anchor five vessels. The two outer ones were small\nmerchant caravels. Behind them lay two long, low, ugly-looking craft, at\nsight of which Yeo gave a long whew.\n\n\"Galleys, as I'm a sinful saint! And what's that big one inside of them,\nRobert Drew? She has more than hawseholes in her idolatrous black sides,\nI think.\"\n\n\"We shall open her astern of the galleys in another minute,\" said Amyas.\n\"Look out, Cary, your eyes are better than mine.\"\n\n\"Six round portholes on the main deck,\" quoth Will.\n\n\"And I can see the brass patararoes glittering on her poop,\" quoth\nAmyas. \"Will, we're in for it.\"\n\n\"In for it we are, captain.\n\n     \"Farewell, farewell, my parents dear.\n     I never shall see you more, I fear.\n\n\"Let's go in, nevertheless, and pound the Don's ribs, my old lad of\nSmerwick. Eh? Three to one is very fair odds.\"\n\n\"Not underneath those fort guns, I beg leave to say,\" quoth Yeo. \"If the\nPhilistines will but come out unto us, we will make them like unto Zeba\nand Zalmunna.\"\n\n\"Quite true,\" said Amyas. \"Game cocks are game cocks, but reason's\nreason.\"\n\n\"If the Philistines are not coming out, they are going to send a\nmessenger instead,\" quoth Cary. \"Look out, all thin skulls!\"\n\nAnd as he spoke, a puff of white smoke rolled from the eastern fort, and\na heavy ball plunged into the water between it and the ship.\n\n\"I don't altogether like this,\" quoth Amyas. \"What do they mean by\nfiring on us without warning? And what are these ships of war doing\nhere? Drew, you told me the armadas never lay here.\"\n\n\"No more, I believe, they do, sir, on account of the anchorage being so\nbad, as you may see. I'm mortal afeared that rascal's story was true,\nand that the Dons have got wind of our coming.\"\n\n\"Run up a white flag, at all events. If they do expect us, they must\nhave known some time since, or how could they have got their craft\nhither?\"\n\n\"True, sir. They must have come from Santa Marta, at the least; perhaps\nfrom Cartagena. And that would take a month at least going and coming.\"\n\nAmyas suddenly recollected Eustace's threat in the wayside inn. Could he\nhave betrayed their purpose? Impossible!\n\n\"Let us hold a council of war, at all events, Frank.\"\n\nFrank was absorbed in a very different matter. A half-mile to the\neastward of the town, two or three hundred feet up the steep mountain\nside, stood a large, low, white house embosomed in trees and gardens.\nThere was no other house of similar size near; no place for one. And was\nnot that the royal flag of Spain which flaunted before it? That must be\nthe governor's house; that must be the abode of the Rose of Torridge!\nAnd Frank stood devouring it with wild eyes, till he had persuaded\nhimself that he could see a woman's figure walking upon the terrace\nin front, and that the figure was none other than hers whom he sought.\nAmyas could hardly tear him away to a council of war, which was a sad,\nand only not a peevish one.\n\nThe three adventurers, with Brimblecombe, Yeo, and Drew, went apart upon\nthe poop; and each looked the other in the face awhile. For what was\nto be done? The plans and hopes of months were brought to naught in an\nhour.\n\n\"It is impossible, you see,\" said Amyas, at last, \"to surprise the town\nby land, while these ships are here; for if we land our men, we leave\nour ship without defence.\"\n\n\"As impossible as to challenge Don Guzman while he is not here,\" said\nCary.\n\n\"I wonder why the ships have not opened on us already,\" said Drew.\n\n\"Perhaps they respect our flag of truce,\" said Cary. \"Why not send in a\nboat to treat with them, and to inquire for--\n\n\"For her?\" interrupted Frank. \"If we show that we are aware of her\nexistence, her name is blasted in the eyes of those jealous Spaniards.\"\n\n\"And as for respecting our flag of truce, gentlemen,\" said Yeo, \"if you\nwill take an old man's advice, trust them not. They will keep the same\nfaith with us as they kept with Captain Hawkins at San Juan d'Ulloa, in\nthat accursed business which was the beginning of all the wars; when\nwe might have taken the whole plate-fleet, with two hundred thousand\npounds' worth of gold on board, and did not, but only asked license to\ntrade like honest men. And yet, after they had granted us license, and\ndeceived us by fair speech into landing ourselves and our ordnance, the\ngovernor and all the fleet set upon us, five to one, and gave no quarter\nto any soul whom he took. No, sir; I expect the only reason why they\ndon't attack us is, because their crews are not on board.\"\n\n\"They will be, soon enough, then,\" said Amyas. \"I can see soldiers\ncoming down the landing-stairs.\"\n\nAnd, in fact, boats full of armed men began to push off to the ships.\n\n\"We may thank Heaven,\" said Drew, \"that we were not here two hours\nagone. The sun will be down before they are ready for sea, and the\nfellows will have no stomach to go looking for us by night.\"\n\n\"So much the worse for us. If they will but do that, we may give them\nthe slip, and back again to the town, and there try our luck; for I\ncannot find it in my heart to leave the place without having one dash at\nit.\"\n\nYeo shook his head. \"There are plenty more towns along the coast more\nworth trying than this, sir: but Heaven's will be done!\"\n\nAnd as they spoke, the sun plunged into the sea, and all was dark.\n\nAt last it was agreed to anchor, and wait till midnight. If the ships\nof war came out, they were to try to run in past them, and, desperate\nas the attempt might be, attempt their original plan of landing to the\nwestward of the town, taking it in flank, plundering the government\nstorehouses, which they saw close to the landing-place, and then\nfighting their way back to their boats, and out of the roadstead. Two\nhours would suffice if the armada and the galleys were but once out of\nthe way.\n\nAmyas went forward, called the men together, and told them the plan. It\nwas not very cheerfully received: but what else was there to be done!\n\nThey ran down about a mile and a half to the westward, and anchored.\n\nThe night wore on, and there was no sign of stir among the shipping;\nfor though they could not see the vessels themselves, yet their lights\n(easily distinguished by their relative height from those in the town\nabove) remained motionless; and the men fretted and fumed for weary\nhours at thus seeing a rich prize (for of course the town was paved with\ngold) within arm's reach, and yet impossible.\n\nLet Amyas and his men have patience. Some short five years more, and the\ngreat Armada will have come and gone; and then that avenging storm,\nof which they, like Oxenham, Hawkins, and Drake, are but the\navant-couriers, will burst upon every Spanish port from Corunna to\nCadiz, from the Canaries to Havana, and La Guayra and St. Yago de Leon\nwill not escape their share. Captain Amyas Preston and Captain Sommers,\nthe colonist of the Bermudas, or Sommers' Islands, will land, with a\nforce tiny enough, though larger far than Leigh's, where Leigh dare not\nland; and taking the fort of Guayra, will find, as Leigh found, that\ntheir coming has been expected, and that the Pass of the Venta, three\nthousand feet above, has been fortified with huge barricadoes, abattis,\nand cannon, making the capital, amid its ring of mountain-walls,\nimpregnable--to all but Englishmen or Zouaves. For up that seven\nthousand feet of precipice, which rises stair on stair behind the town,\nthose fierce adventurers will climb hand over hand, through rain and\nfog, while men lie down, and beg their officers to kill them, for no\nfarther can they go. Yet farther they will go, hewing a path with their\nswords through woods of wild plantain, and rhododendron thickets, over\n(so it seems, however incredible) the very saddle of the Silla,* down\nupon the astonished \"Mantuanos\" of St. Jago, driving all before them;\nand having burnt the city in default of ransom, will return triumphant\nby the right road, and pass along the coast, the masters of the deep.\n\n     * Humboldt says that there is a path from Caravellada to St.\n     Jago, between the peaks, used by smugglers.  This is\n     probably the \"unknowen way of the Indians,\" which Preston\n     used.\n\nI know not whether any men still live who count their descent from those\ntwo valiant captains; but if such there be, let them be sure that the\nhistory of the English navy tells no more Titanic victory over nature\nand man than that now forgotten raid of Amyas Preston and his comrade,\nin the year of grace 1595.\n\nBut though a venture on the town was impossible, yet there was another\nventure which Frank was unwilling to let slip. A light which now shone\nbrightly in one of the windows of the governor's house was the lodestar\nto which all his thoughts were turned; and as he sat in the cabin with\nAmyas, Cary, and Jack, he opened his heart to them.\n\n\"And are we, then,\" asked he, mournfully, \"to go without doing the very\nthing for which we came?\"\n\nAll were silent awhile. At last John Brimblecombe spoke.\n\n\"Show me the way to do it, Mr. Frank, and I will go.\"\n\n\"My dearest man,\" said Amyas, \"what would you have? Any attempt to see\nher, even if she be here, would be all but certain death.\"\n\n\"And what if it were? What if it were, my brother Amyas? Listen to me. I\nhave long ceased to shrink from Death; but till I came into these magic\nclimes, I never knew the beauty of his face.\"\n\n\"Of death?\" said Cary. \"I should have said, of life. God forgive me! but\nman might wish to live forever, if he had such a world as this wherein\nto live.\"\n\n\"And do you forget, Cary, that the more fair this passing world of time,\nby so much the more fair is that eternal world, whereof all here is but\na shadow and a dream; by so much the more fair is He before whose throne\nthe four mystic beasts, the substantial ideas of Nature and her powers,\nstand day and night, crying, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts, Thou\nhast made all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created!'\nMy friends, if He be so prodigal of His own glory as to have decked\nthese lonely shores, all but unknown since the foundation of the world,\nwith splendors beyond all our dreams, what must be the glory of His face\nitself! I have done with vain shadows. It is better to depart and to be\nwith Him, where shall be neither desire nor anger, self-deception nor\npretence, but the eternal fulness of reality and truth. One thing I\nhave to do before I die, for God has laid it on me. Let that be done\nto-night, and then, farewell!\"\n\n\"Frank! Frank! remember our mother!\"\n\n\"I do remember her. I have talked over these things with her many a\ntime; and where I would fain be, she would fain be also. She sent me out\nwith my virgin honor, as the Spartan mother did her boy with the shield,\nsaying, 'Come back either with this, or upon this;' and one or the other\nI must do, if I would meet her either in this life or in the next. But\nin the meanwhile do not mistake me; my life is God's, and I promise not\nto cast it away rashly.\"\n\n\"What would you do, then?\"\n\n\"Go up to that house, Amyas, and speak with her, if Heaven gives me an\nopportunity, as Heaven, I feel assured, will give.\"\n\n\"And do you call that no rashness?\"\n\n\"Is any duty rashness? Is it rash to stand amid the flying bullets, if\nyour queen has sent you? Is it more rash to go to seek Christ's lost\nlamb, if God and your own oath hath sent you? John Brimblecombe answered\nthat question for us long ago.\"\n\n\"If you go, I go with you!\" said all three at once.\n\n\"No. Amyas, you owe a duty to our mother and to your ship. Cary, you are\nheir to great estates, and are bound thereby to your country and to your\ntenants. John Brimblecombe--\"\n\n\"Ay!\" squeaked Jack. \"And what have you to say, Mr. Frank, against my\ngoing?--I, who have neither ship nor estates--except, I suppose, that I\nam not worthy to travel in such good company?\"\n\n\"Think of your old parents, John, and all your sisters.\"\n\n\"I thought of them before I started, sir, as Mr. Cary knows, and\nyou know too. I came here to keep my vow, and I am not going to turn\nrenegade at the very foot of the cross.\"\n\n\"Some one must go with you, Frank,\" said Amyas; \"if it were only to\nbring back the boat's crew in case--\" and he faltered.\n\n\"In case I fall,\" replied Frank, with a smile. \"I will finish your\nsentence for you, lad; I am not afraid of it, though you may be for me.\nYet some one, I fear, must go. Unhappy me! that I cannot risk my own\nworthless life without risking your more precious lives!\"\n\n\"Not so, Mr. Frank! Your oath is our oath, and your duty ours!\" said\nJohn. \"I will tell you what we will do, gentlemen all. We three will\ndraw cuts for the honor of going with him.\"\n\n\"Lots?\" said Amyas. \"I don't like leaving such grave matters to chance,\nfriend John.\"\n\n\"Chance, sir? When you have used all your own wit, and find it fail you,\nthen what is drawing lots but taking the matter out of your own weak\nhands, and laying it in God's strong hands?\"\n\n\"Right, John!\" said Frank. \"So did the apostles choose their successor,\nand so did holy men of old decide controversies too subtle for them;\nand we will not be ashamed to follow their example. For my part, I have\noften said to Sidney and to Spenser, when we have babbled together of\nUtopian governments in days which are now dreams to me, that I would\nhave all officers of state chosen by lot out of the wisest and most fit;\nso making sure that they should be called by God, and not by man alone.\nGentlemen, do you agree to Sir John's advice?\"\n\nThey agreed, seeing no better counsel, and John put three slips of paper\ninto Frank's hand, with the simple old apostolic prayer--\n\n\"Show which of us three Thou hast chosen.\"\n\nThe lot fell upon Amyas Leigh.\n\nFrank shuddered, and clasped his hands over his face.\n\n\"Well,\" said Cary, \"I have ill-luck to-night: but Frank goes at least in\ngood company.\"\n\n\"Ah, that it had been I!\" said Jack; \"though I suppose I was too poor a\nbody to have such an honor fall on me. And yet it is hard for flesh and\nblood; hard indeed to have come all this way, and not to see her after\nall!\"\n\n\"Jack,\" said Frank, \"you are kept to do better work than this, doubt\nnot. But if the lot had fallen on you--ay, if it had fallen on a three\nyears' child, I would have gone up as cheerfully with that child to lead\nme, as I do now with this my brother! Amyas, can we have a boat, and a\ncrew? It is near midnight already.\"\n\nAmyas went on deck, and asked for six volunteers. Whosoever would come,\nAmyas would double out of his own purse any prize-money which might fall\nto that man's share.\n\nOne of the old Pelican's crew, Simon Evans of Clovelly, stepped out at\nonce.\n\n\"Why six only, captain? Give the word, and any and all of us will go\nup with you, sack the house, and bring off the treasure and the lady,\nbefore two hours are out.\"\n\n\"No, no, my brave lads! As for treasure, if there be any, it is sure to\nhave been put all safe into the forts, or hidden in the mountains; and\nas for the lady, God forbid that we should force her a step without her\nown will.\"\n\nThe honest sailor did not quite understand this punctilio: but--\n\n\"Well, captain,\" quoth he, \"as you like; but no man shall say that you\nasked for a volunteer, were it to jump down a shark's throat, but what\nyou had me first of all the crew.\"\n\nAfter this sort of temper had been exhibited, three or four more came\nforward--Yeo was very anxious to go, but Amyas forbade him.\n\n\"I'll volunteer, sir, without reward, for this or anything; though\"\n(added he in a lower tone) \"I would to Heaven that the thought had never\nentered your head.\"\n\n\"And so would I have volunteered,\" said Simon Evans, \"if it were the\nship's quarrel, or the queen's; but being it's a private matter of the\ncaptain's, and I've a wife and children at home, why, I take no shame to\nmyself for asking money for my life.\"\n\nSo the crew was made up; but ere they pushed off, Amyas called Cary\naside--\n\n\"If I perish, Will--\"\n\n\"Don't talk of such things, dear old lad.\"\n\n\"I must. Then you are captain. Do nothing without Yeo and Drew. But if\nthey approve, go right north away for San Domingo and Cuba, and try the\nports; they can have no news of us there, and there is booty without\nend. Tell my mother that I died like a gentleman; and mind--mind, dear\nlad, to keep your temper with the men, let the poor fellows grumble as\nthey may. Mind but that, and fear God, and all will go well.\"\n\nThe tears were glistening in Cary's eyes as he pressed Amyas's hand, and\nwatched the two brothers down over the side upon their desperate errand.\n\nThey reached the pebble beach. There seemed no difficulty about finding\nthe path to the house--so bright was the moon, and so careful a survey\nof the place had Frank taken. Leaving the men with the boat (Amyas had\ntaken care that they should be well armed), they started up the beach,\nwith their swords only. Frank assured Amyas that they would find a path\nleading from the beach up to the house, and he was not mistaken. They\nfound it easily, for it was made of white shell sand; and following it,\nstruck into a \"tunal,\" or belt of tall thorny cactuses. Through this\nthe path wound in zigzags up a steep rocky slope, and ended at a\nwicket-gate. They tried it, and found it open.\n\n\"She may expect us,\" whispered Frank.\n\n\"Impossible!\"\n\n\"Why not? She must have seen our ship; and if, as seems, the townsfolk\nknow who we are, how much more must she! Yes, doubt it not, she still\nlongs to hear news of her own land, and some secret sympathy will draw\nher down towards the sea to-night. See! the light is in the window\nstill!\"\n\n\"But if not,\" said Amyas, who had no such expectation, \"what is your\nplan?\"\n\n\"I have none.\"\n\n\"None?\"\n\n\"I have imagined twenty different ones in the last hour; but all are\nequally uncertain, impossible. I have ceased to struggle--I go where\nI am called, love's willing victim. If Heaven accept the sacrifice, it\nwill provide the altar and the knife.\"\n\nAymas was at his wits' end. Judging of his brother by himself, he had\ntaken for granted that Frank had some well-concocted scheme for gaining\nadmittance to the Rose; and as the wiles of love were altogether out of\nhis province, he had followed in full faith such a sans-appel as he held\nFrank to be. But now he almost doubted of his brother's sanity, though\nFrank's manner was perfectly collected and his voice firm. Amyas, honest\nfellow, had no understanding of that intense devotion, which so many in\nthose days (not content with looking on it as a lofty virtue, and yet\none to be duly kept in its place by other duties) prided themselves on\npampering into the most fantastic and self-willed excesses.\n\nBeautiful folly! the death-song of which two great geniuses were\ncomposing at that very moment, each according to his light. For, while\nSpenser was embalming in immortal verse all that it contained of noble\nand Christian elements, Cervantes sat, perhaps, in his dungeon, writing\nwith his left hand Don Quixote, saddest of books, in spite of all its\nwit; the story of a pure and noble soul, who mistakes this actual life\nfor that ideal one which he fancies (and not so wrongly either) eternal\nin the heavens: and finding instead of a battlefield for heroes in God's\ncause, nothing but frivolity, heartlessness, and godlessness, becomes a\nlaughing-stock,--and dies. One of the saddest books, I say again, which\nman can read.\n\nAmyas hardly dare trust himself to speak, for fear of saying too much;\nbut he could not help saying--\n\n\"You are going to certain death, Frank.\"\n\n\"Did I not entreat,\" answered he, very quietly, \"to go alone?\"\n\nAmyas had half a mind to compel him to return: but he feared Frank's\nobstinacy; and feared, too, the shame of returning on board without\nhaving done anything; so they went up through the wicket-gate, along a\nsmooth turf walk, into what seemed a pleasure-garden, formed by the hand\nof man, or rather of woman. For by the light, not only of the moon, but\nof the innumerable fireflies, which flitted to and fro across the sward\nlike fiery imps sent to light the brothers on their way, they could see\nthat the bushes on either side, and the trees above their heads, were\ndecked with flowers of such strangeness and beauty, that, as Frank\nonce said of Barbados, \"even the gardens of Wilton were a desert in\ncomparison.\" All around were orange and lemon trees (probably the only\naddition which man had made to Nature's prodigality), the fruit of\nwhich, in that strange colored light of the fireflies, flashed in their\neyes like balls of burnished gold and emerald; while great white tassels\nswinging from every tree in the breeze which swept down the glade,\ntossed in their faces a fragrant snow of blossoms, and glittering drops\nof perfumed dew.\n\n\"What a paradise!\" said Amyas to Frank, \"with the serpent in it, as of\nold. Look!\"\n\nAnd as he spoke, there dropped slowly down from a bough, right before\nthem, what seemed a living chain of gold, ruby, and sapphire. Both\nstopped, and another glance showed the small head and bright eyes of a\nsnake, hissing and glaring full in their faces.\n\n\"See!\" said Frank. \"And he comes, as of old, in the likeness of an angel\nof light. Do not strike it. There are worse devils to be fought with\nto-night than that poor beast.\" And stepping aside, they passed the\nsnake safely, and arrived in front of the house.\n\nIt was, as I have said, a long low house, with balconies along the upper\nstory, and the under part mostly open to the wind. The light was still\nburning in the window.\n\n\"Whither now?\" said Amyas, in a tone of desperate resignation.\n\n\"Thither! Where else on earth?\" and Frank pointed to the light,\ntrembling from head to foot, and pushed on.\n\n\"For Heaven's sake! Look at the negroes on the barbecue!\"\n\nIt was indeed time to stop; for on the barbecue, or terrace of white\nplaster, which ran all round the front, lay sleeping full twenty black\nfigures.\n\n\"What will you do now? You must step over them to gain an entrance.\"\n\n\"Wait here, and I will go up gently towards the window. She may see me.\nShe will see me as I step into the moonlight. At least I know an air by\nwhich she will recognize me, if I do but hum a stave.\"\n\n\"Why, you do not even know that that light is hers!--Down, for your\nlife!\"\n\nAnd Amyas dragged him down into the bushes on his left hand; for one\nof the negroes, wakening suddenly with a cry, had sat up, and began\ncrossing himself four or five times, in fear of \"Duppy,\" and mumbling\nvarious charms, ayes, or what not.\n\nThe light above was extinguished instantly.\n\n\"Did you see her?\" whispered Frank.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"I did--the shadow of the face, and the neck! Can I be mistaken?\" And\nthen, covering his face with his hands, he murmured to himself, \"Misery!\nmisery! So near and yet impossible?\"\n\n\"Would it be the less impossible were you face to face? Let us go back.\nWe cannot go up without detection, even if our going were of use. Come\nback, for God's sake, ere all is lost! If you have seen her, as you say,\nyou know at least that she is alive, and safe in his house--\"\n\n\"As his mistress? or as his wife? Do I know that yet, Amyas, and can I\ndepart until I know?\" There was a few minutes' silence, and then Amyas,\nmaking one last attempt to awaken Frank to the absurdity of the whole\nthing, and to laugh him, if possible, out of it, as argument had no\neffect--\n\n\"My dear fellow, I am very hungry and sleepy; and this bush is very\nprickly; and my boots are full of ants--\"\n\n\"So are mine.--Look!\" and Frank caught Amyas's arm, and clenched it\ntight.\n\nFor round the farther corner of the house a dark cloaked figure stole\ngently, turning a look now and then upon the sleeping negroes, and came\non right toward them.\n\n\"Did I not tell you she would come?\" whispered Frank, in a triumphant\ntone.\n\nAmyas was quite bewildered; and to his mind the apparition seemed\nmagical, and Frank prophetic; for as the figure came nearer, incredulous\nas he tried to be, there was no denying that the shape and the walk were\nexactly those of her, to find whom they had crossed the Atlantic. True,\nthe figure was somewhat taller; but then, \"she must be grown since I saw\nher,\" thought Amyas; and his heart for the moment beat as fiercely as\nFrank's.\n\nBut what was that behind her? Her shadow against the white wall of the\nhouse. Not so. Another figure, cloaked likewise, but taller far, was\nfollowing on her steps. It was a man's. They could see that he wore a\nbroad sombrero. It could not be Don Guzman, for he was at sea. Who then?\nHere was a mystery; perhaps a tragedy. And both brothers held their\nbreaths, while Amyas felt whether his sword was loose in the sheath.\n\nThe Rose (if indeed it was she) was within ten yards of them, when she\nperceived that she was followed. She gave a little shriek. The cavalier\nsprang forward, lifted his hat courteously, and joined her, bowing low.\nThe moonlight was full upon his face.\n\n\"It is Eustace, our cousin! How came he here, in the name of all the\nfiends?\"\n\n\"Eustace! Then that is she, after all!\" said Frank, forgetting\neverything else in her.\n\nAnd now flashed across Amyas all that had passed between him and Eustace\nin the moorland inn, and Parracombe's story, too, of the suspicious\ngipsy. Eustace had been beforehand with them, and warned Don Guzman! All\nwas explained now: but how had he got hither?\n\n\"The devil, his master, sent him hither on a broomstick, I suppose: or\nwhat matter how? Here he is; and here we are, worse luck!\" And, setting\nhis teeth, Amyas awaited the end.\n\nThe two came on, talking earnestly, and walking at a slow pace, so that\nthe brothers could hear every word.\n\n\"What shall we do now?\" said Frank. \"We have no right to be\neavesdroppers.\"\n\n\"But we must be, right or none.\" And Amyas held him down firmly by the\narm.\n\n\"But whither are you going, then, my dear madam?\" they heard Eustace\nsay in a wheedling tone. \"Can you wonder if such strange conduct should\ncause at least sorrow to your admirable and faithful husband?\"\n\n\"Husband!\" whispered Frank faintly to Amyas. \"Thank God, thank God! I am\ncontent. Let us go.\"\n\nBut to go was impossible; for, as fate would have it, the two had\nstopped just opposite them.\n\n\"The inestimable Senor Don Guzman--\" began Eustace again.\n\n\"What do you mean by praising him to me in this fulsome way, sir? Do you\nsuppose that I do not know his virtues better than you?\"\n\n\"If you do, madam\" (this was spoken in a harder tone), \"it were wise for\nyou to try them less severely, than by wandering down towards the beach\non the very night that you know his most deadly enemies are lying in\nwait to slay him, plunder his house, and most probably to carry you off\nfrom him.\"\n\n\"Carry me off? I will die first!\"\n\n\"Who can prove that to him? Appearances are at least against you.\"\n\n\"My love to him, and his trust for me, sir!\"\n\n\"His trust? Have you forgotten, madam, what passed last week, and why he\nsailed yesterday?\"\n\nThe only answer was a burst of tears. Eustace stood watching her with a\nterrible eye; but they could see his face writhing in the moonlight.\n\n\"Oh!\" sobbed she at last. \"And if I have been imprudent, was it not\nnatural to wish to look once more upon an English ship? Are you not\nEnglish as well as I? Have you no longing recollections of the dear old\nland at home?\"\n\nEustace was silent; but his face worked more fiercely than ever.\n\n\"How can he ever know it?\"\n\n\"Why should he not know it?\"\n\n\"Ah!\" she burst out passionately, \"why not, indeed, while you are here?\nYou, sir, the tempter, you the eavesdropper, you the sunderer of loving\nhearts! You, serpent, who found our home a paradise, and see it now a\nhell!\"\n\n\"Do you dare to accuse me thus, madam, without a shadow of evidence?\"\n\n\"Dare? I dare anything, for I know all! I have watched you, sir, and I\nhave borne with you too long.\"\n\n\"Me, madam, whose only sin towards you, as you should know by now, is to\nhave loved you too well? Rose! Rose! have you not blighted my life for\nme--broken my heart? And how have I repaid you? How but by sacrificing\nmyself to seek you over land and sea, that I might complete your\nconversion to the bosom of that Church where a Virgin Mother stands\nstretching forth soft arms to embrace her wandering daughter, and cries\nto you all day long, 'Come unto me, ye that are weary and heavy laden,\nand I will give you rest!' And this is my reward!\"\n\n\"Depart with your Virgin Mother, sir, and tempt me no more! You have\nasked me what I dare; and I dare this, upon my own ground, and in my\nown garden, I, Donna Rosa de Soto, to bid you leave this place now and\nforever, after having insulted me by talking of your love, and tempted\nme to give up that faith which my husband promised me he would respect\nand protect. Go, sir!\"\n\nThe brothers listened breathless with surprise as much as with rage.\nLove and conscience, and perhaps, too, the pride of her lofty alliance,\nhad converted the once gentle and dreamy Rose into a very Roxana; but it\nwas only the impulse of a moment. The words had hardly passed her lips,\nwhen, terrified at what she had said, she burst into a fresh flood of\ntears; while Eustace answered calmly:\n\n\"I go, madam: but how know you that I may not have orders, and that,\nafter your last strange speech, my conscience may compel me to obey\nthose orders, to take you with me?\"\n\n\"Me? with you?\"\n\n\"My heart has bled for you, madam, for many a year. It longs now that\nit had bled itself to death, and never known the last worst agony of\ntelling you--\"\n\nAnd drawing close to her he whispered in her ear--what, the brothers\nheard not--but her answer was a shriek which rang through the woods, and\nsent the night-birds fluttering up from every bough above their heads.\n\n\"By Heaven!\" said Amyas, \"I can stand this no longer. Cut that devil's\nthroat I must--\"\n\n\"She is lost if his dead body is found by her.\"\n\n\"We are lost if we stay here, then,\" said Amyas; \"for those negroes will\nhurry down at her cry, and then found we must be.\"\n\n\"Are you mad, madam, to betray yourself by your own cries? The negroes\nwill be here in a moment. I give you one last chance for life, then:\"\nand Eustace shouted in Spanish at the top of his voice, \"Help, help,\nservants! Your mistress is being carried off by bandits!\"\n\n\"What do you mean, sir?\"\n\n\"Let your woman's wit supply the rest: and forget not him who thus saves\nyou from disgrace.\"\n\nWhether the brothers heard the last words or not, I know not; but taking\nfor granted that Eustace had discovered them, they sprang to their feet\nat once, determined to make one last appeal, and then to sell their\nlives as dearly as they could.\n\nEustace started back at the unexpected apparition; but a second glance\nshowed him Amyas's mighty bulk; and he spoke calmly--\n\n\"You see, madam, I did not call without need. Welcome, good cousins. My\ncharity, as you perceive, has found means to outstrip your craft; while\nthe fair lady, as was but natural, has been true to her assignation!\"\n\n\"Liar!\" cried Frank. \"She never knew of our being--\"\n\n\"Credat Judaeus!\" answered Eustace; but, as he spoke, Amyas burst\nthrough the bushes at him. There was no time to be lost; and ere the\ngiant could disentangle himself from the boughs and shrubs, Eustace had\nslipped off his long cloak, thrown it over Amyas's head, and ran up the\nalley shouting for help.\n\nMad with rage, Amyas gave chase: but in two minutes more Eustace was\nsafe among the ranks of the negroes, who came shouting and jabbering\ndown the path.\n\nHe rushed back. Frank was just ending some wild appeal to Rose--\n\n\"Your conscience! your religion!--\"\n\n\"No, never! I can face the chance of death, but not the loss of him. Go!\nfor God's sake, leave me!\"\n\n\"You are lost, then,--and I have ruined you!\"\n\n\"Come off, now or never,\" cried Amyas, clutching him by the arm, and\ndragging him away like a child.\n\n\"You forgive me?\" cried he.\n\n\"Forgive you?\" and she burst into tears again.\n\nFrank burst into tears also.\n\n\"Let me go back, and die with her--Amyas!--my oath!--my honor!\" and he\nstruggled to turn back.\n\nAmyas looked back too, and saw her standing calmly, with her hands\nfolded across her breast, awaiting Eustace and the servants; and he half\nturned to go back also. Both saw how fearfully appearances had put her\ninto Eustace's power. Had he not a right to suspect that they were there\nby her appointment; that she was going to escape with them? And would\nnot Eustace use his power? The thought of the Inquisition crossed their\nminds. \"Was that the threat which Eustace had whispered?\" asked he of\nFrank.\n\n\"It was,\" groaned Frank, in answer.\n\nFor the first and last time in his life, Amyas Leigh stood irresolute.\n\n\"Back, and stab her to the heart first!\" said Frank, struggling to\nescape from him.\n\nOh, if Amyas were but alone, and Frank safe home in England! To charge\nthe whole mob, kill her, kill Eustace, and then cut his way back again\nto the ship, or die,--what matter? as he must die some day,--sword in\nhand! But Frank!--and then flashed before his eyes his mother's hopeless\nface; then rang in his ears his mother's last bequest to him of that\nfrail treasure. Let Rose, let honor, let the whole world perish, he must\nsave Frank. See! the negroes were up with her now--past her--away for\nlife! and once more he dragged his brother down the hill, and through\nthe wicket, only just in time; for the whole gang of negroes were within\nten yards of them in full pursuit.\n\n\"Frank,\" said he, sharply, \"if you ever hope to see your mother again,\nrouse yourself, man, and fight!\" And, without waiting for an answer, he\nturned, and charged up-hill upon his pursuers, who saw the long bright\nblade, and fled instantly.\n\nAgain he hurried Frank down the hill; the path wound in zigzags, and he\nfeared that the negroes would come straight over the cliff, and so cut\noff his retreat: but the prickly cactuses were too much for them, and\nthey were forced to follow by the path, while the brothers (Frank having\nsomewhat regained his senses) turned every now and then to menace\nthem: but once on the rocky path, stones began to fly fast; small ones\nfortunately, and wide and wild for want of light--but when they reached\nthe pebble-beach? Both were too proud to run; but, if ever Amyas prayed\nin his life, he prayed for the last twenty yards before he reached the\nwater-mark.\n\n\"Now, Frank! down to the boat as hard as you can run, while I keep the\ncurs back.\"\n\n\"Amyas! what do you take me for? My madness brought you hither: your\ndevotion shall not bring me back without you.\"\n\n\"Together, then!\"\n\nAnd putting Frank's arm through his, they hurried down, shouting to\ntheir men.\n\nThe boat was not fifty yards off: but fast travelling over the pebbles\nwas impossible, and long ere half the distance was crossed, the negroes\nwere on the beach, and the storm burst. A volley of great quartz pebbles\nwhistled round their heads.\n\n\"Come on, Frank! for life's sake! Men, to the rescue! Ah! what was\nthat?\"\n\nThe dull crash of a pebble against Frank's fair head! Drooping like\nHyacinthus beneath the blow of the quoit, he sank on Amyas's arm. The\ngiant threw him over his shoulder, and plunged blindly on,--himself\nstruck again and again.\n\n\"Fire, men! Give it the black villains!\"\n\nThe arquebuses crackled from the boat in front. What were those\ndull thuds which answered from behind? Echoes? No. Over his head the\ncaliver-balls went screeching. The governors' guard have turned out,\nfollowed them to the beach, fixed their calivers, and are firing over\nthe negroes' heads, as the savages rush down upon the hapless brothers.\n\nIf, as all say, there are moments which are hours, how many hours was\nAmyas Leigh in reaching that boat's bow? Alas! the negroes are there as\nsoon as he, and the guard, having left their calivers, are close behind\nthem, sword in hand. Amyas is up to his knees in water--battered with\nstones--blinded with blood. The boat is swaying off and on against the\nsteep pebble-bank: he clutches at it--misses--falls headlong--rises\nhalf-choked with water: but Frank is still in his arms. Another heavy\nblow--a confused roar of shouts, shots, curses--a confused mass of\nnegroes and English, foam and pebbles--and he recollects no more.\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nHe is lying in the stern-sheets of the boat; stiff, weak, half blind\nwith blood. He looks up; the moon is still bright overhead: but they are\naway from the shore now, for the wave-crests are dancing white before\nthe land-breeze, high above the boat's side. The boat seems strangely\nempty. Two men are pulling instead of six! And what is this lying heavy\nacross his chest? He pushes, and is answered by a groan. He puts his\nhand down to rise, and is answered by another groan.\n\n\"What's this?\"\n\n\"All that are left of us,\" says Simon Evans of Clovelly.\n\n\"All?\" The bottom of the boat seemed paved with human bodies. \"Oh\nGod! oh God!\" moans Amyas, trying to rise. \"And where--where is Frank?\nFrank!\"\n\n\"Mr. Frank!\" cries Evans. There is no answer.\n\n\"Dead?\" shrieks Amyas. \"Look for him, for God's sake, look!\" and\nstruggling from under his living load, he peers into each pale and\nbleeding face.\n\n\"Where is he? Why don't you speak, forward there?\"\n\n\"Because we have naught to say, sir,\" answers Evans, almost surlily.\n\nFrank was not there.\n\n\"Put the boat about! To the shore!\" roars Amyas.\n\n\"Look over the gunwale, and judge for yourself, sir!\"\n\nThe waves are leaping fierce and high before a furious land-breeze.\nReturn is impossible.\n\n\"Cowards! villains! traitors! hounds! to have left him behind.\"\n\n\"Listen you to me, Captain Amyas Leigh,\" says Simon Evans, resting on\nhis oar; \"and hang me for mutiny, if you will, when we're aboard, if we\never get there. Isn't it enough to bring us out to death (as you knew\nyourself, sir, for you're prudent enough) to please that poor young\ngentleman's fancy about a wench; but you must call coward an honest man\nthat have saved your life this night, and not a one of us but has his\nwound to show?\"\n\nAmyas was silent; the rebuke was just.\n\n\"I tell you, sir, if we've hove a stone out of this boat since we got\noff, we've hove two hundredweight, and, if the Lord had not fought for\nus, she'd have been beat to noggin-staves there on the beach.\"\n\n\"How did I come here, then?\"\n\n\"Tom Hart dragged you in out of five feet water, and then thrust the\nboat off, and had his brains beat out for reward. All were knocked down\nbut us two. So help me God, we thought that you had hove Mr. Frank on\nboard just as you were knocked down, and saw William Frost drag him in.\"\n\nBut William Frost was lying senseless in the bottom of the boat. There\nwas no explanation. After all, none was needed.\n\n\"And I have three wounds from stones, and this man behind me as many\nmore, beside a shot through his shoulder. Now, sir, be we cowards?\"\n\n\"You have done your duty,\" said Amyas, and sank down in the boat, and\ncried as if his heart would break; and then sprang up, and, wounded as\nhe was, took the oar from Evans's hands. With weary work they made the\nship, but so exhausted that another boat had to be lowered to get them\nalongside.\n\nThe alarm being now given, it was hardly safe to remain where they were;\nand after a stormy and sad argument, it was agreed to weigh anchor and\nstand off and on till morning; for Amyas refused to leave the spot till\nhe was compelled, though he had no hope (how could he have?) that Frank\nmight still be alive. And perhaps it was well for them, as will appear\nin the next chapter, that morning did not find them at anchor close to\nthe town.\n\nHowever that may be, so ended that fatal venture of mistaken chivalry.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nSPANISH BLOODHOUNDS AND ENGLISH MASTIFFS\n\n     \"Full seven long hours in all men's sight\n       This fight endured sore,\n     Until our men so feeble grew,\n       That they could fight no more.\n     And then upon dead horses\n       Full savorly they fed,\n     And drank the puddle water,\n       They could no better get.\n\n     \"When they had fed so freely\n       They kneeled on the ground,\n     And gave God thanks devoutly for\n       The favor they had found;\n     Then beating up their colors,\n       The fight they did renew;\n     And turning to the Spaniards,\n       A thousand more they slew.\"\n\n       The Brave Lord Willoughby.  1586.\n\nWhen the sun leaped up the next morning, and the tropic light\nflashed suddenly into the tropic day, Amyas was pacing the deck, with\ndishevelled hair and torn clothes, his eyes red with rage and weeping,\nhis heart full--how can I describe it? Picture it to yourselves, picture\nit to yourselves, you who have ever lost a brother; and you who have\nnot, thank God that you know nothing of his agony. Full of impossible\nprojects, he strode and staggered up and down, as the ship thrashed\nclose-hauled through the rolling seas. He would go back and burn the\nvilla. He would take Guayra, and have the life of every man in it in\nreturn for his brother's. \"We can do it, lads!\" he shouted. \"If Drake\ntook Nombre de Dios, we can take La Guayra.\" And every voice shouted,\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"We will have it, Amyas, and have Frank too, yet,\" cried Cary; but Amyas\nshook his head. He knew, and knew not why he knew, that all the ports in\nNew Spain would never restore to him that one beloved face.\n\n\"Yes, he shall be well avenged. And look there! There is the first crop\nof our vengeance. And he pointed toward the shore, where between them\nand the now distant peaks of the Silla, three sails appeared, not five\nmiles to windward.\n\n\"There are the Spanish bloodhounds on our heels, the same ships which we\nsaw yesterday off Guayra. Back, lads, and welcome them, if they were a\ndozen.\"\n\nThere was a murmur of applause from all around; and if any young heart\nsank for a moment at the prospect of fighting three ships at once, it\nwas awed into silence by the cheer which rose from all the older men,\nand by Salvation Yeo's stentorian voice.\n\n\"If there were a dozen, the Lord is with us, who has said, 'One of you\nshall chase a thousand.' Clear away, lads, and see the glory of the Lord\nthis day.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" cried Cary; and the ship was kept still closer to the wind.\n\nAmyas had revived at the sight of battle. He no longer felt his wounds,\nor his great sorrow; even Frank's last angel's look grew dimmer every\nmoment as he bustled about the deck; and ere a quarter of an hour had\npassed, his voice cried firmly and cheerfully as of old--\n\n\"Now, my masters, let us serve God, and then to breakfast, and after\nthat clear for action.\"\n\nJack Brimblecombe read the daily prayers, and the prayers before a\nfight at sea, and his honest voice trembled, as, in the Prayer for\nall Conditions of Men (in spite of Amyas's despair), he added, \"and\nespecially for our dear brother Mr. Francis Leigh, perhaps captive among\nthe idolaters;\" and so they rose.\n\n\"Now, then,\" said Amyas, \"to breakfast. A Frenchman fights best fasting,\na Dutchman drunk, an Englishman full, and a Spaniard when the devil is\nin him, and that's always.\"\n\n\"And good beef and the good cause are a match for the devil,\" said Cary.\n\"Come down, captain; you must eat too.\"\n\nAmyas shook his head, took the tiller from the steersman, and bade him\ngo below and fill himself. Will Cary went down, and returned in five\nminutes, with a plate of bread and beef, and a great jack of ale,\ncoaxed them down Amyas's throat, as a nurse does with a child, and then\nscuttled below again with tears hopping down his face.\n\nAmyas stood still steering. His face was grown seven years older in\nthe last night. A terrible set calm was on him. Woe to the man who came\nacross him that day!\n\n\"There are three of them, you see, my masters,\" said he, as the crew\ncame on deck again. \"A big ship forward, and two galleys astern of her.\nThe big ship may keep; she is a race ship, and if we can but recover\nthe wind of her, we will see whether our height is not a match for her\nlength. We must give her the slip, and take the galleys first.\"\n\n\"I thank the Lord,\" said Yeo, \"who has given so wise a heart to so young\na general; a very David and Daniel, saving his presence, lads; and if\nany dare not follow him, let him be as the men of Meroz and of Succoth.\nAmen! Silas Staveley, smite me that boy over the head, the young monkey;\nwhy is he not down at the powder-room door?\"\n\nAnd Yeo went about his gunnery, as one who knew how to do it, and had\nthe most terrible mind to do it thoroughly, and the most terrible faith\nthat it was God's work.\n\nSo all fell to; and though there was comparatively little to be done,\nthe ship having been kept as far as could be in fighting order all\nnight, yet there was \"clearing of decks, lacing of nettings, making of\nbulwarks, fitting of waist-cloths, arming of tops, tallowing of pikes,\nslinging of yards, doubling of sheets and tacks,\" enough to satisfy even\nthe pedantical soul of Richard Hawkins himself. Amyas took charge of\nthe poop, Cary of the forecastle, and Yeo, as gunner, of the main-deck,\nwhile Drew, as master, settled himself in the waist; and all was ready,\nand more than ready, before the great ship was within two miles of them.\n\nAnd now while the mastiffs of England and the bloodhounds of Spain are\nnearing and nearing over the rolling surges, thirsting for each other's\nblood, let us spend a few minutes at least in looking at them both, and\nconsidering the causes which in those days enabled the English to face\nand conquer armaments immensely superior in size and number of ships,\nand to boast that in the whole Spanish war but one queen's ship, the\nRevenge, and (if I recollect right) but one private man-of-war, Sir\nRichard Hawkins's Dainty, had ever struck their colors to the enemy.\n\nWhat was it which enabled Sir Richard Grenville's Revenge, in his last\nfearful fight off the Azores, to endure, for twelve hours before she\nstruck, the attack of eight Spanish armadas, of which two (three times\nher own burden) sank at her side; and after all her masts were gone, and\nshe had been boarded three times without success, to defy to the last\nthe whole fleet of fifty-four sail, which lay around her, waiting for\nher to sink, \"like dogs around the dying forest king\"?\n\nWhat enabled young Richard Hawkins's Dainty, though half her guns were\nuseless through the carelessness or treachery of the gunner, to maintain\nfor three days a running fight with two Spaniards of equal size with\nher, double the weight of metal, and ten times the number of men?\n\nWhat enabled Sir George Cary's illustrious ship, the Content, to fight,\nsingle-handed, from seven in the morning till eleven at night, with\nfour great armadas and two galleys, though her heaviest gun was but\none nine-pounder, and for many hours she had but thirteen men fit for\nservice?\n\nWhat enabled, in the very year of which I write, those two \"valiant\nTurkey Merchantmen of London, the Merchant Royal and the Tobie,\"\nwith their three small consorts, to cripple, off Pantellaria in the\nMediterranean, the whole fleet of Spanish galleys sent to intercept\nthem, and return triumphant through the Straits of Gibraltar?\n\nAnd lastly, what in the fight of 1588, whereof more hereafter, enabled\nthe English fleet to capture, destroy, and scatter that Great Armada,\nwith the loss (but not the capture) of one pinnace, and one gentleman of\nnote?\n\nThere were more causes than one: the first seems to have lain in the\nbuild of the English ships; the second in their superior gunnery and\nweight of metal; the third (without which the first would have been\nuseless) in the hearts of the English men.\n\nThe English ship was much shorter than the Spanish; and this (with\nthe rig of those days) gave them an ease in manoeuvring, which utterly\nconfounded their Spanish foes. \"The English ships in the fight of 1588,\"\nsays Camden, \"charged the enemy with marvellous agility, and having\ndischarged their broadsides, flew forth presently into the deep, and\nlevelled their shot directly, without missing, at those great ships of\nthe Spaniards, which were altogether heavy and unwieldy.\" Moreover, the\nSpanish fashion, in the West Indies at least, though not in the ships\nof the Great Armada, was, for the sake of carrying merchandise, to build\ntheir men-of-war flush-decked, or as it was called \"race\" (razes), which\nleft those on deck exposed and open; while the English fashion was to\nheighten the ship as much as possible at stem and stern, both by\nthe sweep of her lines, and also by stockades (\"close fights and\ncage-works\") on the poop and forecastle, thus giving to the men\na shelter, which was further increased by strong bulkheads\n(\"cobridgeheads\") across the main-deck below, dividing the ship thus\ninto a number of separate forts, fitted with swivels (\"bases, fowlers,\nand murderers\") and loopholed for musketry and arrows.\n\nBut the great source of superiority was, after all, in the men\nthemselves. The English sailor was then, as now, a quite amphibious\nand all-cunning animal, capable of turning his hand to everything, from\nneedlework and carpentry to gunnery or hand-to-hand blows; and he\nwas, moreover, one of a nation, every citizen of which was not merely\npermitted to carry arms, but compelled by law to practise from\nchildhood the use of the bow, and accustomed to consider sword-play\nand quarter-staff as a necessary part and parcel of education, and the\npastime of every leisure hour. The \"fiercest nation upon earth,\" as\nthey were then called, and the freest also, each man of them fought for\nhimself with the self-help and self-respect of a Yankee ranger, and once\nbidden to do his work, was trusted to carry it out by his own wit as\nbest he could. In one word, he was a free man.\n\nThe English officers, too, as now, lived on terms of sympathy with their\nmen unknown to the Spaniards, who raised between the commander and the\ncommanded absurd barriers of rank and blood, which forbade to his pride\nany labor but that of fighting. The English officers, on the other hand,\nbrought up to the same athletic sports, the same martial exercises, as\ntheir men, were not ashamed to care for them, to win their friendship,\neven on emergency to consult their judgment; and used their rank, not to\ndiffer from their men, but to outvie them; not merely to command and be\nobeyed, but, like Homer's heroes, or the old Norse Vikings, to lead and\nbe followed. Drake touched the true mainspring of English success when\nhe once (in his voyage round the world) indignantly rebuked some coxcomb\ngentlemen-adventurers with--\"I should like to see the gentleman that\nwill refuse to set his hand to a rope. I must have the gentlemen to hale\nand draw with the mariners.\" But those were days in which her majesty's\nservice was as little overridden by absurd rules of seniority, as by\nthat etiquette which is at once the counterfeit and the ruin of true\ndiscipline. Under Elizabeth and her ministers, a brave and a shrewd man\nwas certain of promotion, let his rank or his age be what they might;\nthe true honor of knighthood covered once and for all any lowliness of\nbirth; and the merchant service (in which all the best sea-captains,\neven those of noble blood, were more or less engaged) was then a\nnursery, not only for seamen, but for warriors, in days when Spanish\nand Portuguese traders (whenever they had a chance) got rid of English\ncompetition by salvos of cannon-shot.\n\nHence, as I have said, that strong fellow-feeling between officers and\nmen; and hence mutinies (as Sir Richard Hawkins tells us) were all but\nunknown in the English ships, while in the Spanish they broke out on\nevery slight occasion. For the Spaniards, by some suicidal pedantry, had\nallowed their navy to be crippled by the same despotism, etiquette,\nand official routine, by which the whole nation was gradually frozen to\ndeath in the course of the next century or two; forgetting that, fifty\nyears before, Cortez, Pizarro, and the early Conquistadores of America\nhad achieved their miraculous triumphs on the exactly opposite method\nby that very fellow-feeling between commander and commanded by which the\nEnglish were now conquering them in their turn.\n\nTheir navy was organized on a plan complete enough; but on one which\nwas, as the event proved, utterly fatal to their prowess and unanimity,\nand which made even their courage and honor useless against the assaults\nof free men. \"They do, in their armadas at sea, divide themselves into\nthree bodies; to wit, soldiers, mariners, and gunners. The soldiers and\nofficers watch and ward as if on shore; and this is the only duty they\nundergo, except cleaning their arms, wherein they are not over curious.\nThe gunners are exempted from all labor and care, except about the\nartillery; and these are either Almaines, Flemings, or strangers; for\nthe Spaniards are but indifferently practised in this art. The mariners\nare but as slaves to the rest, to moil and to toil day and night; and\nthose but few and bad, and not suffered to sleep or harbor under the\ndecks. For in fair or foul weather, in storms, sun, or rain, they must\npass void of covert or succor.\"\n\nThis is the account of one who was long prisoner on board their ships;\nlet it explain itself, while I return to my tale. For the great ship is\nnow within two musket-shots of the Rose, with the golden flag of Spain\nfloating at her poop; and her trumpets are shouting defiance up the\nbreeze, from a dozen brazen throats, which two or three answer lustily\nfrom the Rose, from whose poop flies the flag of England, and from her\nfore the arms of Leigh and Cary side by side, and over them the ship and\nbridge of the good town of Bideford. And then Amyas calls:\n\n\"Now, silence trumpets, waits, play up! 'Fortune my foe!' and God and\nthe Queen be with us!\"\n\nWhereon (laugh not, reader, for it was the fashion of those musical\nas well as valiant days) up rose that noble old favorite of good Queen\nBess, from cornet and sackbut, fife and drum; while Parson Jack, who had\ntaken his stand with the musicians on the poop, worked away lustily at\nhis violin, and like Volker of the Nibelungen Lied.\n\n\"Well played, Jack; thy elbow flies like a lamb's tail,\" said Amyas,\nforcing a jest.\n\n\"It shall fly to a better fiddle-bow presently, sir, an I have the\nluck--\"\n\n\"Steady, helm!\" said Amyas. \"What is he after now?\"\n\nThe Spaniard, who had been coming upon them right down the wind under a\npress of sail, took in his light canvas.\n\n\"He don't know what to make of our waiting for him so bold,\" said the\nhelmsman.\n\n\"He does though, and means to fight us,\" cried another. \"See, he is\nhauling up the foot of his mainsail, but he wants to keep the wind of\nus.\"\n\n\"Let him try, then,\" quoth Amyas. \"Keep her closer still. Let no one\nfire till we are about. Man the starboard guns; to starboard, and wait,\nall small arm men. Pass the order down to the gunner, and bid all fire\nhigh, and take the rigging.\"\n\nBang went one of the Spaniard's bow guns, and the shot went wide.\nThen another and another, while the men fidgeted about, looking at the\npriming of their muskets, and loosened their arrows in the sheaf.\n\n\"Lie down, men, and sing a psalm. When I want you, I'll call you. Closer\nstill, if you can, helmsman, and we will try a short ship against a long\none. We can sail two points nearer the wind than he.\"\n\nAs Amyas had calculated, the Spaniard would gladly enough have stood\nacross the Rose's bows, but knowing the English readiness, dare not for\nfear of being raked; so her only plan, if she did not intend to shoot\npast her foe down to leeward, was to put her head close to the wind, and\nwait for her on the same tack.\n\nAmyas laughed to himself. \"Hold on yet awhile. More ways of killing a\ncat than choking her with cream. Drew, there, are your men ready?\"\n\n\"Ay, ay, sir!\" and on they went, closing fast with the Spaniard, till\nwithin a pistol-shot.\n\n\"Ready about!\" and about she went like an eel, and ran upon the opposite\ntack right under the Spaniard's stern. The Spaniard, astounded at the\nquickness of the manoeuvre, hesitated a moment, and then tried to get\nabout also, as his only chance; but it was too late, and while his\nlumbering length was still hanging in the wind's eye, Amyas's bowsprit\nhad all but scraped his quarter, and the Rose passed slowly across his\nstern at ten yards' distance.\n\n\"Now, then!\" roared Amyas. \"Fire, and with a will! Have at her,\narchers: have at her, muskets all!\" and in an instant a storm of bar and\nchain-shot, round and canister, swept the proud Don from stem to stern,\nwhile through the white cloud of smoke the musket-balls, and the still\ndeadlier cloth-yard arrows, whistled and rushed upon their venomous\nerrand. Down went the steersman, and every soul who manned the\npoop. Down went the mizzen topmast, in went the stern-windows and\nquarter-galleries; and as the smoke cleared away, the gorgeous painting\nof the Madre Dolorosa, with her heart full of seven swords, which, in\na gilded frame, bedizened the Spanish stern, was shivered in splinters;\nwhile, most glorious of all, the golden flag of Spain, which the last\nmoment flaunted above their heads, hung trailing in the water. The ship,\nher tiller shot away, and her helmsman killed, staggered helplessly a\nmoment, and then fell up into the wind.\n\n\"Well done, men of Devon!\" shouted Amyas, as cheers rent the welkin.\n\n\"She has struck,\" cried some, as the deafening hurrahs died away.\n\n\"Not a bit,\" said Amyas. \"Hold on, helmsman, and leave her to patch her\ntackle while we settle the galleys.\"\n\nOn they shot merrily, and long ere the armada could get herself to\nrights again, were two good miles to windward, with the galleys sweeping\ndown fast upon them.\n\nAnd two venomous-looking craft they were, as they shot through the\nshort chopping sea upon some forty oars apiece, stretching their long\nsword-fish snouts over the water, as if snuffing for their prey. Behind\nthis long snout, a strong square forecastle was crammed with soldiers,\nand the muzzles of cannon grinned out through portholes, not only in the\nsides of the forecastle, but forward in the line of the galley's course,\nthus enabling her to keep up a continual fire on a ship right ahead.\n\nThe long low waist was packed full of the slaves, some five or six to\neach oar, and down the centre, between the two banks, the English could\nsee the slave-drivers walking up and down a long gangway, whip in hand.\nA raised quarter-deck at the stern held more soldiers, the sunlight\nflashing merrily upon their armor and their gun-barrels; as they neared,\nthe English could hear plainly the cracks of the whips, and the yells as\nof wild beasts which answered them; the roll and rattle of the oars,\nand the loud \"Ha!\" of the slaves which accompanied every stroke, and the\noaths and curses of the drivers; while a sickening musky smell, as of\na pack of kennelled hounds, came down the wind from off those dens of\nmisery. No wonder if many a young heart shuddered as it faced, for the\nfirst time, the horrible reality of those floating hells, the cruelties\nwhereof had rung so often in English ears, from the stories of their own\ncountrymen, who had passed them, fought them, and now and then passed\nyears of misery on board of them. Who knew but what there might be\nEnglish among those sun-browned half-naked masses of panting wretches?\n\n\"Must we fire upon the slaves?\" asked more than one, as the thought\ncrossed him.\n\nAmyas sighed.\n\n\"Spare them all you can, in God's name; but if they try to run us down,\nrake them we must, and God forgive us.\"\n\nThe two galleys came on abreast of each other, some forty yards apart.\nTo outmanoeuvre their oars as he had done the ship's sails, Amyas knew\nwas impossible. To run from them was to be caught between them and the\nship.\n\nHe made up his mind, as usual, to the desperate game.\n\n\"Lay her head up in the wind, helmsman, and we will wait for them.\"\n\nThey were now within musket-shot, and opened fire from their bow-guns;\nbut, owing to the chopping sea, their aim was wild. Amyas, as usual,\nwithheld his fire.\n\nThe men stood at quarters with compressed lips, not knowing what was\nto come next. Amyas, towering motionless on the quarter-deck, gave his\norders calmly and decisively. The men saw that he trusted himself, and\ntrusted him accordingly.\n\nThe Spaniards, seeing him wait for them, gave a shout of joy--was the\nEnglishman mad? And the two galleys converged rapidly, intending to\nstrike him full, one on each bow.\n\nThey were within forty yards--another minute, and the shock would come.\nThe Englishman's helm went up, his yards creaked round, and gathering\nway, he plunged upon the larboard galley.\n\n\"A dozen gold nobles to him who brings down the steersman!\" shouted\nCary, who had his cue.\n\nAnd a flight of arrows from the forecastle rattled upon the galley's\nquarter-deck.\n\nHit or not hit, the steersman lost his nerve, and shrank from the coming\nshock. The galley's helm went up to port, and her beak slid all but\nharmless along Amyas's bow; a long dull grind, and then loud crack on\ncrack, as the Rose sawed slowly through the bank of oars from stem to\nstern, hurling the wretched slaves in heaps upon each other; and ere\nher mate on the other side could swing round, to strike him in his new\nposition, Amyas's whole broadside, great and small, had been poured into\nher at pistol-shot, answered by a yell which rent their ears and hearts.\n\n\"Spare the slaves! Fire at the soldiers!\" cried Amyas; but the work was\ntoo hot for much discrimination; for the larboard galley, crippled\nbut not undaunted, swung round across his stern, and hooked herself\nvenomously on to him.\n\nIt was a move more brave than wise; for it prevented the other galley\nfrom returning to the attack without exposing herself a second time to\nthe English broadside; and a desperate attempt of the Spaniards to board\nat once through the stern-ports and up the quarter was met with such a\ndemurrer of shot and steel, that they found themselves in three minutes\nagain upon the galley's poop, accompanied, to their intense disgust, by\nAmyas Leigh and twenty English swords.\n\nFive minutes' hard cutting, hand to hand, and the poop was clear. The\nsoldiers in the forecastle had been able to give them no assistance,\nopen as they lay to the arrows and musketry from the Rose's lofty stern.\nAmyas rushed along the central gangway, shouting in Spanish, \"Freedom\nto the slaves! death to the masters!\" clambered into the forecastle,\nfollowed close by his swarm of wasps, and set them so good an example\nhow to use their stings, that in three minutes more there was not a\nSpaniard on board who was not dead or dying.\n\n\"Let the slaves free!\" shouted he. \"Throw us a hammer down, men. Hark!\nthere's an English voice!\"\n\nThere is indeed. From amid the wreck of broken oars and writhing limbs,\na voice is shrieking in broadest Devon to the master, who is looking\nover the side.\n\n\"Oh, Robert Drew! Robert Drew! Come down, and take me out of hell!\"\n\n\"Who be you, in the name of the Lord!\"\n\n\"Don't you mind William Prust, that Captain Hawkins left behind in the\nHonduras, years and years agone? There's nine of us aboard, if your shot\nhasn't put 'em out of their misery. Come down, if you've a Christian\nheart, come down!\"\n\nUtterly forgetful of all discipline, Drew leaps down hammer in hand, and\nthe two old comrades rush into each other's arms.\n\nWhy make a long story of what took but five minutes to do? The nine men\n(luckily none of them wounded) are freed, and helped on board, to be\nhugged and kissed by old comrades and young kinsmen; while the remaining\nslaves, furnished with a couple of hammers, are told to free themselves\nand help the English. The wretches answer by a shout; and Amyas, once\nmore safe on board again, dashes after the other galley, which has\nbeen hovering out of reach of his guns: but there is no need to trouble\nhimself about her; sickened with what she has got, she is struggling\nright up wind, leaning over to one side, and seemingly ready to sink.\n\n\"Are there any English on board of her?\" asks Amyas, loath to lose the\nchance of freeing a countryman.\n\n\"Never a one, sir, thank God.\"\n\nSo they set to work to repair damages; while the liberated slaves,\nhaving shifted some of the galley's oars, pull away after their comrade;\nand that with such a will, that in ten minutes they have caught her up,\nand careless of the Spaniard's fire, boarded her en masse, with yells\nas of a thousand wolves. There will be fearful vengeance taken on those\ntyrants, unless they play the man this day.\n\nAnd in the meanwhile half the crew are clothing, feeding, questioning,\ncaressing those nine poor fellows thus snatched from living death;\nand Yeo, hearing the news, has rushed up on deck to welcome his old\ncomrades, and--\n\n\"Is Michael Heard, my cousin, here among you?\"\n\nYes, Michael Heard is there, white-headed rather from misery than age;\nand the embracings and questionings begin afresh.\n\n\"Where is my wife, Salvation Yeo?\"\n\n\"With the Lord.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" says the old man, with a short shudder. \"I thought so much; and\nmy two boys?\"\n\n\"With the Lord.\"\n\nThe old man catches Yeo by the arm.\n\n\"How, then?\" It is Yeo's turn to shudder now.\n\n\"Killed in Panama, fighting the Spaniards; sailing with Mr. Oxenham; and\n'twas I led 'em into it. May God and you forgive me!\"\n\n\"They couldn't die better, cousin Yeo. Where's my girl Grace?\"\n\n\"Died in childbed.\"\n\n\"Any childer?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nThe old man covers his face with his hands for a while.\n\n\"Well, I've been alone with the Lord these fifteen years, so I must not\nwhine at being alone a while longer--'t won't be long.\"\n\n\"Put this coat on your back, uncle,\" says some one.\n\n\"No; no coats for me. Naked came I into the world, and naked I go out of\nit this day, if I have a chance. You'm better to go to your work, lads,\nor the big one will have the wind of you yet.\"\n\n\"So she will,\" said Amyas, who has overheard; but so great is the\ncuriosity on all hands, that he has some trouble in getting the men\nto quarters again; indeed, they only go on condition of parting among\nthemselves with them the new-comers, each to tell his sad and strange\nstory. How after Captain Hawkins, constrained by famine, had put them\nashore, they wandered in misery till the Spaniards took them; how,\ninstead of hanging them (as they at first intended), the Dons fed and\nclothed them, and allotted them as servants to various gentlemen about\nMexico, where they throve, turned their hands (like true sailors) to all\nmanner of trades, and made much money, and some of them were married,\neven to women of wealth; so that all went well, until the fatal year\n1574, when, \"much against the minds of many of the Spaniards themselves,\nthat cruel and bloody Inquisition was established for the first time in\nthe Indies;\" and how from that moment their lives were one long\ntragedy; how they were all imprisoned for a year and a half, not for\nproselytizing, but simply for not believing in transubstantiation;\nracked again and again, and at last adjudged to receive publicly, on\nGood Friday, 1575, some three hundred, some one hundred stripes, and to\nserve in the galleys for six or ten years each; while, as the crowning\natrocity of the Moloch sacrifice, three of them were burnt alive in the\nmarket-place of Mexico; a story no less hideous than true, the details\nwhereof whoso list may read in Hakluyt's third volume, as told by\nPhilip Miles, one of that hapless crew; as well as the adventures of Job\nHortop, a messmate of his, who, after being sent to Spain, and seeing\ntwo more of his companions burnt alive at Seville, was sentenced to\nrow in the galleys ten years, and after that to go to the \"everlasting\nprison remediless;\" from which doom, after twenty-three years of\nslavery, he was delivered by the galleon Dudley, and came safely home to\nRedriff.\n\nThe fate of Hortop and his comrades was, of course, still unknown to\nthe rescued men; but the history even of their party was not likely to\nimprove the good feeling of the crew toward the Spanish ship which was\ntwo miles to leeward of them, and which must be fought with, or fled\nfrom, before a quarter of an hour was past. So, kneeling down upon the\ndeck, as many a brave crew in those days did in like case, they \"gave\nGod thanks devoutly for the favor they had found;\" and then with one\naccord, at Jack's leading, sang one and all the Ninety-fourth Psalm:*\n\n     \"Oh, Lord, thou dost revenge all wrong;\n       Vengeance belongs to thee,\" etc.\n\n     * The crew of the Tobie, cast away on the Barbary coast a\n     few years after, \"began with heavy hearts to sing the\n     twelfth Psalm, 'Help, Lord, for good and godly men,' etc.\n     Howbeit, ere we had finished four verses, the waves of the\n     sea had stopped the breaths of most.\"\n\nAnd then again to quarters; for half the day's work, or more than half,\nstill remained to be done; and hardly were the decks cleared afresh,\nand the damage repaired as best it could be, when she came ranging up to\nleeward, as closehauled as she could.\n\nShe was, as I said, a long flush-decked ship of full five hundred tons,\nmore than double the size, in fact, of the Rose, though not so lofty in\nproportion; and many a bold heart beat loud, and no shame to them, as\nshe began firing away merrily, determined, as all well knew, to wipe out\nin English blood the disgrace of her late foil.\n\n\"Never mind, my merry masters,\" said Amyas, \"she has quantity and we\nquality.\"\n\n\"That's true,\" said one, \"for one honest man is worth two rogues.\"\n\n\"And one culverin three of their footy little ordnance,\" said another.\n\"So when you will, captain, and have at her.\"\n\n\"Let her come abreast of us, and don't burn powder. We have the wind,\nand can do what we like with her. Serve the men out a horn of ale all\nround, steward, and all take your time.\"\n\nSo they waited for five minutes more, and then set to work quietly,\nafter the fashion of English mastiffs, though, like those mastiffs, they\nwaxed right mad before three rounds were fired, and the white splinters\n(sight beloved) began to crackle and fly.\n\nAmyas, having, as he had said, the wind, and being able to go nearer it\nthan the Spaniard, kept his place at easy point-blank range for his two\neighteen-pounder culverins, which Yeo and his mate worked with terrible\neffect.\n\n\"We are lacking her through and through every shot,\" said he. \"Leave the\nsmall ordnance alone yet awhile, and we shall sink her without them.\"\n\n\"Whing, whing,\" went the Spaniard's shot, like so many humming-tops,\nthrough the rigging far above their heads; for the ill-constructed\nports of those days prevented the guns from hulling an enemy who was to\nwindward, unless close alongside.\n\n\"Blow, jolly breeze,\" cried one, \"and lay the Don over all thou\ncanst.--What the murrain is gone, aloft there?\"\n\nAlas! a crack, a flap, a rattle; and blank dismay! An unlucky shot had\ncut the foremast (already wounded) in two, and all forward was a mass of\ndangling wreck.\n\n\"Forward, and cut away the wreck!\" said Amyas, unmoved. \"Small arm men,\nbe ready. He will be aboard of us in five minutes!\"\n\nIt was too true. The Rose, unmanageable from the loss of her head-sail,\nlay at the mercy of the Spaniard; and the archers and musqueteers had\nhardly time to range themselves to leeward, when the Madre Dolorosa's\nchains were grinding against the Rose's, and grapples tossed on board\nfrom stem to stern.\n\n\"Don't cut them loose!\" roared Amyas. \"Let them stay and see the fun!\nNow, dogs of Devon, show your teeth, and hurrah for God and the queen!\"\n\nAnd then began a fight most fierce and fell: the Spaniards, according to\ntheir fashion, attempting to board, the English, amid fierce shouts of\n\"God and the queen!\" \"God and St. George for England!\" sweeping them\nback by showers of arrows and musquet balls, thrusting them down with\npikes, hurling grenades and stink-pots from the tops; while the swivels\non both sides poured their grape, and bar, and chain, and the great\nmain-deck guns, thundering muzzle to muzzle, made both ships quiver and\nrecoil, as they smashed the round shot through and through each other.\n\nSo they roared and flashed, fast clenched to each other in that devil's\nwedlock, under a cloud of smoke beneath the cloudless tropic sky; while\nall around, the dolphins gambolled, and the flying-fish shot on from\nswell to swell, and the rainbow-hued jellies opened and shut their cups\nof living crystal to the sun, as merrily as if man had never fallen, and\nhell had never broken loose on earth.\n\nSo it raged for an hour or more, till all arms were weary, and all\ntongues clove to the mouth. And sick men, rotting with scurvy,\nscrambled up on deck, and fought with the strength of madness; and tiny\npowder-boys, handing up cartridges from the hold, laughed and cheered\nas the shots ran past their ears; and old Salvation Yeo, a text upon his\nlips, and a fury in his heart as of Joshua or Elijah in old time, worked\non, calm and grim, but with the energy of a boy at play. And now and\nthen an opening in the smoke showed the Spanish captain, in his suit\nof black steel armor, standing cool and proud, guiding and pointing,\ncareless of the iron hail, but too lofty a gentleman to soil his glove\nwith aught but a knightly sword-hilt: while Amyas and Will, after the\nfashion of the English gentlemen, had stripped themselves nearly as bare\nas their own sailors, and were cheering, thrusting, hewing, and hauling,\nhere, there, and everywhere, like any common mariner, and filling them\nwith a spirit of self-respect, fellow-feeling, and personal daring,\nwhich the discipline of the Spaniards, more perfect mechanically, but\ncold and tyrannous, and crushing spiritually, never could bestow. The\nblack-plumed senor was obeyed; but the golden-locked Amyas was followed,\nand would have been followed through the jaws of hell.\n\nThe Spaniards, ere five minutes had passed, poured en masse into the\nRose's waist, but only to their destruction. Between the poop and\nforecastle (as was then the fashion) the upper-deck beams were left open\nand unplanked, with the exception of a narrow gangway on either side;\nand off that fatal ledge the boarders, thrust on by those behind, fell\nheadlong between the beams to the main-deck below, to be slaughtered\nhelpless in that pit of destruction, by the double fire from the\nbulkheads fore and aft; while the few who kept their footing on\nthe gangway, after vain attempts to force the stockades on poop and\nforecastle, leaped overboard again amid a shower of shot and arrows.\nThe fire of the English was as steady as it was quick; and though\nthree-fourths of the crew had never smelt powder before, they proved\nwell the truth of the old chronicler's saying (since proved again more\ngloriously than ever, at Alma, Balaklava, and Inkerman), that \"the\nEnglish never fight better than in their first battle.\"\n\nThrice the Spaniards clambered on board, and thrice surged back before\nthat deadly hail. The decks on both sides were very shambles; and Jack\nBrimblecombe, who had fought as long as his conscience would allow him,\nfound, when he turned to a more clerical occupation, enough to do in\ncarrying poor wretches to the surgeon, without giving that spiritual\nconsolation which he longed to give, and they to receive. At last there\nwas a lull in that wild storm. No shot was heard from the Spaniard's\nupper-deck.\n\nAmyas leaped into the mizzen rigging, and looked through the smoke. Dead\nmen he could descry through the blinding veil, rolled in heaps, laid\nflat; dead men and dying: but no man upon his feet. The last volley had\nswept the deck clear; one by one had dropped below to escape that\nfiery shower: and alone at the helm, grinding his teeth with rage, his\nmustachios curling up to his very eyes, stood the Spanish captain.\n\nNow was the moment for a counter-stroke. Amyas shouted for the boarders,\nand in two minutes more he was over the side, and clutching at the\nSpaniard's mizzen rigging.\n\nWhat was this? The distance between him and the enemy's side was\nwidening. Was she sheering off? Yes--and rising too, growing bodily\nhigher every moment, as if by magic. Amyas looked up in astonishment and\nsaw what it was. The Spaniard was heeling fast over to leeward away from\nhim. Her masts were all sloping forward, swifter and swifter--the end\nwas come, then!\n\n\"Back! in God's name back, men! She is sinking by the head!\" And with\nmuch ado some were dragged back, some leaped back--all but old Michael\nHeard.\n\nWith hair and beard floating in the wind, the bronzed naked figure,\nlike some weird old Indian fakir, still climbed on steadfastly up the\nmizzen-chains of the Spaniard, hatchet in hand.\n\n\"Come back, Michael! Leap while you may!\" shouted a dozen voices.\nMichael turned--\n\n\"And what should I come back for, then, to go home where no one knoweth\nme? I'll die like an Englishman this day, or I'll know the rason why!\"\nand turning, he sprang in over the bulwarks, as the huge ship rolled\nup more and more, like a dying whale, exposing all her long black\nhulk almost down to the keel, and one of her lower-deck guns, as if in\ndefiance, exploded upright into the air, hurling the ball to the very\nheavens.\n\nIn an instant it was answered from the Rose by a column of smoke, and\nthe eighteen-pound ball crashed through the bottom of the defenceless\nSpaniard.\n\n\"Who fired? Shame to fire on a sinking ship!\"\n\n\"Gunner Yeo, sir,\" shouted a voice up from the main-deck. \"He's like a\nmadman down here.\"\n\n\"Tell him if he fires again, I'll put him in irons, if he were my own\nbrother. Cut away the grapples aloft, men. Don't you see how she drags\nus over? Cut away, or we shall sink with her.\"\n\nThey cut away, and the Rose, released from the strain, shook her\nfeathers on the wave-crest like a freed sea-gull, while all men held\ntheir breaths.\n\nSuddenly the glorious creature righted herself, and rose again, as if in\nnoble shame, for one last struggle with her doom. Her bows were deep in\nthe water, but her after-deck still dry. Righted: but only for a moment,\nlong enough to let her crew come pouring wildly up on deck, with cries\nand prayers, and rush aft to the poop, where, under the flag of Spain,\nstood the tall captain, his left hand on the standard-staff, his sword\npointed in his right.\n\n\"Back, men!\" they heard him cry, \"and die like valiant mariners.\"\n\nSome of them ran to the bulwarks, and shouted \"Mercy! We surrender!\" and\nthe English broke into a cheer and called to them to run her alongside.\n\n\"Silence!\" shouted Amyas. \"I take no surrender from mutineers. Senor,\"\ncried he to the captain, springing into the rigging and taking off his\nhat, \"for the love of God and these men, strike! and surrender a buena\nquerra.\"\n\nThe Spaniard lifted his hat and bowed courteously, and answered,\n\"Impossible, senor. No querra is good which stains my honor.\"\n\n\"God have mercy on you, then!\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said the Spaniard, crossing himself.\n\nShe gave one awful lounge forward, and dived under the coming swell,\nhurling her crew into the eddies. Nothing but the point of her poop\nremained, and there stood the stern and steadfast Don, cap-a-pie in his\nglistening black armor, immovable as a man of iron, while over him the\nflag, which claimed the empire of both worlds, flaunted its gold aloft\nand upwards in the glare of the tropic noon.\n\n\"He shall not carry that flag to the devil with him; I will have it\nyet, if I die for it!\" said Will Cary, and rushed to the side to leap\noverboard, but Amyas stopped him.\n\n\"Let him die as he has lived, with honor.\"\n\nA wild figure sprang out of the mass of sailors who struggled and\nshrieked amid the foam, and rushed upward at the Spaniard. It was\nMichael Heard. The Don, who stood above him, plunged his sword into the\nold man's body: but the hatchet gleamed, nevertheless: down went the\nblade through headpiece and through head; and as Heard sprang onward,\nbleeding, but alive, the steel-clad corpse rattled down the deck into\nthe surge. Two more strokes, struck with the fury of a dying man, and\nthe standard-staff was hewn through. Old Michael collected all his\nstrength, hurled the flag far from the sinking ship, and then stood\nerect one moment and shouted, \"God save Queen Bess!\" and the English\nanswered with a \"Hurrah!\" which rent the welkin.\n\nAnother moment and the gulf had swallowed his victim, and the poop, and\nhim; and nothing remained of the Madre Dolorosa but a few floating spars\nand struggling wretches, while a great awe fell upon all men, and a\nsolemn silence, broken only by the cry\n\n     \"Of some strong swimmer in his agony.\"\n\nAnd then, suddenly collecting themselves, as men awakened from a dream,\nhalf-a-dozen desperate gallants, reckless of sharks and eddies, leaped\noverboard, swam towards the flag, and towed it alongside in triumph.\n\n\"Ah!\" said Salvation Yeo, as he helped the trophy up over the side; \"ah!\nit was not for nothing that we found poor Michael! He was always a good\ncomrade--nigh as good a one as William Penberthy of Marazion, whom the\nLord grant I meet in bliss! And now, then, my masters, shall we inshore\nagain and burn La Guayra?\"\n\n\"Art thou never glutted with Spanish blood, thou old wolf?\" asked Will\nCary.\n\n\"Never, sir,\" answered Yeo.\n\n\"To St. Jago be it,\" said Amyas, \"if we can get there; but--God help\nus!\"\n\nAnd he looked round sadly enough; while no one needed that he should\nfinish his sentence, or explain his \"but.\"\n\nThe foremast was gone, the main-yard sprung, the rigging hanging in\nelf-locks, the hull shot through and through in twenty places, the deck\nstrewn with the bodies of nine good men, beside sixteen wounded down\nbelow; while the pitiless sun, right above their heads, poured down a\nflood of fire upon a sea of glass.\n\nAnd it would have been well if faintness and weariness had been all that\nwas the matter; but now that the excitement was over, the collapse came;\nand the men sat down listlessly and sulkily by twos and threes upon the\ndeck, starting and wincing when they heard some poor fellow below cry\nout under the surgeon's knife; or murmuring to each other that all was\nlost. Drew tried in vain to rouse them, telling them that all depended\non rigging a jury-mast forward as soon as possible. They answered only\nby growls; and at last broke into open reproaches. Even Will Cary's\nvolatile nature, which had kept him up during the fight, gave way, when\nYeo and the carpenter came aft, and told Amyas in a low voice--\n\n\"We are hit somewhere forward, below the water-line, sir. She leaks a\nterrible deal, and the Lord will not vouchsafe to us to lay our hands on\nthe place, for all our searching.\"\n\n\"What are we to do now, Amyas, in the devil's name?\" asked Cary,\npeevishly.\n\n\"What are we to do, in God's name, rather,\" answered Amyas, in a low\nvoice. \"Will, Will, what did God make you a gentleman for, but to know\nbetter than those poor fickle fellows forward, who blow hot and cold at\nevery change of weather!\"\n\n\"I wish you'd come forward and speak to them, sir,\" said Yeo, who had\noverheard the last words, \"or we shall get naught done.\"\n\nAmyas went forward instantly.\n\n\"Now then, my brave lads, what's the matter here, that you are all\nsitting on your tails like monkeys?\"\n\n\"Ugh!\" grunts one. \"Don't you think our day's work has been long enough\nyet, captain?\"\n\n\"You don't want us to go in to La Guayra again, sir? There are enough of\nus thrown away already, I reckon, about that wench there.\"\n\n\"Best sit here, and sink quietly. There's no getting home again, that's\nplain.\"\n\n\"Why were we brought out here to be killed?\"\n\n\"For shame, men!\" cries Yeo; \"you're no better than a set of\nstiff-necked Hebrew Jews, murmuring against Moses the very minute after\nthe Lord has delivered you from the Egyptians.\"\n\nNow I do not wish to set Amyas up as a perfect man; for he had his\nfaults, like every one else; nor as better, thank God, than many and\nmany a brave and virtuous captain in her majesty's service at this very\nday: but certainly he behaved admirably under that trial. Drake had\ntrained him, as he trained many another excellent officer, to be as\nstout in discipline, and as dogged of purpose, as he himself was: but\nhe had trained him also to feel with and for his men, to make allowances\nfor them, and to keep his temper with them, as he did this day. True, he\nhad seen Drake in a rage; he had seen him hang one man for a mutiny\n(and that man his dearest friend), and threaten to hang thirty more;\nbut Amyas remembered well that that explosion took place when having, as\nDrake said publicly himself, \"taken in hand that I know not in the world\nhow to go through with; it passeth my capacity; it hath even bereaved\nme of my wits to think of it,\" . . . and having \"now set together by\nthe ears three mighty princes, her majesty and the kings of Spain\nand Portugal,\" he found his whole voyage ready to come to naught, \"by\nmutinies and discords, controversy between the sailors and gentlemen,\nand stomaching between the gentlemen and sailors.\" \"But, my masters\"\n(quoth the self-trained hero, and Amyas never forgot his words), \"I must\nhave it left; for I must have the gentlemen to haul and draw with the\nmariner, and the mariner with the gentlemen. I would like to know him\nthat would refuse to set his hand to a rope!\"\n\nAnd now Amyas's conscience smote him (and his simple and pious soul took\nthe loss of his brother as God's verdict on his conduct), because he had\nset his own private affection, even his own private revenge, before the\nsafety of his ship's company, and the good of his country.\n\n\"Ah,\" said he to himself, as he listened to his men's reproaches, \"if\nI had been thinking, like a loyal soldier, of serving my queen, and\ncrippling the Spaniard, I should have taken that great bark three days\nago, and in it the very man I sought!\"\n\nSo \"choking down his old man,\" as Yeo used to say, he made answer\ncheerfully--\n\n\"Pooh! pooh! brave lads! For shame, for shame! You were lions\nhalf-an-hour ago; you are not surely turned sheep already! Why, but\nyesterday evening you were grumbling because I would not run in and\nfight those three ships under the batteries of La Guayra, and now\nyou think it too much to have fought them fairly out at sea? What has\nhappened but the chances of war, which might have happened anywhere?\nNothing venture, nothing win; and nobody goes bird-nesting without a\nfall at times. If any one wants to be safe in this life, he'd best stay\nat home and keep his bed; though even there, who knows but the roof\nmight fall through on him?\"\n\n\"Ah, it's all very well for you, captain,\" said some grumbling younker,\nwith a vague notion that Amyas must be better off than he, because he\nwas a gentleman. Amyas's blood rose.\n\n\"Yes, sirrah! it is very well for me, as long as God is with me: but He\nis with every man in this ship, I would have you to know, as much as\nHe is with me. Do you fancy that I have nothing to lose? I who have\nadventured in this voyage all I am worth, and more; who, if I fail, must\nreturn to beggary and scorn? And if I have ventured rashly, sinfully,\nif you will, the lives of any of you in my own private quarrel, am I not\npunished? Have I not lost--?\"\n\nHis voice trembled and stopped there, but he recovered himself in a\nmoment.\n\n\"Pish! I can't stand here chattering. Carpenter! an axe! and help me to\ncast these spars loose. Get out of my way, there! lumbering the scuppers\nup like so many moulting fowls! Here, all old friends, lend a hand!\nPelican's men, stand by your captain! Did we sail round the world for\nnothing?\"\n\nThis last appeal struck home, and up leaped half-a-dozen of the old\nPelicans, and set to work at his side manfully to rig the jury-mast.\n\n\"Come along!\" cried Cary to the malcontents; \"we're raw longshore\nfellows, but we won't be outdone by any old sea-dog of them all.\" And\nsetting to work himself, he was soon followed by one and another, till\norder and work went on well enough.\n\n\"And where are we going, when the mast's up?\" shouted some saucy hand\nfrom behind.\n\n\"Where you daren't follow us alone by yourself, so you had better keep\nus company,\" replied Yeo.\n\n\"I'll tell you where we are going, lads,\" said Amyas, rising from his\nwork. \"Like it or leave it as you will, I have no secrets from my crew.\nWe are going inshore there to find a harbor, and careen the ship.\"\n\nThere was a start and a murmur.\n\n\"Inshore? Into the Spaniards' mouths?\"\n\n\"All in the Inquisition in a week's time.\"\n\n\"Better stay here, and be drowned.\"\n\n\"You're right in that last,\" shouts Cary. \"That's the right death for\nblind puppies. Look you! I don't know in the least where we are, and I\nhardly know stem from stern aboard ship; and the captain may be right or\nwrong--that's nothing to me; but this I know, that I am a soldier, and\nwill obey orders; and where he goes, I go; and whosoever hinders me must\nwalk up my sword to do it.\"\n\nAmyas pressed Cary's hand, and then--\n\n\"And here's my broadside next, men. I'll go nowhere, and do nothing\nwithout the advice of Salvation Yeo and Robert Drew; and if any man in\nthe ship knows better than these two, let him up, and we'll give him a\nhearing. Eh, Pelicans?\"\n\nThere was a grunt of approbation from the Pelicans; and Amyas returned\nto the charge.\n\n\"We have five shot between wind and water, and one somewhere below. Can\nwe face a gale of wind in that state, or can we not?\"\n\nSilence.\n\n\"Can we get home with a leak in our bottom?\"\n\nSilence.\n\n\"Then what can we do but run inshore, and take our chance? Speak! It's\na coward's trick to do nothing because what we must do is not pleasant.\nWill you be like children, that would sooner die than take nasty physic,\nor will you not?\"\n\nSilence still.\n\n\"Come along now! Here's the wind again round with the sun, and up to the\nnorth-west. In with her!\"\n\nSulkily enough, but unable to deny the necessity, the men set to work,\nand the vessel's head was put toward the land; but when she began to\nslip through the water, the leak increased so fast, that they were kept\nhard at work at the pumps for the rest of the afternoon.\n\nThe current had by this time brought them abreast of the bay of\nHiguerote; and, luckily for them, safe out of the short heavy swell\nwhich it causes round Cape Codera. Looking inland, they had now to the\nsouth-west that noble headland, backed by the Caracas Mountains, range\non range, up to the Silla and the Neguater; while, right ahead of them\nto the south, the shore sank suddenly into a low line of mangrove-wood,\nbacked by primaeval forest. As they ran inward, all eyes were strained\ngreedily to find some opening in the mangrove belt; but none was to\nbe seen for some time. The lead was kept going; and every fresh heave\nannounced shallower water.\n\n\"We shall have very shoal work off those mangroves, Yeo,\" said Amyas; \"I\ndoubt whether we shall do aught now, unless we find a river's mouth.\"\n\n\"If the Lord thinks a river good for us, sir, He'll show us one.\" So on\nthey went, keeping a south-east course, and at last an opening in the\nmangrove belt was hailed with a cheer from the older hands, though\nthe majority shrugged their shoulders, as men going open-eyed to\ndestruction.\n\nOff the mouth they sent in Drew and Cary with a boat, and watched\nanxiously for an hour. The boat returned with a good report of two\nfathoms of water over the bar, impenetrable forests for two miles up,\nthe river sixty yards broad, and no sign of man. The river's banks were\nsoft and sloping mud, fit for careening.\n\n\"Safe quarters, sir,\" said Yeo, privately, \"as far as Spaniards go. I\nhope in God it may be as safe from calentures and fevers.\"\n\n\"Beggars must not be choosers,\" said Amyas. So in they went.\n\nThey towed the ship up about half-a-mile to a point where she could not\nbe seen from the seaward; and there moored her to the mangrove-stems.\nAmyas ordered a boat out, and went up the river himself to reconnoitre.\nHe rowed some three miles, till the river narrowed suddenly, and was all\nbut covered in by the interlacing boughs of mighty trees. There was no\nsign that man had been there since the making of the world.\n\nHe dropped down the stream again, thoughtfully and sadly. How many years\nago was it that he passed this river's mouth? Three days. And yet how\nmuch had passed in them! Don Guzman found and lost--Rose found and\nlost--a great victory gained, and yet lost--perhaps his ship lost--above\nall, his brother lost.\n\nLost! O God, how should he find his brother?\n\nSome strange bird out of the woods made mournful answer--\"Never, never,\nnever!\"\n\nHow should he face his mother?\n\n\"Never, never, never!\" wailed the bird again; and Amyas smiled bitterly,\nand said \"Never!\" likewise.\n\nThe night mist began to steam and wreathe upon the foul beer-colored\nstream. The loathy floor of liquid mud lay bare beneath the mangrove\nforest. Upon the endless web of interarching roots great purple crabs\nwere crawling up and down. They would have supped with pleasure upon\nAmyas's corpse; perhaps they might sup on him after all; for a heavy\nsickening graveyard smell made his heart sink within him, and his\nstomach heave; and his weary body, and more weary soul, gave themselves\nup helplessly to the depressing influence of that doleful place.\nThe black bank of dingy leathern leaves above his head, the endless\nlabyrinth of stems and withes (for every bough had lowered its own\nliving cord, to take fresh hold of the foul soil below); the web of\nroots, which stretched away inland till it was lost in the shades of\nevening--all seemed one horrid complicated trap for him and his; and\neven where, here and there, he passed the mouth of a lagoon, there was\nno opening, no relief--nothing but the dark ring of mangroves, and here\nand there an isolated group of large and small, parents and children,\nbreeding and spreading, as if in hideous haste to choke out air and sky.\nWailing sadly, sad-colored mangrove-hens ran off across the mud into the\ndreary dark. The hoarse night-raven, hid among the roots, startled the\nvoyagers with a sudden shout, and then all was again silent as a grave.\nThe loathly alligators, lounging in the slime, lifted their horny\neyelids lazily, and leered upon him as he passed with stupid savageness.\nLines of tall herons stood dimly in the growing gloom, like white\nfantastic ghosts, watching the passage of the doomed boat. All was foul,\nsullen, weird as witches' dream. If Amyas had seen a crew of skeletons\nglide down the stream behind him, with Satan standing at the helm, he\nwould have scarcely been surprised. What fitter craft could haunt that\nStygian flood?\n\nThat night every man of the boat's crew, save Amyas, was down with\nraging fever; before ten the next morning, five more men were taken, and\nothers sickening fast.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nHOW THEY TOOK THE COMMUNION UNDER THE TREE AT HIGUEROTE\n\n     \"Follow thee?  Follow thee?  Wha wad na follow thee?  Lang hast\n     thou looed and trusted us fairly.\"\n\nAmyas would have certainly taken the yellow fever, but for one reason,\nwhich he himself gave to Cary. He had no time to be sick while his men\nwere sick; a valid and sufficient reason (as many a noble soul in\nthe Crimea has known too well), as long as the excitement of work is\npresent, but too apt to fail the hero, and to let him sink into the pit\nwhich he has so often over-leapt, the moment that his work is done.\n\nHe called a council of war, or rather a sanitary commission, the\nnext morning; for he was fairly at his wits' end. The men were\npanic-stricken, ready to mutiny: Amyas told them that he could not see\nany possible good which could accrue to them by killing him, or--(for\nthere were two sides to every question)--being killed by him; and then\nwent below to consult. The doctor talked mere science, or nonscience,\nabout humors, complexions, and animal spirits. Jack Brimblecombe, mere\npulpit, about its being the visitation of God. Cary, mere despair,\nthough he jested over it with a smile. Yeo, mere stoic fatalism, though\nhe quoted Scripture to back the same. Drew, the master, had nothing to\nsay. His \"business was to sail the ship, and not to cure calentures.\"\n\nWhereon Amyas clutched his locks, according to custom; and at last broke\nforth--\"Doctor! a fig for your humors and complexions! Can you cure\na man's humors, or change his complexion? Can an Ethiopian change his\nskin, or a leopard his spots? Don't shove off your ignorance on God,\nsir. I ask you what's the reason of this sickness, and you don't know.\nJack Brimblecombe, don't talk to me about God's visitation; this looks\nmuch more like the devil's visitation, to my mind. We are doing God's\nwork, Sir John, and He is not likely to hinder us. So down with the\ndevil, say I. Cary, laughing killed the cat, but it won't cure a\nChristian. Yeo, when an angel tells me that it's God's will that we\nshould all die like dogs in a ditch, I'll call this God's will; but not\nbefore. Drew, you say your business is to sail the ship; then sail her\nout of this infernal poison-trap this very morning, if you can, which\nyou can't. The mischief's in the air, and nowhere else. I felt it run\nthrough me coming down last night, and smelt it like any sewer: and\nif it was not in the air, why was my boat's crew taken first, tell me\nthat?\"\n\nThere was no answer.\n\n\"Then I'll tell you why they were taken first: because the mist, when\nwe came through it, only rose five or six feet above the stream, and we\nwere in it, while you on board were above it. And those that were taken\non board this morning, every one of them, slept on the main-deck, and\nevery one of them, too, was in fear of the fever, whereby I judge two\nthings,--Keep as high as you can, and fear nothing but God, and we're\nall safe yet.\"\n\n\"But the fog was up to our round-tops at sunrise this morning,\" said\nCary.\n\n\"I know it: but we who were on the half-deck were not in it so long as\nthose below, and that may have made the difference, let alone our having\nfree air. Beside, I suspect the heat in the evening draws the poison out\nmore, and that when it gets cold toward morning, the venom of it goes\noff somehow.\"\n\nHow it went off Amyas could not tell (right in his facts as he was), for\nnobody on earth knew I suppose, at that day; and it was not till\nnearly two centuries of fatal experience that the settlers in America\ndiscovered the simple laws of these epidemics which now every child\nknows, or ought to know. But common sense was on his side; and Yeo rose\nand spoke--\n\n\"As I have said before, many a time, the Lord has sent us a very young\nDaniel for judge. I remember now to have heard the Spaniards say, how\nthese calentures lay always in the low ground, and never came more than\na few hundred feet above the sea.\"\n\n\"Let us go up those few hundred feet, then.\"\n\nEvery man looked at Amyas, and then at his neighbor.\n\n\"Gentlemen, 'Look the devil straight in the face, if you would hit him\nin the right place.' We cannot get the ship to sea as she is; and if we\ncould, we cannot go home empty-handed; and we surely cannot stay here to\ndie of fever.--We must leave the ship and go inland.\"\n\n\"Inland?\" answered every voice but Yeo's.\n\n\"Up those hundred feet which Yeo talks of. Up to the mountains; stockade\na camp, and get our sick and provisions thither.\"\n\n\"And what next?\"\n\n\"And when we are recruited, march over the mountains, and surprise St.\nJago de Leon.\"\n\nCary swore a great oath. \"Amyas! you are a daring fellow!\"\n\n\"Not a bit. It's the plain path of prudence.\"\n\n\"So it is, sir,\" said old Yeo, \"and I follow you in it.\"\n\n\"And so do I,\" squeaked Jack Brimblecombe.\n\n\"Nay, then, Jack, thou shalt not outrun me. So I say yes too,\" quoth\nCary.\n\n\"Mr. Drew?\"\n\n\"At your service, sir, to live or die. I know naught about stockading;\nbut Sir Francis would have given the same counsel, I verily believe, if\nhe had been in your place.\"\n\n\"Then tell the men that we start in an hour's time. Win over the\nPelicans, Yeo and Drew; and the rest must follow, like sheep over a\nhedge.\"\n\nThe Pelicans, and the liberated galley-slaves, joined the project at\nonce; but the rest gave Amyas a stormy hour. The great question was,\nwhere were the hills? In that dense mangrove thicket they could not see\nfifty yards before them.\n\n\"The hills are not three miles to the south-west of you at this moment,\"\nsaid Amyas. \"I marked every shoulder of them as we ran in.\"\n\n\"I suppose you meant to take us there?\"\n\nThe question set a light to a train--and angry suspicions were blazing\nup one after another, but Amyas silenced them with a countermine.\n\n\"Fools! if I had not wit enow to look ahead a little farther than you\ndo, where would you be? Are you mad as well as reckless, to rise against\nyour own captain because he has two strings to his bow? Go my way, I\nsay, or, as I live, I'll blow up the ship and every soul on board, and\nsave you the pain of rotting here by inches.\"\n\nThe men knew that Amyas never said what he did not intend to do; not\nthat Amyas intended to do this, because he knew that the threat would be\nenough. So they, agreed to go; and were reassured by seeing that the old\nPelican's men turned to the work heartily and cheerfully.\n\nThere is no use keeping the reader for five or six weary hours, under a\nbroiling (or rather stewing) sun, stumbling over mangrove roots, hewing\nhis way through thorny thickets, dragging sick men and provisions up\nmountain steeps, amid disappointment, fatigue, murmurs, curses, snakes,\nmosquitoes, false alarms of Spaniards, and every misery, save cold,\nwhich flesh is heir to. Suffice it that by sunset that evening they had\ngained a level spot, a full thousand feet above the sea, backed by an\ninaccessible cliff which formed the upper shoulder of a mighty mountain,\ndefended below by steep wooded slopes, and needing but the felling of a\nfew trees to make it impregnable.\n\nAmyas settled the sick under the arched roots of an enormous cottonwood\ntree, and made a second journey to the ship, to bring up hammocks and\nblankets for them; while Yeo's wisdom and courage were of inestimable\nvalue. He, as pioneer, had found the little brook up which they forced\ntheir way; he had encouraged them to climb the cliffs over which it\nfell, arguing rightly that on its course they were sure to find some\nground fit for encampment within the reach of water; he had supported\nAmyas, when again and again the weary crew entreated to be dragged no\nfarther, and had gone back again a dozen times to cheer them upward;\nwhile Cary, who brought up the rear, bullied and cheered on the\nstragglers who sat down and refused to move, drove back at the sword's\npoint more than one who was beating a retreat, carried their burdens for\nthem, sang them songs on the halt; in all things approving himself the\ngallant and hopeful soul which he had always been: till Amyas, beside\nhimself with joy at finding that the two men on whom he had counted\nmost were utterly worthy of his trust, went so far as to whisper to them\nboth, in confidence, that very night--\n\n\"Cortez burnt his ships when he landed. Why should not we?\"\n\nYeo leapt upright; and then sat down again, and whispered--\n\n\"Do you say that, captain? 'Tis from above, then, that's certain; for\nit's been hanging on my mind too all day.\"\n\n\"There's no hurry,\" quoth Amyas; \"we must clear her out first, you\nknow,\" while Cary sat silent and musing. Amyas had evidently more\nschemes in his head than he chose to tell.\n\nThe men were too tired that evening to do much, but ere the sun rose\nnext morning Amyas had them hard at work fortifying their position. It\nwas, as I said, strong enough by nature; for though it was commanded by\nhigh cliffs on three sides, yet there was no chance of an enemy coming\nover the enormous mountain-range behind them, and still less chance\nthat, if he came, he would discover them through the dense mass of\ntrees which crowned the cliff, and clothed the hills for a thousand feet\nabove. The attack, if it took place, would come from below; and against\nthat Amyas guarded by felling the smaller trees, and laying them with\ntheir boughs outward over the crest of the slope, thus forming an abatis\n(as every one who has shot in thick cover knows to his cost) warranted\nto bring up in two steps, horse, dog, or man. The trunks were sawn into\nlogs, laid lengthwise, and steadied by stakes and mould; and three or\nfour hours' hard work finished a stockade which would defy anything\nbut artillery. The work done, Amyas scrambled up into the boughs of the\nenormous ceiba-tree, and there sat inspecting his own handiwork, looking\nout far and wide over the forest-covered plains and the blue sea beyond,\nand thinking, in his simple straightforward way, of what was to be done\nnext.\n\nTo stay there long was impossible; to avenge himself upon La Guayra was\nimpossible; to go until he had found out whether Frank was alive or dead\nseemed at first equally impossible. But were Brimblecombe, Cary, and\nthose eighty men to be sacrificed a second time to his private interest?\nAmyas wept with rage, and then wept again with earnest, honest prayer,\nbefore he could make up his mind. But he made it up. There were a\nhundred chances to one that Frank was dead; and if not, he was equally\npast their help; for he was--Amyas knew that too well--by this time\nin the hands of the Inquisition. Who could lift him from that pit? Not\nAmyas, at least! And crying aloud in his agony, \"God help him! for I\ncannot!\" Amyas made up his mind to move. But whither? Many an hour he\nthought and thought alone, there in his airy nest; and at last he went\ndown, calm and cheerful, and drew Cary and Yeo aside. They could not,\nhe said, refit the ship without dying of fever during the process; an\nassertion which neither of his hearers was bold enough to deny. Even\nif they refitted her, they would be pretty certain to have to fight the\nSpaniards again; for it was impossible to doubt the Indian's story, that\nthey had been forewarned of the Rose's coming, or to doubt, either, that\nEustace had been the traitor.\n\n\"Let us try St. Jago, then; sack it, come down on La Guayra in the rear,\ntake a ship there, and so get home.\"\n\n\"Nay, Will. If they have strengthened themselves against us at La\nGuayra, where they had little to lose, surely they have done so at St.\nJago, where they have much. I hear the town is large, though new; and\nbesides, how can we get over these mountains without a guide?\"\n\n\"Or with one?\" said Cary, with a sigh, looking up at the vast walls of\nwood and rock which rose range on range for miles. \"But it is strange to\nfind you, at least, throwing cold water on a daring plot.\"\n\n\"What if I had a still more daring one? Did you ever hear of the golden\ncity of Manoa?\"\n\nYeo laughed a grim but joyful laugh. \"I have, sir; and so have the old\nhands from the Pelican and the Jesus of Lubec, I doubt not.\"\n\n\"So much the better;\" and Amyas began to tell Cary all which he had\nlearned from the Spaniard, while Yeo capped every word thereof with\nrumors and traditions of his own gathering. Cary sat half aghast as\nthe huge phantasmagoria unfolded itself before his dazzled eyes; and at\nlast--\n\n\"So that was why you wanted to burn the ship! Well, after all, nobody\nneeds me at home, and one less at table won't be missed. So you want to\nplay Cortez, eh?\"\n\n\"We shall never need to play Cortez (who was not such a bad fellow after\nall, Will), because we shall have no such cannibal fiends' tyranny to\nrid the earth of, as he had. And I trust we shall fear God enough not to\nplay Pizarro.\"\n\nSo the conversation dropped for the time, but none of them forgot it.\n\nIn that mountain-nook the party spent some ten days and more. Several of\nthe sick men died, some from the fever superadded to their wounds;\nsome, probably, from having been bled by the surgeon; the others mended\nsteadily, by the help of certain herbs which Yeo administered, much\nto the disgust of the doctor, who, of course, wanted to bleed the poor\nfellows all round, and was all but mutinous when Amyas stayed his hand.\nIn the meanwhile, by dint of daily trips to the ship, provisions\nwere plentiful enough,--beside the raccoons, monkeys, and other small\nanimals, which Yeo and the veterans of Hawkins's crew knew how to catch,\nand the fruit and vegetables; above all, the delicious mountain cabbage\nof the Areca palm, and the fresh milk of the cow-tree, which they\nbrought in daily, paying well thereby for the hospitality they received.\n\nAll day long a careful watch was kept among the branches of the mighty\nceiba-tree. And what a tree that was! The hugest English oak would have\nseemed a stunted bush beside it. Borne up on roots, or rather walls,\nof twisted board, some twelve feet high, between which the whole\ncrew, their ammunitions, and provisions, were housed roomily, rose\nthe enormous trunk full forty feet in girth, towering like some tall\nlighthouse, smooth for a hundred feet, then crowned with boughs, each of\nwhich was a stately tree, whose topmost twigs were full two hundred\nand fifty feet from the ground. And yet it was easy for the sailors to\nascend; so many natural ropes had kind Nature lowered for their use, in\nthe smooth lianes which hung to the very earth, often without a knot or\nleaf. Once in the tree, you were within a new world, suspended between\nheaven and earth, and as Cary said, no wonder if, like Jack when he\nclimbed the magic bean-stalk, you had found a castle, a giant, and a few\nacres of well-stocked park, packed away somewhere amid that labyrinth of\ntimber. Flower-gardens at least were there in plenty; for every limb was\ncovered with pendent cactuses, gorgeous orchises, and wild pines; and\nwhile one-half the tree was clothed in rich foliage, the other half,\nutterly leafless, bore on every twig brilliant yellow flowers, around\nwhich humming-birds whirred all day long. Parrots peeped in and out of\nevery cranny, while, within the airy woodland, brilliant lizards basked\nlike living gems upon the bark, gaudy finches flitted and chirruped,\nbutterflies of every size and color hovered over the topmost twigs,\ninnumerable insects hummed from morn till eve; and when the sun went\ndown, tree-toads came out to snore and croak till dawn. There was more\nlife round that one tree than in a whole square mile of English soil.\n\nAnd Amyas, as he lounged among the branches, felt at moments as if he\nwould be content to stay there forever, and feed his eyes and ears\nwith all its wonders--and then started sighing from his dream, as he\nrecollected that a few days must bring the foe upon them, and force\nhim to decide upon some scheme at which the bravest heart might falter\nwithout shame. So there he sat (for he often took the scout's place\nhimself), looking out over the fantastic tropic forest at his feet,\nand the flat mangrove-swamps below, and the white sheet of foam-flecked\nblue; and yet no sail appeared; and the men, as their fear of fever\nsubsided, began to ask when they would go down and refit the ship, and\nAmyas put them off as best he could, till one noon he saw slipping\nalong the shore from the westward, a large ship under easy sail, and\nrecognized in her, or thought he did so, the ship which they had passed\nupon their way.\n\nIf it was she, she must have run past them to La Guayra in the night,\nand have now returned, perhaps, to search for them along the coast.\n\nShe crept along slowly. He was in hopes that she might pass the river's\nmouth: but no. She lay-to close to the shore; and, after a while, Amyas\nsaw two boats pull in from her, and vanish behind the mangroves.\n\nSliding down a liane, he told what he had seen. The men, tired of\ninactivity, received the news with a shout of joy, and set to work to\nmake all ready for their guests. Four brass swivels, which they had\nbrought up, were mounted, fixed in logs, so as to command the path; the\nmusketeers and archers clustered round them with their tackle ready, and\nhalf-a-dozen good marksmen volunteered into the cotton-tree with their\narquebuses, as a post whence \"a man might have very pretty shooting.\"\nPrayers followed as a matter of course, and dinner as a matter of\ncourse also; but two weary hours passed before there was any sign of the\nSpaniards.\n\nPresently a wreath of white smoke curled up from the swamp, and then the\nreport of a caliver. Then, amid the growls of the English, the Spanish\nflag ran up above the trees, and floated--horrible to behold--at the\nmast-head of the Rose. They were signalling the ship for more hands;\nand, in effect, a third boat soon pushed off and vanished into the\nforest.\n\nAnother hour, during which the men had thoroughly lost their temper, but\nnot their hearts, by waiting; and talked so loud, and strode up and down\nso wildly, that Amyas had to warn them that there was no need to betray\nthemselves; that the Spaniards might not find them after all; that they\nmight pass the stockade close without seeing it; that, unless they hit\noff the track at once, they would probably return to their ship for the\npresent; and exacted a promise from them that they would be perfectly\nsilent till he gave the word to fire.\n\nWhich wise commands had scarcely passed his lips, when, in the path\nbelow, glanced the headpiece of a Spanish soldier, and then another and\nanother.\n\n\"Fools!\" whispered Amyas to Cary; \"they are coming up in single file,\nrushing on their own death. Lie close, men!\"\n\nThe path was so narrow that two could seldom come up abreast, and so\nsteep that the enemy had much ado to struggle and stumble upwards. The\nmen seemed half unwilling to proceed, and hung back more than once;\nbut Amyas could hear an authoritative voice behind, and presently there\nemerged to the front, sword in hand, a figure at which Amyas and Cary\nboth started.\n\n\"Is it he?\"\n\n\"Surely I know those legs among a thousand, though they are in armor.\"\n\n\"It is my turn for him, now, Cary, remember! Silence, silence, men!\"\n\nThe Spaniards seemed to feel that they were leading a forlorn hope. Don\nGuzman (for there was little doubt that it was he) had much ado to get\nthem on at all.\n\n\"The fellows have heard how gently we handled the Guayra squadron,\"\nwhispers Cary, \"and have no wish to become fellow-martyrs with the\ncaptain of the Madre Dolorosa.\"\n\nAt last the Spaniards get up the steep slope to within forty yards of\nthe stockade, and pause, suspecting a trap, and puzzled by the complete\nsilence. Amyas leaps on the top of it, a white flag in his hand; but his\nheart beats so fiercely at the sight of that hated figure, that he can\nhardly get out the words--\n\n\"Don Guzman, the quarrel is between you and me, not between your men and\nmine. I would have sent in a challenge to you at La Guayra, but you were\naway; I challenge you now to single combat.\"\n\n\"Lutheran dog, I have a halter for you, but no sword! As you served us\nat Smerwick, we will serve you now. Pirate and ravisher, you and yours\nshall share Oxenham's fate, as you have copied his crimes, and learn\nwhat it is to set foot unbidden on the dominions of the king of Spain.\"\n\n\"The devil take you and the king of Spain together!\" shouts Amyas,\nlaughing loudly. \"This ground belongs to him no more than it does to\nme, but to the Queen Elizabeth, in whose name I have taken as lawful\npossession of it as you ever did of Caracas. Fire, men! and God defend\nthe right!\"\n\nBoth parties obeyed the order; Amyas dropped down behind the stockade\nin time to let a caliver bullet whistle over his head; and the Spaniards\nrecoiled as the narrow face of the stockade burst into one blaze of\nmusketry and swivels, raking their long array from front to rear.\n\nThe front ranks fell over each other in heaps; the rear ones turned and\nran; overtaken, nevertheless, by the English bullets and arrows, which\ntumbled them headlong down the steep path.\n\n\"Out, men, and charge them. See! the Don is running like the rest!\" And\nscrambling over the abattis, Amyas and about thirty followed them fast;\nfor he had hope of learning from some prisoner his brother's fate.\n\nAmyas was unjust in his last words. Don Guzman, as if by miracle, had\nbeen only slightly wounded; and seeing his men run, had rushed back and\ntried to rally them, but was borne away by the fugitives.\n\nHowever, the Spaniards were out of sight among the thick bushes before\nthe English could overtake them; and Amyas, afraid lest they should\nrally and surround his small party, withdrew sorely against his will,\nand found in the pathway fourteen Spaniards, but all dead. For one of\nthe wounded, with more courage than wisdom, had fired on the English\nas he lay; and Amyas's men, whose blood was maddened both by their\ndesperate situation, and the frightful stories of the rescued\ngalley-slaves, had killed them all before their captain could stop them.\n\n\"Are you mad?\" cries Amyas, as he strikes up one fellow's sword. \"Will\nyou kill an Indian?\"\n\nAnd he drags out of the bushes an Indian lad of sixteen, who, slightly\nwounded, is crawling away like a copper snake along the ground.\n\n\"The black vermin has sent an arrow through my leg; and poisoned too,\nmost like.\"\n\n\"God grant not: but an Indian is worth his weight in gold to us now,\"\nsaid Amyas, tucking his prize under his arm like a bundle. The lad, as\nsoon as he saw there was no escape, resigned himself to his fate with\ntrue Indian stoicism, was brought in, and treated kindly enough, but\nrefused to eat. For which, after much questioning, he gave as a reason,\nthat he would make them kill him at once; for fat him they should not;\nand gradually gave them to understand that the English always (so\nat least the Spaniards said) fatted and ate their prisoners like\nthe Caribs; and till he saw them go out and bury the bodies of the\nSpaniards, nothing would persuade him that the corpses were not to be\ncooked for supper.\n\nHowever, kind words, kind looks, and the present of that inestimable\ntreasure--a knife, brought him to reason; and he told Amyas that he\nbelonged to a Spaniard who had an \"encomienda\" of Indians some fifteen\nmiles to the south-west; that he had fled from his master, and lived\nby hunting for some months past; and having seen the ship where she lay\nmoored, and boarded her in hope of plunder, had been surprised therein\nby the Spaniards, and forced by threats to go with them as a guide in\ntheir search for the English. But now came a part of his story which\nfilled the soul of Amyas with delight. He was an Indian of the Llanos,\nor great savannahs which lay to the southward beyond the mountains, and\nhad actually been upon the Orinoco. He had been stolen as a boy by some\nSpaniards, who had gone down (as was the fashion of the Jesuits even\nas late as 1790) for the pious purpose of converting the savages by the\nsimple process of catching, baptizing, and making servants of those\nwhom they could carry off, and murdering those who resisted their gentle\nmethod of salvation. Did he know the way back again? Who could ask such\na question of an Indian? And the lad's black eyes flashed fire, as Amyas\noffered him liberty and iron enough for a dozen Indians, if he would\nlead them through the passes of the mountains, and southward to the\nmighty river, where lay their golden hopes. Hernando de Serpa, Amyas\nknew, had tried the same course, which was supposed to be about one\nhundred and twenty leagues, and failed, being overthrown utterly by the\nWikiri Indians; but Amyas knew enough of the Spaniards' brutal method\nof treating those Indians, to be pretty sure that they had brought that\ncatastrophe upon themselves, and that he might avoid it well enough by\nthat common justice and mercy toward the savages which he had learned\nfrom his incomparable tutor, Francis Drake.\n\nNow was the time to speak; and, assembling his men around him, Amyas\nopened his whole heart, simply and manfully. This was their only hope\nof safety. Some of them had murmured that they should perish like John\nOxenham's crew. This plan was rather the only way to avoid perishing\nlike them. Don Guzman would certainly return to seek them; and not only\nhe, but land-forces from St. Jago. Even if the stockade was not forced,\nthey would be soon starved out; why not move at once, ere the Spaniards\ncould return, and begin a blockade? As for taking St. Jago, it was\nimpossible. The treasure would all be safely hidden, and the town well\nprepared to meet them. If they wanted gold and glory, they must seek it\nelsewhere. Neither was there any use in marching along the coast, and\ntrying the ports: ships could outstrip them, and the country was already\nwarned. There was but this one chance; and on it Amyas, the first and\nlast time in his life, waxed eloquent, and set forth the glory of the\nenterprise, the service to the queen, the salvation of heathens, and\nthe certainty that, if successful, they should win honor and wealth and\neverlasting fame, beyond that of Cortez or Pizarro, till the men, sulky\nat first, warmed every moment; and one old Pelican broke out with--\n\n\"Yes, sir! we didn't go round the world with you for naught; and watched\nyour works and ways, which was always those of a gentleman, as you\nare--who spoke a word for a poor fellow when he was in a scrape, and saw\nall you ought to see, and naught that you ought not. And we'll follow\nyou, sir, all alone to ourselves; and let those that know you worse\nfollow after when they're come to their right mind.\"\n\nMan after man capped this brave speech; the minority, who, if they liked\nlittle to go, liked still less to be left behind, gave in their consent\nperforce; and, to make a long story short, Amyas conquered, and the plan\nwas accepted.\n\n\"This,\" said Amyas, \"is indeed the proudest day of my life! I have lost\none brother, but I have gained fourscore. God do so to me and more also,\nif I do not deal with you according to the trust which you have put in\nme this day!\"\n\nWe, I suppose, are to believe that we have a right to laugh at Amyas's\nscheme as frantic and chimerical. It is easy to amuse ourselves with the\npremises, after the conclusion has been found for us. We know, now, that\nhe was mistaken: but we have not discovered his mistake for ourselves,\nand have no right to plume ourselves on other men's discoveries. Had we\nlived in Amyas's days, we should have belonged either to the many wise\nmen who believed as he did, or to the many foolish men, who not only\nsneered at the story of Manoa, but at a hundred other stories, which we\nnow know to be true. Columbus was laughed at: but he found a new world,\nnevertheless. Cortez was laughed at: but he found Mexico. Pizarro: but\nhe found Peru. I ask any fair reader of those two charming books, Mr.\nPrescott's Conquest of Mexico and his Conquest of Peru, whether the true\nwonders in them described do not outdo all the false wonders of Manoa.\n\nBut what reason was there to think them false? One quarter, perhaps, of\nAmerica had been explored, and yet in that quarter two empires had been\nalready found, in a state of mechanical, military, and agricultural\ncivilization superior, in many things, to any nation of Europe. Was\nit not most rational to suppose that in the remaining three-quarters\nsimilar empires existed? If a second Mexico had been discovered in the\nmountains of Parima, and a second Peru in those of Brazil, what right\nwould any man have had to wonder? As for the gold legends, nothing was\ntold of Manoa which had not been seen in Peru and Mexico by the bodily\neyes of men then living. Why should not the rocks of Guiana have been\nas full of the precious metals (we do not know yet that they are not) as\nthe rocks of Peru and Mexico were known to be? Even the details of the\nstory, its standing on a lake, for instance, bore a probability with\nthem. Mexico actually stood in the centre of a lake--why should not\nManoa? The Peruvian worship centred round a sacred lake--why not that\nof Manoa? Pizarro and Cortez, again, were led on to their desperate\nenterprises by the sight of small quantities of gold among savages, who\ntold them of a civilized gold-country near at hand; and they found that\nthose savages spoke truth. Why was the unanimous report of the Carib\ntribes of the Orinoco to be disbelieved, when they told a similar tale?\nSir Richard Schomburgk's admirable preface to Raleigh's Guiana proves,\nsurely, that the Indians themselves were deceived, as well as deceivers.\nIt was known, again, that vast quantities of the Peruvian treasure had\nbeen concealed by the priests, and that members of the Inca family had\nfled across the Andes, and held out against the Spaniards. Barely fifty\nyears had elapsed since then;--what more probable than that this remnant\nof the Peruvian dynasty and treasure still existed? Even the story of\nthe Amazons, though it may serve Hume as a point for his ungenerous and\nuntruthful attempt to make Raleigh out either fool or villain, has\ncome from Spaniards, who had with their own eyes seen the Indian women\nfighting by their husbands' sides, and from Indians, who asserted the\nexistence of an Amazonian tribe. What right had Amyas, or any man, to\ndisbelieve the story? The existence of the Amazons in ancient Asia, and\nof their intercourse with Alexander the Great, was then an accredited\npart of history, which it would have been gratuitous impertinence to\ndeny. And what if some stories connected these warlike women with the\nEmperor of Manoa, and the capital itself? This generation ought surely\nto be the last to laugh at such a story, at least as long as the\nAmazonian guards of the King of Dahomey continue to outvie the men in\nthat relentless ferocity, with which they have subdued every neighboring\ntribe, save the Christians of Abbeokuta. In this case, as in a hundred\nmore, fact not only outdoes, but justifies imagination; and Amyas spoke\ncommon sense when he said to his men that day--\n\n\"Let fools laugh and stay at home. Wise men dare and win. Saul went to\nlook for his father's asses, and found a kingdom; and Columbus, my men,\nwas called a madman for only going to seek China, and never knew, they\nsay, until his dying day, that he had found a whole new world instead\nof it. Find Manoa? God only, who made all things, knows what we may find\nbeside!\"\n\nSo underneath that giant ceiba-tree, those valiant men, reduced by\nbattle and sickness to some eighty, swore a great oath, and kept that\noath like men. To search for the golden city for two full years to come,\nwhatever might befall; to stand to each other for weal or woe; to obey\ntheir officers to the death; to murmur privately against no man, but\nbring all complaints to a council of war; to use no profane oaths, but\nserve God daily with prayer; to take by violence from no man, save from\ntheir natural enemies the Spaniards; to be civil and merciful to all\nsavages, and chaste and courteous to all women; to bring all booty and\nall food into the common stock, and observe to the utmost their faith\nwith the adventurers who had fitted out the ship; and finally, to march\nat sunrise the next morning toward the south, trusting in God to be\ntheir guide.\n\n\"It is a great oath, and a hard one,\" said Brimblecombe; \"but God will\ngive us strength to keep it.\" And they knelt all together and received\nthe Holy Communion, and then rose to pack provisions and ammunition,\nand lay down again to sleep and to dream that they were sailing home\nup Torridge stream--as Cavendish, returning from round the world, did\nactually sail home up Thames but five years afterwards--\"with mariners\nand soldiers clothed in silk, with sails of damask, and topsails of\ncloth of gold, and the richest prize which ever was brought at one time\nunto English shores.\"\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nThe Cross stands upright in the southern sky. It is the middle of the\nnight. Cary and Yeo glide silently up the hill and into the camp,\nand whisper to Amyas that they have done the deed. The sleepers are\nawakened, and the train sets forth.\n\nUpward and southward ever: but whither, who can tell? They hardly think\nof the whither; but go like sleep-walkers, shaken out of one land of\ndreams, only to find themselves in another and stranger one. All around\nis fantastic and unearthly; now each man starts as he sees the figures\nof his fellows, clothed from head to foot in golden filigree; looks up,\nand sees the yellow moonlight through the fronds of the huge tree-ferns\noverhead, as through a cloud of glittering lace. Now they are hewing\ntheir way through a thicket of enormous flags; now through bamboos forty\nfeet high; now they are stumbling over boulders, waist-deep in cushions\nof club-moss; now they are struggling through shrubberies of heaths and\nrhododendrons, and woolly incense-trees, where every leaf, as they brush\npast, dashes some fresh scent into their faces, and\n\n     \"The winds, with musky wing,\n     About the cedarn alleys fling\n     Nard and cassia's balmy smells.\"\n\nNow they open upon some craggy brow, from whence they can see far below\nan ocean of soft cloud, whose silver billows, girdled by the mountain\nsides, hide the lowland from their sight.\n\nAnd from beneath the cloud strange voices rise; the screams of thousand\nnight-birds, and wild howls, which they used at first to fancy were the\ncries of ravenous beasts, till they found them to proceed from nothing\nfiercer than an ape. But what is that deeper note, like a series\nof muffled explosions,--arquebuses fired within some subterranean\ncavern,--the heavy pulse of which rolls up through the depths of the\nunseen forest? They hear it now for the first time, but they will hear\nit many a time again; and the Indian lad is hushed, and cowers close\nto them, and then takes heart, as he looks upon their swords and\narquebuses; for that is the roar of the jaguar, \"seeking his meat from\nGod.\"\n\nBut what is that glare away to the northward? The yellow moon is ringed\nwith gay rainbows; but that light is far too red to be the reflection\nof any beams of hers. Now through the cloud rises a column of black and\nlurid smoke; the fog clears away right and left around it, and shows\nbeneath, a mighty fire.\n\nThe men look at each other with questioning eyes, each half suspecting,\nand yet not daring to confess their own suspicions; and Amyas whispers\nto Yeo--\n\n\"You took care to flood the powder?\"\n\n\"Ay, ay, sir, and to unload the ordnance too. No use in making a noise\nto tell the Spaniards our whereabouts.\"\n\nYes; that glare rises from the good ship Rose. Amyas, like Cortez of\nold, has burnt his ship, and retreat is now impossible. Forward into the\nunknown abyss of the New World, and God be with them as they go!\n\nThe Indian knows a cunning path: it winds along the highest ridges of\nthe mountains; but the travelling is far more open and easy.\n\nThey have passed the head of a valley which leads down to St. Jago.\nBeneath that long shining river of mist, which ends at the foot of\nthe great Silla, lies (so says the Indian lad) the rich capital of\nVenezuela; and beyond, the gold-mines of Los Teques and Baruta, which\nfirst attracted the founder Diego de Losada; and many a longing eye is\nturned towards it as they pass the saddle at the valley head; but the\nattempt is hopeless, they turn again to the left, and so down towards\nthe rancho, taking care (so the prudent Amyas had commanded) to break\ndown, after crossing, the frail rope bridge which spans each torrent and\nravine.\n\nThey are at the rancho long before daybreak, and have secured there,\nnot only fourteen mules, but eight or nine Indians stolen from off\nthe Llanos, like their guide, who are glad enough to escape from their\ntyrants by taking service with them. And now southward and away, with\nlightened shoulders and hearts; for they are all but safe from pursuit.\nThe broken bridges prevent the news of their raid reaching St. Jago\nuntil nightfall; and in the meanwhile, Don Guzman returns to the river\nmouth the next day to find the ship a blackened wreck, and the camp\nempty; follows their trail over the hills till he is stopped by a broken\nbridge; surmounts that difficulty, and meets a second; his men are\nworn out with heat, and a little afraid of stumbling on the heretic\ndesperadoes, and he returns by land to St. Jago; and when he arrives\nthere, has news from home which gives him other things to think of than\nfollowing those mad Englishmen, who have vanished into the wilderness.\n\"What need, after all, to follow them?\" asked the Spaniards of each\nother. \"Blinded by the devil, whom they serve, they rush on in search of\ncertain death, as many a larger company has before them, and they will\nfind it, and will trouble La Guayra no more forever.\" \"Lutheran dogs and\nenemies of God,\" said Don Guzman to his soldiers, \"they will leave their\nbones to whiten on the Llanos, as may every heretic who sets foot on\nSpanish soil!\"\n\nWill they do so, Don Guzman? Or wilt thou and Amyas meet again upon a\nmightier battlefield, to learn a lesson which neither of you yet has\nlearned?\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nTHE INQUISITION IN THE INDIES\n\n\nMy next chapter is perhaps too sad; it shall be at least as short as I\ncan make it; but it was needful to be written, that readers may judge\nfairly for themselves what sort of enemies the English nation had to\nface in those stern days.\n\nThree weeks have passed, and the scene is shifted to a long, low range\nof cells in a dark corridor in the city of Cartagena. The door of one is\nopen; and within stand two cloaked figures, one of whom we know. It is\nEustace Leigh. The other is a familiar of the Holy Office.\n\nHe holds in his hand a lamp, from which the light falls on a bed of\nstraw, and on the sleeping figure of a man. The high white brow, the\npale and delicate features--them too we know, for they are those of\nFrank. Saved half-dead from the fury of the savage negroes, he has been\nreserved for the more delicate cruelty of civilized and Christian men.\nHe underwent the question but this afternoon; and now Eustace, his\nbetrayer, is come to persuade him--or to entrap him? Eustace himself\nhardly knows whether of the two.\n\nAnd yet he would give his life to save his cousin.\n\nHis life? He has long since ceased to care for that. He has done what\nhe has done, because it is his duty; and now he is to do his duty\nonce more, and wake the sleeper, and argue, coax, threaten him into\nrecantation while \"his heart is still tender from the torture,\" so\nEustace's employers phrase it.\n\nAnd yet how calmly he is sleeping! Is it but a freak of the lamplight,\nor is there a smile upon his lips? Eustace takes the lamp and bends over\nhim to see; and as he bends he hears Frank whispering in his dreams his\nmother's name, and a name higher and holier still.\n\nEustace cannot find the heart to wake him.\n\n\"Let him rest,\" whispers he to his companion. \"After all, I fear my\nwords will be of little use.\"\n\n\"I fear so too, sir. Never did I behold a more obdurate heretic. He did\nnot scruple to scoff openly at their holinesses.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Eustace; \"great is the pravity of the human heart, and the\npower of Satan! Let us go for the present.\"\n\n\"Where is she?\"\n\n\"The elder sorceress, or the younger?\"\n\n\"The younger--the--\"\n\n\"The Senora de Soto? Ah, poor thing! One could be sorry for her, were\nshe not a heretic.\" And the man eyed Eustace keenly, and then quietly\nadded, \"She is at present with the notary; to the benefit of her soul, I\ntrust--\"\n\nEustace half stopped, shuddering. He could hardly collect himself enough\nto gasp out an \"Amen!\"\n\n\"Within there,\" said the man, pointing carelessly to a door as they\nwent down the corridor. \"We can listen a moment, if you like; but don't\nbetray me, senor.\"\n\nEustace knows well enough that the fellow is probably on the watch to\nbetray him, if he shows any signs of compunction; at least to report\nfaithfully to his superiors the slightest expression of sympathy with\na heretic; but a horrible curiosity prevails over fear, and he pauses\nclose to the fatal door. His face is all of a flame, his knees knock\ntogether, his ears are ringing, his heart bursting through his ribs, as\nhe supports himself against the wall, hiding his convulsed face as well\nas he can from his companion.\n\nA man's voice is plainly audible within; low, but distinct. The notary\nis trying that old charge of witchcraft, which the Inquisitors, whether\nto justify themselves to their own consciences, or to whiten their\nvillainy somewhat in the eyes of the mob, so often brought against their\nvictims. And then Eustace's heart sinks within him as he hears a woman's\nvoice reply, sharpened by indignation and agony--\n\n\"Witchcraft against Don Guzman? What need of that, oh God! what need?\"\n\n\"You deny it then, senora? we are sorry for you; but--\"\n\nA confused choking murmur from the victim, mingled with words which\nmight mean anything or nothing.\n\n\"She has confessed!\" whispered Eustace; \"saints, I thank you!--she--\"\n\nA wail which rings through Eustace's ears, and brain, and heart! He\nwould have torn at the door to open it; but his companion forces him\naway. Another, and another wail, while the wretched man hurries off,\nstopping his ears in vain against those piercing cries, which follow\nhim, like avenging angels, through the dreadful vaults.\n\nHe escaped into the fragrant open air, and the golden tropic moonlight,\nand a garden which might have served as a model for Eden; but man's hell\nfollowed into God's heaven, and still those wails seemed to ring through\nhis ears.\n\n\"Oh, misery, misery, misery!\" murmured he to himself through grinding\nteeth; \"and I have brought her to this! I have had to bring her to it!\nWhat else could I? Who dare blame me? And yet what devilish sin can I\nhave committed, that requires to be punished thus? Was there no one to\nbe found but me? No one? And yet it may save her soul. It may bring her\nto repentance!\"\n\n\"It may, indeed; for she is delicate, and cannot endure much. You\nought to know as well as I, senor, the merciful disposition of the Holy\nOffice.\"\n\n\"I know it, I know it,\" interrupted poor Eustace, trembling now for\nhimself. \"All in love--all in love.--A paternal chastisement--\"\n\n\"And the proofs of heresy are patent, beside the strong suspicion\nof enchantment, and the known character of the elder sorceress.\nYou yourself, you must remember, senor, told us that she had been a\nnotorious witch in England, before the senora brought her hither as her\nattendant.\"\n\n\"Of course she was; of course. Yes; there was no other course open. And\nthough the flesh may be weak, sir, in my case, yet none can have proved\nbetter to the Holy Office how willing is the spirit!\"\n\nAnd so Eustace departed; and ere another sun had set, he had gone to the\nprincipal of the Jesuits; told him his whole heart, or as much of it,\npoor wretch, as he dare tell to himself; and entreated to be allowed to\nfinish his novitiate, and enter the order, on the understanding that he\nwas to be sent at once back to Europe, or anywhere else; \"Otherwise,\"\nas he said frankly, \"he should go mad, even if he were not mad already.\"\nThe Jesuit, who was a kindly man enough, went to the Holy Office, and\nsettled all with the Inquisitors, recounting to them, to set him above\nall suspicion, Eustace's past valiant services to the Church. His\ntestimony was no longer needed; he left Cartagena for Nombre that very\nnight, and sailed the next week I know not whither.\n\nI say, I know not whither. Eustace Leigh vanishes henceforth from these\npages. He may have ended as General of his Order. He may have worn out\nhis years in some tropic forest, \"conquering the souls\" (including, of\ncourse, the bodies) of Indians; he may have gone back to his old work\nin England, and been the very Ballard who was hanged and quartered three\nyears afterwards for his share in Babington's villainous conspiracy:\nI know not. This book is a history of men,--of men's virtues and sins,\nvictories and defeats; and Eustace is a man no longer: he is become a\nthing, a tool, a Jesuit; which goes only where it is sent, and does good\nor evil indifferently as it is bid; which, by an act of moral suicide,\nhas lost its soul, in the hope of saving it; without a will, a\nconscience, a responsibility (as it fancies), to God or man, but only to\n\"The Society.\" In a word, Eustace, as he says himself, is \"dead.\" Twice\ndead, I fear. Let the dead bury their dead. We have no more concern with\nEustace Leigh.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nTHE BANKS OF THE META\n\n                                        \"My mariners,\n     Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with\n          me--Death closes all: but something ere the end,\n     Some work of noble note, may yet be done,\n     Not unbecoming men that strove with gods!\"\n\n                                         TENNYSON'S Ulysses.\n\nNearly three years are past and gone since that little band had knelt\nat evensong beneath the giant tree of Guayra--years of seeming blank,\nthrough which they are to be tracked only by scattered notes and\nmis-spelt names. Through untrodden hills and forests, over a space of\nsome eight hundred miles in length by four hundred in breadth, they had\nbeen seeking for the Golden City, and they had sought in vain. They had\nsought it along the wooded banks of the Orinoco, and beyond the roaring\nfoam-world of Maypures, and on the upper waters of the mighty Amazon.\nThey had gone up the streams even into Peru itself, and had trodden the\ncinchona groves of Loxa, ignorant, as all the world was then, of their\nhealing virtues. They had seen the virgin snows of Chimborazo towering\nwhite above the thundercloud, and the giant cone of Cotopaxi blackening\nin its sullen wrath, before the fiery streams rolled down its sides.\nFoiled in their search at the back of the Andes, they had turned\neastward once more, and plunged from the alpine cliffs into \"the green\nand misty ocean of the Montana.\" Slowly and painfully they had worked\ntheir way northward again, along the eastern foot of the inland\nCordillera, and now they were bivouacking, as it seems, upon one of the\nmany feeders of the Meta, which flow down from the Suma Paz into the\nforest-covered plains. There they sat, their watch-fires glittering\non the stream, beneath the shadow of enormous trees, Amyas and Cary,\nBrimblecombe, Yeo, and the Indian lad, who has followed them in all\ntheir wanderings, alive and well: but as far as ever from Manoa, and\nits fairy lake, and golden palaces, and all the wonders of the Indian's\ntale. Again and again in their wanderings they had heard faint rumors of\nits existence, and started off in some fresh direction, to meet only a\nfresh disappointment, and hope deferred, which maketh sick the heart.\n\nThere they sit at last--four-and-forty men out of the eighty-four who\nleft the tree of Guayra:--where are the rest?\n\n     \"Their bones are scatter'd far and wide,\n     By mount, by stream, and sea.\"\n\nDrew, the master, lies on the banks of the Rio Negro, and five brave\nfellows by him, slain in fight by the poisoned arrows of the Indians, in\na vain attempt to penetrate the mountain-gorges of the Parima. Two more\nlie amid the valleys of the Andes, frozen to death by the fierce slaty\nhail which sweeps down from the condor's eyrie; four more were drowned\nat one of the rapids of the Orinoco; five or six more wounded men are\nleft behind at another rapid among friendly Indians, to be recovered\nwhen they can be: perhaps never. Fever, snakes, jaguars, alligators,\ncannibal fish, electric eels, have thinned their ranks month by month,\nand of their march through the primeval wilderness no track remains,\nexcept those lonely graves.\n\nAnd there the survivors sit, beside the silent stream, beneath the\ntropic moon; sun-dried and lean, but strong and bold as ever, with the\nquiet fire of English courage burning undimmed in every eye, and the\ngenial smile of English mirth fresh on every lip; making a jest of\ndanger and a sport of toil, as cheerily as when they sailed over the bar\nof Bideford, in days which seem to belong to some antenatal life. Their\nbeards have grown down upon their breasts; their long hair is knotted\non their heads, like women's, to keep off the burning sunshine; their\nleggings are of the skin of the delicate Guazu-puti deer; their shirts\nare patched with Indian cotton web; the spoils of jaguar, puma, and ape\nhang from their shoulders. Their ammunition is long since spent, their\nmuskets, spoilt by the perpetual vapor-bath of the steaming woods, are\nleft behind as useless in a cave by some cataract of the Orinoco: but\ntheir swords are bright and terrible as ever; and they carry bows of\na strength which no Indian arm can bend, and arrows pointed with the\nremnants of their armor; many of them, too, are armed with the pocuna\nor blowgun of the Indians--more deadly, because more silent, than the\nfirearms which they have left behind them. So they have wandered, and so\nthey will wander still, the lords of the forest and its beasts; terrible\nto all hostile Indians, but kindly, just, and generous to all who will\ndeal faithfully with them; and many a smooth-chinned Carib and\nAture, Solimo and Guahiba, recounts with wonder and admiration the\nrighteousness of the bearded heroes, who proclaimed themselves the\ndeadly foes of the faithless and murderous Spaniard, and spoke to them\nof the great and good queen beyond the seas, who would send her warriors\nto deliver and avenge the oppressed Indian.\n\nThe men are sleeping among the trees, some on the ground, and some in\ngrass-hammocks slung between the stems. All is silent, save the heavy\nplunge of the tapir in the river, as he tears up the water-weeds for\nhis night's repast. Sometimes, indeed, the jaguar, as he climbs from one\ntree-top to another after his prey, wakens the monkeys clustered on the\nboughs, and they again arouse the birds, and ten minutes of unearthly\nroars, howls, shrieks, and cacklings make the forest ring as if all\npandemonium had broke loose; but that soon dies away again; and, even\nwhile it lasts, it is too common a matter to awaken the sleepers,\nmuch less to interrupt the council of war which is going on beside\nthe watch-fire, between the three adventurers and the faithful Yeo. A\nhundred times have they held such a council, and in vain; and, for aught\nthey know, this one will be as fruitless as those which have gone before\nit. Nevertheless, it is a more solemn one than usual; for the two years\nduring which they had agreed to search for Manoa are long past, and some\nnew place must be determined on, unless they intend to spend the rest of\ntheir lives in that green wilderness.\n\n\"Well,\" says Will Cary, taking his cigar out of his mouth, \"at least we\nhave got something out of those last Indians. It is a comfort to have a\npuff at tobacco once more, after three weeks' fasting.\"\n\n\"For me,\" said Jack Brimblecombe, \"Heaven forgive me! but when I get the\nmagical leaf between my teeth again, I feel tempted to sit as still as a\nchimney, and smoke till my dying day, without stirring hand or foot.\"\n\n\"Then I shall forbid you tobacco, Master Parson,\" said Amyas; \"for we\nmust be up and away again to-morrow. We have been idling here three\nmortal days, and nothing done.\"\n\n\"Shall we ever do anything? I think the gold of Manoa is like the gold\nwhich lies where the rainbow touches the ground, always a field beyond\nyou.\"\n\nAmyas was silent awhile, and so were the rest. There was no denying that\ntheir hopes were all but gone. In the immense circuit which they had\nmade, they had met with nothing but disappointment.\n\n\"There is but one more chance,\" said he at length, \"and that is, the\nmountains to the east of the Orinoco, where we failed the first time.\nThe Incas may have moved on to them when they escaped.\"\n\n\"Why not?\" said Cary; \"they would so put all the forests, beside the\nLlanos and half-a-dozen great rivers, between them and those dogs of\nSpaniards.\"\n\n\"Shall we try it once more?\" said Amyas. \"This river ought to run\ninto the Orinoco; and once there, we are again at the very foot of the\nmountains. What say you, Yeo?\"\n\n\"I cannot but mind, your worship, that when we came up the Orinoco,\nthe Indians told us terrible stories of those mountains, how far they\nstretched, and how difficult they were to cross, by reason of the cliffs\naloft, and the thick forests in the valleys. And have we not lost five\ngood men there already?\"\n\n\"What care we? No forests can be thicker than those we have bored\nthrough already; why, if one had had but a tail, like a monkey, for\nan extra warp, one might have gone a hundred miles on end along the\ntree-tops, and found it far pleasanter walking than tripping in withes,\nand being eaten up with creeping things, from morn till night.\"\n\n\"But remember, too,\" said Jack, \"how they told us to beware of the\nAmazons.\"\n\n\"What, Jack, afraid of a parcel of women?\"\n\n\"Why not?\" said Jack, \"I wouldn't run from a man, as you know; but a\nwoman--it's not natural, like. They must be witches or devils. See how\nthe Caribs feared them. And there were men there without necks, and with\ntheir eyes in their breasts, they said. Now how could a Christian tackle\nsuch customers as them?\"\n\n\"He couldn't cut off their heads, that's certain; but, I suppose, a poke\nin the ribs will do as much for them as for their neighbors.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Jack, \"if I fight, let me fight honest flesh and blood,\nthat's all, and none of these outlandish monsters. How do you know but\nthat they are invulnerable by art-magic?\"\n\n\"How do you know that they are? And as for the Amazons,\" said Cary,\n\"woman's woman, all the world over. I'll bet that you may wheedle them\nround with a compliment or two, just as if they were so many burghers'\nwives. Pity I have not a court-suit and a Spanish hat. I would have\ntaken an orange in one hand and a handkerchief in the other, gone all\nalone to them as ambassador, and been in a week as great with Queen\nBlackfacealinda as ever Raleigh is at Whitehall.\"\n\n\"Gentlemen!\" said Yeo, \"where you go, I go; and not only I, but every\nman of us, I doubt not; but we have lost now half our company, and spent\nour ammunition, so we are no better men, were it not for our swords,\nthan these naked heathens round us. Now it was, as you all know, by the\nwonder and noise of their ordnance (let alone their horses, which is a\nbreak-neck beast I put no faith in) that both Cortez and Pizarro, those\nimps of Satan, made their golden conquests, with which if we could have\nastounded the people of Manoa--\"\n\n\"Having first found the said people,\" laughed Amyas. \"It is like the\nold fable. Every craftsman thinks his own trade the one pillar of the\ncommonweal.\"\n\n\"Well! your worship,\" quoth Yeo, \"it may be that being a gunner I\noverprize guns. But it don't need slate and pencil to do this sum--Are\nforty men without shot as good as eighty with?\"\n\n\"Thou art right, old fellow, right enough, and I was only jesting for\nvery sorrow, and must needs laugh about it lest I weep about it. Our\nchance is over, I believe, though I dare not confess as much to the\nmen.\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said Yeo, \"I have a feeling on me that the Lord's hand is against\nus in this matter. Whether He means to keep this wealth for worthier men\nthan us, or whether it is His will to hide this great city in the secret\nplace of His presence from the strife of tongues, and so to spare them\nfrom sinful man's covetousness, and England from that sin and luxury\nwhich I have seen gold beget among the Spaniards, I know not, sir; for\nwho knoweth the counsels of the Lord? But I have long had a voice within\nwhich saith, 'Salvation Yeo, thou shalt never behold the Golden City\nwhich is on earth, where heathens worship sun and moon and the hosts of\nheaven; be content, therefore, to see that Golden City which is above,\nwhere is neither sun nor moon, but the Lord God and the Lamb are the\nlight thereof.\"\n\nThere was a simple majesty about old Yeo when he broke forth in\nutterances like these, which made his comrades, and even Amyas and Cary,\nlook on him as Mussulmans look on madmen, as possessed of mysterious\nknowledge and flashes of inspiration; and Brimblecombe, whose pious soul\nlooked up to the old hero with a reverence which had overcome all his\nChurchman's prejudices against Anabaptists, answered gently,--\n\n\"Amen! amen! my masters all: and it has been on my mind, too, this long\ntime, that there is a providence against our going east; for see how\nthis two years past, whenever we have pushed eastward, we have fallen\ninto trouble, and lost good men; and whenever we went Westward-ho, we\nhave prospered; and do prosper to this day.\"\n\n\"And what is more, gentlemen,\" said Yeo, \"if, as Scripture says, dreams\nare from the Lord, I verily believe mine last night came from Him; for\nas I lay by the fire, sirs, I heard my little maid's voice calling of\nme, as plain as ever I heard in my life; and the very same words, sirs,\nwhich she learned from me and my good comrade William Penberthy to say,\n'Westward-ho! jolly mariners all!' a bit of an ungodly song, my masters,\nwhich we sang in our wild days; but she stood and called it as plain as\never mortal ears heard, and called again till I answered, 'Coming! my\nmaid, coming!' and after that the dear chuck called no more--God grant I\nfind her yet!--and so I woke.\"\n\nCary had long since given up laughing at Yeo about the \"little maid;\"\nand Amyas answered,--\n\n\"So let it be, Yeo, if the rest agree: but what shall we do to the\nwestward?\"\n\n\"Do?\" said Cary; \"there's plenty to do; for there's plenty of gold,\nand plenty of Spaniards, too, they say, on the other side of these\nmountains: so that our swords will not rust for lack of adventures, my\ngay knights-errant all.\"\n\nSo they chatted on; and before night was half through a plan was\nmatured, desperate enough--but what cared those brave hearts for that?\nThey would cross the Cordillera to Santa Fe de Bogota, of the wealth\nwhereof both Yeo and Amyas had often heard in the Pacific: try to seize\neither the town or some convoy of gold going from it; make for the\nnearest river (there was said to be a large one which ran northward\nthence), build canoes, and try to reach the Northern Sea once more; and\nthen, if Heaven prospered them, they might seize a Spanish ship, and\nmake their way home to England, not, indeed, with the wealth of Manoa,\nbut with a fair booty of Spanish gold. This was their new dream. It was\na wild one: but hardly more wild than the one which Drake had fulfilled,\nand not as wild as the one which Oxenham might have fulfilled, but for\nhis own fatal folly.\n\nAmyas sat watching late that night, sad of heart. To give up the\ncherished dream of years was hard; to face his mother, harder still: but\nit must be done, for the men's sake. So the new plan was proposed next\nday, and accepted joyfully. They would go up to the mountains and rest\nawhile; if possible, bring up the wounded whom they had left behind; and\nthen, try a new venture, with new hopes, perhaps new dangers; they were\ninured to the latter.\n\nThey started next morning cheerfully enough, and for three hours or more\npaddled easily up the glassy and windless reaches, between two green\nflower-bespangled walls of forest, gay with innumerable birds and\ninsects; while down from the branches which overhung the stream long\ntrailers hung to the water's edge, and seemed admiring in the clear\nmirror the images of their own gorgeous flowers. River, trees, flowers,\nbirds, insects,--it was all a fairy-land: but it was a colossal one; and\nyet the voyagers took little note of it. It was now to them an everyday\noccurrence, to see trees full two hundred feet high one mass of yellow\nor purple blossom to the highest twigs, and every branch and stem one\nhanging garden of crimson and orange orchids or vanillas. Common to them\nwere all the fantastic and enormous shapes with which Nature bedecks her\nrobes beneath the fierce suns and fattening rains of the tropic forest.\nCommon were forms and colors of bird, and fish, and butterfly, more\nstrange and bright than ever opium-eater dreamed. The long processions\nof monkeys, who kept pace with them along the tree-tops, and proclaimed\ntheir wonder in every imaginable whistle, and grunt, and howl, had\nceased to move their laughter, as much as the roar of the jaguar and the\nrustle of the boa had ceased to move their fear; and when a brilliant\ngreen and rose-colored fish, flat-bodied like a bream, flab-finned like\na salmon, and saw-toothed like a shark, leapt clean on board of the\ncanoe to escape the rush of the huge alligator (whose loathsome snout,\nere he could stop, actually rattled against the canoe within a foot of\nJack Brimblecombe's hand), Jack, instead of turning pale, as he had done\nat the sharks upon a certain memorable occasion, coolly picked up the\nfish, and said, \"He's four pound weight! If you can catch 'pirai' for\nus like that, old fellow, just keep in our wake, and we'll give you the\ncleanings for wages.\"\n\nYes. The mind of man is not so \"infinite,\" in the vulgar sense of that\nword, as people fancy; and however greedy the appetite for wonder may\nbe, while it remains unsatisfied in everyday European life, it is as\neasily satiated as any other appetite, and then leaves the senses of\nits possessor as dull as those of a city gourmand after a lord mayor's\nfeast. Only the highest minds--our Humboldts, and Bonplands, and\nSchomburgks (and they only when quickened to an almost unhealthy\nactivity by civilization)--can go on long appreciating where Nature is\ninsatiable, imperious, maddening, in her demands on our admiration. The\nvery power of observing wears out under the rush of ever new objects;\nand the dizzy spectator is fain at last to shut the eyes of his soul,\nand take refuge (as West Indian Spaniards do) in tobacco and stupidity.\nThe man, too, who has not only eyes but utterance,--what shall he do\nwhere all words fail him? Superlatives are but inarticulate, after all,\nand give no pictures even of size any more than do numbers of feet and\nyards: and yet what else can we do, but heap superlative on superlative,\nand cry, \"Wonderful, wonderful!\" and after that, \"wonderful, past all\nwhooping\"? What Humboldt's self cannot paint, we will not try to daub.\nThe voyagers were in a South American forest, readers. Fill up the\nmeaning of those words, each as your knowledge enables you, for I cannot\ndo it for you.\n\nCertainly those adventurers could not. The absence of any attempt at\nword-painting, even of admiration at the glorious things which they saw,\nis most remarkable in all early voyagers, both Spanish and English. The\nonly two exceptions which I recollect are Columbus--(but then all was\nnew, and he was bound to tell what he had seen)--and Raleigh; the two\nmost gifted men, perhaps, with the exception of Humboldt, who ever set\nfoot in tropical America; but even they dare nothing but a few feeble\nhints in passing. Their souls had been dazzled and stunned by a great\nglory. Coming out of our European Nature into that tropic one, they had\nfelt like Plato's men, bred in the twilight cavern, and then suddenly\nturned round to the broad blaze of day; they had seen things awful and\nunspeakable: why talk of them, except to say with the Turks, \"God is\ngreat!\"\n\nSo it was with these men. Among the higher-hearted of them, the grandeur\nand the glory around had attuned their spirits to itself, and kept up in\nthem a lofty, heroical, reverent frame of mind; but they knew as little\nabout the trees and animals in an \"artistic\" or \"critical\" point\nof view, as in a scientific one. This tree the Indians called one\nunpronounceable name, and it made good bows; that, some other name, and\nit made good canoes; of that, you could eat the fruit; that produced the\ncaoutchouc gum, useful for a hundred matters; that was what the Indians\n(and they likewise) used to poison their arrows with; from the ashes of\nthose palm-nuts you could make good salt; that tree, again, was full of\ngood milk if you bored the stem: they drank it, and gave God thanks, and\nwere not astonished. God was great: but that they had discovered long\nbefore they came into the tropics. Noble old child-hearted heroes, with\njust romance and superstition enough about them to keep them from that\nprurient hysterical wonder and enthusiasm, which is simply, one often\nfears, a product of our scepticism! We do not trust enough in God, we do\nnot really believe His power enough, to be ready, as they were, as every\none ought to be on a God-made earth, for anything and everything being\npossible; and then, when a wonder is discovered, we go into ecstasies\nand shrieks over it, and take to ourselves credit for being susceptible\nof so lofty a feeling, true index, forsooth, of a refined and cultivated\nmind.\n\nThey paddled onward hour after hour, sheltering themselves as best they\ncould under the shadow of the southern bank, while on their right hand\nthe full sun-glare lay upon the enormous wall of mimosas, figs, and\nlaurels, which formed the northern forest, broken by the slender shafts\nof bamboo tufts, and decked with a thousand gaudy parasites; bank upon\nbank of gorgeous bloom piled upward to the sky, till where its outline\ncut the blue, flowers and leaves, too lofty to be distinguished by the\neye, formed a broken rainbow of all hues quivering in the ascending\nstreams of azure mist, until they seemed to melt and mingle with the\nvery heavens.\n\nAnd as the sun rose higher and higher, a great stillness fell upon the\nforest. The jaguars and the monkeys had hidden themselves in the darkest\ndepths of the woods. The birds' notes died out one by one; the very\nbutterflies ceased their flitting over the tree-tops, and slept with\noutspread wings upon the glossy leaves, undistinguishable from the\nflowers around them. Now and then a colibri whirred downward toward\nthe water, hummed for a moment around some pendent flower, and then\nthe living gem was lost in the deep blackness of the inner wood, among\ntree-trunks as huge and dark as the pillars of some Hindoo shrine; or\na parrot swung and screamed at them from an overhanging bough; or a\nthirsty monkey slid lazily down a liana to the surface of the stream,\ndipped up the water in his tiny hand, and started chattering back, as\nhis eyes met those of some foul alligator peering upward through the\nclear depths below. In shaded nooks beneath the boughs, the capybaras,\nrabbits as large as sheep, went paddling sleepily round and round,\nthrusting up their unwieldy heads among the blooms of the blue\nwater-lilies; while black and purple water-hens ran up and down upon the\nrafts of floating leaves. The shining snout of a freshwater dolphin rose\nslowly to the surface; a jet of spray whirred up; a rainbow hung upon\nit for a moment; and the black snout sank lazily again. Here and there,\ntoo, upon some shallow pebbly shore, scarlet flamingoes stood dreaming\nknee-deep, on one leg; crested cranes pranced up and down, admiring\ntheir own finery; and ibises and egrets dipped their bills under water\nin search of prey: but before noon even those had slipped away, and\nthere reigned a stillness which might be heard--such a stillness (to\ncompare small things with great) as broods beneath the rich shadows of\nAmyas's own Devon woods, or among the lonely sweeps of Exmoor, when the\nheather is in flower--a stillness in which, as Humboldt says, \"If beyond\nthe silence we listen for the faintest undertones, we detect a stifled,\ncontinuous hum of insects, which crowd the air close to the earth; a\nconfused swarming murmur which hangs round every bush, in the cracked\nbark of trees, in the soil undermined by lizards, millepedes, and\nbees; a voice proclaiming to us that all Nature breathes, that under a\nthousand different forms life swarms in the gaping and dusty earth, as\nmuch as in the bosom of the waters, and the air which breathes around.\"\n\nAt last a soft and distant murmur, increasing gradually to a heavy roar,\nannounced that they were nearing some cataract; till turning a point,\nwhere the deep alluvial soil rose into a low cliff fringed with delicate\nferns, they came full in sight of a scene at which all paused: not with\nastonishment, but with something very like disgust.\n\n\"Rapids again!\" grumbled one. \"I thought we had had enough of them on\nthe Orinoco.\"\n\n\"We shall have to get out, and draw the canoes overland, I suppose.\nThree hours will be lost, and in the very hottest of the day, too.\"\n\n\"There's worse behind; don't you see the spray behind the palms?\"\n\n\"Stop grumbling, my masters, and don't cry out before you are hurt.\nPaddle right up to the largest of those islands, and let us look about\nus.\"\n\nIn front of them was a snow-white bar of raging foam, some ten feet\nhigh, along which were ranged three or four islands of black rock. Each\nwas crested with a knot of lofty palms, whose green tops stood out clear\nagainst the bright sky, while the lower half of their stems loomed hazy\nthrough a luminous veil of rainbowed mist. The banks right and left\nof the fall were so densely fringed with a low hedge of shrubs, that\nlanding seemed all but impossible; and their Indian guide, suddenly\nlooking round him and whispering, bade them beware of savages; and\npointed to a canoe which lay swinging in the eddies under the largest\nisland, moored apparently to the root of some tree.\n\n\"Silence all!\" cried Amyas, \"and paddle up thither and seize the canoe.\nIf there be an Indian on the island, we will have speech of him: but\nmind and treat him friendly; and on your lives, neither strike nor\nshoot, even if he offers to fight.\"\n\nSo, choosing a line of smooth backwater just in the wake of the island,\nthey drove their canoes up by main force, and fastened them safely\nby the side of the Indian's, while Amyas, always the foremost, sprang\nboldly on shore, whispering to the Indian boy to follow him.\n\nOnce on the island, Amyas felt sure enough, that if its wild tenant had\nnot seen them approach, he certainly had not heard them, so deafening\nwas the noise which filled his brain, and seemed to make the very leaves\nupon the bushes quiver, and the solid stone beneath his feet to reel and\nring. For two hundred yards and more above the fall nothing met his eye\nbut one white waste of raging foam, with here and there a transverse\ndyke of rock, which hurled columns of spray and surges of beaded water\nhigh into the air,--strangely contrasting with the still and silent\ncliffs of green leaves which walled the river right and left, and more\nstrangely still with the knots of enormous palms upon the islets, which\nreared their polished shafts a hundred feet into the air, straight and\nupright as masts, while their broad plumes and golden-clustered fruit\nslept in the sunshine far aloft, the image of the stateliest repose amid\nthe wildest wrath of Nature.\n\nHe looked round anxiously for the expected Indian; but he was nowhere to\nbe seen; and, in the meanwhile, as he stept cautiously along the island,\nwhich was some fifty yards in length and breadth, his senses, accustomed\nas they were to such sights, could not help dwelling on the exquisite\nbeauty of the scene; on the garden of gay flowers, of every imaginable\nform and hue, which fringed every boulder at his feet, peeping out amid\ndelicate fern-fans and luxuriant cushions of moss; on the chequered\nshade of the palms, and the cool air, which wafted down from the\ncataracts above the scents of a thousand flowers. Gradually his ear\nbecame accustomed to the roar, and, above its mighty undertone, he could\nhear the whisper of the wind among the shrubs, and the hum of myriad\ninsects; while the rock manakin, with its saffron plumage, flitted\nbefore him from stone to stone, calling cheerily, and seeming to lead\nhim on. Suddenly, scrambling over the rocky flower-beds to the other\nside of the isle, he came upon a little shady beach, which, beneath a\nbank of stone some six feet high, fringed the edge of a perfectly still\nand glassy bay. Ten yards farther, the cataract fell sheer in thunder:\nbut a high fern-fringed rock turned its force away from that quiet nook.\nIn it the water swung slowly round and round in glassy dark-green rings,\namong which dimpled a hundred gaudy fish, waiting for every fly and worm\nwhich spun and quivered on the eddy. Here, if anywhere, was the place to\nfind the owner of the canoe. He leapt down upon the pebbles; and as he\ndid so, a figure rose from behind a neighboring rock, and met him face\nto face.\n\nIt was an Indian girl; and yet, when he looked again,--was it an Indian\ngirl? Amyas had seen hundreds of those delicate dark-skinned daughters\nof the forest, but never such a one as this. Her stature was taller,\nher limbs were fuller and more rounded; her complexion, though tanned by\nlight, was fairer by far than his own sunburnt face; her hair, crowned\nwith a garland of white flowers, was not lank, and straight, and black,\nlike an Indian's, but of a rich, glossy brown, and curling richly and\ncrisply from her very temples to her knees. Her forehead, though low,\nwas upright and ample; her nose was straight and small; her lips, the\nlips of a European; her whole face of the highest and richest type of\nSpanish beauty; a collar of gold mingled with green beads hung round her\nneck, and golden bracelets were on her wrists. All the strange and dim\nlegends of white Indians, and of nations of a higher race than Carib, or\nArrowak, or Solimo, which Amyas had ever heard, rose up in his memory.\nShe must be the daughter of some great cacique, perhaps of the lost\nIncas themselves--why not? And full of simple wonder, he gazed upon\nthat fairy vision, while she, unabashed in her free innocence, gazed\nfearlessly in return, as Eve might have done in Paradise, upon the\nmighty stature, and the strange garments, and above all, on the bushy\nbeard and flowing yellow locks of the Englishman.\n\nHe spoke first, in some Indian tongue, gently and smilingly, and made\na half-step forward; but quick as light she caught up from the ground a\nbow, and held it fiercely toward him, fitted with the long arrow,\nwith which, as he could see, she had been striking fish, for a line of\ntwisted grass hung from its barbed head. Amyas stopped, laid down his\nown bow and sword, and made another step in advance, smiling still,\nand making all Indian signs of amity: but the arrow was still pointed\nstraight at his breast, and he knew the mettle and strength of the\nforest nymphs well enough to stand still and call for the Indian boy;\ntoo proud to retreat, but in the uncomfortable expectation of feeling\nevery moment the shaft quivering between his ribs.\n\nThe boy, who had been peering from above, leaped down to them in a\nmoment; and began, as the safest method, grovelling on his nose upon the\npebbles, while he tried two or three dialects; one of which at last she\nseemed to understand, and answered in a tone of evident suspicion and\nanger.\n\n\"What does she say?\"\n\n\"That you are a Spaniard and a robber, because you have a beard.\"\n\n\"Tell her that we are no Spaniards, but that we hate them; and are come\nacross the great waters to help the Indians to kill them.\"\n\nThe boy translated his speech. The nymph answered by a contemptuous\nshake of the head.\n\n\"Tell her, that if she will send her tribe to us, we will do them no\nharm. We are going over the mountains to fight the Spaniards, and we\nwant them to show us the way.\"\n\nThe boy had no sooner spoken, than, nimble as a deer, the nymph had\nsprung up the rocks, and darted between the palm-stems to her canoe.\nSuddenly she caught sight of the English boat, and stopped with a cry of\nfear and rage.\n\n\"Let her pass!\" shouted Amyas, who had followed her close. \"Push your\nboat off, and let her pass. Boy, tell her to go on; they will not come\nnear her.\"\n\nBut she hesitated still, and with arrow drawn to the head, faced first\non the boat's crew, and then on Amyas, till the Englishmen had shoved\noff full twenty yards.\n\nThen, leaping into her tiny piragua, she darted into the wildest whirl\nof the eddies, shooting along with vigorous strokes, while the English\ntrembled as they saw the frail bark spinning and leaping amid the\nmuzzles of the alligators, and the huge dog-toothed trout: but with the\nswiftness of an arrow she reached the northern bank, drove her canoe\namong the bushes, and leaping from it, darted through some narrow\nopening in the bush, and vanished like a dream.\n\n\"What fair virago have you unearthed?\" cried Cary, as they toiled up\nagain to the landing-place.\n\n\"Beshrew me,\" quoth Jack, \"but we are in the very land of the nymphs,\nand I shall expect to see Diana herself next, with the moon on her\nforehead.\"\n\n\"Take care, then, where you wander hereabouts, Sir John: lest you end as\nActaeon did, by turning into a stag, and being eaten by a jaguar.\"\n\n\"Actaeon was eaten by his own hounds, Mr. Cary, so the parallel don't\nhold. But surely she was a very wonder of beauty!\"\n\nWhy was it that Amyas did not like this harmless talk? There had come\nover him the strangest new feeling; as if that fair vision was his\nproperty, and the men had no right to talk about her, no right to have\neven seen her. And he spoke quite surlily as he said--\n\n\"You may leave the women to themselves, my masters; you'll have to deal\nwith the men ere long: so get your canoes up on the rock, and keep good\nwatch.\"\n\n\"Hillo!\" shouted one in a few minutes, \"here's fresh fish enough to feed\nus all round. I suppose that young cat-a-mountain left it behind her\nin her hurry. I wish she had left her golden chains and ouches into the\nbargain.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said another, \"we'll take it as fair payment, for having made\nus drop down the current again to let her ladyship pass.\"\n\n\"Leave that fish alone,\" said Amyas; \"it is none of yours.\"\n\n\"Why, sir!\" quoth the finder in a tone of sulky deprecation.\n\n\"If we are to make good friends with the heathens, we had better not\nbegin by stealing their goods. There are plenty more fish in the river;\ngo and catch them, and let the Indians have their own.\"\n\nThe men were accustomed enough to strict and stern justice in their\ndealings with the savages: but they could not help looking slyly at\neach other, and hinting, when out of sight, that the captain seemed in a\nmighty fuss about his new acquaintance.\n\nHowever, they were expert by this time in all the Indian's fishing\nmethods; and so abundant was the animal life which swarmed around every\nrock, that in an hour fish enough lay on the beach to feed them all;\nwhose forms and colors, names and families, I must leave the reader to\nguess from the wondrous pages of Sir Richard Schomburgk, for I know too\nlittle of them to speak without the fear of making mistakes.\n\nA full hour passed before they saw anything more of their Indian\nneighbors; and then from under the bushes shot out a canoe, on which all\neyes were fixed in expectation.\n\nAmyas, who expected to find there some remnant of a higher race, was\ndisappointed enough at seeing on board only the usual half-dozen of\nlow-browed, dirty Orsons, painted red with arnotto: but a gray-headed\nelder at the stern seemed, by his feathers and gold ornaments, to be\nsome man of note in the little woodland community.\n\nThe canoe came close up to the island; Amyas saw that they were unarmed,\nand, laying down his weapons, advanced alone to the bank, making all\nsigns of amity. They were returned with interest by the old man, and\nAmyas's next care was to bring forward the fish which the fair nymph\nhad left behind, and, through the medium of the Indian lad, to give the\ncacique (for so he seemed to be) to understand that he wished to render\nevery one his own. This offer was received, as Amyas expected, with\ngreat applause, and the canoe came alongside; but the crew still seemed\nafraid to land. Amyas bade his men throw the fish one by one into the\nboat; and then proclaimed by the boy's mouth, as was his custom with all\nIndians, that he and his were enemies of the Spaniards, and on their\nway to make war against them,--and that all which they desired was a\npeaceable and safe passage through the dominions of the mighty potentate\nand renowned warrior whom they beheld before them; for Amyas argued\nrightly enough, that even if the old fellow aft was not the cacique, he\nwould be none the less pleased at being mistaken for him.\n\nWhereon the ancient worthy, rising in the canoe, pointed to heaven,\nearth, and the things under, and commenced a long sermon, in tone,\nmanner, and articulation, very like one of those which the great\nblack-bearded apes were in the habit of preaching every evening when\nthey could get together a congregation of little monkeys to listen, to\nthe great scandal of Jack, who would have it that some evil spirit set\nthem on to mimic him; which sermon, being partly interpreted by the\nIndian lad, seemed to signify, that the valor and justice of the white\nmen had already reached the ears of the speaker, and that he was sent to\nwelcome them into those regions by the Daughter of the Sun.\n\n\"The Daughter of the Sun!\" quoth Amyas; \"then we have found the lost\nIncas after all.\"\n\n\"We have found something,\" said Cary; \"I only hope it may not be a\nmare's nest, like many another of our finding.\"\n\n\"Or an adder's,\" said Yeo. \"We must beware of treachery.\"\n\n\"We must beware of no such thing,\" said Amyas, pretty sharply. \"Have I\nnot told you fifty times, that if they see that we trust them, they will\ntrust us, and if they see that we suspect them, they will suspect us?\nAnd when two parties are watching to see who strikes the first blow,\nthey are sure to come to fisticuffs from mere dirty fear of each other.\"\n\nAmyas spoke truth; for almost every atrocity against savages which had\nbeen committed by the Spaniards, and which was in later and worse times\ncommitted by the English, was wont to be excused in that same base fear\nof treachery. Amyas's plan, like that of Drake, and Cook, and all\ngreat English voyagers, had been all along to inspire at once awe\nand confidence, by a frank and fearless carriage; and he was not\ndisappointed here. He bade the men step boldly into their canoes, and\nfollow the old Indian whither he would. The simple children of the\nforest bowed themselves reverently before the mighty strangers, and then\nled them smilingly across the stream, and through a narrow passage in\nthe covert, to a hidden lagoon, on the banks of which stood, not Manoa,\nbut a tiny Indian village.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nHOW AMYAS WAS TEMPTED OF THE DEVIL\n\n     \"Let us alone.  What pleasure can we have\n        To war with evil?  Is there any peace\n     In always climbing up the climbing wave?\n        All things have rest, and ripen toward the grave\n     In silence; ripen, fall, and cease:\n        Give us long rest or death, dark death, or dreamful ease.\"\n\n                                                       TENNYSON.\n\nHumboldt has somewhere a curious passage; in which, looking on some\nwretched group of Indians, squatting stupidly round their fires,\nbesmeared with grease and paint, and devouring ants and clay, he\nsomewhat naively remarks, that were it not for science, which teaches\nus that such is the crude material of humanity, and this the state from\nwhich we all have risen, he should have been tempted rather to look upon\nthose hapless beings as the last degraded remnants of some fallen and\ndying race. One wishes that the great traveller had been bold enough\nto yield to that temptation, which his own reason and common sense\npresented to him as the real explanation of the sad sight, instead\nof following the dogmas of a so-called science, which has not a fact\nwhereon to base its wild notion, and must ignore a thousand facts in\nasserting it. His own good sense, it seems, coincided instinctively with\nthe Bible doctrine, that man in a state of nature is a fallen being,\ndoomed to death--a view which may be a sad one, but still one more\nhonorable to poor humanity than the theory, that we all began as some\nsort of two-handed apes. It is surely more hopeful to believe that those\npoor Otomacs or Guahibas were not what they ought to be, than to believe\nthat they were. It is certainly more complimentary to them to think that\nthey had been somewhat nobler and more prudent in centuries gone by,\nthan that they were such blockheads as to have dragged on, the son after\nthe father, for all the thousands of years which have elapsed since man\nwas made, without having had wit enough to discover any better food than\nants and clay.\n\nOur voyagers, however, like those of their time, troubled their heads\nwith no such questions. Taking the Bible story as they found it, they\nagreed with Humboldt's reason, and not with his science; or, to speak\ncorrectly, agreed with Humboldt's self, and not with the shallow\nanthropologic theories which happened to be in vogue fifty years ago;\nand their new hosts were in their eyes immortal souls like themselves,\n\"captivated by the devil at his will,\" lost there in the pathless\nforests, likely to be lost hereafter.\n\nAnd certainly facts seemed to bear out their old-fashioned theories;\nalthough these Indians had sunk by no means so low as the Guahibas whom\nthey had met upon the lower waters of the same river.\n\nThey beheld, on landing, a scattered village of palm-leaf sheds, under\nwhich, as usual, the hammocks were slung from tree to tree. Here\nand there, in openings in the forest, patches of cassava and indigo\nappeared; and there was a look of neatness and comfort about the little\nsettlement superior to the average.\n\nBut now for the signs of the evil spirit. Certainly it was no good\nspirit who had inspired them with the art of music; or else (as Cary\nsaid) Apollo and Mercury (if they ever visited America) had played their\nforefathers a shabby trick, and put them off with very poor instruments,\nand still poorer taste. For on either side of the landing-place were\narranged four or five stout fellows, each with a tall drum, or long\nearthen trumpet, swelling out in the course of its length into several\nhollow balls from which arose, the moment the strangers set foot on\nshore, so deafening a cacophony of howls, and groans, and thumps, as\nfully to justify Yeo's remark, \"They are calling upon their devil, sir.\"\nTo which Cary answered, with some show of reason, that \"they were the\nless likely to be disappointed, for none but Sir Urian would ever come\nto listen to such a noise.\"\n\n\"And you mark, sirs,\" said Yeo, \"there's some feast or sacrifice toward.\nI'm not overconfident of them yet.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Amyas, \"we could kill every soul of them in\nhalf-an-hour, and they know that as well as we.\"\n\nBut some great demonstration was plainly toward; for the children of the\nforest were arrayed in two lines, right and left of the open space, the\nmen in front, and the women behind; and all bedizened, to the best of\ntheir power, with arnotto, indigo, and feathers.\n\nNext, with a hideous yell, leapt into the centre of the space a\npersonage who certainly could not have complained if any one had taken\nhim for the devil, for he had dressed himself up carefully for that very\nintent, in a jaguar-skin with a long tail, grinning teeth, a pair of\nhorns, a plume of black and yellow feathers, and a huge rattle.\n\n\"Here's the Piache, the rascal,\" says Amyas.\n\n\"Ay,\" says Yeo, \"in Satan's livery, and I've no doubt his works are\naccording, trust him for it.\"\n\n\"Don't be frightened, Jack,\" says Cary, backing up Brimblecombe from\nbehind. \"It's your business to tackle him, you know. At him boldly, and\nhe'll run.\"\n\nWhereat all the men laughed; and the Piache, who had intended to produce\na very solemn impression, hung fire a little. However, being accustomed\nto get his bread by his impudence, he soon recovered himself, advanced,\nsmote one of the musicians over the head with his rattle to procure\nsilence; and then began a harangue, to which Amyas listened patiently,\ncigar in mouth.\n\n\"What's it all about, boy?\"\n\n\"He wants to know whether you have seen Amalivaca on the other shore of\nthe great water?\"\n\nAmyas was accustomed to this inquiry after the mythic civilizer of\nthe forest Indians, who, after carving the mysterious sculptures which\nappear upon so many inland cliffs of that region, returned again whence\nhe came, beyond the ocean. He answered, as usual, by setting forth the\npraises of Queen Elizabeth.\n\nTo which the Piache replied, that she must be one of Amalivaca's seven\ndaughters, some of whom he took back with him, while he broke the legs\nof the rest to prevent their running away, and left them to people the\nforests.\n\nTo which Amyas replied, that his queen's legs were certainly not broken;\nfor she was a very model of grace and activity, and the best dancer in\nall her dominions; but that it was more important to him to know whether\nthe tribe would give them cassava bread, and let them stay peaceably on\nthat island, to rest a while before they went on to fight the clothed\nmen (the Spaniards), on the other side of the mountains.\n\nOn which the Piache, after capering and turning head over heels with\nmuch howling, beckoned Amyas and his party to follow him; they did so,\nseeing that the Indians were all unarmed, and evidently in the highest\ngood humor.\n\nThe Piache went toward the door of a carefully closed hut, and crawling\nup to it on all-fours in most abject fashion, began whining to some one\nwithin.\n\n\"Ask what he is about, boy.\"\n\nThe lad asked the old cacique, who had accompanied them, and received\nfor answer, that he was consulting the Daughter of the Sun.\n\n\"Here is our mare's nest at last,\" quoth Cary, as the Piache from whines\nrose to screams and gesticulations, and then to violent convulsions,\nfoaming at the mouth, and rolling of the eyeballs, till he suddenly sank\nexhausted, and lay for dead.\n\n\"As good as a stage play.\"\n\n\"The devil has played his part,\" says Jack; \"and now by the rules of all\nplays Vice should come on.\"\n\n\"And a very fair Vice it will be, I suspect; a right sweet Iniquity, my\nJack! Listen.\"\n\nAnd from the interior of the hut rose a low sweet song, at which all\nthe simple Indians bowed their heads in reverence; and the English were\nhushed in astonishment; for the voice was not shrill or guttural, like\nthat of an Indian, but round, clear, and rich, like a European's; and as\nit swelled and rose louder and louder, showed a compass and power which\nwould have been extraordinary anywhere (and many a man of the party,\nas was usual in musical old England, was a good judge enough of such\na matter, and could hold his part right well in glee, and catch, and\nroundelay, and psalm). And as it leaped, and ran, and sank again, and\nrose once more to fall once more, all but inarticulate, yet perfect in\nmelody, like the voice of bird on bough, the wild wanderers were rapt\nin new delight, and did not wonder at the Indians as they bowed their\nheads, and welcomed the notes as messengers from some higher world. At\nlast one triumphant burst, so shrill that all ears rang again, and then\ndead silence. The Piache, suddenly restored to life, jumped upright, and\nrecommenced preaching at Amyas.\n\n\"Tell the howling villain to make short work of it, lad! His tune won't\ndo after that last one.\"\n\nThe lad, grinning, informed Amyas that the Piache signified their\nacceptance as friends by the Daughter of the Sun; that her friends were\ntheirs, and her foes theirs. Whereon the Indians set up a scream of\ndelight, and Amyas, rolling another tobacco leaf up in another strip of\nplantain, answered,--\n\n\"Then let her give us some cassava,\" and lighted a fresh cigar.\n\nWhereon the door of the hut opened, and the Indians prostrated\nthemselves to the earth, as there came forth the same fair apparition\nwhich they had encountered upon the island, but decked now in\nfeather-robes, and plumes of every imaginable hue.\n\nSlowly and stately, as one accustomed to command, she walked up to\nAmyas, glancing proudly round on her prostrate adorers, and pointing\nwith graceful arms to the trees, the gardens, and the huts, gave him to\nunderstand by signs (so expressive were her looks, that no words were\nneeded) that all was at his service; after which, taking his hand, she\nlifted it gently to her forehead.\n\nAt that sign of submission a shout of rapture rose from the crowd; and\nas the mysterious maiden retired again to her hut, they pressed round\nthe English, caressing and admiring, pointing with equal surprise to\ntheir swords, to their Indian bows and blow-guns, and to the trophies\nof wild beasts with which they were clothed; while women hastened off\nto bring fruit, and flowers, and cassava, and (to Amyas's great anxiety)\ncalabashes of intoxicating drink; and, to make a long story short, the\nEnglish sat down beneath the trees, and feasted merrily, while the drums\nand trumpets made hideous music, and lithe young girls and lads danced\nuncouth dances, which so scandalized both Brimblecombe and Yeo, that\nthey persuaded Amyas to beat an early retreat. He was willing enough\nto get back to the island while the men were still sober; so there were\nmany leave-takings and promises of return on the morrow, and the party\npaddled back to their island-fortress, racking their wits as to who or\nwhat the mysterious maid could be.\n\nAmyas, however, had settled in his mind that she was one of the lost\nInca race; perhaps a descendant of that very fair girl, wife of the\nInca Manco, whom Pizarro, forty years before, had, merely to torture\nthe fugitive king's heart, as his body was safe from the tyrant's reach,\nstripped, scourged, and shot to death with arrows, uncomplaining to the\nlast.\n\nThey all assembled for the evening service (hardly a day had passed\nsince they left England on which they had not done the same); and after\nit was over, they must needs sing a Psalm, and then a catch or two, ere\nthey went to sleep; and till the moon was high in heaven, twenty mellow\nvoices rang out above the roar of the cataract, in many a good old tune.\nOnce or twice they thought they heard an echo to their song: but they\ntook no note of it, till Cary, who had gone apart for a few minutes,\nreturned, and whispered Amyas away.\n\n\"The sweet Iniquity is mimicking us, lad.\"\n\nThey went to the brink of the river; and there (for their ears were by\nthis time dead to the noise of the torrent) they could hear plainly the\nsame voice which had so surprised them in the hut, repeating, clear\nand true, snatches of the airs which they had sung. Strange and solemn\nenough was the effect of the men's deep voices on the island, answered\nout of the dark forest by those sweet treble notes; and the two young\nmen stood a long while listening and looking out across the eddies,\nwhich swirled down golden in the moonlight: but they could see nothing\nbeyond save the black wall of trees. After a while the voice ceased, and\nthe two returned to dream of Incas and nightingales.\n\nThey visited the village again next day; and every day for a week or\nmore: but the maiden appeared but rarely, and when she did, kept her\ndistance as haughtily as a queen.\n\nAmyas, of course, as soon as he could converse somewhat better with his\nnew friends, was not long before he questioned the cacique about\nher. But the old man made an owl's face at her name, and intimated by\nmysterious shakes of the head, that she was a very strange personage,\nand the less said about her the better. She was \"a child of the Sun,\"\nand that was enough.\n\n\"Tell him, boy,\" quoth Cary, \"that we are the children of the Sun by\nhis first wife; and have orders from him to inquire how the Indians\nhave behaved to our step-sister, for he cannot see all their tricks down\nhere, the trees are so thick. So let him tell us, or all the cassava\nplants shall be blighted.\"\n\n\"Will, Will, don't play with lying!\" said Amyas: but the threat was\nenough for the cacique, and taking them in his canoe a full mile down\nthe stream, as if in fear that the wonderful maiden should overhear him,\nhe told them, in a sort of rhythmic chant, how, many moons ago (he\ncould not tell how many), his tribe was a mighty nation, and dwelt in\nPapamene, till the Spaniards drove them forth. And how, as they wandered\nnorthward, far away upon the mountain spurs beneath the flaming cone\nof Cotopaxi, they had found this fair creature wandering in the forest,\nabout the bigness of a seven years' child. Wondering at her white skin\nand her delicate beauty, the simple Indians worshipped her as a god,\nand led her home with them. And when they found that she was human like\nthemselves, their wonder scarcely lessened. How could so tender a being\nhave sustained life in those forests, and escaped the jaguar and the\nsnake? She must be under some Divine protection: she must be a daughter\nof the Sun, one of that mighty Inca race, the news of whose fearful\nfall had reached even those lonely wildernesses; who had, many of them,\nhaunted for years as exiles the eastern slopes of the Andes, about the\nUcalayi and the Maranon; who would, as all Indians knew, rise again\nsome day to power, when bearded white men should come across the seas to\nrestore them to their ancient throne.\n\nSo, as the girl grew up among them, she was tended with royal honors,\nby command of the conjuror of the tribe, that so her forefather the Sun\nmight be propitious to them, and the Incas might show favor to the poor\nruined Omaguas, in the day of their coming glory. And as she grew, she\nhad become, it seemed, somewhat of a prophetess among them, as well\nas an object of fetish-worship; for she was more prudent in council,\nvaliant in war, and cunning in the chase, than all the elders of the\ntribe; and those strange and sweet songs of hers, which had so surprised\nthe white men, were full of mysterious wisdom about the birds, and the\nanimals, and the flowers, and the rivers, which the Sun and the Good\nSpirit taught her from above. So she had lived among them, unmarried\nstill, not only because she despised the addresses of all Indian youths,\nbut because the conjuror had declared it to be profane in them to mingle\nwith the race of the Sun, and had assigned her a cabin near his own,\nwhere she was served in state, and gave some sort of oracular responses,\nas they had seen, to the questions which he put to her.\n\nSuch was the cacique's tale; on which Cary remarked, probably not\nunjustly, that he \"dared to say the conjuror made a very good thing of\nit:\" but Amyas was silent, full of dreams, if not about Manoa, still\nabout the remnant of the Inca race. What if they were still to be found\nabout the southern sources of the Amazon? He must have been very near\nthem already, in that case. It was vexatious; but at least he might\nbe sure that they had formed no great kingdom in that direction, or he\nshould have heard of it long ago. Perhaps they had moved lately from\nthence eastward, to escape some fresh encroachment of the Spaniards; and\nthis girl had been left behind in their flight. And then he recollected,\nwith a sigh, how hopeless was any further search with his diminished\nband. At least, he might learn something of the truth from the maiden\nherself. It might be useful to him in some future attempt; for he\nhad not yet given up Manoa. If he but got safe home, there was many a\ngallant gentleman (and Raleigh came at once into his mind) who would\njoin him in a fresh search for the Golden City of Guiana; not by the\nupper waters, but by the mouth of the Orinoco.\n\nSo they paddled back, while the simple cacique entreated them to tell\nthe Sun, in their daily prayers, how well the wild people had treated\nhis descendant; and besought them not to take her away with them, lest\nthe Sun should forget the poor Omaguas, and ripen their manioc and their\nfruit no more.\n\nAmyas had no wish to stay where he was longer than was absolutely\nnecessary to bring up the sick men from the Orinoco; but this, he well\nknew, would be a journey probably of some months, and attended with much\ndanger.\n\nCary volunteered at once, however, to undertake the adventure, if\nhalf-a-dozen men would join him, and the Indians would send a few young\nmen to help in working the canoe: but this latter item was not an easy\none to obtain; for the tribe with whom they now were, stood in some fear\nof the fierce and brutal Guahibas, through whose country they must pass;\nand every Indian tribe, as Amyas knew well enough, looks on each tribe\nof different language to itself as natural enemies, hateful, and made\nonly to be destroyed wherever met. This strange fact, too, Amyas and his\nparty attributed to delusion of the devil, the divider and accuser; and\nI am of opinion that they were perfectly right: only let Amyas take care\nthat while he is discovering the devil in the Indians, he does not give\nplace to him in himself, and that in more ways than one. But of that\nmore hereafter.\n\nWhether, however, it was pride or shyness which kept the maiden aloof,\nshe conquered it after a while; perhaps through mere woman's curiosity;\nand perhaps, too, from mere longing for amusement in a place so\nunspeakably stupid as the forest. She gave the English to understand,\nhowever, that though they all might be very important personages, none\nof them was to be her companion but Amyas. And ere a month was past, she\nwas often hunting with him far and wide in the neighboring forest, with\na train of chosen nymphs, whom she had persuaded to follow her example\nand spurn the dusky suitors around. This fashion, not uncommon, perhaps,\namong the Indian tribes, where women are continually escaping to\nthe forest from the tyranny of the men, and often, perhaps, forming\ntemporary communities, was to the English a plain proof that they were\nnear the land of the famous Amazons, of whom they had heard so often\nfrom the Indians; while Amyas had no doubt that, as a descendant of the\nIncas, the maiden preserved the tradition of the Virgins of the Sun, and\nof the austere monastic rule of the Peruvian superstition. Had not that\nvaliant German, George of Spires, and Jeronimo Ortal too, fifty years\nbefore, found convents of the Sun upon these very upper waters?\n\nSo a harmless friendship sprang up between Amyas and the girl, which\nsoon turned to good account. For she no sooner heard that he needed a\ncrew of Indians, than she consulted the Piache, assembled the tribe, and\nhaving retired to her hut, commenced a song, which (unless the Piache\nlied) was a command to furnish young men for Cary's expedition,\nunder penalty of the sovereign displeasure of an evil spirit with an\nunpronounceable name--an argument which succeeded on the spot, and the\ncanoe departed on its perilous errand.\n\nJohn Brimblecombe had great doubts whether a venture thus started by\ndirect help and patronage of the fiend would succeed; and Amyas himself,\ndisliking the humbug, told Ayacanora that it would be better to have\ntold the tribe that it was a good deed, and pleasing to the Good Spirit.\n\n\"Ah!\" said she, naively enough, \"they know better than that. The Good\nSpirit is big and lazy; and he smiles, and takes no trouble: but the\nlittle bad spirit, he is so busy--here, and there, and everywhere,\" and\nshe waved her pretty hands up and down; \"he is the useful one to have\nfor a friend!\" Which sentiment the Piache much approved, as became his\noccupation; and once told Brimblecombe pretty sharply, that he was a\nmeddlesome fellow for telling the Indians that the Good Spirit cared for\nthem; \"for,\" quoth he, \"if they begin to ask the Good Spirit for what\nthey want, who will bring me cassava and coca for keeping the bad spirit\nquiet?\" This argument, however forcible the devil's priests in all ages\nhave felt it to be, did not stop Jack's preaching (and very good and\nrighteous preaching it was, moreover), and much less the morning and\nevening service in the island camp. This last, the Indians, attracted\nby the singing, attended in such numbers, that the Piache found his\noccupation gone, and vowed to put an end to Jack's Gospel with a\npoisoned arrow.\n\nWhich plan he (blinded by his master, Satan, so Jack phrased it) took\ninto his head to impart to Ayacanora, as the partner of his tithes and\nofferings; and was exceedingly astonished to receive in answer a box on\nthe ear, and a storm of abuse. After which, Ayacanora went to Amyas,\nand telling him all, proposed that the Piache should be thrown to the\nalligators, and Jack installed in his place; declaring that whatsoever\nthe bearded men said must be true, and whosoever plotted against them\nshould die the death.\n\nJack, however, magnanimously forgave his foe, and preached on, of course\nwith fresh zeal; but not, alas! with much success. For the conjuror,\nthough his main treasure was gone over to the camp of the enemy, had a\nreserve in a certain holy trumpet, which was hidden mysteriously in a\ncave on the neighboring hills, not to be looked on by woman under pain\nof death; and it was well known, and had been known for generations,\nthat unless that trumpet, after fastings, flagellations, and other\nsolemn rites, was blown by night throughout the woods, the palm-trees\nwould bear no fruit; yea, so great was the fame of that trumpet, that\nneighboring tribes sent at the proper season to hire it and the blower\nthereof, by payment of much precious trumpery, that so they might be\nsharers in its fertilizing powers.\n\nSo the Piache announced one day in public, that in consequence of the\nimpiety of the Omaguas, he should retire to a neighboring tribe, of more\nreligious turn of mind; and taking with him the precious instrument,\nleave their palms to blight, and themselves to the evil spirit.\n\nDire was the wailing, and dire the wrath throughout the village.\nJack's words were allowed to be good words; but what was the Gospel in\ncomparison of the trumpet? The rascal saw his advantage, and began\na fierce harangue against the heretic strangers. As he maddened, his\nhearers maddened; the savage nature, capricious as a child's, flashed\nout in wild suspicion. Women yelled, men scowled, and ran hastily to\ntheir huts for bows and blow-guns. The case was grown critical. There\nwere not more than a dozen men with Amyas at the time, and they had only\ntheir swords, while the Indian men might muster nearly a hundred. Amyas\nforbade his men either to draw or to retreat; but poisoned arrows were\nweapons before which the boldest might well quail; and more than one\ncheek grew pale, which had seldom been pale before.\n\n\"It is God's quarrel, sirs all,\" said Jack Brimblecombe; \"let Him defend\nthe right.\"\n\nAs he spoke, from Ayacanora's hut arose her magic song, and quivered\naloft among the green heights of the forest.\n\nThe mob stood spell-bound, still growling fiercely, but not daring to\nmove. Another moment, and she had rushed out, like a very Diana, into\nthe centre of the ring, bow in hand, and arrow on the string.\n\nThe fallen \"children of wrath\" had found their match in her; for her\nbeautiful face was convulsed with fury. Almost foaming in her passion,\nshe burst forth with bitter revilings; she pointed with admiration to\nthe English, and then with fiercest contempt to the Indians; and at\nlast, with fierce gestures, seemed to cast off the very dust of her\nfeet against them, and springing to Amyas's side, placed herself in the\nforefront of the English battle.\n\nThe whole scene was so sudden, that Amyas had hardly discovered whether\nshe came as friend or foe, before her bow was raised. He had just time\nto strike up her hand, when the arrow flew past the ear of the offending\nPiache, and stuck quivering in a tree.\n\n\"Let me kill the wretch!\" said she, stamping with rage; but Amyas held\nher arm firmly.\n\n\"Fools!\" cried she to the tribe, while tears of anger rolled down her\ncheeks. \"Choose between me and your trumpet! I am a daughter of the Sun;\nI am white; I am a companion for Englishmen! But you! your mothers were\nGuahibas, and ate mud; and your fathers--they were howling apes! Let\nthem sing to you! I shall go to the white men, and never sing you to\nsleep any more; and when the little evil spirit misses my voice, he will\ncome and tumble you out of your hammocks, and make you dream of ghosts\nevery night, till you grow as thin as blow-guns, and as stupid as\naye-ayes!\"*\n\n     * Two-toed sloths.\n\nThis terrible counter-threat, in spite of the slight bathos involved,\nhad its effect; for it appealed to that dread of the sleep world which\nis common to all savages: but the conjuror was ready to outbid the\nprophetess, and had begun a fresh oration, when Amyas turned the tide\nof war. Bursting into a huge laugh at the whole matter, he took the\nconjuror by his shoulders, sent him with one crafty kick half-a-dozen\nyards off upon his nose; and then, walking out of the ranks, shook hands\nround with all his Indian acquaintances.\n\nWhereon, like grown-up babies, they all burst out laughing too, shook\nhands with all the English, and then with each other; being, after all,\nas glad as any bishops to prorogue the convocation, and let unpleasant\nquestions stand over till the next session. The Piache relented, like\na prudent man; Ayacanora returned to her hut to sulk; and Amyas to his\nisland, to long for Cary's return, for he felt himself on dangerous\nground.\n\nAt last Will returned, safe and sound, and as merry as ever, not having\nlost a man (though he had had a smart brush with the Guahibas). He\nbrought back three of the wounded men, now pretty nigh cured; the other\ntwo, who had lost a leg apiece, had refused to come. They had Indian\nwives; more than they could eat; and tobacco without end: and if it were\nnot for the gnats (of which Cary said that there were more mosquitoes\nthan there was air), they should be the happiest men alive. Amyas could\nhardly blame the poor fellows; for the chance of their getting home\nthrough the forest with one leg each was very small, and, after all,\nthey were making the best of a bad matter. And a very bad matter it\nseemed to him, to be left in a heathen land; and a still worse matter,\nwhen he overheard some of the men talking about their comrades' lonely\nfate, as if, after all, they were not so much to be pitied. He said\nnothing about it then, for he made a rule never to take notice of any\nfacts which he got at by eavesdropping, however unintentional; but he\nlonged that one of them would say as much to him, and he would \"give\nthem a piece of his mind.\" And a piece of his mind he had to give within\nthe week; for while he was on a hunting party, two of his men were\nmissing, and were not heard of for some days; at the end of which time\nthe old cacique come to tell him that he believed they had taken to the\nforest, each with an Indian girl.\n\nAmyas was very wroth at the news. First, because it had never happened\nbefore: he could say with honest pride, as Raleigh did afterwards when\nhe returned from his Guiana voyage, that no Indian woman had ever been\nthe worse for any man of his. He had preached on this point month after\nmonth, and practised what he preached; and now his pride was sorely\nhurt.\n\nMoreover, he dreaded offence to the Indians themselves: but on this\nscore the cacique soon comforted him, telling him that the girls, as far\nas he could find, had gone off of their own free will; intimating that\nhe thought it somewhat an honor to the tribe that they had found favor\nin the eyes of the bearded men; and moreover, that late wars had so\nthinned the ranks of their men, that they were glad enough to find\nhusbands for their maidens, and had been driven of late years to kill\nmany of their female infants. This sad story, common perhaps to every\nAmerican tribe, and one of the chief causes of their extermination,\nreassured Amyas somewhat: but he could not stomach either the loss of\nhis men, or their breach of discipline; and look for them he would. Did\nany one know where they were? If the tribe knew, they did not care to\ntell: but Ayacanora, the moment she found out his wishes, vanished into\nthe forest, and returned in two days, saying that she had found the\nfugitives; but she would not show him where they were, unless he\npromised not to kill them. He, of course, had no mind for so rigorous a\nmethod: he both needed the men, and he had no malice against them,--for\nthe one, Ebsworthy, was a plain, honest, happy-go-lucky sailor, and\nas good a hand as there was in the crew; and the other was that same\nne'er-do-weel Will Parracombe, his old schoolfellow, who had been\ntempted by the gipsy-Jesuit at Appledore, and resisting that bait, had\nmade a very fair seaman.\n\nSo forth Amyas went, with Ayacanora as a guide, some five miles upward\nalong the forest slopes, till the girl whispered, \"There they are;\"\nand Amyas, pushing himself gently through a thicket of bamboo, beheld\na scene which, in spite of his wrath, kept him silent, and perhaps\nsoftened, for a minute.\n\nOn the farther side of a little lawn, the stream leapt through a chasm\nbeneath overarching vines, sprinkling eternal freshness upon all around,\nand then sank foaming into a clear rock-basin, a bath for Dian's self.\nOn its farther side, the crag rose some twenty feet in height, bank upon\nbank of feathered ferns and cushioned moss, over the rich green beds of\nwhich drooped a thousand orchids, scarlet, white, and orange, and made\nthe still pool gorgeous with the reflection of their gorgeousness. At\nits more quiet outfall, it was half-hidden in huge fantastic leaves and\ntall flowering stems; but near the waterfall the grassy bank sloped\ndown toward the stream, and there, on palm-leaves strewed upon the turf,\nbeneath the shadow of the crags, lay the two men whom Amyas sought,\nand whom, now he had found them, he had hardly heart to wake from their\ndelicious dream.\n\nFor what a nest it was which they had found! the air was heavy with\nthe scent of flowers, and quivering with the murmur of the stream, the\nhumming of the colibris and insects, the cheerful song of birds, the\ngentle cooing of a hundred doves; while now and then, from far away,\nthe musical wail of the sloth, or the deep toll of the bell-bird, came\nsoftly to the ear. What was not there which eye or ear could need? And\nwhat which palate could need either? For on the rock above, some strange\ntree, leaning forward, dropped every now and then a luscious apple upon\nthe grass below, and huge wild plantains bent beneath their load of\nfruit.\n\nThere, on the stream bank, lay the two renegades from civilized life.\nThey had cast away their clothes, and painted themselves, like the\nIndians, with arnotto and indigo. One lay lazily picking up the fruit\nwhich fell close to his side; the other sat, his back against a cushion\nof soft moss, his hands folded languidly upon his lap, giving himself up\nto the soft influence of the narcotic coca-juice, with half-shut dreamy\neyes fixed on the everlasting sparkle of the waterfall--\n\n     \"While beauty, born of murmuring sound,\n     Did pass into his face.\"\n\nSomewhat apart crouched their two dusky brides, crowned with fragrant\nflowers, but working busily, like true women, for the lords whom they\ndelighted to honor. One sat plaiting palm fibres into a basket; the\nother was boring the stem of a huge milk-tree, which rose like some\nmighty column on the right hand of the lawn, its broad canopy of leaves\nunseen through the dense underwood of laurel and bamboo, and betokened\nonly by the rustle far aloft, and by the mellow shade in which it bathed\nthe whole delicious scene.\n\nAmyas stood silent for awhile, partly from noble shame at seeing two\nChristian men thus fallen of their own self-will; partly because--and\nhe could not but confess that--a solemn calm brooded above that glorious\nplace, to break through which seemed sacrilege even while he felt it\na duty. Such, he thought, was Paradise of old; such our first parents'\nbridal bower! Ah! if man had not fallen, he too might have dwelt forever\nin such a home--with whom? He started, and shaking off the spell,\nadvanced sword in hand.\n\nThe women saw him, and springing to their feet, caught up their long\npocunas, and leapt like deer each in front of her beloved. There they\nstood, the deadly tubes pressed to their lips, eyeing him like tigresses\nwho protect their young, while every slender limb quivered, not with\nterror, but with rage.\n\nAmyas paused, half in admiration, half in prudence; for one rash step\nwas death. But rushing through the canes, Ayacanora sprang to the front,\nand shrieked to them in Indian. At the sight of the prophetess the women\nwavered, and Amyas, putting on as gentle a face as he could, stepped\nforward, assuring them in his best Indian that he would harm no one.\n\n\"Ebsworthy! Parracombe! Are you grown such savages already, that you\nhave forgotten your captain? Stand up, men, and salute!\"\n\nEbsworthy sprang to his feet, obeyed mechanically, and then slipped\nbehind his bride again, as if in shame. The dreamer turned his head\nlanguidly, raised his hand to his forehead, and then returned to his\ncontemplation.\n\nAmyas rested the point of his sword on the ground, and his hands upon\nthe hilt, and looked sadly and solemnly upon the pair. Ebsworthy broke\nthe silence, half reproachfully, half trying to bluster away the coming\nstorm.\n\n\"Well, noble captain, so you've hunted out us poor fellows; and want to\ndrag us back again in a halter, I suppose?\"\n\n\"I came to look for Christians, and I find heathens; for men, and I find\nswine. I shall leave the heathens to their wilderness, and the swine to\ntheir trough. Parracombe!\"\n\n\"He's too happy to answer you, sir. And why not? What do you want of us?\nOur two years vow is out, and we are free men now.\"\n\n\"Free to become like the beasts that perish? You are the queen's\nservants still, and in her name I charge you--\n\n\"Free to be happy,\" interrupted the man. \"With the best of wives, the\nbest of food, a warmer bed than a duke's, and a finer garden than an\nemperor's. As for clothes, why the plague should a man wear them where\nhe don't need them? As for gold, what's the use of it where Heaven sends\neverything ready-made to your hands? Hearken, Captain Leigh. You've been\na good captain to me, and I'll repay you with a bit of sound advice.\nGive up your gold-hunting, and toiling and moiling after honor and\nglory, and copy us. Take that fair maid behind you there to wife; pitch\nhere with us; and see if you are not happier in one day than ever you\nwere in all your life before.\"\n\n\"You are drunk, sirrah! William Parracombe! Will you speak to me, or\nshall I heave you into the stream to sober you?\"\n\n\"Who calls William Parracombe?\" answered a sleepy voice.\n\n\"I, fool!--your captain.\"\n\n\"I am not William Parracombe. He is dead long ago of hunger, and labor,\nand heavy sorrow, and will never see Bideford town any more. He is\nturned into an Indian now; and he is to sleep, sleep, sleep for a\nhundred years, till he gets his strength again, poor fellow--\"\n\n\"Awake, then, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ\nshall give thee light! A christened Englishman, and living thus the life\nof a beast?\"\n\n\"Christ shall give thee light?\" answered the same unnatural abstracted\nvoice. \"Yes; so the parsons say. And they say too, that He is Lord of\nheaven and earth. I should have thought His light was as near us here\nas anywhere, and nearer too, by the look of the place. Look round!\"\nsaid he, waving a lazy hand, \"and see the works of God, and the place of\nParadise, whither poor weary souls go home and rest, after their masters\nin the wicked world have used them up, with labor and sorrow, and made\nthem wade knee-deep in blood--I'm tired of blood, and tired of gold.\nI'll march no more; I'll fight no more; I'll hunger no more after vanity\nand vexation of spirit. What shall I get by it? Maybe I shall leave my\nbones in the wilderness. I can but do that here. Maybe I shall get home\nwith a few pezos, to die an old cripple in some stinking hovel, that a\nmonkey would scorn to lodge in here. You may go on; it'll pay you. You\nmay be a rich man, and a knight, and live in a fine house, and drink\ngood wine, and go to Court, and torment your soul with trying to\nget more, when you've got too much already; plotting and planning to\nscramble upon your neighbor's shoulders, as they all did--Sir Richard,\nand Mr. Raleigh, and Chichester, and poor dear old Sir Warham, and all\nof them that I used to watch when I lived before. They were no happier\nthan I was then; I'll warrant they are no happier now. Go your ways,\ncaptain; climb to glory upon some other backs than ours, and leave us\nhere in peace, alone with God and God's woods, and the good wives that\nGod has given us, to play a little like school children. It's long since\nI've had play-hours; and now I'll be a little child once more, with the\nflowers, and the singing birds, and the silver fishes in the stream,\nthat are at peace, and think no harm, and want neither clothes, nor\nmoney, nor knighthood, nor peerage, but just take what comes; and their\nheavenly Father feedeth them, and Solomon in all his glory was not\narrayed like one of these--and will He not much more feed us, that are\nof more value than many sparrows?\"\n\n\"And will you live here, shut out from all Christian ordinances?\"\n\n\"Christian ordinances? Adam and Eve had no parsons in Paradise. The Lord\nwas their priest, and the Lord was their shepherd, and He'll be ours\ntoo. But go your ways, sir, and send up Sir John Brimblecombe, and let\nhim marry us here Church fashion (though we have sworn troth to each\nother before God already), and let him give us the Holy Sacrament once\nand for all, and then read the funeral service over us, and go his ways,\nand count us for dead, sir--for dead we are to the wicked worthless\nworld we came out of three years ago. And when the Lord chooses to call\nus, the little birds will cover us with leaves, as they did the babies\nin the wood, and fresher flowers will grow out of our graves, sir, than\nout of yours in that bare Northam churchyard there beyond the weary,\nweary, weary sea.\"\n\nHis voice died away to a murmur, and his head sank on his breast.\n\nAmyas stood spell-bound. The effect of the narcotic was all but\nmiraculous in his eyes. The sustained eloquence, the novel richness of\ndiction in one seemingly drowned in sensual sloth, were, in his eyes,\nthe possession of some evil spirit. And yet he could not answer the Evil\nOne. His English heart, full of the divine instinct of duty and public\nspirit, told him that it must be a lie: but how to prove it a lie? And\nhe stood for full ten minutes searching for an answer, which seemed to\nfly farther and farther off the more he sought for it.\n\nHis eye glanced upon Ayacanora. The two girls were whispering to her\nsmilingly. He saw one of them glance a look toward him, and then say\nsomething, which raised a beautiful blush in the maiden's face. With a\nplayful blow at the speaker, she turned away. Amyas knew instinctively\nthat they were giving her the same advice as Ebsworthy had given to him.\nOh, how beautiful she was! Might not the renegades have some reason on\ntheir side after all.\n\nHe shuddered at the thought: but he could not shake it off. It glided\nin like some gaudy snake, and wreathed its coils round all his heart\nand brain. He drew back to the other side of the lawn, and thought and\nthought--\n\nShould he ever get home? If he did, might he not get home a beggar?\nBeggar or rich, he would still have to face his mother, to go through\nthat meeting, to tell that tale, perhaps, to hear those reproaches, the\nforecast of which had weighed on him like a dark thunder-cloud for two\nweary years; to wipe out which by some desperate deed of glory he had\nwandered the wilderness, and wandered in vain.\n\nCould he not settle here? He need not be a savage, he and his might\nChristianize, civilize, teach equal law, mercy in war, chivalry to\nwomen; found a community which might be hereafter as strong a barrier\nagainst the encroachments of the Spaniard, as Manoa itself would have\nbeen. Who knew the wealth of the surrounding forests? Even if there were\nno gold, there were boundless vegetable treasures. What might he not\nexport down the rivers? This might be the nucleus of a great commercial\nsettlement--\n\nAnd yet, was even that worth while? To settle here only to torment\nhis soul with fresh schemes, fresh ambitions; not to rest, but only to\nchange one labor for another? Was not your dreamer right? Did they not\nall need rest? What if they each sat down among the flowers, beside an\nIndian bride? They might live like Christians, while they lived like the\nbirds of heaven.--\n\nWhat a dead silence! He looked up and round; the birds had ceased to\nchirp; the parroquets were hiding behind the leaves; the monkeys were\nclustered motionless upon the highest twigs; only out of the far depths\nof the forest, the campanero gave its solemn toll, once, twice, thrice,\nlike a great death-knell rolling down from far cathedral towers. Was\nit an omen? He looked up hastily at Ayacanora. She was watching him\nearnestly. Heavens! was she waiting for his decision? Both dropped their\neyes. The decision was not to come from them.\n\nA rustle! a roar! a shriek! and Amyas lifted his eyes in time to see a\nhuge dark bar shoot from the crag above the dreamer's head, among the\ngroup of girls.\n\nA dull crash, as the group flew asunder; and in the midst, upon the\nground, the tawny limbs of one were writhing beneath the fangs of a\nblack jaguar, the rarest and most terrible of the forest kings. Of one?\nBut of which? Was it Ayacanora? And sword in hand, Amyas rushed madly\nforward; before he reached the spot those tortured limbs were still.\n\nIt was not Ayacanora, for with a shriek which rang through the woods,\nthe wretched dreamer, wakened thus at last, sprang up and felt for his\nsword. Fool! he had left it in his hammock! Screaming the name of his\ndead bride, he rushed on the jaguar, as it crouched above its prey, and\nseizing its head with teeth and nails, worried it, in the ferocity of\nhis madness, like a mastiff-dog.\n\nThe brute wrenched its head from his grasp, and raised its dreadful paw.\nAnother moment and the husband's corpse would have lain by the wife's.\n\nBut high in air gleamed Amyas's blade; down with all the weight of his\nhuge body and strong arm, fell that most trusty steel; the head of the\njaguar dropped grinning on its victim's corpse;\n\n     \"And all stood still, who saw him fall,\n     While men might count a score.\"\n\n\"O Lord Jesus,\" said Amyas to himself, \"Thou hast answered the devil\nfor me! And this is the selfish rest for which I would have bartered the\nrest which comes by working where Thou hast put me!\"\n\nThey bore away the lithe corpse into the forest, and buried it under\nsoft moss and virgin mould; and so the fair clay was transfigured into\nfairer flowers, and the poor, gentle, untaught spirit returned to God\nwho gave it.\n\nAnd then Amyas went sadly and silently back again, and Parracombe walked\nafter him, like one who walks in sleep.\n\nEbsworthy, sobered by the shock, entreated to come too: but Amyas\nforbade him gently,--\n\n\"No, lad, you are forgiven. God forbid that I should judge you or any\nman! Sir John shall come up and marry you; and then, if it still be your\nwill to stay, the Lord forgive you, if you be wrong; in the meanwhile,\nwe will leave with you all that we can spare. Stay here and pray to God\nto make you, and me too, wiser men.\"\n\nAnd so Amyas departed. He had come out stern and proud; but he came back\nagain like a little child.\n\nThree days after Parracombe was dead. Once in camp he seemed unable to\neat or move, and having received absolution and communion from good Sir\nJohn, faded away without disease or pain, \"babbling of green fields,\"\nand murmuring the name of his lost Indian bride.\n\nAmyas, too, sought ghostly council of Sir John, and told him all which\nhad passed through his mind.\n\n\"It was indeed a temptation of Diabolus,\" said that simple sage; \"for he\nis by his very name the divider who sets man against man, and tempts\none to care only for oneself, and forget kin and country, and duty\nand queen. But you have resisted him, Captain Leigh, like a true-born\nEnglishman, as you always are, and he has fled from you. But that is no\nreason why we should not flee from him too; and so I think the sooner we\nare out of this place, and at work again, the better for all our souls.\"\n\nTo which Amyas most devoutly said, \"Amen!\" If Ayacanora were the\ndaughter of ten thousand Incas, he must get out of her way as soon as\npossible.\n\nThe next day he announced his intention to march once more, and to\nhis delight found the men ready enough to move towards the Spanish\nsettlements. One thing they needed: gunpowder for their muskets. But\nthat they must make as they went along; that is, if they could get the\nmaterials. Charcoal they could procure, enough to set the world on fire;\nbut nitre they had not yet seen; perhaps they should find it among the\nhills: while as for sulphur, any brave man could get that where there\nwere volcanoes. Who had not heard how one of Cortez' Spaniards, in like\nneed, was lowered in a basket down the smoking crater of Popocatepetl,\ntill he had gathered sulphur enough to conquer an empire? And what a\nSpaniard could do an Englishman could do, or they would know the reason\nwhy. And if they found none--why clothyard arrows had done Englishmen's\nwork many a time already, and they could do it again, not to mention\nthose same blow-guns and their arrows of curare poison, which, though\nthey might be useless against Spaniards' armor, were far more valuable\nthan muskets for procuring food, from the simple fact of their silence.\n\nOne thing remained; to invite their Indian friends to join them. And\nthat was done in due form the next day.\n\nAyacanora was consulted, of course, and by the Piache, too, who was glad\nenough to be rid of the rival preacher, and his unpleasantly good news\nthat men need not worship the devil, because there was a good God above\nthem. The maiden sang most melodious assent; the whole tribe echoed it;\nand all went smoothly enough till the old cacique observed that before\nstarting a compact should be made between the allies as to their share\nof the booty.\n\nNothing could be more reasonable; and Amyas asked him to name his terms.\n\n\"You take the gold, and we will take the prisoners.\"\n\n\"And what will you do with them?\" asked Amyas, who recollected poor John\nOxenham's hapless compact made in like case.\n\n\"Eat them,\" quoth the cacique, innocently enough.\n\nAmyas whistled.\n\n\"Humph!\" said Cary. \"The old proverb comes true--'the more the merrier:\nbut the fewer the better fare.' I think we will do without our red\nfriends for this time.\"\n\nAyacanora, who had been preaching war like a very Boadicea, was much\nvexed.\n\n\"Do you too want to dine off roast Spaniards?\" asked Amyas.\n\nShe shook her head, and denied the imputation with much disgust.\n\nAmyas was relieved; he had shrunk from joining the thought of so fair a\ncreature, however degraded, with the horrors of cannibalism.\n\nBut the cacique was a man of business, and held out stanchly.\n\n\"Is it fair?\" he asked. \"The white man loves gold, and he gets it. The\npoor Indian, what use is gold to him? He only wants something to eat,\nand he must eat his enemies. What else will pay him for going so far\nthrough the forests hungry and thirsty? You will get all, and the\nOmaguas will get nothing.\"\n\nThe argument was unanswerable; and the next day they started without the\nIndians, while John Brimblecombe heaved many an honest sigh at leaving\nthem to darkness, the devil, and the holy trumpet.\n\nAnd Ayacanora?\n\nWhen their departure was determined, she shut herself up in her hut, and\nappeared no more. Great was the weeping, howling, and leave-taking on\nthe part of the simple Indians, and loud the entreaties to come again,\nbring them a message from Amalivaca's daughter beyond the seas, and help\nthem to recover their lost land of Papamene; but Ayacanora took no part\nin them; and Amyas left her, wondering at her absence, but joyful and\nlight-hearted at having escaped the rocks of the Sirens, and being at\nwork once more.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nHOW THEY TOOK THE GOLD-TRAIN\n\n     \"God will relent, and quit thee all thy debt,\n     Who ever more approves, and more accepts\n     Him who imploring mercy sues for life,\n     Than who self-rigorous chooses death as due,\n     Which argues over-just, and self-displeased\n     For self-offence, more than for God offended.\"\n\n                               Samson Agonistes.\n\nA fortnight or more has passed in severe toil, but not more severe than\nthey have endured many a time before. Bidding farewell once and\nforever to the green ocean of the eastern plains, they have crossed the\nCordillera; they have taken a longing glance at the city of Santa Fe,\nlying in the midst of rich gardens on its lofty mountain plateau, and\nhave seen, as was to be expected, that it was far too large a place for\nany attempt of theirs. But they have not altogether thrown away their\ntime. Their Indian lad has discovered that a gold-train is going down\nfrom Santa Fe toward the Magdalena; and they are waiting for it beside\nthe miserable rut which serves for a road, encamped in a forest of oaks\nwhich would make them almost fancy themselves back again in Europe, were\nit not for the tree-ferns which form the undergrowth; and were it not,\ntoo, for the deep gorges opening at their very feet; in which, while\ntheir brows are swept by the cool breezes of a temperate zone, they\ncan see far below, dim through their everlasting vapor-bath of rank hot\nsteam, the mighty forms and gorgeous colors of the tropic forest.\n\nThey have pitched their camp among the tree-ferns, above a spot where\nthe path winds along a steep hill-side, with a sheer cliff below of many\na hundred feet. There was a road there once, perhaps, when Cundinamarca\nwas a civilized and cultivated kingdom; but all which Spanish misrule\nhas left of it are a few steps slipping from their places at the bottom\nof a narrow ditch of mud. It has gone the way of the aqueducts, and\nbridges, and post-houses, the gardens and the llama-flocks of that\nstrange empire. In the mad search for gold, every art of civilization\nhas fallen to decay, save architecture alone; and that survives only in\nthe splendid cathedrals which have risen upon the ruins of the temples\nof the Sun, in honor of a milder Pantheon; if, indeed, that can be\ncalled a milder one which demands (as we have seen already) human\nsacrifices, unknown to the gentle nature-worship of the Incas.\n\nAnd now, the rapid tropic vegetation has reclaimed its old domains,\nand Amyas and his crew are as utterly alone, within a few miles of an\nimportant Spanish settlement, as they would be in the solitudes of the\nOrinoco or the Amazon.\n\nIn the meanwhile, all their attempts to find sulphur and nitre have been\nunavailing; and they have been forced to depend after all (much to Yeo's\ndisgust) upon their swords and arrows. Be it so: Drake took Nombre de\nDios and the gold-train there with no better weapons; and they may do as\nmuch.\n\nSo, having blocked up the road above by felling a large tree across it,\nthey sit there among the flowers chewing coca, in default of food and\ndrink, and meditating among themselves the cause of a mysterious roar,\nwhich has been heard nightly in their wake ever since they left the\nbanks of the Meta. Jaguar it is not, nor monkey: it is unlike any sound\nthey know; and why should it follow them? However, they are in the land\nof wonders; and, moreover, the gold train is far more important than any\nnoise.\n\nAt last, up from beneath there was a sharp crack and a loud cry.\nThe crack was neither the snapping of a branch, nor the tapping of a\nwoodpecker; the cry was neither the scream of the parrot, nor the howl\nof the monkey.\n\n\"That was a whip's crack,\" said Yeo, \"and a woman's wail. They are close\nhere, lads!\"\n\n\"A woman's? Do they drive women in their gangs?\" asked Amyas.\n\n\"Why not, the brutes? There they are, sir. Did you see their basnets\nglitter?\"\n\n\"Men!\" said Amyas, in a low voice, \"I trust you all not to shoot till\nI do. Then give them one arrow, out swords, and at them! Pass the word\nalong.\"\n\nUp they came, slowly, and all hearts beat loud at their coming.\n\nFirst, about twenty soldiers, only one-half of whom were on foot; the\nother half being borne, incredible as it may seem, each in a chair on\nthe back of a single Indian, while those who marched had consigned their\nheaviest armor and their arquebuses into the hands of attendant slaves,\nwho were each pricked on at will by the pike of the soldier behind them.\n\n\"The men are mad to let their ordnance out of their hands.\"\n\n\"Oh, sir, an Indian will pray to an arquebus not to shoot him; he sure\ntheir artillery is safe enough,\" said Yeo.\n\n\"Look at the proud villains,\" whispered another, \"to make dumb beasts of\nhuman creatures like that!\"\n\n\"Ten shot,\" counted the business-like Amyas, \"and ten pikes; Will can\ntackle them up above.\"\n\nLast of this troop came some inferior officer, also in his chair, who,\nas he went slowly up the hill, with his face turned toward the gang\nwhich followed, drew every other second the cigar from his lips, to\ninspirit them with those pious ejaculations to the various objects of\nhis worship, divine, human, anatomic, wooden and textile, which earned\nfor the pious Spaniards of the sixteenth century the uncharitable\nimputation of being at once the most fetish-ridden idolaters and the\nmost abominable swearers of all Europeans.\n\n\"The blasphemous dog!\" said Yeo, fumbling at his bow-string, as if\nhe longed to send an arrow through him. But Amyas had hardly laid his\nfinger on the impatient veteran's arm, when another procession followed,\nwhich made them forget all else.\n\nA sad and hideous sight it was: yet one too common even then in those\nremoter districts, where the humane edicts were disregarded which the\nprayers of Dominican friars (to their everlasting honor be it spoken)\nhad wrung from the Spanish sovereigns, and which the legislation of that\nmost wise, virtuous, and heroic Inquisitor (paradoxical as the words may\nseem), Pedro de la Gasca, had carried into effect in Peru,--futile and\ntardy alleviations of cruelties and miseries unexampled in the\nhistory of Christendom, or perhaps on earth, save in the conquests of\nSennacherib and Zingis Khan. But on the frontiers, where negroes were\nimported to endure the toil which was found fatal to the Indian, and all\nIndian tribes convicted (or suspected) of cannibalism were hunted down\nfor the salvation of their souls and the enslavement of their bodies,\nsuch scenes as these were still too common; and, indeed, if we are to\njudge from Humboldt's impartial account, were not very much amended even\nat the close of the last century, in those much-boasted Jesuit missions\nin which (as many of them as existed anywhere but on paper) military\ntyranny was superadded to monastic, and the Gospel preached with fire\nand sword, almost as shamelessly as by the first Conquistadores.\n\nA line of Indians, Negroes, and Zambos, naked, emaciated, scarred with\nwhips and fetters, and chained together by their left wrists, toiled\nupwards, panting and perspiring under the burden of a basket held up\nby a strap which passed across their foreheads. Yeo's sneer was but\ntoo just; there were not only old men and youths among them, but women;\nslender young girls, mothers with children, running at their knee;\nand, at the sight, a low murmur of indignation rose from the ambushed\nEnglishmen, worthy of the free and righteous hearts of those days, when\nRaleigh could appeal to man and God, on the ground of a common humanity,\nin behalf of the outraged heathens of the New World; when Englishmen\nstill knew that man was man, and that the instinct of freedom was\nthe righteous voice of God; ere the hapless seventeenth century had\nbrutalized them also, by bestowing on them, amid a hundred other bad\nlegacies, the fatal gift of negro-slaves.\n\nBut the first forty, so Amyas counted, bore on their backs a burden\nwhich made all, perhaps, but him and Yeo, forget even the wretches who\nbore it. Each basket contained a square package of carefully corded\nhide; the look whereof friend Amyas knew full well.\n\n\"What's in they, captain?\"\n\n\"Gold!\" And at that magic word all eyes were strained greedily forward,\nand such a rustle followed, that Amyas, in the very face of detection,\nhad to whisper--\n\n\"Be men, be men, or you will spoil all yet!\"\n\nThe last twenty, or so, of the Indians bore larger baskets, but more\nlightly freighted, seemingly with manioc, and maize-bread, and other\nfood for the party; and after them came, with their bearers and\nattendants, just twenty soldiers more, followed by the officer in\ncharge, who smiled away in his chair, and twirled two huge mustachios,\nthinking of nothing less than of the English arrows which were itching\nto be away and through his ribs. The ambush was complete; the only\nquestion how and when to begin?\n\nAmyas had a shrinking, which all will understand, from drawing bow in\ncool blood on men so utterly unsuspicious and defenceless, even though\nin the very act of devilish cruelty--for devilish cruelty it was, as\nthree or four drivers armed with whips lingered up and down the slowly\nstaggering file of Indians, and avenged every moment's lagging, even\nevery stumble, by a blow of the cruel manati-hide, which cracked like\na pistol-shot against the naked limbs of the silent and uncomplaining\nvictim.\n\nSuddenly the casus belli, as usually happens, arose of its own accord.\n\nThe last but one of the chained line was an old gray-headed man,\nfollowed by a slender graceful girl of some eighteen years old, and\nAmyas's heart yearned over them as they came up. Just as they passed,\nthe foremost of the file had rounded the corner above; there was a\nbustle, and a voice shouted, \"Halt, senors! there is a tree across the\npath!\"\n\n\"A tree across the path?\" bellowed the officer, with a variety of\npassionate addresses to the Mother of Heaven, the fiends of hell, Saint\nJago of Compostella, and various other personages; while the line of\ntrembling Indians, told to halt above, and driven on by blows below,\nsurged up and down upon the ruinous steps of the Indian road, until the\npoor old man fell grovelling on his face.\n\nThe officer leaped down, and hurried upward to see what had happened. Of\ncourse, he came across the old man.\n\n\"Sin peccado concebida! Grandfather of Beelzebub, is this a place to lie\nworshipping your fiends?\" and he pricked the prostrate wretch with the\npoint of his sword.\n\nThe old man tried to rise: but the weight on his head was too much for\nhim; he fell again, and lay motionless.\n\nThe driver applied the manati-hide across his loins, once, twice, with\nfearful force; but even that specific was useless.\n\n\"Gastado, Senor Capitan,\" said he, with a shrug. \"Used up. He has been\nfailing these three months!\"\n\n\"What does the intendant mean by sending me out with worn-out cattle\nlike these? Forward there!\" shouted he. \"Clear away the tree, senors,\nand I'll soon clear the chain. Hold it up, Pedrillo!\"\n\nThe driver held up the chain, which was fastened to the old man's wrist.\nThe officer stepped back, and flourished round his head a Toledo blade,\nwhose beauty made Amyas break the Tenth Commandment on the spot.\n\nThe man was a tall, handsome, broad-shouldered, high-bred man; and Amyas\nthought that he was going to display the strength of his arm, and the\ntemper of his blade, in severing the chain at one stroke.\n\nEven he was not prepared for the recondite fancies of a Spanish\nadventurer, worthy son or nephew of those first conquerors, who used to\ntry the keenness of their swords upon the living bodies of Indians, and\nregale themselves at meals with the odor of roasting caciques.\n\nThe blade gleamed in the air, once, twice, and fell: not on the chain,\nbut on the wrist which it fettered. There was a shriek--a crimson\nflash--and the chain and its prisoner were parted indeed.\n\nOne moment more, and Amyas's arrow would have been through the throat\nof the murderer, who paused, regarding his workmanship with a satisfied\nsmile; but vengeance was not to come from him.\n\nQuick and fierce as a tiger-cat, the girl sprang on the ruffian, and\nwith the intense strength of passion, clasped him in her arms, and\nleaped with him from the narrow ledge into the abyss below.\n\nThere was a rush, a shout; all faces were bent over the precipice.\nThe girl hung by her chained wrist: the officer was gone. There was a\nmoment's awful silence; and then Amyas heard his body crashing through\nthe tree-tops far below.\n\n\"Haul her up! Hew her in pieces! Burn the witch!\" and the driver,\nseizing the chain, pulled at it with all his might, while all springing\nfrom their chairs, stooped over the brink.\n\nNow was the time for Amyas! Heaven had delivered them into his hands.\nSwift and sure, at ten yards off, his arrow rushed through the body of\nthe driver, and then, with a roar as of the leaping lion, he sprang like\nan avenging angel into the midst of the astonished ruffians.\n\nHis first thought was for the girl. In a moment, by sheer strength, he\nhad jerked her safely up into the road; while the Spaniards recoiled\nright and left, fancying him for the moment some mountain giant or\nsupernatural foe. His hurrah undeceived them in an instant, and a cry\nof \"English! Lutheran dogs!\" arose, but arose too late. The men of Devon\nhad followed their captain's lead: a storm of arrows left five Spaniards\ndead, and a dozen more wounded, and down leapt Salvation Yeo, his white\nhair streaming behind him, with twenty good swords more, and the work of\ndeath began.\n\nThe Spaniards fought like lions; but they had no time to fix their\narquebuses on the crutches; no room, in that narrow path, to use their\npikes. The English had the wall of them; and to have the wall there, was\nto have the foe's life at their mercy. Five desperate minutes, and not a\nliving Spaniard stood upon those steps; and certainly no living one lay\nin the green abyss below. Two only, who were behind the rest, happening\nto be in full armor, escaped without mortal wound, and fled down the\nhill again.\n\n\"After them! Michael Evans and Simon Heard; and catch them, if they run\na league.\"\n\nThe two long and lean Clovelly men, active as deer from forest training,\nran two feet for the Spaniard's one; and in ten minutes returned, having\ndone their work; while Amyas and his men hurried past the Indians, to\nhelp Cary and the party forward, where shouts and musket shots announced\na sharp affray.\n\nTheir arrival settled the matter. All the Spaniards fell but three or\nfour, who scrambled down the crannies of the cliff.\n\n\"Let not one of them escape! Slay them as Israel slew Amalek!\" cried\nYeo, as he bent over; and ere the wretches could reach a place of\nshelter, an arrow was quivering in each body, as it rolled lifeless down\nthe rocks.\n\n\"Now then! Loose the Indians!\"\n\nThey found armorers tools on one of the dead bodies, and it was done.\n\n\"We are your friends,\" said Amyas. \"All we ask is, that you shall help\nus to carry this gold down to the Magdalena, and then you are free.\"\n\nSome few of the younger grovelled at his knees, and kissed his feet,\nhailing him as the child of the Sun: but the most part kept a stolid\nindifference, and when freed from their fetters, sat quietly down where\nthey stood, staring into vacancy. The iron had entered too deeply into\ntheir soul. They seemed past hope, enjoyment, even understanding.\n\nBut the young girl, who was last of all in the line, as soon as she was\nloosed, sprang to her father's body, speaking no word, lifted it in her\nthin arms, laid it across her knees, kissed the fallen lips, stroked\nthe furrowed cheeks, murmured inarticulate sounds like the cooing of a\nwoodland dove, of which none knew the meaning but she, and he who heard\nnot, for his soul had long since fled. Suddenly the truth flashed on\nher; silent as ever, she drew one long heaving breath, and rose erect,\nthe body in her arms.\n\nAnother moment, and she had leaped into the abyss.\n\nThey watched her dark and slender limbs, twined closely round the old\nman's corpse, turn over, and over, and over, till a crash among the\nleaves, and a scream among the birds, told that she had reached the\ntrees; and the green roof hid her from their view.\n\n\"Brave lass!\" shouted a sailor.\n\n\"The Lord forgive her!\" said Yeo. \"But, your worship, we must have these\nrascals' ordnance.\"\n\n\"And their clothes too, Yeo, if we wish to get down the Magdalena\nunchallenged. Now listen, my masters all! We have won, by God's good\ngrace, gold enough to serve us the rest of our lives, and that without\nlosing a single man; and may yet win more, if we be wise, and He thinks\ngood. But oh, my friends, remember Mr. Oxenham and his crew; and do\nnot make God's gift our ruin, by faithlessness, or greediness, or any\nmutinous haste.\"\n\n\"You shall find none in us!\" cried several men. \"We know your worship.\nWe can trust our general.\"\n\n\"Thank God!\" said Amyas. \"Now then, it will be no shame or sin to\nmake the Indians carry it, saving the women, whom God forbid we\nshould burden. But we must pass through the very heart of the Spanish\nsettlements, and by the town of Saint Martha itself. So the clothes and\nweapons of these Spaniards we must have, let it cost us what labor it\nmay. How many lie in the road?\"\n\n\"Thirteen here, and about ten up above,\" said Cary.\n\n\"Then there are near twenty missing. Who will volunteer to go down over\ncliff, and bring up the spoil of them?\"\n\n\"I, and I, and I;\" and a dozen stepped out, as they did always when\nAmyas wanted anything done; for the simple reason, that they knew that\nhe meant to help at the doing of it himself.\n\n\"Very well, then, follow me. Sir John, take the Indian lad for your\ninterpreter, and try and comfort the souls of these poor heathens. Tell\nthem that they shall all be free.\"\n\n\"Why, who is that comes up the road?\"\n\nAll eyes were turned in the direction of which he spoke. And, wonder of\nwonders! up came none other than Ayacanora herself, blow-gun in hand,\nbow on back, and bedecked in all her feather garments, which last were\nrather the worse for a fortnight's woodland travel.\n\nAll stood mute with astonishment, as, seeing Amyas, she uttered a cry\nof joy, quickened her pace into a run, and at last fell panting and\nexhausted at his feet.\n\n\"I have found you!\" she said; \"you ran away from me, but you could not\nescape me!\" And she fawned round Amyas, like a dog who has found his\nmaster, and then sat down on the bank, and burst into wild sobs.\n\n\"God help us!\" said Amyas, clutching his hair, as he looked down upon\nthe beautiful weeper. \"What am I to do with her, over and above all\nthese poor heathens?\"\n\nBut there was no time to be lost, and over the cliff he scrambled; while\nthe girl, seeing that the main body of the English remained, sat down on\na point of rock to watch him.\n\nAfter half-an-hour's hard work, the weapons, clothes, and armor of the\nfallen Spaniards were hauled up the cliff, and distributed in bundles\namong the men; the rest of the corpses were thrown over the precipice,\nand they started again upon their road toward the Magdalena, while Yeo\nsnorted like a war-horse who smells the battle, at the delight of once\nmore handling powder and ball.\n\n\"We can face the world now, sir! Why not go back and try Santa Fe, after\nall?\"\n\nBut Amyas thought that enough was as good as a feast, and they held on\ndownwards, while the slaves followed, without a sign of gratitude, but\nmeekly obedient to their new masters, and testifying now and then by a\nsign or a grunt, their surprise at not being beaten, or made to carry\ntheir captors. Some, however, caught sight of the little calabashes of\ncoca which the English carried. That woke them from their torpor,\nand they began coaxing abjectly (and not in vain) for a taste of that\nmiraculous herb, which would not only make food unnecessary, and enable\ntheir panting lungs to endure that keen mountain air, but would rid\nthem, for awhile at least, of the fallen Indian's most unpitying foe,\nthe malady of thought.\n\nAs the cavalcade turned the corner of the mountain, they paused for one\nlast look at the scene of that fearful triumph. Lines of vultures were\nalready streaming out of infinite space, as if created suddenly for the\noccasion. A few hours and there would be no trace of that fierce fray,\nbut a few white bones amid untrodden beds of flowers.\n\nAnd now Amyas had time to ask Ayacanora the meaning of this her strange\nappearance. He wished her anywhere but where she was: but now that she\nwas here, what heart could be so hard as not to take pity on the poor\nwild thing? And Amyas as he spoke to her had, perhaps, a tenderness in\nhis tone, from very fear of hurting her, which he had never used before.\nPassionately she told him how she had followed on their track day and\nnight, and had every evening made sounds, as loud as she dared, in hopes\nof their hearing her, and either waiting for her, or coming back to see\nwhat caused the noise.\n\nAmyas now recollected the strange roaring which had followed them.\n\n\"Noises? What did you make them with?\"\n\nAyacanora lifted her finger with an air of most self-satisfied mystery,\nand then drew cautiously from under her feather cloak an object at which\nAmyas had hard work to keep his countenance.\n\n\"Look!\" whispered she, as if half afraid that the thing itself should\nhear her. \"I have it--the holy trumpet!\"\n\nThere it was verily, that mysterious bone of contention; a handsome\nearthen tube some two feet long, neatly glazed, and painted with quaint\ngrecques and figures of animals; a relic evidently of some civilization\nnow extinct.\n\nBrimblecombe rubbed his little fat hands. \"Brave maid! you have cheated\nSatan this time,\" quoth he; while Yeo advised that the \"idolatrous\nrelic\" should be forthwith \"hove over cliff.\"\n\n\"Let be,\" said Amyas. \"What is the meaning of this, Ayacanora? And why\nhave you followed us?\"\n\nShe told a long story, from which Amyas picked up, as far as he could\nunderstand her, that that trumpet had been for years the torment of her\nlife; the one thing in the tribe superior to her; the one thing which\nshe was not allowed to see, because, forsooth, she was a woman. So she\ndetermined to show them that a woman was as good as a man; and hence\nher hatred of marriage, and her Amazonian exploits. But still the Piache\nwould not show her that trumpet, or tell her where it was; and as for\ngoing to seek it, even she feared the superstitious wrath of the tribe\nat such a profanation. But the day after the English went, the Piache\nchose to express his joy at their departure; whereon, as was to be\nexpected, a fresh explosion between master and pupil, which ended, she\nconfessed, in her burning the old rogue's hut over his head, from which\nhe escaped with loss of all his conjuring-tackle, and fled raging into\nthe woods, vowing that he would carry off the trumpet to the neighboring\ntribe. Whereon, by a sudden impulse, the young lady took plenty of coca,\nher weapons, and her feathers, started on his trail, and ran him to\nearth just as he was unveiling the precious mystery. At which sight\n(she confessed) she was horribly afraid, and half inclined to run; but,\ngathering courage from the thought that the white men used to laugh at\nthe whole matter, she rushed upon the hapless conjuror, and bore off her\nprize in triumph; and there it was!\n\n\"I hope you have not killed him?\" said Amyas.\n\n\"I did beat him a little; but I thought you would not let me kill him.\"\n\nAmyas was half amused with her confession of his authority over her; but\nshe went on--\n\n\"And then I dare not go back to the Indians; so I was forced to come\nafter you.\"\n\n\"And is that, then, your only reason for coming after us?\" asked stupid\nAmyas.\n\nHe had touched some secret chord--though what it was he was too busy to\ninquire. The girl drew herself up proudly, blushing scarlet, and said:\n\n\"You never tell lies. Do you think that I would tell lies?\"\n\nOn which she fell to the rear, and followed them steadfastly, speaking\nto no one, but evidently determined to follow them to the world's end.\n\nThey soon left the highroad; and for several days held on downwards,\nhewing their path slowly and painfully through the thick underwood. On\nthe evening of the fourth day, they had reached the margin of a river,\nat a point where it seemed broad and still enough for navigation. For\nthose three days they had not seen a trace of human beings, and the spot\nseemed lonely enough for them to encamp without fear of discovery, and\nbegin the making of their canoes. They began to spread themselves along\nthe stream, in search of the soft-wooded trees proper for their purpose;\nbut hardly had their search begun, when, in the midst of a dense\nthicket, they came upon a sight which filled them with astonishment.\nBeneath a honeycombed cliff, which supported one enormous cotton-tree,\nwas a spot of some thirty yards square sloping down to the stream,\nplanted in rows with magnificent banana-plants, full twelve feet high,\nand bearing among their huge waxy leaves clusters of ripening\nfruit; while, under their mellow shade, yams and cassava plants were\nflourishing luxuriantly, the whole being surrounded by a hedge of orange\nand scarlet flowers. There it lay, streaked with long shadows from the\nsetting sun, while a cool southern air rustled in the cotton-tree, and\nflapped to and fro the great banana-leaves; a tiny paradise of art and\ncare. But where was its inhabitant?\n\nAroused by the noise of their approach, a figure issued from a cave in\nthe rocks, and, after gazing at them for a moment, came down the garden\ntowards them. He was a tall and stately old man, whose snow-white beard\nand hair covered his chest and shoulders, while his lower limbs were\nwrapt in Indian-web. Slowly and solemnly he approached, a staff in one\nhand, a string of beads in the other, the living likeness of some old\nHebrew prophet, or anchorite of ancient legend. He bowed courteously to\nAmyas (who of course returned his salute), and was in act to speak, when\nhis eye fell upon the Indians, who were laying down their burdens in\na heap under the trees. His mild countenance assumed instantly an\nexpression of the acutest sorrow and displeasure; and, striking his\nhands together, he spoke in Spanish:\n\n\"Alas! miserable me! Alas! unhappy senors! Do my old eyes deceive me,\nand is it one of those evil visions of the past which haunt my dreams\nby night; or has the accursed thirst of gold, the ruin of my race,\npenetrated even into this my solitude? Oh, senors, senors, know you not\nthat you bear with you your own poison, your own familiar fiend, the\nroot of every evil? And is it not enough for you, senors, to load\nyourselves with the wedge of Achan, and partake his doom, but you must\nmake these hapless heathens the victims of your greed and cruelty,\nand forestall for them on earth those torments which may await their\nunbaptized souls hereafter?\"\n\n\"We have preserved, and not enslaved these Indians, ancient senor,\" said\nAmyas, proudly; \"and to-morrow will see them as free as the birds over\nour heads.\"\n\n\"Free? Then you cannot be countrymen of mine! But pardon an old man,\nmy son, if he has spoken too hastily in the bitterness of his own\nexperience. But who and whence are you? And why are you bringing into\nthis lonely wilderness that gold--for I know too well the shape of those\naccursed packets, which would God that I had never seen!\"\n\n\"What we are, reverend sir, matters little, as long as we behave to you\nas the young should to the old. As for our gold, it will be a curse or\na blessing to us, I conceive, just as we use it well or ill; and so is\na man's head, or his hand, or any other thing; but that is no reason for\ncutting off his limbs for fear of doing harm with them; neither is it\nfor throwing away those packages, which, by your leave, we shall deposit\nin one of these caves. We must be your neighbors, I fear, for a day\nor two; but I can promise you, that your garden shall be respected, on\ncondition that you do not inform any human soul of our being here.\"\n\n\"God forbid, senor, that I should try to increase the number of my\nvisitors, much less to bring hither strife and blood, of which I have\nseen too much already. As you have come in peace, in peace depart. Leave\nme alone with God and my penitence, and may the Lord have mercy on you!\"\n\nAnd he was about to withdraw, when, recollecting himself, he turned\nsuddenly to Amyas again--\n\n\"Pardon me, senor, if, after forty years of utter solitude, I shrink at\nfirst from the conversation of human beings, and forget, in the habitual\nshyness of a recluse, the duties of a hospitable gentleman of Spain.\nMy garden, and all which it produces, is at your service. Only let me\nentreat that these poor Indians shall have their share; for heathens\nthough they be, Christ died for them; and I cannot but cherish in my\nsoul some secret hope that He did not die in vain.\"\n\n\"God forbid!\" said Brimblecombe. \"They are no worse than we, for aught\nI see, whatsoever their fathers may have been; and they have fared no\nworse than we since they have been with us, nor will, I promise you.\"\n\nThe good fellow did not tell that he had been starving himself for the\nlast three days to cram the children with his own rations; and that\nthe sailors, and even Amyas, had been going out of their way every five\nminutes, to get fruit for their new pets.\n\nA camp was soon formed; and that evening the old hermit asked Amyas,\nCary, and Brimblecombe to come up into his cavern.\n\nThey went; and after the accustomed compliments had passed, sat down on\nmats upon the ground, while the old man stood, leaning against a slab of\nstone surmounted by a rude wooden cross, which evidently served him as\na place of prayer. He seemed restless and anxious, as if he waited for\nthem to begin the conversation; while they, in their turn, waited for\nhim. At last, when courtesy would not allow him to be silent any longer,\nhe began with a faltering voice:\n\n\"You may be equally surprised, senors, at my presence in such a spot,\nand at my asking you to become my guests even for one evening, while I\nhave no better hospitality to offer you.\"\n\n\"It is superfluous, senor, to offer us food in your own habitation when\nyou have already put all that you possess at our command.\"\n\n\"True, senors: and my motive for inviting you was, perhaps, somewhat of\na selfish one. I am possessed by a longing to unburthen my heart of a\ntale which I never yet told to man, and which I fear can give to you\nnothing but pain; and yet I will entreat you, of your courtesy, to hear\nof that which you cannot amend, simply in mercy to a man who feels that\nhe must confess to some one, or die as miserable as he has lived. And\nI believe my confidence will not be misplaced, when it is bestowed upon\nyou. I have been a cavalier, even as you are; and, strange as it may\nseem, that which I have to tell I would sooner impart to the ears of a\nsoldier than of a priest; because it will then sink into souls which can\nat least sympathize, though they cannot absolve. And you, cavaliers, I\nperceive to be noble, from your very looks; to be valiant, by your mere\npresence in this hostile land; and to be gentle, courteous, and prudent,\nby your conduct this day to me and to your captives. Will you, then,\nhear an old man's tale? I am, as you see, full of words; for speech,\nfrom long disuse, is difficult to me, and I fear at every sentence lest\nmy stiffened tongue should play the traitor to my worn-out brain: but\nif my request seems impertinent, you have only to bid me talk as a host\nshould, of matters which concern his guests, and not himself.\"\n\nThe three young men, equally surprised and interested by this exordium,\ncould only entreat their host to \"use their ears as those of his\nslaves,\" on which, after fresh apologies, he began:\n\n\"Know, then, victorious cavaliers, that I, whom you now see here as a\npoor hermit, was formerly one of the foremost of that terrible band who\nwent with Pizarro to the conquest of Peru. Eighty years old am I this\nday, unless the calendar which I have carved upon yonder tree deceives\nme; and twenty years old was I when I sailed with that fierce man from\nPanama, to do that deed with which all earth, and heaven, and hell\nitself, I fear, has rung. How we endured, suffered, and triumphed; how,\nmad with success, and glutted with blood, we turned our swords against\neach other, I need not tell to you. For what gentleman of Europe knows\nnot our glory and our shame?\"\n\nHis hearers bowed assent.\n\n\"Yes; you have heard of our prowess: for glorious we were awhile, in\nthe sight of God and man. But I will not speak of our glory, for it is\ntarnished; nor of our wealth, for it was our poison; nor of the sins of\nmy comrades, for they have expiated them; but of my own sins, senors,\nwhich are more in number than the hairs of my head, and a burden too\ngreat to bear. Miserere Domine!\"\n\nAnd smiting on his breast, the old warrior went on:\n\n\"As I said, we were mad with blood; and none more mad than I. Surely it\nis no fable that men are possessed, even in this latter age, by devils.\nWhy else did I rejoice in slaying? Why else was I, the son of a noble\nand truthful cavalier of Castile, among the foremost to urge upon\nmy general the murder of the Inca? Why did I rejoice over his dying\nagonies? Why, when Don Ferdinando de Soto returned, and upbraided us\nwith our villainy, did I, instead of confessing the sin which that noble\ncavalier set before us, withstand him to his face, ay, and would have\ndrawn the sword on him, but that he refused to fight a liar, as he said\nthat I was?\"\n\n\"Then Don de Soto was against the murder? So his own grandson told me.\nBut I had heard of him only as a tyrant and a butcher.\"\n\n\"Senor, he was compact of good and evil, as are other men: he has paid\ndearly for his sin; let us hope that he has been paid in turn for his\nrighteousness.\"\n\nJohn Brimblecombe shook his head at this doctrine, but did not speak.\n\n\"So you know his grandson? I trust he is a noble cavalier?\"\n\nAmyas was silent; the old gentleman saw that he had touched some sore\npoint, and continued:\n\n\"And why, again, senors, did I after that day give myself up to cruelty\nas to a sport; yea, thought that I did God service by destroying the\ncreatures whom He had made; I who now dare not destroy a gnat, lest I\nharm a being more righteous than myself? Was I mad? If I was, how then\nwas I all that while as prudent as I am this day? But I am not here to\nargue, senors, but to confess. In a word, there was no deed of blood\ndone for the next few years in which I had not my share, if it were but\nwithin my reach. When Challcuchima was burned, I was consenting; when\nthat fair girl, the wife of Inca Manco, was tortured to death, I smiled\nat the agonies at which she too smiled, and taunted on the soldiers, to\ntry if I could wring one groan from her before she died. You know what\nfollowed, the pillage, the violence, the indignities offered to the\nvirgins of the Sun. Senors, I will not pollute your chaste ears with\nwhat was done. But, senors, I had a brother.\"\n\nAnd the old man paused awhile.\n\n\"A brother--whether better or worse than me, God knows, before whom he\nhas appeared ere now. At least he did not, as I did, end as a rebel\nto his king! There was a maiden in one of those convents, senors, more\nbeautiful than day: and (I blush to tell it) the two brothers of whom\nI spoke quarrelled for the possession of her. They struck each other,\nsenors! Who struck first I know not; but swords were drawn, and--The\ncavaliers round parted them, crying shame. And one of those two\nbrothers--the one who speaks to you now--crying, 'If I cannot have her,\nno man shall!' turned the sword which was aimed at his brother, against\nthat hapless maiden--and--hear me out, senors, before you flee from my\npresence as from that of a monster!--stabbed her to the heart. And as\nshe died--one moment more, senors, that I may confess all!--she looked\nup in my face with a smile as of heaven, and thanked me for having rid\nher once and for all from Christians and their villainy.\"\n\nThe old man paused.\n\n\"God forgive you, senor!\" said Jack Brimblecombe, softly.\n\n\"You do not, then, turn from me, do not curse me? Then I will try you\nfarther still, senors. I will know from human lips, whether man can do\nsuch deeds as I have done, and yet be pitied by his kind; that so I may\nhave some hope, that where man has mercy, God may have mercy also. Do\nyou think that I repented at those awful words? Nothing less, senors\nall. No more than I did when De Soto (on whose soul God have mercy)\ncalled me--me, a liar! I knew myself a sinner; and for that very reason\nI was determined to sin. I would go on, that I might prove myself right\nto myself, by showing that I could go on, and not be struck dead from\nheaven. Out of mere pride, senors, and self-will, I would fill up the\ncup of my iniquity; and I filled it.\n\n\"You know, doubtless, senors, how, after the death of old Almagro, his\nson's party conspired against Pizarro. Now my brother remained faithful\nto his old commander; and for that very reason, if you will believe it,\ndid I join the opposite party, and gave myself up, body and soul, to do\nAlmagro's work. It was enough for me, that the brother who had struck\nme thought a man right, for me to think that man a devil. What Almagro's\nwork was, you know. He slew Pizarro, murdered him, senors, like a dog,\nor rather, like an old lion.\"\n\n\"He deserved his doom,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Let God judge him, senor, not we; and least of all of us I, who drew\nthe first blood, and perhaps the last, that day. I, senors, it was\nwho treacherously stabbed Francisco de Chanes on the staircase, and so\nopened the door which else had foiled us all; and I--But I am speaking\nto men of honor, not to butchers. Suffice it that the old man died like\na lion, and that we pulled him down, young as we were, like curs.\n\n\"Well, I followed Almagro's fortunes. I helped to slay Alvarado. Call\nthat my third murder, if you will, for if he was traitor to a traitor, I\nwas traitor to a true man. Then to the war; you know how Vaca de Castro\nwas sent from Spain to bring order and justice where was naught but\nchaos, and the dance of all devils. We met him on the hills of Chupas.\nPeter of Candia, the Venetian villain, pointed our guns false, and\nAlmagro stabbed him to the heart. We charged with our lances, man\nagainst man, horse against horse. All fights I ever fought\" (and the old\nman's eyes flashed out the ancient fire) \"were child's play to that day.\nOur lances shivered like reeds, and we fell on with battle-axe and mace.\nNone asked for quarter, and none gave it; friend to friend, cousin to\ncousin--no, nor brother, O God! to brother. We were the better armed:\nbut numbers were on their side. Fat Carbajal charged our cannon like an\nelephant, and took them; but Holguin was shot down. I was with Almagro,\nand we swept all before us, inch by inch, but surely, till the night\nfell. Then Vaca de Castro, the licentiate, the clerk, the schoolman,\nthe man of books, came down on us with his reserve like a whirlwind.\nOh! cavaliers, did not God fight against us, when He let us, the men of\niron, us, the heroes of Cuzco and Vilcaconga, be foiled by a scholar in\na black gown, with a pen behind his ear? We were beaten. Some ran; some\ndid not run, senors; and I did not. Geronimo de Alvarado shouted to\nme, 'We slew Pizarro! We killed the tyrant!' and we rushed upon the\nconqueror's lances, to die like cavaliers. There was a gallant gentleman\nin front of me. His lance struck me in the crest, and bore me over my\nhorse's croup: but mine, senors, struck him full in the vizor. We both\nwent to the ground together, and the battle galloped over us.\n\n\"I know not how long I lay, for I was stunned: but after awhile I lifted\nmyself. My lance was still clenched in my hand, broken but not parted.\nThe point of it was in my foeman's brain. I crawled to him, weary and\nwounded, and saw that he was a noble cavalier. He lay on his back, his\narms spread wide. I knew that he was dead: but there came over me the\nstrangest longing to see that dead man's face. Perhaps I knew him. At\nleast I could set my foot upon it, and say, 'Vanquished as I am, there\nlies a foe!' I caught hold of the rivets, and tore his helmet off. The\nmoon shone bright, senors, as bright as she shines now--the glaring,\nghastly, tell-tale moon, which shows man all the sins which he tries to\nhide; and by that moonlight, senors, I beheld the dead man's face. And\nit was the face of my brother!\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\n\"Did you ever guess, most noble cavaliers, what Cain's curse might be\nlike? Look on me, and know!\n\n\"I tore off my armor and fled, as Cain fled--northward ever, till I\nshould reach a land where the name of Spaniard, yea, and the name of\nChristian, which the Spaniard has caused to be blasphemed from east to\nwest, should never come. I sank fainting, and waked beneath this rock,\nthis tree, forty-four years ago, and I have never left them since, save\nonce, to obtain seeds from Indians, who knew not that I was a Spanish\nConquistador. And may God have mercy on my soul!\"\n\nThe old man ceased; and his young hearers, deeply affected by his tale,\nsat silent for a few minutes. Then John Brimblecombe spoke:\n\n\"You are old, sir, and I am young; and perhaps it is not my place to\ncounsel you. Moreover, sir, in spite of this strange dress of mine, I am\nneither more nor less than an English priest; and I suppose you will not\nbe willing to listen to a heretic.\"\n\n\"I have seen Catholics, senor, commit too many abominations even with\nthe name of God upon their lips, to shrink from a heretic if he speak\nwisely and well. At least, you are a man; and after all, my heart yearns\nmore and more, the longer I sit among you, for the speech of beings of\nmy own race. Say what you will, in God's name!\"\n\n\"I hold, sir,\" said Jack, modestly, \"according to holy Scripture, that\nwhosoever repents from his heart, as God knows you seem to have done, is\nforgiven there and then; and though his sins be as scarlet, they shall\nbe white as snow, for the sake of Him who died for all.\"\n\n\"Amen! Amen!\" said the old man, looking lovingly at his little crucifix.\n\"I hope and pray--His name is Love. I know it now; who better? But, sir,\neven if He have forgiven me, how can I forgive myself? In honor, sir, I\nmust be just, and sternly just, to myself, even if God be indulgent;\nas He has been to me, who has left me here in peace for forty years,\ninstead of giving me a prey to the first puma or jaguar which howls\nround me every night. He has given me time to work out my own salvation;\nbut have I done it? That doubt maddens me at whiles. When I look upon\nthat crucifix, I float on boundless hope: but if I take my eyes from\nit for a moment, faith fails, and all is blank, and dark, and dreadful,\ntill the devil whispers me to plunge into yon stream, and once and for\never wake to certainty, even though it be in hell.\"\n\nWhat was Jack to answer? He himself knew not at first. More was wanted\nthan the mere repetition of free pardon.\n\n\"Heretic as I am, sir, you will not believe me when I tell you, as a\npriest, that God accepts your penitence.\"\n\n\"My heart tells me so already, at moments. But how know I that it does\nnot lie?\"\n\n\"Senor,\" said Jack, \"the best way to punish oneself for doing ill, seems\nto me to go and do good; and the best way to find out whether God means\nyou well, is to find out whether He will help you to do well. If you\nhave wronged Indians in time past, see whether you cannot right them\nnow. If you can, you are safe. For the Lord will not send the devil's\nservants to do His work.\"\n\nThe old man held down his head.\n\n\"Right the Indians? Alas! what is done, is done!\"\n\n\"Not altogether, senor,\" said Amyas, \"as long as an Indian remains alive\nin New Granada.\"\n\n\"Senor, shall I confess my weakness? A voice within me has bid me a\nhundred times go forth and labor, for those oppressed wretches, but I\ndare not obey. I dare not look them in the face. I should fancy that\nthey knew my story; that the very birds upon the trees would reveal my\ncrime, and bid them turn from me with horror.\"\n\n\"Senor,\" said Amyas, \"these are but the sick fancies of a noble spirit,\nfeeding on itself in solitude. You have but to try to conquer.\"\n\n\"And look now,\" said Jack, \"if you dare not go forth to help the\nIndians, see now how God has brought the Indians to your own door. Oh,\nexcellent sir--\"\n\n\"Call me not excellent,\" said the old man, smiting his breast.\n\n\"I do, and shall, sir, while I see in you an excellent repentance, an\nexcellent humility, and an excellent justice,\" said Jack. \"But oh, sir,\nlook upon these forty souls, whom we must leave behind, like sheep which\nhave no shepherd. Could you not teach them to fear God and to love each\nother, to live like rational men, perhaps to die like Christians? They\nwould obey you as a dog obeys his master. You might be their king, their\nfather, yea, their pope, if you would.\"\n\n\"You do not speak like a Lutheran.\"\n\n\"I am not a Lutheran, but an Englishman: but, Protestant as I am, God\nknows, I had sooner see these poor souls of your creed, than of none.\"\n\n\"But I am no priest.\"\n\n\"When they are ready,\" said Jack, \"the Lord will send a priest. If you\nbegin the good work, you may trust to Him to finish it.\"\n\n\"God help me!\" said the old warrior.\n\nThe talk lasted long into the night, but Amyas was up long before\ndaybreak, felling the trees; and as he and Cary walked back to\nbreakfast, the first thing which they saw was the old man in his garden\nwith four or five Indian children round him, talking smilingly to them.\n\n\"The old man's heart is sound still,\" said Will. \"No man is lost who\nstill is fond of little children.\"\n\n\"Ah, senors!\" said the hermit as they came up, \"you see that I have\nbegun already to act upon your advice.\"\n\n\"And you have begun at the right end,\" quoth Amyas; \"if you win the\nchildren, you win the mothers.\"\n\n\"And if you win the mothers,\" quoth Will, \"the poor fathers must needs\nobey their wives, and follow in the wake.\"\n\nThe old man only sighed. \"The prattle of these little ones softens\nmy hard heart, senors, with a new pleasure; but it saddens me, when I\nrecollect that there may be children of mine now in the world--children\nwho have never known a father's love--never known aught but a master's\nthreats--\"\n\n\"God has taken care of these little ones. Trust that He has taken care\nof yours.\"\n\nThat day Amyas assembled the Indians, and told them that they must obey\nthe hermit as their king, and settle there as best they could: for if\nthey broke up and wandered away, nothing was left for them but to fall\none by one into the hands of the Spaniards. They heard him with their\nusual melancholy and stupid acquiescence, and went and came as they were\nbid, like animated machines; but the negroes were of a different temper;\nand four or five stout fellows gave Amyas to understand that they had\nbeen warriors in their own country, and that warriors they would be\nstill; and nothing should keep them from Spaniard-hunting. Amyas saw\nthat the presence of these desperadoes in the new colony would both\nendanger the authority of the hermit, and bring the Spaniards down\nupon it in a few weeks; so, making a virtue of necessity, he asked them\nwhether they would go Spaniard-hunting with him.\n\nThis was just what the bold Coromantees wished for; they grinned and\nshouted their delight at serving under so great a warrior, and then set\nto work most gallantly, getting through more in the day than any ten\nIndians, and indeed than any two Englishmen.\n\nSo went on several days, during which the trees were felled, and the\nprocess of digging them out began; while Ayacanora, silent and moody,\nwandered into the woods all day with her blow-gun, and brought home\nat evening a load of parrots, monkeys, and curassows; two or three old\nhands were sent out to hunt likewise; so that, what with the game and\nthe fish of the river, which seemed inexhaustible, and the fruit of the\nneighboring palm-trees, there was no lack of food in the camp. But what\nto do with Ayacanora weighed heavily on the mind of Amyas. He opened his\nheart on the matter to the old hermit, and asked him whether he would\ntake charge of her. The latter smiled, and shook his head at the notion.\n\"If your report of her be true, I may as well take in hand to tame a\njaguar.\" However, he promised to try; and one evening, as they were\nall standing together before the mouth of the cave, Ayacanora came up\nsmiling with the fruit of her day's sport; and Amyas, thinking this a\nfit opportunity, began a carefully prepared harangue to her, which he\nintended to be altogether soothing, and even pathetic,--to the effect\nthat the maiden, having no parents, was to look upon this good old man\nas her father; that he would instruct her in the white man's religion\n(at which promise Yeo, as a good Protestant, winced a good deal), and\nteach her how to be happy and good, and so forth; and that, in fine, she\nwas to remain there with the hermit.\n\nShe heard him quietly, her great dark eyes opening wider and wider, her\nbosom swelling, her stature seeming to grow taller every moment, as she\nclenched her weapons firmly in both her hands. Beautiful as she always\nwas, she had never looked so beautiful before; and as Amyas spoke of\nparting with her, it was like throwing away a lovely toy; but it must be\ndone, for her sake, for his, perhaps for that of all the crew.\n\nThe last words had hardly passed his lips, when, with a shriek of\nmingled scorn, rage, and fear, she dashed through the astonished group.\n\n\"Stop her!\" were Amyas's first words; but his next were, \"Let her\ngo!\" for, springing like a deer through the little garden and over the\nflower-fence, she turned, menacing with her blow-gun the sailors, who\nhad already started in her pursuit.\n\n\"Let her alone, for Heaven's sake!\" shouted Amyas, who, he scarce knew\nwhy, shrank from the thought of seeing those graceful limbs struggling\nin the seamen's grasp.\n\nShe turned again, and in another minute her gaudy plumes had vanished\namong the dark forest stems, as swiftly as if she had been a passing\nbird.\n\nAll stood thunderstruck at this unexpected end to the conference. At\nlast Aymas spoke:\n\n\"There's no use in standing here idle, gentlemen. Staring after her\nwon't bring her back. After all, I'm glad she's gone.\"\n\nBut the tone of his voice belied his words. Now he had lost her, he\nwanted her back; and perhaps every one present, except he, guessed why.\n\nBut Ayacanora did not return; and ten days more went on in continual\ntoil at the canoes without any news of her from the hunters. Amyas, by\nthe by, had strictly bidden these last not to follow the girl, not even\nto speak to her, if they came across her in their wanderings. He was\nshrewd enough to guess that the only way to cure her sulkiness was to\noutsulk her; but there was no sign of her presence in any direction; and\nthe canoes being finished at last, the gold, and such provisions as they\ncould collect, were placed on board, and one evening the party prepared\nfor their fresh voyage. They determined to travel as much as possible by\nnight, for fear of discovery, especially in the neighborhood of the few\nSpanish settlements which were then scattered along the banks of the\nmain stream. These, however, the negroes knew, so that there was no fear\nof coming on them unawares; and as for falling asleep in their night\njourneys, \"Nobody,\" the negroes said, \"ever slept on the Magdalena; the\nmosquitoes took too good care of that.\" Which fact Amyas and his crew\nverified afterwards as thoroughly as wretched men could do.\n\nThe sun had sunk; the night had all but fallen; the men were all on\nboard; Amyas in command of one canoe, Cary of the other. The Indians\nwere grouped on the bank, watching the party with their listless\nstare, and with them the young guide, who preferred remaining among the\nIndians, and was made supremely happy by the present of Spanish sword\nand an English axe; while, in the midst, the old hermit, with tears in\nhis eyes, prayed God's blessing on them.\n\n\"I owe to you, noble cavaliers, new peace, new labor, I may say, new\nlife. May God be with you, and teach you to use your gold and your\nswords better than I used mine.\"\n\nThe adventurers waved their hands to him.\n\n\"Give way, men,\" cried Amyas; and as he spoke the paddles dashed into\nthe water, to a right English hurrah! which sent the birds fluttering\nfrom their roosts, and was answered by the yell of a hundred monkeys,\nand the distant roar of the jaguar.\n\nAbout twenty yards below, a wooded rock, some ten feet high, hung over\nthe stream. The river was not there more than fifteen yards broad; deep\nnear the rock, shallow on the farther side; and Amyas's canoe led the\nway, within ten feet of the stone.\n\nAs he passed, a dark figure leapt from the bushes on the edge, and\nplunged heavily into the water close to the boat. All started. A jaguar?\nNo; he would not have missed so short a spring. What, then? A human\nbeing?\n\nA head rose panting to the surface, and with a few strong strokes the\nswimmer had clutched the gunwale. It was Ayacanora!\n\n\"Go back!\" shouted Amyas. \"Go back, girl!\"\n\nShe uttered the same wild cry with which she had fled into the forest.\n\n\"I will die, then!\" and she threw up her arms. Another moment, and she\nhad sunk.\n\nTo see her perish before his eyes! who could bear that? Her hands\nalone were above the surface. Amyas caught convulsively at her in the\ndarkness, and seized her wrist.\n\nA yell rose from the negroes: a roar from the crew as from a cage of\nlions. There was a rush and a swirl along the surface of the stream; and\n\"Caiman! caiman!\" shouted twenty voices.\n\nNow, or never, for the strong arm! \"To larboard, men, or over we go!\"\ncried Amyas, and with one huge heave he lifted the slender body upon\nthe gunwale. Her lower limbs were still in the water, when, within arm's\nlength, rose above the stream a huge muzzle. The lower jaw lay flat, the\nupper reached as high as Amyas's head. He could see the long fangs\ngleam white in the moonshine; he could see for one moment full down the\nmonstrous depths of that great gape, which would have crushed a buffalo.\nThree inches, and no more, from that soft side, the snout surged up--\n\nThere was the gleam of an axe from above, a sharp ringing blow, and the\njaws came together with a clash which rang from bank to bank. He had\nmissed her! Swerving beneath the blow, his snout had passed beneath\nher body, and smashed up against the side of the canoe, as the striker,\noverbalanced, fell headlong overboard upon the monster's back.\n\n\"Who is it?\"\n\n\"Yeo!\" shouted a dozen.\n\nMan and beast went down together, and where they sank, the moonlight\nshone on a great swirling eddy, while all held their breaths, and\nAyacanora cowered down into the bottom of the canoe, her proud spirit\nutterly broken, for the first time, by the terror of that great need,\nand by a bitter loss. For in the struggle, the holy trumpet, companion\nof all her wanderings, had fallen from her bosom; and her fond hope of\nbringing magic prosperity to her English friends had sunk with it to the\nbottom of the stream.\n\nNone heeded her; not even Amyas, round whose knees she clung, fawning\nlike a spaniel dog: for where was Yeo?\n\nAnother swirl; a shout from the canoe abreast of them, and Yeo rose,\nhaving dived clean under his own boat, and risen between the two.\n\n\"Safe as yet, lads! Heave me a line, or he'll have me after all.\"\n\nBut ere the brute reappeared, the old man was safe on board.\n\n\"The Lord has stood by me,\" panted he, as he shot the water from\nhis ears. \"We went down together: I knew the Indian trick, and being\nuppermost, had my thumbs in his eyes before he could turn: but he\ncarried me down to the very mud. My breath was nigh gone, so I left go,\nand struck up: but my toes tingled as I rose again, I'll warrant. There\nthe beggar is, looking for me, I declare!\"\n\nAnd, true enough, there was the huge brute swimming slowly round and\nround, in search of his lost victim. It was too dark to put an arrow\ninto his eye; so they paddled on, while Ayacanora crouched silently at\nAmyas's feet.\n\n\"Yeo!\" asked he, in a low voice, \"what shall we do with her?\"\n\n\"Why ask me, sir?\" said the old man, as he had a very good right to ask.\n\n\"Because, when one don't know oneself, one had best inquire of one's\nelders. Besides, you saved her life at the risk of your own, and have a\nright to a voice in the matter, if any one has, old friend.\"\n\n\"Then, my dear young captain, if the Lord puts a precious soul under\nyour care, don't you refuse to bear the burden He lays on you.\"\n\nAmyas was silent awhile; while Ayacanora, who was evidently utterly\nexhausted by the night's adventure, and probably by long wanderings,\nwatchings, and weepings which had gone before it, sank with her head\nagainst his knee, fell fast asleep, and breathed as gently as a child.\n\nAt last he rose in the canoe, and called Cary alongside.\n\n\"Listen to me, gentlemen, and sailors all. You know that we have a\nmaiden on board here, by no choice of our own. Whether she will be a\nblessing to us, God alone can tell: but she may turn to the greatest\ncurse which has befallen us ever since we came out over Bar three years\nago. Promise me one thing, or I put her ashore the next beach, and that\nis, that you will treat her as if she were your own sister; and make an\nagreement here and now, that if the maid comes to harm among us, the man\nthat is guilty shall hang for it by the neck till he's dead, even though\nhe be I, Captain Leigh, who speak to you. I'll hang you, as I am a\nChristian; and I give you free leave to hang me.\"\n\n\"A very fair bargain,\" quoth Cary, \"and I for one will see it kept to.\nLads, we'll twine a double strong halter for the captain as we go down\nalong.\"\n\n\"I am not jesting, Will.\"\n\n\"I know it, good old lad,\" said Cary, stretching out his own hand to him\nacross the water through the darkness, and giving him a hearty shake. \"I\nknow it; and listen, men! So help me God! but I'll be the first to back\nthe Captain in being as good as his word, as I trust he never will need\nto be.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said Brimblecombe. \"Amen!\" said Yeo; and many an honest voice\njoined in that honest compact, and kept it too, like men.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nHOW THEY TOOK THE GREAT GALLEON\n\n     \"When captains courageous, whom death could not daunt,\n     Did march to the siege of the city of Gaunt,\n     They muster'd their soldiers by two and by three,\n     But the foremost in battle was Mary Ambree.\n     When brave Sir John Major was slain in her sight,\n     Who was her true lover, her joy and delight,\n     Because he was murther'd most treacherouslie,\n     Then vow'd to avenge him fair Mary Ambree.\"\n\n                                 Old Ballad, A. D. 1584.\n\nOne more glance at the golden tropic sea, and the golden tropic\nevenings, by the shore of New Granada, in the golden Spanish Main.\n\nThe bay of Santa Marta is rippling before the land-breeze one sheet of\nliving flame. The mighty forests are sparkling with myriad fireflies.\nThe lazy mist which lounges round the inner hills shines golden in\nthe sunset rays; and, nineteen thousand feet aloft, the mighty peak of\nHorqueta cleaves the abyss of air, rose-red against the dark-blue\nvault of heaven. The rosy cone fades to a dull leaden hue; but only for\nawhile. The stars flash out one by one, and Venus, like another moon,\ntinges the eastern snows with gold, and sheds across the bay a long\nyellow line of rippling light. Everywhere is glory and richness. What\nwonder if the earth in that enchanted land be as rich to her inmost\ndepths as she is upon the surface? The heaven, the hills, the sea, are\none sparkling garland of jewels--what wonder if the soil be jewelled\nalso? if every watercourse and bank of earth be spangled with emeralds\nand rubies, with grains of gold and feathered wreaths of native silver?\n\nSo thought, in a poetic mood, the Bishop of Cartagena, as he sat in\nthe state cabin of that great galleon, The City of the True Cross, and\nlooked pensively out of the window towards the shore. The good man was\nin a state of holy calm. His stout figure rested on one easy-chair, his\nstout ankles on another, beside a table spread with oranges and limes,\nguavas and pine-apples, and all the fruits of Ind.\n\nAn Indian girl, bedizened with scarfs and gold chains, kept off the\nflies with a fan of feathers; and by him, in a pail of ice from the\nHorqueta (the gift of some pious Spanish lady, who had \"spent\" an Indian\nor two in bringing down the precious offering), stood more than one\nflask of virtuous wine of Alicant. But he was not so selfish, good man,\nas to enjoy either ice or wine alone; Don Pedro, colonel of the soldiers\non board, Don Alverez, intendant of his Catholic majesty's customs at\nSanta Marta, and Don Paul, captain of mariners in The City of the\nTrue Cross, had, by his especial request, come to his assistance that\nevening, and with two friars, who sat at the lower end of the table,\nwere doing their best to prevent the good man from taking too bitterly\nto heart the present unsatisfactory state of his cathedral town, which\nhad just been sacked and burnt by an old friend of ours, Sir Francis\nDrake.\n\n\"We have been great sufferers, senors,--ah, great sufferers,\" snuffled\nthe bishop, quoting Scripture, after the fashion of the day, glibly\nenough, but often much too irreverently for me to repeat, so boldly were\nhis texts travestied, and so freely interlarded by grumblings at Tita\nand the mosquitoes. \"Great sufferers, truly; but there shall be a\nremnant,--ah, a remnant like the shaking of the olive tree and the\ngleaning grapes when the vintage is done.--Ah! Gold? Yes, I trust\nOur Lady's mercies are not shut up, nor her arms shortened.--Look,\nsenors!\"--and he pointed majestically out of the window. \"It looks gold!\nit smells of gold, as I may say, by a poetical license. Yea, the very\nwaves, as they ripple past us, sing of gold, gold, gold!\"\n\n\"It is a great privilege,\" said the intendant, \"to have comfort so\ngracefully administered at once by a churchman and a scholar.\"\n\n\"A poet, too,\" said Don Pedro. \"You have no notion what sweet sonnets--\"\n\n\"Hush, Don Pedro--hush! If I, a mateless bird, have spent an idle hour\nin teaching lovers how to sing, why, what of that? I am a churchman,\nsenors; but I am a man and I can feel, senors; I can sympathize; I can\npalliate; I can excuse. Who knows better than I how much human nature\nlurks in us fallen sons of Adam? Tita!\"\n\n\"Um?\" said the trembling girl, with a true Indian grunt.\n\n\"Fill his excellency the intendant's glass. Does much more treasure come\ndown, illustrious senor? May the poor of Mary hope for a few more crumbs\nfrom their Mistress's table?\"\n\n\"Not a pezo, I fear. The big white cow up there\"--and he pointed to the\nHorqueta--\"has been milked dry for this year.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" And he looked up at the magnificent snow peak. \"Only good to cool\nwine with, eh? and as safe for the time being as Solomon's birds.\"\n\n\"Solomon's birds? Explain your recondite allusion, my lord.\"\n\n\"Enlighten us, your excellency, enlighten us.\"\n\n\"Ah! thereby hangs a tale. You know the holy birds who run up and down\non the Prado at Seville among the ladies' pretty feet,--eh? with hooked\nnoses and cinnamon crests? Of course. Hoopoes--Upupa, as the classics\nhave it. Well, senors, once on a time, the story goes, these hoopoes\nall had golden crowns on their heads; and, senors, they took the\nconsequences--eh? But it befell on a day that all the birds and beasts\ncame to do homage at the court of his most Catholic majesty King\nSolomon, and among them came these same hoopoes; and they had a little\nrequest to make, the poor rogues. And what do you think it was? Why,\nthat King Solomon would pray for them that they might wear any sort of\ncrowns but these same golden ones; for--listen, Tita, and see the snare\nof riches--mankind so hunted, and shot, and trapped, and snared them,\nfor the sake of these same golden crowns, that life was a burden to\nbear. So Solomon prayed, and instead of golden crowns, they all received\ncrowns of feathers; and ever since, senors, they live as merrily as\ncrickets in an oven, and also have the honor of bearing the name of his\nmost Catholic majesty King Solomon. Tita! fill the senor commandant's\nglass. Fray Gerundio, what are you whispering about down there, sir?\"\n\nFray Gerundio had merely commented to his brother on the bishop's story\nof Solomon's birds with an--\n\n\"O si sic omnia!--would that all gold would turn to feathers in like\nwise!\"\n\n\"Then, friend,\" replied the other, a Dominican, like Gerundio, but of a\ndarker and sterner complexion, \"corrupt human nature would within a week\ndiscover some fresh bauble, for which to kill and be killed in vain.\"\n\n\"What is that, Fray Gerundio?\" asked the bishop again.\n\n\"I merely remarked, that it were well for the world if all mankind were\nto put up the same prayer as the hoopoes.\"\n\n\"World, sir? What do you know about the world? Convert your Indians,\nsir, if you please, and leave affairs of state to your superiors. You\nwill excuse him, senors\" (turning to the Dons, and speaking in a lower\ntone). \"A very worthy and pious man, but a poor peasant's son; and\nbeside--you understand. A little wrong here; too much fasting and\nwatching, I fear, good man.\" And the bishop touched his forehead\nknowingly, to signify that Fray Gerundio's wits were in an\nunsatisfactory state.\n\nThe Fray heard and saw with a quiet smile. He was one of those excellent\nmen whom the cruelties of his countrymen had stirred up (as the\ndarkness, by mere contrast, makes the light more bright), as they did\nLas Casas, Gasca, and many another noble name which is written in the\nbook of life, to deeds of love and pious daring worthy of any creed or\nage. True Protestants, they protested, even before kings, against the\nevil which lay nearest them, the sin which really beset them; true\nliberals, they did not disdain to call the dark-skinned heathen their\nbrothers; and asserted in terms which astonish us, when we recollect the\nage in which they were spoken, the inherent freedom of every being who\nwore the flesh and blood which their Lord wore; true martyrs, they\nbore witness of Christ, and received too often the rewards of such,\nin slander and contempt. Such an one was Fray Gerundio; a poor, mean,\nclumsy-tongued peasant's son, who never could put three sentences\ntogether, save when he waxed eloquent, crucifix in hand, amid some\ngroup of Indians or negroes. He was accustomed to such rebuffs as the\nbishop's; he took them for what they were worth, and sipped his wine in\nsilence; while the talk went on.\n\n\"They say,\" observed the commandant, \"that a very small Plate-fleet will\ngo to Spain this year.\"\n\n\"What else?\" says the intendant. \"What have we to send, in the name of\nall saints, since these accursed English Lutherans have swept us out\nclean?\"\n\n\"And if we had anything to send,\" says the sea-captain, \"what have we to\nsend it in? That fiend incarnate, Drake--\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said his holiness; \"spare my ears! Don Pedro, you will oblige my\nweakness by not mentioning that man;--his name is Tartarean, unfit\nfor polite lips. Draco--a dragon--serpent--the emblem of Diabolus\nhimself--ah! And the guardian of the golden apples of the West, who\nwould fain devour our new Hercules, his most Catholic majesty. Deceived\nEve, too, with one of those same apples--a very evil name, senors--a\nTartarean name,--Tita!\"\n\n\"Um!\"\n\n\"Fill my glass.\"\n\n\"Nay,\" cried the colonel, with a great oath, \"this English fellow is of\nanother breed of serpent from that, I warrant.\"\n\n\"Your reason, senor; your reason?\"\n\n\"Because this one would have seen Eve at the bottom of the sea, before\nhe let her, or any one but himself, taste aught which looked like gold.\"\n\n\"Ah, ah!--very good! But--we laugh, valiant senors, while the Church\nweeps. Alas for my sheep!\"\n\n\"And alas for their sheepfold! It will be four years before we can get\nCartagena rebuilt again. And as for the blockhouse, when we shall get\nthat rebuilt, Heaven only knows, while his majesty goes on draining the\nIndies for his English Armada. The town is as naked now as an Indian's\nback.\"\n\n\"Baptista Antonio, the surveyor, has sent home by me a relation to the\nking, setting forth our defenceless state. But to read a relation and\nto act on it are two cocks of very different hackles, bishop, as all\nstatesmen know. Heaven grant we may have orders by the next fleet to\nfortify, or we shall be at the mercy of every English pirate!\"\n\n\"Ah, that blockhouse!\" sighed the bishop. \"That was indeed a villainous\ntrick. A hundred and ten thousand ducats for the ransom of the town!\nAfter having burned and plundered the one-half--and having made me\ndine with them too, ah! and sit between the--the serpent, and his\nlieutenant-general--and drunk my health in my own private wine--wine\nthat I had from Xeres nine years ago, senors and offered, the shameless\nheretics, to take me to England, if I would turn Lutheran, and find me a\nwife, and make an honest man of me--ah! and then to demand fresh ransom\nfor the priory and the fort--perfidious!\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the colonel, \"they had the law of us, the cunning rascals,\nfor we forgot to mention anything but the town, in the agreement. Who\nwould have dreamed of such a fetch as that?\"\n\n\"So I told my good friend the prior, when he came to me to borrow the\nthousand crowns. It was Heaven's will. Unexpected like the thunderbolt,\nand to be borne as such. Every man must bear his own burden. How could I\nlend him aught?\"\n\n\"Your holiness's money had been all carried off by them before,\" said\nthe intendant, who knew, and none better, the exact contrary.\n\n\"Just so--all my scanty savings! desolate in my lone old age. Ah,\nsenors, had we not had warning of the coming of these wretches from\nmy dear friend the Marquess of Santa Cruz, whom I remember daily in my\nprayers, we had been like to them who go down quick into the pit. I too\nmight have saved a trifle, had I been minded: but in thinking too much\nof others, I forgot myself, alas!\"\n\n\"Warning or none, we had no right to be beaten by such a handful,\" said\nthe sea-captain; \"and a shame it is, and a shame it will be, for many a\nday to come.\"\n\n\"Do you mean to cast any slur, sir, upon the courage and conduct of his\nCatholic majesty's soldiers?\" asked the colonel.\n\n\"I?--No; but we were foully beaten, and that behind our barricades too,\nand there's the plain truth.\"\n\n\"Beaten, sir! Do you apply such a term to the fortunes of war? What more\ncould our governor have done? Had we not the ways filled with poisoned\ncaltrops, guarded by Indian archers, barred with butts full of earth,\nraked with culverins and arquebuses? What familiar spirit had we, sir,\nto tell us that these villains would come along the sea-beach, and not\nby the high-road, like Christian men?\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said the bishop, \"it was by intuition diabolic, I doubt not, that\nthey took that way. Satanas must need help those who serve him; and for\nmy part, I can only attribute (I would the captain here had piety enough\nto do so) the misfortune which occurred to art-magic. I believe these\nmen to have been possessed by all fiends whatsoever.\"\n\n\"Well, your holiness,\" said the colonel, \"there may have been devilry\nin it; how else would men have dared to run right into the mouths of our\ncannon, fire their shot against our very noses, and tumble harmless over\nthose huge butts of earth?\"\n\n\"Doubtless by force of the fiends which raged with them,\" interposed the\nbishop.\n\n\"And then, with their blasphemous cries, leap upon us with sword and\npike? I myself saw that Lieutenant-General Carlisle hew down with one\nstroke that noble young gentleman the ensign-bearer, your excellency's\nsister's son's nephew, though he was armed cap-a-pie. Was not art-magic\nhere? And that most furious and blaspheming Lutheran Captain Young, I\nsaw how he caught our general by the head, after the illustrious Don\nAlonzo had given him a grievous wound, threw him to the earth, and so\ntook him. Was not art-magic here?\"\n\n\"Well, I say,\" said the captain, \"if you are looking for art-magic, what\nsay you to their marching through the flank fire of our galleys, with\neleven pieces of ordnance, and two hundred shot playing on them, as if\nit had been a mosquito swarm? Some said my men fired too high: but that\nwas the English rascals' doing, for they got down on the tide beach.\nBut, senor commandant, though Satan may have taught them that trick, was\nit he that taught them to carry pikes a foot longer than yours?\"\n\n\"Ah, well,\" said the bishop, \"sacked are we; and San Domingo, as I hear,\nin worse case than we are; and St. Augustine in Florida likewise; and\nall that is left for a poor priest like me is to return to Spain, and\nsee whether the pious clemency of his majesty, and of the universal\nFather, may not be willing to grant some small relief or bounty to the\npoor of Mary--perhaps--(for who knows?) to translate to a sphere of\nmore peaceful labor one who is now old, senors, and weary with many\ntoils--Tita! fill our glasses. I have saved somewhat--as you may have\ndone, senors, from the general wreck; and for the flock, when I am no\nmore, illustrious senors, Heaven's mercies are infinite; new cities will\nrise from the ashes of the old, new mines pour forth their treasures\ninto the sanctified laps of the faithful, and new Indians flock toward\nthe life-giving standard of the Cross, to put on the easy yoke and light\nburden of the Church, and--\"\n\n\"And where shall I be then? Ah, where? Fain would I rest, and fain\ndepart. Tita! sling my hammock. Senors, you will excuse age and\ninfirmities. Fray Gerundio, go to bed!\"\n\nAnd the Dons rose to depart, while the bishop went on maundering,--\n\n\"Farewell! Life is short. Ah! we shall meet in heaven at last. And there\nare really no more pearls?\"\n\n\"Not a frail; nor gold either,\" said the intendant.\n\n\"Ah, well! Better a dinner of herbs where love is, than--Tita!\"\n\n\"My breviary--ah! Man's gratitude is short-lived, I had hoped--You have\nseen nothing of the Senora Bovadilla?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Ah! she promised:--but no matter--a little trifle as a keepsake--a gold\ncross, or an emerald ring, or what not--I forget. And what have I to do\nwith worldly wealth!--Ah! Tita! bring me the casket.\"\n\nAnd when his guests were gone, the old man began mumbling prayers out of\nhis breviary, and fingering over jewels and gold, with the dull greedy\neyes of covetous old age.\n\n\"Ah!--it may buy the red hat yet!--Omnia Romae venalia! Put it by, Tita,\nand do not look at it too much, child. Enter not into temptation. The\nlove of money is the root of all evil; and Heaven, in love for the\nIndian, has made him poor in this world, that he may be rich in faith.\nAh!--Ugh!--So!\"\n\nAnd the old miser clambered into his hammock. Tita drew the mosquito\nnet over him, wrapt another round her own head, and slept, or seemed to\nsleep; for she coiled herself up upon the floor, and master and slave\nsoon snored a merry bass to the treble of the mosquitoes.\n\nIt was long past midnight, and the moon was down. The sentinels, who had\ntramped and challenged overhead till they thought their officers were\nsound asleep, had slipped out of the unwholesome rays of the planet to\nseek that health and peace which they considered their right, and slept\nas soundly as the bishop's self.\n\nTwo long lines glided out from behind the isolated rocks of the Morro\nGrande, which bounded the bay some five hundred yards astern of the\ngalleon. They were almost invisible on the glittering surface of the\nwater, being perfectly white; and, had a sentinel been looking out, he\ncould only have descried them by the phosphorescent flashes along their\nsides.\n\nNow the bishop had awoke, and turned himself over uneasily; for the wine\nwas dying out within him, and his shoulders had slipped down, and his\nheels up, and his head ached! so he sat upright in his hammock, looked\nout upon the bay, and called Tita.\n\n\"Put another pillow under my head, child! What is that? a fish?\"\n\nTita looked. She did not think it was a fish: but she did not choose to\nsay so; for it might have produced an argument, and she had her reasons\nfor not keeping his holiness awake.\n\nThe bishop looked again; settled that it must be a white whale, or\nshark, or other monster of the deep; crossed himself, prayed for a safe\nvoyage, and snored once more.\n\nPresently the cabin-door opened gently, and the head of the senor\nintendant appeared.\n\nTita sat up; and then began crawling like a snake along the floor, among\nthe chairs and tables, by the light of the cabin lamp.\n\n\"Is he asleep?\"\n\n\"Yes: but the casket is under his head.\"\n\n\"Curse him! How shall we take it?\"\n\n\"I brought him a fresh pillow half-an-hour ago; I hung his hammock wrong\non purpose that he might want one. I thought to slip the box away as I\ndid it; but the old ox nursed it in both hands all the while.\"\n\n\"What shall we do, in the name of all the fiends? She sails to-morrow\nmorning, and then all is lost.\"\n\nTita showed her white teeth, and touched the dagger which hung by the\nintendant's side.\n\n\"I dare not!\" said the rascal, with a shudder.\n\n\"I dare!\" said she. \"He whipt my mother, because she would not give me\nup to him to be taught in his schools, when she went to the mines. And\nshe went to the mines, and died there in three months. I saw her go,\nwith a chain round her neck; but she never came back again. Yes; I dare\nkill him! I will kill him! I will!\"\n\nThe senor felt his mind much relieved. He had no wish, of course, to\ncommit the murder himself; for he was a good Catholic, and feared the\ndevil. But Tita was an Indian, and her being lost did not matter so\nmuch. Indians' souls were cheap, like their bodies. So he answered, \"But\nwe shall be discovered!\"\n\n\"I will leap out of the window with the casket, and swim ashore. They\nwill never suspect you, and they will fancy I am drowned.\"\n\n\"The sharks may seize you, Tita. You had better give me the casket.\"\n\nTita smiled. \"You would not like to lose that, eh? though you care\nlittle about losing me. And yet you told me that you loved me!\"\n\n\"And I do love you, Tita! light of my eyes! life of my heart! I swear,\nby all the saints, I love you. I will marry you, I swear I will--I will\nswear on the crucifix, if you like!\"\n\n\"Swear, then, or I do not give you the casket,\" said she, holding out\nthe little crucifix round her neck, and devouring him with the wild eyes\nof passionate unreasoning tropic love.\n\nHe swore, trembling, and deadly pale.\n\n\"Give me your dagger.\"\n\n\"No, not mine. It may be found. I shall be suspected. What if my sheath\nwere seen to be empty?\"\n\n\"Your knife will do. His throat is soft enough.\"\n\nAnd she glided stealthily as a cat toward the hammock, while her\ncowardly companion stood shivering at the other end of the cabin, and\nturned his back to her, that he might not see the deed.\n\nHe stood waiting, one minute--two--five? Was it an hour, rather? A cold\nsweat bathed his limbs; the blood beat so fiercely within his temples,\nthat his head rang again. Was that a death-bell tolling? No; it was the\npulses of his brain. Impossible, surely, a death-bell. Whence could it\ncome?\n\nThere was a struggle--ah! she was about it now; a stifled cry--Ah! he\nhad dreaded that most of all, to hear the old man cry. Would there be\nmuch blood? He hoped not. Another struggle, and Tita's voice, apparently\nmuffled, called for help.\n\n\"I cannot help you. Mother of Mercies! I dare not help you!\" hissed he.\n\"She-devil! you have begun it, and you must finish it yourself!\"\n\nA heavy arm from behind clasped his throat. The bishop had broken loose\nfrom her and seized him! Or was it his ghost? or a fiend come to drag\nhim down to the pit? And forgetting all but mere wild terror, he opened\nhis lips for a scream, which would have wakened every soul on board. But\na handkerchief was thrust into his mouth and in another minute he found\nhimself bound hand and foot, and laid upon the table by a gigantic\nenemy. The cabin was full of armed men, two of whom were lashing up\nthe bishop in his hammock; two more had seized Tita; and more were\nclambering up into the stern-gallery beyond, wild figures, with bright\nblades and armor gleaming in the starlight.\n\n\"Now, Will,\" whispered the giant who had seized him, \"forward and\nclap the fore-hatches on; and shout Fire! with all your might. Girl!\nmurderess! your life is in my hands. Tell me where the commander sleeps,\nand I pardon you.\"\n\nTita looked up at the huge speaker, and obeyed in silence. The intendant\nheard him enter the colonel's cabin, and then a short scuffle, and\nsilence for a moment.\n\nBut only for a moment; for already the alarm had been given, and mad\nconfusion reigned through every deck. Amyas (for it was none other) had\nalready gained the poop; the sentinels were gagged and bound; and every\nhalf-naked wretch who came trembling up on deck in his shirt by the main\nhatchway, calling one, \"Fire!\" another, \"Wreck!\" and another, \"Treason!\"\nwas hurled into the scuppers, and there secured.\n\n\"Lower away that boat!\" shouted Amyas in Spanish to his first batch of\nprisoners.\n\nThe men, unarmed and naked, could but obey.\n\n\"Now then, jump in. Here, hand them to the gangway as they come up.\"\n\nIt was done; and as each appeared he was kicked to the scuppers, and\nbundled down over the side.\n\n\"She's full. Cast loose now and off with you. If you try to board again\nwe'll sink you.\"\n\n\"Fire! fire!\" shouted Cary, forward. \"Up the main hatchway for your\nlives!\"\n\nThe ruse succeeded utterly; and before half-an-hour was over, all the\nship's boats which could be lowered were filled with Spaniards in their\nshirts, getting ashore as best they could.\n\n\"Here is a new sort of camisado,\" quoth Cary. \"The last Spanish one\nI saw was at the sortie from Smerwick: but this is somewhat more\nprosperous than that.\"\n\n\"Get the main and foresail up, Will!\" said Amyas, \"cut the cable; and we\nwill plume the quarry as we fly.\"\n\n\"Spoken like a good falconer. Heaven grant that this big woodcock may\ncarry a good trail inside!\"\n\n\"I'll warrant her for that,\" said Jack Brimblecombe. \"She floats so\nlow.\"\n\n\"Much of your build, too, Jack. By the by, where is the commander?\"\n\nAlas! Don Pedro, forgotten in the bustle, had been lying on the deck\nin his shirt, helplessly bound, exhausting that part of his vocabulary\nwhich related to the unseen world. Which most discourteous act seemed at\nfirst likely to be somewhat heavily avenged on Amyas; for as he spoke, a\ncouple of caliver-shots, fired from under the poop, passed \"ping\" \"ping\"\nby his ears, and Cary clapped his hand to his side.\n\n\"Hurt, Will?\"\n\n\"A pinch, old lad--Look out, or we are 'allen verloren' after all, as\nthe Flemings say.\"\n\nAnd as he spoke, a rush forward on the poop drove two of their best men\ndown the ladder into the waist, where Amyas stood.\n\n\"Killed?\" asked he, as he picked one up, who had fallen head over heels.\n\n\"Sound as a bell, sir: but they Gentiles has got hold of the firearms,\nand set the captain free.\"\n\nAnd rubbing the back of his head for a minute, he jumped up the ladder\nagain, shouting--\n\n\"Have at ye, idolatrous pagans! Have at ye, Satan's spawn!\"\n\nAmyas jumped up after him, shouting to all hands to follow; for there\nwas no time to be lost.\n\nOut of the windows of the poop, which looked on the main-deck, a galling\nfire had been opened, and he could not afford to lose men; for, as far\nas he knew, the Spaniards left on board might still far outnumber the\nEnglish; so up he sprang on the poop, followed by a dozen men, and there\nbegan a very heavy fight between two parties of valiant warriors, who\neasily knew each other apart by the peculiar fashion of their armor. For\nthe Spaniards fought in their shirts, and in no other garments: but the\nEnglish in all other manner of garments, tag, rag, and bobtail; and yet\nhad never a shirt between them.\n\nThe rest of the English made a rush, of course, to get upon the poop,\nseeing that the Spaniards could not shoot them through the deck; but\nthe fire from the windows was so hot, that although they dodged behind\nmasts, spars, and every possible shelter, one or two dropped; and Jack\nBrimblecombe and Yeo took on themselves to call a retreat, and with\nabout a dozen men, got back, and held a council of war.\n\nWhat was to be done? Their arquebuses were of little use; for the\nSpaniards were behind a strong bulkhead. There were cannon: but where\nwas powder or shot? The boats, encouraged by the clamor on deck, were\npaddling alongside again. Yeo rushed round and round, probing every gun\nwith his sword.\n\n\"Here's a patararo loaded! Now for a match, lads.\"\n\nLuckily one of the English had kept his match alight during the scuffle.\n\n\"Thanks be! Help me to unship the gun--the mast's in the way here.\"\n\nThe patararo, or brass swivel, was unshipped.\n\n\"Steady, lads, and keep it level, or you'll shake out the priming. Ship\nit here; turn out that one, and heave it into that boat, if they come\nalongside. Steady now--so! Rummage about, and find me a bolt or two,\na marlin-spike, anything. Quick, or the captain will be over-mastered\nyet.\"\n\nMissiles were found--odds and ends--and crammed into the swivel up to\nthe muzzle: and, in another minute, its \"cargo of notions\" was crashing\ninto the poop-windows, silencing the fire from thence effectually enough\nfor the time.\n\n\"Now, then, a rush forward, and right in along the deck!\" shouted Yeo;\nand the whole party charged through the cabin-doors, which their shot\nhad burst open, and hewed their way from room to room.\n\nIn the meanwhile, the Spaniards above had fought fiercely: but, in\nspite of superior numbers, they had gradually given back before the\n\"demoniacal possession of those blasphemous heretics, who fought,\nnot like men, but like furies from the pit.\" And by the time that\nBrimblecombe and Yeo shouted from the stern-gallery below that the\nquarter-deck was won, few on either side but had their shrewd scratch to\nshow.\n\n\"Yield, senor!\" shouted Amyas to the commander, who had been fighting\nlike a lion, back to back with the captain of mariners.\n\n\"Never! You have bound me, and insulted me! Your blood or mine must wipe\nout the stain!\"\n\nAnd he rushed on Amyas. There was a few moments' heavy fence between\nthem; and then Amyas cut right at his head. But as he raised his arm,\nthe Spaniard's blade slipped along his ribs, and snapped against the\npoint of his shoulder-blade. An inch more to the left, and it would have\nbeen through his heart. The blow fell, nevertheless, and the commandant\nfell with it, stunned by the flat of the sword, but not wounded;\nfor Amyas's hand had turned, as he winced from his wound. But the\nsea-captain, seeing Amyas stagger, sprang at him, and, seizing him by\nthe wrist, ere he could raise his sword again, shortened his weapon to\nrun him through. Amyas made a grasp at his wrist in return, but, between\nhis faintness and the darkness, missed it.--Another moment, and all\nwould have been over!\n\nA bright blade flashed close past Amyas's ear; the sea-captain's grasp\nloosened, and he dropped a corpse; while over him, like an angry lioness\nabove her prey, stood Ayacanora, her long hair floating in the wind, her\ndagger raised aloft, as she looked round, challenging all and every one\nto approach.\n\n\"Are you hurt?\" panted she.\n\n\"A scratch, child.--What do you do here? Go back, go back.\"\n\nAyacanora slipped back like a scolded child, and vanished in the\ndarkness.\n\nThe battle was over. The Spaniards, seeing their commanders fall, laid\ndown their arms, and cried for quarter. It was given; the poor fellows\nwere tied together, two and two, and seated in a row on the deck; the\ncommandant, sorely bruised, yielded himself perforce; and the galleon\nwas taken.\n\nAmyas hurried forward to get the sails set. As he went down the\npoop-ladder, there was some one sitting on the lowest step.\n\n\"Who is here--wounded?\"\n\n\"I am not wounded,\" said a woman's voice, low, and stifled with sobs.\n\nIt was Ayacanora. She rose, and let him pass. He saw that her face was\nbright with tears; but he hurried on, nevertheless.\n\n\"Perhaps I did speak a little hastily to her, considering she saved my\nlife; but what a brimstone it is! Mary Ambree in a dark skin! Now then,\nlads! Get the Santa Fe gold up out of the canoes, and then we will put\nher head to the north-east, and away for Old England. Mr. Brimblecombe!\ndon't say that Eastward-ho don't bring luck this time.\"\n\nIt was impossible, till morning dawned, either to get matters into any\norder, or to overhaul the prize they had taken; and many of the men were\nso much exhausted that they fell fast asleep on the deck ere the surgeon\nhad time to dress their wounds. However, Amyas contrived, when once the\nship was leaping merrily, close-hauled against a fresh land-breeze,\nto count his little flock, and found out of the forty-four but six\nseriously wounded, and none killed. However, their working numbers were\nnow reduced to thirty-eight, beside the four negroes, a scanty crew\nenough to take home such a ship to England.\n\nAfter awhile, up came Jack Brimblecombe on deck, a bottle in his hand.\n\n\"Lads, a prize!\"\n\n\"Well, we know that already.\"\n\n\"Nay, but--look hither, and laid in ice, too, as I live, the luxurious\ndogs! But I had to fight for it, I had. For when I went down into the\nstate cabin, after I had seen to the wounded; whom should I find loose\nbut that Indian lass, who had just unbound the fellow you caught--\"\n\n\"Ah! those two, I believe, were going to murder the old man in the\nhammock, if we had not come in the nick of time. What have you done with\nthem?\"\n\n\"Why, the Spaniard ran when he saw me, and got into a cabin; but the\nwoman, instead of running, came at me with a knife, and chased me round\nthe table like a very cat-a-mountain. So I ducked under the old man's\nhammock, and out into the gallery; and when I thought the coast was\nclear, back again I came, and stumbled over this. So I just picked it\nup, and ran on deck with my tail between my legs, for I expected\nverily to have the black woman's knife between my ribs out of some dark\ncorner.\"\n\n\"Well done, Jack! Let's have the wine, nevertheless, and then down to\nset a guard on the cabin doors for fear of plundering.\"\n\n\"Better go down, and see that nothing is thrown overboard by Spaniards.\nAs for plundering, I will settle that.\"\n\nAnd Amyas walked forward among the men.\n\n\"Muster the men, boatswain, and count them.\"\n\n\"All here, sir, but the six poor fellows who are laid forward.\"\n\n\"Now, my men,\" said Amyas, \"for three years you and I have wandered\non the face of the earth, seeking our fortune, and we have found it at\nlast, thanks be to God! Now, what was our promise and vow which we made\nto God beneath the tree of Guayra, if He should grant us good fortune,\nand bring us home again with a prize? Was it not, that the dead should\nshare with the living; and that every man's portion, if he fell, should\ngo to his widow or his orphans, or if he had none, to his parents?\"\n\n\"It was, sir,\" said Yeo, \"and I trust that the Lord will give these men\ngrace to keep their vow. They have seen enough of His providences by\nthis time to fear Him.\"\n\n\"I doubt them not; but I remind them of it. The Lord has put into our\nhands a rich prize; and what with the gold which we have already, we are\nwell paid for all our labors. Let us thank Him with fervent hearts\nas soon as the sun rises; and in the meanwhile, remember all, that\nwhosoever plunders on his private account, robs not the adventurers\nmerely, but the orphan and the widow, which is to rob God; and makes\nhimself partaker of Achan's curse, who hid the wedge of gold, and\nbrought down God's anger on the whole army of Israel. For me, lest you\nshould think me covetous, I could claim my brother's share; but I hereby\ngive it up freely into the common stock, for the use of the whole ship's\ncrew, who have stood by me through weal and woe, as men never stood\nbefore, as I believe, by any captain. So, now to prayers, lads, and then\nto eat our breakfast.\"\n\nSo, to the Spaniards' surprise (who most of them believed that the\nEnglish were atheists), to prayers they went.\n\nAfter which Brimblecombe contrived to inspire the black cook and the\nPortuguese steward with such energy that, by seven o'clock, the latter\nworthy appeared on deck, and, with profound reverences, announced to\n\"The most excellent and heroical Senor Adelantado Captain Englishman,\"\nthat breakfast was ready in the state-cabin.\n\n\"You will do us the honor of accompanying us as our guest, sir, or our\nhost, if you prefer the title,\" said Amyas to the commandant, who stood\nby.\n\n\"Pardon, senor: but honor forbids me to eat with one who has offered to\nme the indelible insult of bonds.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Amyas, taking off his hat, \"then pray accept on the spot my\nhumble apologies for all which has passed, and my assurances that the\nindignities which you have unfortunately endured, were owing altogether\nto the necessities of war, and not to any wish to hurt the feelings of\nso valiant a soldier and gentleman.\"\n\n\"It is enough, senor,\" said the commandant, bowing and shrugging his\nshoulders--for, indeed, he too was very hungry; while Cary whispered to\nAmyas--\n\n\"You will make a courtier, yet, old lad.\"\n\n\"I am not in jesting humor, Will: my mind sadly misgives me that we\nshall hear black news, and have, perhaps, to do a black deed yet, on\nboard here. Senor, I follow you.\"\n\nSo they went down, and found the bishop, who was by this time unbound,\nseated in a corner of the cabin, his hands fallen on his knees, his eyes\nstaring on vacancy, while the two priests stood as close against the\nwall as they could squeeze themselves, keeping up a ceaseless mutter of\nprayers.\n\n\"Your holiness will breakfast with us, of course; and these two frocked\ngentlemen likewise. I see no reason for refusing them all hospitality,\nas yet.\"\n\nThere was a marked emphasis on the last two words, which made both monks\nwince.\n\n\"Our chaplain will attend to you, gentlemen. His lordship the bishop\nwill do me the honor of sitting next to me.\"\n\nThe bishop seemed to revive slowly as he snuffed the savory steam;\nand at last, rising mechanically, subsided into the chair which Amyas\noffered him on his left, while the commandant sat on his right.\n\n\"A little of this kid, my lord? No--ah--Friday, I recollect. Some of\nthat turtle-fin, then. Will, serve his lordship; pass the cassava-bread\nup, Jack! Senor commandant! a glass of wine? You need it after your\nvaliant toils. To the health of all brave soldiers--and a toast from\nyour own Spanish proverb, 'To-day to me, tomorrow to thee!'\"\n\n\"I drink it, brave senor. Your courtesy shows you the worthy countryman\nof General Drake, and his brave lieutenant.\"\n\n\"Drake! Did you know him, senor?\" asked all the Englishmen at once.\n\n\"Too well, too well--\" and he would have continued; but the bishop burst\nout--\n\n\"Ah, senor commandant! that name again! Have you no mercy? To sit\nbetween another pair of--, and my own wine, too! Ugh, ugh!\"\n\nThe old gentleman, whose mouth had been full of turtle the whole time,\nburst into a violent fit of coughing, and was only saved from apoplexy\nby Cary's patting him on the back.\n\n\"Ugh, ugh! The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel, and their\nprecious balms. Ah, senor lieutenant Englishman! May I ask you to pass\nthose limes?--Ah! what is turtle without lime?--Even as a fat old man\nwithout money! Nudus intravi, nudus exeo--ah!\"\n\n\"But what of Drake?\"\n\n\"Do you not know, sir, that he and his fleet, only last year, swept the\nwhole of this coast, and took, with shame I confess it, Cartagena, San\nDomingo, St. Augustine, and--I see you are too courteous, senors, to\nexpress before me what you have a right to feel. But whence come you,\nsir? From the skies, or the depth of the sea?\"\n\n\"Art-magic, art-magic!\" moaned the bishop.\n\n\"Your holiness! It is scarcely prudent to speak thus here,\" said the\ncommandant, who was nevertheless much of the same opinion.\n\n\"Why, you said so yourself, last night, senor, about the taking of\nCartagena.\"\n\nThe commandant blushed, and stammered out somewhat--\"That it was\nexcusable in him, if he had said, in jest, that so prodigious and\ncurious a valor had not sprung from mortal source.\"\n\n\"No more it did, senor,\" said Jack Brimblecombe, stoutly: \"but from Him\nwho taught our 'hands to war, and our fingers to fight.'\"\n\nThe commandant bowed stiffly. \"You will excuse me, sir preacher: but I\nam a Catholic, and hold the cause of my king to be alone the cause of\nHeaven. But, senor captain, how came you thither, if I may ask? That you\nneeded no art-magic after you came on board, I, alas! can testify but\ntoo well: but what spirit--whether good or evil, I ask not--brought you\non board, and whence? Where is your ship? I thought that all Drake's\nsquadron had left six months ago.\"\n\n\"Our ship, senor, has lain this three years rotting on the coast near\nCape Codera.\"\n\n\"Ah! we heard of that bold adventure--but we thought you all lost in the\ninterior.\"\n\n\"You did? Can you tell me, then, where the senor governor of La Guayra\nmay be now?\"\n\n\"The Senor Don Guzman de Soto,\" said the commandant, in a somewhat\nconstrained tone, \"is said to be at present in Spain, having thrown up\nhis office in consequence of domestic matters, of which I have not the\nhonor of knowing anything.\"\n\nAmyas longed to ask more: but he knew that the well-bred Spaniard would\ntell him nothing which concerned another man's wife; and went on.\n\n\"What befell us after, I tell you frankly.\"\n\nAnd Amyas told his story, from the landing at Guayra to the passage down\nthe Magdalena. The commandant lifted up his hands.\n\n\"Were it not forbidden to me, as a Catholic, most invincible senor, I\nshould say that the Divine protection has indeed--\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said one of the friars, \"that you could be brought, senors, to\nrender thanks for your miraculous preservation to her to whom alone it\nis due, Mary, the fount of mercies!\"\n\n\"We have done well enough without her as yet,\" said Amyas, bluntly.\n\n\"The Lord raised up Nebuchadnezzar of old to punish the sins of the\nJewish Church; and He has raised up these men to punish ours!\" said Fray\nGerundio.\n\n\"But Nebuchadnezzar fell, and so may they,\" growled the other to\nhimself. Jack overheard him.\n\n\"I say, my lord bishop,\" called he from the other end of the table. \"It\nis our English custom to let our guests be as rude as they like; but\nperhaps your lordship will hint to these two friars, that if they wish\nto keep whole skins, they will keep civil tongues.\"\n\n\"Be silent, asses! mules!\" shouted the bishop, whose spirits were\nimproving over the wine, \"who are you, that you cannot eat dirt as well\nas your betters?\"\n\n\"Well spoken, my lord. Here's the health of our saintly and venerable\nguest,\" said Cary: while the commandant whispered to Amyas, \"Fat old\ntyrant! I hope you have found his money--for I am sure he has some on\nboard, and I should be loath that you lost the advantage of it.\"\n\n\"I shall have to say a few words to you about that money this morning,\ncommandant: by the by, they had better be said now. My lord bishop, do\nyou know that had we not taken this ship when we did, you had lost not\nmerely money, as you have now, but life itself?\"\n\n\"Money? I had none to lose! Life?--what do you mean?\" asked the bishop,\nturning very pale.\n\n\"This, sir. That it ill befits one to lie, whose throat has been saved\nfrom the assassin's knife but four hours since. When we entered the\nstern-gallery, we found two persons, now on board this ship, in the very\nact, sir, and article, of cutting your sinful throat, that they might\nrob you of the casket which lay beneath your pillow. A moment more, and\nyou were dead. We seized and bound them, and so saved your life. Is that\nplain, sir?\"\n\nThe bishop looked steadfastly and stupidly into Amyas's face, heaved a\ndeep sigh, and gradually sank back in his chair, dropping the glass from\nhis hand.\n\n\"He is in a fit! Call in the surgeon! Run!\" and up jumped kind-hearted\nJack, and brought in the surgeon of the galleon.\n\n\"Is this possible, senor?\" asked the commandant.\n\n\"It is true. Door, there! Evans! go and bring in that rascal whom we\nleft bound in his cabin!\"\n\nEvans went, and the commandant continued--\n\n\"But the stern-gallery? How, in the name of all witches and miracles,\ncame your valor thither?\"\n\n\"Simply enough, and owing neither to witch nor miracle. The night before\nlast we passed the mouth of the bay in our two canoes, which we had\nlashed together after the fashion I had seen in the Moluccas, to keep\nthem afloat in the surf. We had scraped the canoes bright the day\nbefore, and rubbed them with white clay, that they might be invisible at\nnight; and so we got safely to the Morro Grande, passing within half a\nmile of your ship.\"\n\n\"Oh! my scoundrels of sentinels!\"\n\n\"We landed at the back of the Morro, and lay there all day, being\npurposed to do that which, with your pardon, we have done. We took our\nsails of Indian cloth, whitened them likewise with clay which we had\nbrought with us from the river (expecting to find a Spanish ship as we\nwent along the coast, and determined to attempt her, or die with honor),\nand laid them over us on the canoes, paddling from underneath them. So\nthat, had your sentinels been awake, they would have hardly made us\nout, till we were close on board. We had provided ourselves, instead\nof ladders, with bamboos rigged with cross-pieces, and a hook of strong\nwood at the top of each; they hang at your stern-gallery now. And the\nrest of the tale I need not tell you.\"\n\nThe commandant rose in his courtly Spanish way,--\n\n\"Your admirable story, senor, proves to me how truly your nation, while\nit has yet, and I trust will ever have, to dispute the palm of valor\nwith our own, is famed throughout the world for ingenuity, and for\ndaring beyond that of mortal man. You have succeeded, valiant captain,\nbecause you have deserved to succeed; and it is no shame to me to\nsuccumb to enemies who have united the cunning of the serpent with the\nvalor of the lion. Senor, I feel as proud of becoming your guest as I\nshould have been proud, under a happier star, of becoming your host.\"\n\n\"You are, like your nation, only too generous, senor. But what noise is\nthat outside? Cary, go and see.\"\n\nBut ere Cary could reach the door, it was opened; and Evans presented\nhimself with a terrified face.\n\n\"Here's villainy, sir! The Don's murdered, and cold; the Indian lass\nfled; and as we searched the ship for her, we found an Englishwoman, as\nI'm a sinful man!--and a shocking sight she is to see!\"\n\n\"An Englishwoman?\" cried all three, springing forward.\n\n\"Bring her in!\" said Amyas, turning very pale; and as he spoke, Yeo and\nanother led into the cabin a figure scarcely human.\n\nAn elderly woman, dressed in the yellow \"San Benito\" of the Inquisition,\nwith ragged gray locks hanging about a countenance distorted by\nsuffering and shrunk by famine. Painfully, as one unaccustomed to the\nlight, she peered and blinked round her. Her fallen lip gave her a\nhalf-idiotic expression; and yet there was an uneasy twinkle in the eye,\nas of boundless terror and suspicion. She lifted up her fettered wrist\nto shade her face; and as she did so, disclosed a line of fearful scars\nupon her skinny arm.\n\n\"Look there, sirs!\" said Yeo, pointing to them with a stern smile.\n\"Here's some of these Popish gentry's handiwork. I know well enough how\nthose marks came;\" and he pointed to the similar scars on his own wrist.\n\nThe commandant, as well as the Englishmen, recoiled with horror.\n\n\"Holy Virgin! what wretch is this on board my ship? Bishop, is this the\nprisoner whom you sent on board?\"\n\nThe bishop, who had been slowly recovering his senses, looked at her a\nmoment; and then thrusting his chair back, crossed himself, and almost\nscreamed, \"Malefica! Malefica! Who brought her here? Turn her away,\ngentlemen; turn her eye away; she will bewitch, fascinate\"--and he began\nmuttering prayers.\n\nAmyas seized him by the shoulder, and shook him on to his legs.\n\n\"Swine! who is this? Wake up, coward, and tell me, or I will cut you\npiecemeal!\"\n\nBut ere the bishop could answer, the woman uttered a wild shriek, and\npointing to the taller of the two monks, cowered behind Yeo.\n\n\"He here?\" cried she, in broken Spanish. \"Take me away! I will tell you\nno more. I have told you all, and lies enough beside. Oh! why is he come\nagain? Did they not say that I should have no more torments?\"\n\nThe monk turned pale: but like a wild beast at bay, glared firmly round\non the whole company; and then, fixing his dark eyes full on the woman,\nhe bade her be silent so sternly, that she shrank down like a beaten\nhound.\n\n\"Silence, dog!\" said Will Cary, whose blood was up, and followed his\nwords with a blow on the monk's mouth, which silenced him effectually.\n\n\"Don't be afraid, good woman, but speak English. We are all English\nhere, and Protestants too. Tell us what they have done for you.\"\n\n\"Another trap! another trap!\" cried she, in a strong Devonshire accent.\n\"You be no English! You want to make me lie again, and then torment me.\nOh! wretched, wretched that I am!\" cried she, bursting into tears. \"Whom\nshould I trust? Not myself: no, nor God; for I have denied Him! O Lord!\nO Lord!\"\n\nAmyas stood silent with fear and horror; some instinct told him that he\nwas on the point of hearing news for which he feared to ask. But Jack\nspoke--\n\n\"My dear soul! my dear soul! don't you be afraid; and the Lord will\nstand by you, if you will but tell the truth. We are all Englishmen, and\nmen of Devon, as you seem to be by your speech; and this ship is ours;\nand the pope himself sha'n't touch you.\"\n\n\"Devon?\" she said doubtingly; \"Devon! Whence, then?\"\n\n\"Bideford men. This is Mr. Will Cary, to Clovelly. If you are a Devon\nwoman, you've heard tell of the Carys, to be sure.\"\n\nThe woman made a rush forward, and threw her fettered arms round Will's\nneck,--\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Cary, my dear life! Mr. Cary! and so you be! Oh, dear soul\nalive! but you're burnt so brown, and I be 'most blind with misery. Oh,\nwho ever sent you here, my dear Mr. Will, then, to save a poor wretch\nfrom the pit?\"\n\n\"Who on earth are you?\"\n\n\"Lucy Passmore, the white witch to Welcombe. Don't you mind Lucy\nPassmore, as charmed your warts for you when you was a boy?\"\n\n\"Lucy Passmore!\" almost shrieked all three friends. \"She that went off\nwith--\"\n\n\"Yes! she that sold her own soul, and persuaded that dear saint to\nsell hers; she that did the devil's work, and has taken the devil's\nwages;--after this fashion!\" and she held up her scarred wrists wildly.\n\n\"Where is Dona de--Rose Salterne?\" shouted Will and Jack.\n\n\"Where is my brother Frank?\" shouted Amyas.\n\n\"Dead, dead, dead!\"\n\n\"I knew it,\" said Amyas, sitting down again calmly.\n\n\"How did she die?\"\n\n\"The Inquisition--he!\" pointing to the monk. \"Ask him--he betrayed her\nto her death. And ask him!\" pointing to the bishop; \"he sat by her and\nsaw her die.\"\n\n\"Woman, you rave!\" said the bishop, getting up with a terrified air, and\nmoving as far as possible from Amyas.\n\n\"How did my brother die, Lucy?\" asked Amyas, still calmly.\n\n\"Who be you, sir?\"\n\nA gleam of hope flashed across Amyas--she had not answered his question.\n\n\"I am Amyas Leigh of Burrough. Do you know aught of my brother Frank,\nwho was lost at La Guayra?\"\n\n\"Mr. Amyas! Heaven forgive me that I did not know the bigness of you.\nYour brother, sir, died like a gentleman as he was.\"\n\n\"But how?\" gasped Amyas.\n\n\"Burned with her, sir!\"\n\n\"Is this true, sir?\" said Amyas, turning to the bishop, with a very\nquiet voice.\n\n\"I, sir?\" stammered he, in panting haste. \"I had nothing to do--I was\ncompelled in my office of bishop to be an unwilling spectator--the\nsecular arm, sir; I could not interfere with that--any more than I can\nwith the Holy Office. I do not belong to it--ask that gentleman--sir!\nSaints and angels, sir! what are you going to do?\" shrieked he, as Amyas\nlaid a heavy hand upon his shoulder, and began to lead him towards the\ndoor.\n\n\"Hang you!\" said Amyas. \"If I had been a Spaniard and a priest like\nyourself, I should have burnt you alive.\"\n\n\"Hang me?\" shrieked the wretched old Balaam; and burst into abject howls\nfor mercy.\n\n\"Take the dark monk, Yeo, and hang him too. Lucy Passmore, do you know\nthat fellow also?\"\n\n\"No, sir,\" said Lucy.\n\n\"Lucky for you, Fray Gerundio,\" said Will Cary; while the good friar\nhid his face in his hands, and burst into tears. Lucky it was for\nhim, indeed; for he had been a pitying spectator of the tragedy. \"Ah!\"\nthought he, \"if life in this mad and sinful world be a reward, perhaps\nthis escape is vouchsafed to me for having pleaded the cause of the poor\nIndian!\"\n\nBut the bishop shrieked on.\n\n\"Oh! not yet. An hour, only an hour! I am not fit to die.\"\n\n\"That is no concern of mine,\" said Amyas. \"I only know that you are not\nfit to live.\"\n\n\"Let us at least make our peace with God,\" said the dark monk.\n\n\"Hound! if your saints can really smuggle you up the back-stairs\nto heaven, they will do it without five minutes' more coaxing and\nflattering.\"\n\nFray Gerundio and the condemned man alike stopped their ears at the\nblasphemy.\n\n\"Oh, Fray Gerundio!\" screamed the bishop, \"pray for me. I have treated\nyou like a beast. Oh, Fray, Fray!\"\n\n\"Oh, my lord! my lord!\" said the good man, as with tears streaming\ndown his face he followed his shrieking and struggling diocesan up the\nstairs, \"who am I? Ask no pardon of me. Ask pardon of God for all your\nsins against the poor innocent savages, when you saw your harmless sheep\nbutchered year after year, and yet never lifted up your voice to save\nthe flock which God had committed to you. Oh, confess that, my lord!\nconfess it ere it be too late!\"\n\n\"I will confess all about the Indians, and the gold, and Tita too, Fray;\npeccavi, peccavi--only five minutes, senors, five little minutes' grace,\nwhile I confess to the good Fray!\"--and he grovelled on the deck.\n\n\"I will have no such mummery where I command,\" said Amyas, sternly. \"I\nwill be no accomplice in cheating Satan of his due.\"\n\n\"If you will confess,\" said Brimblecombe, whose heart was melting fast,\n\"confess to the Lord, and He will forgive you. Even at the last moment\nmercy is open. Is it not, Fray Gerundio?\"\n\n\"It is, senor; it is, my lord,\" said Gerundio; but the bishop only\nclasped his hands over his head.\n\n\"Then I am undone! All my money is stolen! Not a farthing left to buy\nmasses for my poor soul! And no absolution, no viaticum, nor anything! I\ndie like a dog and am damned!\"\n\n\"Clear away that running rigging!\" said Amyas, while the dark Dominican\nstood perfectly collected, with something of a smile of pity at\nthe miserable bishop. A man accustomed to cruelty, and firm in his\nfanaticism, he was as ready to endure suffering as to inflict it;\nrepeating to himself the necessary prayers, he called Fray Gerundio to\nwitness that he died, however unworthy, a martyr, in charity with all\nmen, and in the communion of the Holy Catholic Church; and then, as\nhe fitted the cord to his own neck, gave Fray Gerundio various petty\ncommissions about his sister and her children, and a little vineyard far\naway upon the sunny slopes of Castile; and so died, with a \"Domine, in\nmanus tuas,\" like a valiant man of Spain.\n\nAmyas stood long in solemn silence, watching the two corpses dangling\nabove his head. At last he drew a long breath, as if a load was taken\noff his heart.\n\nSuddenly he looked round to his men, who were watching eagerly to know\nwhat he would have done next.\n\n\"Hearken to me, my masters all, and may God hearken too, and do so to\nme, and more also, if, as long as I have eyes to see a Spaniard, and\nhands to hew him down, I do any other thing than hunt down that accursed\nnation day and night, and avenge all the innocent blood which has been\nshed by them since the day in which King Ferdinand drove out the Moors!\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said Salvation Yeo. \"I need not to swear that oath, for I have\nsworn it long ago, and kept it. Will your honor have us kill the rest of\nthe idolaters?\"\n\n\"God forbid!\" said Cary. \"You would not do that, Amyas?\"\n\n\"No; we will spare them. God has shown us a great mercy this day, and we\nmust be merciful in it. We will land them at Cabo Velo. But henceforth\ntill I die no quarter to a Spaniard.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said Yeo.\n\nAmyas's whole countenance had changed in the last half-hour. He seemed\nto have grown years older. His brow was wrinkled, his lip compressed,\nhis eyes full of a terrible stony calm, as of one who had formed a great\nand dreadful purpose, and yet for that very reason could afford to be\nquiet under the burden of it, even cheerful; and when he returned to the\ncabin he bowed courteously to the commandant, begged pardon of him\nfor having played the host so ill, and entreated him to finish his\nbreakfast.\n\n\"But, senor--is it possible? Is his holiness dead?\"\n\n\"He is hanged and dead, senor. I would have hanged, could I have caught\nthem, every living thing which was present at my brother's death, even\nto the very flies upon the wall. No more words, senor; your conscience\ntells you that I am just.\"\n\n\"Senor,\" said the commandant--\"one word--I trust there are no\nlisteners--none of my crew, I mean; but I must exculpate myself in your\neyes.\"\n\n\"Walk out, then, into the gallery with me.\"\n\n\"To tell you the truth, senor--I trust in Heaven no one overhears.--You\nare just. This Inquisition is the curse of us, the weight which is\ncrushing out the very life of Spain. No man dares speak. No man dares\ntrust his neighbor, no, not his child, or the wife of his bosom. It\navails nothing to be a good Catholic, as I trust I am,\" and he crossed\nhimself, \"when any villain whom you may offend, any unnatural son or\nwife who wishes to be rid of you, has but to hint heresy against you,\nand you vanish into the Holy Office--and then God have mercy on you,\nfor man has none. Noble ladies of my family, sir, have vanished\nthither, carried off by night, we know not why; we dare not ask why. To\nexpostulate, even to inquire, would have been to share their fate. There\nis one now, senor--Heaven alone knows whether she is alive or dead!--It\nwas nine years since, and we have never heard; and we shall never hear.\"\n\nAnd the commandant's face worked frightfully.\n\n\"She was my sister, senor!\"\n\n\"Heavens! sir, and have you not avenged her?\"\n\n\"On churchmen, senor, and I a Catholic? To be burned at the stake in\nthis life, and after that to all eternity beside? Even a Spaniard\ndare not face that. Beside, sir, the mob like this Inquisition, and an\nAuto-da-fe is even better sport to them than a bull-fight. They would be\nthe first to tear a man in pieces who dare touch an Inquisitor. Sir,\nmay all the saints in heaven obtain me forgiveness for my blasphemy, but\nwhen I saw you just now fearing those churchmen no more than you feared\nme, I longed, sinner that I am, to be a heretic like you.\"\n\n\"It will not take long to make a brave and wise gentleman who has\nsuffered such things as you have, a heretic, as you call it--a free\nChristian man, as we call it.\"\n\n\"Tempt me not, sir!\" said the poor man, crossing himself fervently. \"Let\nus say no more. Obedience is my duty; and for the rest the Church must\ndecide, according to her infallible authority--for I am a good Catholic,\nsenor, the best of Catholics, though a great sinner.--I trust no one has\noverheard us!\"\n\nAmyas left him with a smile of pity, and went to look for Lucy Passmore,\nwhom the sailors were nursing and feeding, while Ayacanora watched them\nwith a puzzled face.\n\n\"I will talk to you when you are better, Lucy,\" said he, taking her\nhand. \"Now you must eat and drink, and forget all among us lads of\nDevon.\"\n\n\"Oh, dear blessed sir, and you will send Sir John to pray with me? For\nI turned, sir, I turned: but I could not help it--I could not abear the\ntorments: but she bore them, sweet angel--and more than I did. Oh, dear\nme!\"\n\n\"Lucy, I am not fit now to hear more. You shall tell me all to-morrow;\"\nand he turned away.\n\n\"Why do you take her hand?\" said Ayacanora, half-scornfully. \"She is\nold, and ugly, and dirty.\"\n\n\"She is an Englishwoman, child, and a martyr, poor thing; and I would\nnurse her as I would my own mother.\"\n\n\"Why don't you make me an Englishwoman, and a martyr? I could learn how\nto do anything that that old hag could do!\"\n\n\"Instead of calling her names, go and tend her; that would be much\nfitter work for a woman than fighting among men.\"\n\nAyacanora darted from him, thrust the sailors aside, and took possession\nof Lucy Passmore.\n\n\"Where shall I put her?\" asked she of Amyas, without looking up.\n\n\"In the best cabin; and let her be served like a queen, lads.\"\n\n\"No one shall touch her but me;\" and taking up the withered frame in her\narms, as if it were a doll, Ayacanora walked off with her in triumph,\ntelling the men to go and mind the ship.\n\n\"The girl is mad,\" said one.\n\n\"Mad or not, she has an eye to our captain,\" said another.\n\n\"And where's the man that would behave to the poor wild thing as he\ndoes?\"\n\n\"Sir Francis Drake would, from whom he got his lesson. Do you mind his\nputting the negro lass ashore after he found out about--\"\n\n\"Hush! Bygones be bygones, and those that did it are in their graves\nlong ago. But it was too hard of him on the poor thing.\"\n\n\"If he had not got rid of her, there would have been more throats than\none cut about the lass, that's all I know,\" said another; \"and so there\nwould have been about this one before now, if the captain wasn't a born\nangel out of heaven, and the lieutenant no less.\"\n\n\"Well, I suppose we may get a whet by now. I wonder if these Dons have\nany beer aboard.\"\n\n\"Naught but grape vinegar, which fools call wine, I'll warrant.\"\n\n\"There was better than vinegar on the table in there just now.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said one grumbler of true English breed, \"but that's not for poor\nfellows like we.\"\n\n\"Don't lie, Tom Evans; you never were given that way yet, and I don't\nthink the trade will suit a good fellow like you.\"\n\nThe whole party stared; for the speaker of these words was none other\nthan Amyas himself, who had rejoined them, a bottle in each hand.\n\n\"No, Tom Evans. It has been share and share alike for three years,\nand bravely you have all held up, and share alike it shall be now, and\nhere's the handsel of it. We'll serve out the good wine fairly all round\nas long as it lasts, and then take to the bad: but mind you don't get\ndrunk, my sons, for we are much too short of hands to have any stout\nfellows lying about the scuppers.\"\n\nBut what was the story of the intendant's being murdered? Brimblecombe\nhad seen him run into a neighboring cabin; and when the door of it\nwas opened, there was the culprit, but dead and cold, with a deep\nknife-wound in his side. Who could have done the deed? It must have been\nTita, whom Brimblecombe had seen loose, and trying to free her lover.\n\nThe ship was searched from stem to stern: but no Tita. The mystery was\nnever explained. That she had leapt overboard, and tried to swim ashore,\nnone doubted: but whether she had reached it, who could tell? One thing\nwas strange; that not only had she carried off no treasure with her,\nbut that the gold ornaments which she had worn the night before, lay\ntogether in a heap on the table, close by the murdered man. Had she\nwished to rid herself of everything which had belonged to her tyrants?\n\nThe commandant heard the whole story thoughtfully.\n\n\"Wretched man!\" said he, \"and he has a wife and children in Seville.\"\n\n\"A wife and children?\" said Amyas; \"and I heard him promise marriage to\nthe Indian girl.\"\n\nThat was the only hint which gave a reason for his death. What if,\nin the terror of discovery and capture, the scoundrel had dropped any\nself-condemning words about his marriage, any prayer for those whom he\nhad left behind, and the Indian had overheard them? It might be so; at\nleast sin had brought its own punishment.\n\nAnd so that wild night and day subsided. The prisoners were kindly used\nenough; for the Englishman, free from any petty love of tormenting,\nknows no mean between killing a foe outright, and treating him as a\nbrother; and when, two days afterwards, they were sent ashore in the\ncanoes off Cabo Velo, captives and captors shook hands all round; and\nAmyas, after returning the commandant his sword, and presenting him with\na case of the bishop's wine, bowed him courteously over the side.\n\n\"I trust that you will pay us another visit, valiant senor capitan,\"\nsaid the Spaniard, bowing and smiling.\n\n\"I should most gladly accept your invitation, illustrious senor\ncommandant; but as I have vowed henceforth, whenever I shall meet a\nSpaniard, neither to give nor take quarter, I trust that our paths to\nglory may lie in different directions.\"\n\nThe commandant shrugged his shoulders; the ship was put again before the\nwind, and as the shores of the Main faded lower and dimmer behind her,\na mighty cheer broke from all on board; and for once the cry from every\nmouth was Eastward-ho!\n\nScrap by scrap, as weakness and confusion of intellect permitted her,\nLucy Passmore told her story. It was a simple one after all, and Amyas\nmight almost have guessed it for himself. Rose had not yielded to the\nSpaniard without a struggle. He had visited her two or three times at\nLucy's house (how he found out Lucy's existence she herself could never\ntell, unless from the Jesuits) before she agreed to go with him. He had\ngained Lucy to his side by huge promises of Indian gold; and, in fine,\nthey had gone to Lundy, where the lovers were married by a priest, who\nwas none other, Lucy would swear, than the shorter and stouter of the\ntwo who had carried off her husband and his boat--in a word, Father\nParsons.\n\nAmyas gnashed his teeth at the thought that he had had Parsons in his\npower at Brenttor down, and let him go. It was a fresh proof to him that\nHeaven's vengeance was upon him for letting one of its enemies escape.\nThough what good to Rose or Frank the hanging of Parsons would have\nbeen, I, for my part, cannot see.\n\nBut when had Eustace been at Lundy? Lucy could throw no light on that\nmatter. It was evidently some by-thread in the huge spider's web of\nJesuit intrigue, which was, perhaps, not worth knowing after all.\n\nThey sailed from Lundy in a Portugal ship, were at Lisbon a few days\n(during which Rose and Lucy remained on board), and then away for the\nWest Indies; while all went merry as a marriage bell. \"Sir, he would\nhave kissed the dust off her dear feet, till that evil eye of Mr.\nEustace's came, no one knew how or whence.\" And, from that time, all\nwent wrong. Eustace got power over Don Guzman, whether by threatening\nthat the marriage should be dissolved, whether by working on his\nsuperstitious scruples about leaving his wife still a heretic, or\nwhether (and this last Lucy much suspected) by insinuations that her\nheart was still at home in England, and that she was longing for Amyas\nand his ship to come and take her home again; the house soon became a\nden of misery, and Eustace the presiding evil genius. Don Guzman had\neven commanded him to leave it--and he went; but, somehow, within a week\nhe was there again, in greater favor than ever. Then came preparations\nto meet the English, and high words about it between Don Guzman and\nRose; till a few days before Amyas's arrival, the Don had dashed out\nof the house in a fury, saying openly that she preferred these Lutheran\ndogs to him, and that he would have their hearts' blood first, and hers\nafter.\n\nThe rest was soon told. Amyas knew but too much of it already. The very\nmorning after he had gone up to the villa, Lucy and her mistress were\ntaken (they knew not by whom) down to the quay, in the name of the Holy\nOffice, and shipped off to Cartagena.\n\nThere they were examined, and confronted on a charge of witchcraft,\nwhich the wretched Lucy could not well deny. She was tortured to\nmake her inculpate Rose; and what she said, or did not say, under the\ntorture, the poor wretch could never tell. She recanted, and became a\nRomanist; Rose remained firm. Three weeks afterwards, they were brought\nout to an Auto-da-fe; and there, for the first time, Lucy saw Frank\nwalking, dressed in a San Benito, in that ghastly procession. Lucy was\nadjudged to receive publicly two hundred stripes, and to be sent to\n\"The Holy House\" at Seville to perpetual prison. Frank and Rose, with\na renegade Jew, and a negro who had been convicted of practising \"Obi,\"\nwere sentenced to death as impenitent, and delivered over to the\nsecular arm, with prayers that there might be no shedding of blood. In\ncompliance with which request, the Jew and the negro were burnt at one\nstake, Frank and Rose at another. She thought they did not feel it more\nthan twenty minutes. They were both very bold and steadfast, and held\neach other's hand (that she would swear to) to the very last.\n\nAnd so ended Lucy Passmore's story. And if Amyas Leigh, after he had\nheard it, vowed afresh to give no quarter to Spaniards wherever he\nshould find them, who can wonder, even if they blame?\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nHOW SALVATION YEO FOUND HIS LITTLE MAID AGAIN\n\n     \"All precious things, discover'd late,\n        To them who seek them issue forth;\n     For love in sequel works with fate,\n        And draws the veil from hidden worth.\"\n\n                         The Sleeping Beauty.\n\nAnd so Ayacanora took up her abode in Lucy's cabin, as a regularly\naccredited member of the crew.\n\nBut a most troublesome member; for now began in her that perilous crisis\nwhich seems to endanger the bodies and souls of all savages and savage\ntribes, when they first mingle with the white man; that crisis which,\na few years afterwards, began to hasten the extermination of the North\nAmerican tribes; and had it not been for the admirable good sense and\nconstancy of Amyas, Ayacanora might have ended even more miserably than\ndid the far-famed Pocahontas, daughter of the Virginian king; who, after\nhaving been received at Court by the old pedant James the First,\nwith the honors of a sister sovereign, and having become the reputed\nancestress of more than one ancient Virginian family, ended her days in\nwretchedness in some Wapping garret.\n\nFor the mind of the savage, crushed by the sight of the white man's\nsuperior skill, and wealth, and wisdom, loses at first its self-respect;\nwhile his body, pampered with easily obtained luxuries, instead\nof having to win the necessaries of life by heavy toil, loses its\nself-helpfulness; and with self-respect and self-help vanish all the\nsavage virtues, few and flimsy as they are, and the downward road toward\nbegging and stealing, sottishness and idleness, is easy, if not sure.\n\nAnd down that road, it really seemed at first, that poor Ayacanora was\nwalking fast. For the warrior-prophetess of the Omaguas soon became, to\nall appearance, nothing but a very naughty child; and the Diana of the\nMeta, after she had satisfied her simple wonder at the great floating\nhouse by rambling from deck to deck, and peeping into every cupboard\nand cranny, manifested a great propensity to steal and hide (she was too\nproud or too shy to ask for) every trumpery which smit her fancy; and\nwhen Amyas forbade her to take anything without leave, threatened\nto drown herself, and went off and sulked all day in her cabin.\nNevertheless, she obeyed him, except in the matter of sweet things.\nPerhaps she craved naturally for the vegetable food of her native\nforests; at all events the bishop's stores of fruit and sweetmeats\ndiminished rapidly; and what was worse, so did the sweet Spanish wine\nwhich Amyas had set apart for poor Lucy's daily cordial. Whereon another\nsevere lecture, in which Amyas told her how mean it was to rob poor\nsick Lucy; whereat she, as usual, threatened to drown herself; and was\nrunning upon deck to do it, when Amyas caught her and forgave her. On\nwhich a violent fit of crying, and great penitence and promises; and\na week after, Amyas found that she had cheated Satan and her own\nconscience by tormenting the Portuguese steward into giving her some\nother wine instead: but luckily for her, she found Amyas's warnings\nabout wine making her mad so far fulfilled, that she did several foolish\nthings one evening, and had a bad headache next morning; so the murder\nwas out, and Amyas ordered the steward up for a sound flogging; but\nAyacanora, honorably enough, not only begged him off, but offered to be\nwhipped instead of him, confessing that the poor fellow spoke truly when\nhe swore that she had threatened to kill him, and that he had given her\nthe wine in bodily fear for his life.\n\nHowever, her own headache and Amyas's cold looks were lesson enough, and\nafter another attempt to drown herself, the wilful beauty settled down\nfor awhile; and what was better, could hardly be persuaded, thenceforth\nto her dying day, to touch fermented liquors.\n\nBut, in the meanwhile, poor Amyas had many a brains-beating as to how\nhe was to tame a lady who, on the least provocation, took refuge in\nsuicide. Punish her he dared not, even if he had the heart. And as for\nputting her ashore, he had an instinct, and surely not a superstitious\none, that her strange affection for the English was not unsent by\nHeaven, and that God had committed her into his charge, and that He\nwould require an account at his hands of the soul of that fair lost\nlamb.\n\nSo, almost at his wits' end, he prayed to God, good simple fellow, and\nthat many a time, to show him what he should do with her before she\nkilled either herself, or what was just as likely, one of the crew; and\nit seemed best to him to make Parson Jack teach her the rudiments of\nChristianity, that she might be baptized in due time when they got home\nto England.\n\nBut here arose a fresh trouble--for she roundly refused to learn of\nJack, or of any one but Amyas himself; while he had many a good reason\nfor refusing the office of schoolmaster; so, for a week or two more,\nAyacanora remained untaught, save in the English tongue, which she\npicked up with marvellous rapidity.\n\nAnd next, as if troubles would never end, she took a violent dislike,\nnot only to John Brimblecombe, whose gait and voice she openly mimicked\nfor the edification of the men; but also to Will Cary, whom she never\nallowed to speak to her or approach her. Perhaps she was jealous of his\nintimacy with Amyas; or perhaps, with the subtle instinct of a woman,\nshe knew that he was the only other man on board who might dare to make\nlove to her (though Will, to do him justice, was as guiltless of any\nsuch intention as Amyas himself). But when she was remonstrated with,\nher only answer was that Cary was a cacique as well as Amyas, and that\nthere ought not to be two caciques; and one day she actually proposed to\nAmyas to kill his supposed rival, and take the ship all to himself;\nand sulked for several days at hearing Amyas, amid shouts of laughter,\nretail her precious advice to its intended victim.\n\nMoreover, the negroes came in for their share, being regarded all along\nby her with an unspeakable repugnance, which showed itself at first in\nhiding from them whenever she could, and, afterwards, in throwing at\nthem everything she could lay hands on, till the poor Quashies, in\ndanger of their lives, complained to Amyas, and got rest for awhile.\n\nOver the rest of the sailors she lorded it like a very princess, calling\nthem from their work to run on her errands and make toys for her,\nenforcing her commands now and then by a shrewd box on the ears; while\nthe good fellows, especially old Yeo, like true sailors, petted her,\nobeyed her, even jested with her, much as they might have done with a\ntame leopard, whose claws might be unsheathed and about their ears at\nany moment. But she amused them, and amused Amyas too. They must of\ncourse have a pet; and what prettier one could they have? And as for\nAmyas, the constant interest of her presence, even the constant\nanxiety of her wilfulness, kept his mind busy, and drove out many a sad\nforeboding about that meeting with his mother, and the tragedy which\nhe had to tell her, which would otherwise, so heavily did they weigh on\nhim, have crushed his spirit with melancholy, and made all his worldly\nsuccess and marvellous deliverance worthless in his eyes.\n\nAt last the matter, as most things luckily do, came to a climax; and it\ncame in this way.\n\nThe ship had been slipping along now for many a day, slowly but steadily\nbefore a favorable breeze. She had passed the ring of the West India\nislands, and was now crawling, safe from all pursuit, through the vast\nweed-beds of the Sargasso Sea. There, for the first time, it was thought\nsafe to relax the discipline which had been hitherto kept up, and to\n\"rummage\" (as was the word in those days) their noble prize. What they\nfound, of gold and silver, jewels, and merchandise, will interest no\nreaders. Suffice it to say, that there was enough there, with the other\ntreasure, to make Amyas rich for life, after all claims of Cary's and\nthe crew, not forgetting Mr. Salterne's third, as owner of the ship,\nhad been paid off. But in the captain's cabin were found two chests, one\nfull of gorgeous Mexican feather dresses, and the other of Spanish and\nEast Indian finery, which, having come by way of Havana and Cartagena,\nwas going on, it seemed, to some senora or other at the Caracas. Which\ntwo chests were, at Cary's proposal, voted amid the acclamations of\nthe crew to Ayacanora, as her due and fit share of the pillage, in\nconsideration of her Amazonian prowess and valuable services.\n\nSo the poor child took greedy possession of the trumpery, had them\ncarried into Lucy's cabin, and there knelt gloating over them many an\nhour. The Mexican work she chose to despise as savage; but the Spanish\ndresses were a treasure; and for two or three days she appeared on the\nquarter-deck, sunning herself like a peacock before the eyes of Amyas in\nSeville mantillas, Madrid hats, Indian brocade farthingales, and I know\nnot how many other gewgaws, and dare not say how put on.\n\nThe crew tittered: Amyas felt much more inclined to cry. There is\nnothing so pathetic as a child's vanity, saving a grown person aping a\nchild's vanity; and saving, too, a child's agony of disappointment when\nit finds that it has been laughed at instead of being admired. Amyas\nwould have spoken, but he was afraid: however, the evil brought its own\ncure. The pageant went on, as its actor thought, most successfully\nfor three days or so; but at last the dupe, unable to contain herself\nlonger, appealed to Amyas,--\"Ayacanora quite English girl now; is she\nnot?\"--heard a titter behind her, looked round, saw a dozen honest\nfaces in broad grin, comprehended all in a moment, darted down the\ncompanion-ladder, and vanished.\n\nAmyas, fully expecting her to jump overboard, followed as fast as he\ncould. But she had locked herself in with Lucy, and he could hear her\nviolent sobs, and Lucy's faint voice entreating to know what was the\nmatter.\n\nIn vain he knocked. She refused to come out all day, and at even they\nwere forced to break the door open, to prevent Lucy being starved.\n\nThere sat Ayacanora, her finery half torn off, and scattered about the\nfloor in spite, crying still as if her heart would break; while poor\nLucy cried too, half from fright and hunger, and half for company.\n\nAmyas tried to comfort the poor child, assured her that the men should\nnever laugh at her again; \"But then,\" added he, \"you must not be\nso--so--\" What to say he hardly knew.\n\n\"So what?\" asked she, crying more bitterly than ever.\n\n\"So like a wild girl, Ayacanora.\"\n\nHer hands dropped on her knees: a strong spasm ran through her\nthroat and bosom, and she fell on her knees before him, and looked up\nimploringly in his face.\n\n\"Yes; wild girl--poor, bad wild girl. . . . But I will be English girl\nnow!\"\n\n\"Fine clothes will never make you English, my child,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"No! not English clothes--English heart! Good heart, like yours! Yes, I\nwill be good, and Sir John shall teach me!\"\n\n\"There's my good maid,\" said Amyas. \"Sir John shall begin and teach you\nto-morrow.\"\n\n\"No! Now! now! Ayacanora cannot wait. She will drown herself if she is\nbad another day! Come, now!\"\n\nAnd she made him fetch Brimblecombe, heard the honest fellow patiently\nfor an hour or more, and told Lucy that very night all that he had said.\nAnd from that day, whenever Jack went in to read and pray with the\npoor sufferer, Ayacanora, instead of escaping on deck as before, stood\npatiently trying to make it all out, and knelt when he knelt, and tried\nto pray too--that she might have an English heart; and doubtless her\nprayers, dumb as they were, were not unheard.\n\nSo went on a few days more, hopefully enough, without any outbreak, till\none morning, just after they had passed the Sargasso-beds. The ship\nwas taking care of herself; the men were all on deck under the awning,\ntinkering, and cobbling, and chatting; Brimblecombe was catechising his\nfair pupil in the cabin; Amyas and Cary, cigar in mouth, were chatting\nabout all heaven and earth, and, above all, of the best way of getting\nup a fresh adventure against the Spaniards as soon as they returned;\nwhile Amyas was pouring out to Will that dark hatred of the whole\nnation, that dark purpose of revenge for his brother and for Rose, which\nhad settled down like a murky cloud into every cranny of his heart and\nmind. Suddenly there was a noise below; a scuffle and a shout,\nwhich made them both leap to their feet; and up on deck rushed Jack\nBrimblecombe, holding his head on with both his hands.\n\n\"Save me! save me from that she-fiend! She is possessed with a legion!\nShe has broken my nose--torn out half my hair!--and I'm sure I have none\nto spare! Here she comes! Stand by me, gentlemen both! Satanas, I defy\nthee!\" And Jack ensconced himself behind the pair, as Ayacanora whirled\nupon deck like a very Maenad, and, seeing Amyas, stopped short.\n\n\"If you had defied Satan down below there,\" said Cary, with a laugh, \"I\nsuspect he wouldn't have broken out on you so boldly, Master Jack.\"\n\n\"I am innocent--innocent as the babe unborn! Oh! Mr. Cary! this is too\nbad of you, sir!\" quoth Jack indignantly, while Amyas asked what was the\nmatter.\n\n\"He looked at me,\" said she, sturdily.\n\n\"Well, a cat may look at a king.\"\n\n\"But he sha'n't look at Ayacanora. Nobody shall but you, or I'll kill\nhim!\"\n\nIn vain Jack protested his innocence of having even looked at her. The\nfancy (and I verily believe it was nothing more) had taken possession of\nher. She refused to return below to her lesson. Jack went off grumbling,\nminus his hair, and wore a black eye for a week after.\n\n\"At all events,\" quoth Cary, re-lighting his cigar, \"it's a fault on the\nright side.\"\n\n\"God give me grace, or it may be one on the wrong side for me.\"\n\n\"He will, old heart-of-oak!\" said Cary, laying his arm around Amyas's\nneck, to the evident disgust of Ayacanora, who went off to the side,\ngot a fishing-line, and began amusing herself therewith, while the ship\nslipped on quietly and silently as ever, save when Ayacanora laughed and\nclapped her hands at the flying-fish scudding from the bonitos. At last,\ntired of doing nothing, she went forward to the poop-rail to listen to\nJohn Squire the armorer, who sat tinkering a headpiece, and humming a\nsong, mutato nomine, concerning his native place--\n\n     \"Oh, Bideford is a pleasant place, it shines where it stands,\n     And the more I look upon it, the more my heart it warms;\n     For there are fair young lasses, in rows upon the quay,\n     To welcome gallant mariners, when they come home from say.\"\n\n\"'Tis Sunderland, John Squire, to the song, and not Bidevor,\" said his\nmate.\n\n\"Well, Bidevor's so good as Sunderland any day, for all there's\nno say-coals there blacking a place about; and makes just so good\nharmonies, Tommy Hamblyn--\n\n     \"Oh, if I was a herring, to swim the ocean o'er,\n     Or if I was a say-dove, to fly unto the shoor,\n     To fly unto my true love, a waiting at the door,\n     To wed her with a goold ring, and plough the main no moor.\"\n\nHere Yeo broke in--\n\n\"Aren't you ashamed, John Squire, to your years, singing such carnal\nvanities, after all the providences you have seen? Let the songs of Zion\nbe in your mouth, man, if you must needs keep a caterwauling all day\nlike that.\"\n\n\"You sing 'em yourself then, gunner.\"\n\n\"Well,\" says Yeo, \"and why not?\" And out he pulled his psalm-book, and\nbegan a scrap of the grand old psalm--\n\n     \"Such as in ships and brittle barks\n        Into the seas descend,\n     Their merchandise through fearful floods\n        To compass and to end;\n     There men are forced to behold\n        The Lord's works what they be;\n     And in the dreadful deep the same,\n        Most marvellous they see.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said John Squire. \"Very good and godly: but still I du like\na merry catch now and then, I du. Wouldn't you let a body sing\n'Rumbelow'--even when he's heaving of the anchor?\"\n\n\"Well, I don't know,\" said Yeo; \"but the Lord's people had better\npraise the Lord then too, and pray for a good voyage, instead of howling\nabout--\n\n       \"A randy, dandy, dandy O,\n        A whet of ale and brandy O,\n     With a rumbelow and a Westward-ho!\n        And heave, my mariners all, O!\"\n\n\"Is that fit talk for immortal souls? How does that child's-trade sound\nbeside the Psalms, John Squire?\"\n\nNow it befell that Salvation Yeo, for the very purpose of holding up to\nridicule that time-honored melody, had put into it the true nasal twang,\nand rung it out as merrily as he had done perhaps twelve years before,\nwhen he got up John Oxenham's anchor in Plymouth Sound. And it befell\nalso that Ayacanora, as she stood by Amyas's side, watching the men, and\ntrying to make out their chat, heard it, and started; and then, half to\nherself, took up the strain, and sang it over again, word for word, in\nthe very same tune and tone.\n\nSalvation Yeo started in his turn, and turned deadly pale.\n\n\"Who sung that?\" he asked quickly.\n\n\"The little maid here. She's coming on nicely in her English,\" said\nAmyas.\n\n\"The little maid?\" said Yeo, turning paler still. \"Why do you go about\nto scare an old servant, by talking of little maids, Captain Amyas?\nWell,\" he said aloud to himself, \"as I am a sinful saint, if I hadn't\nseen where the voice came from, I could have sworn it was her; just as\nwe taught her to sing it by the river there, I and William Penberthy of\nMarazion, my good comrade. The Lord have mercy on me!\"\n\nAll were silent as the grave whenever Yeo made any allusion to that lost\nchild. Ayacanora only, pleased with Amyas's commendation, went humming\non to herself--\n\n     \"And heave, my mariners all, O!\"\n\nYeo started up from the gun where he sat.\n\n\"I can't abear it! As I live, I can't! You, Indian maiden, where did you\nlearn to sing that there?\"\n\nAyacanora looked up at him, half frightened by his vehemence, then at\nAmyas, to see if she had been doing anything wrong; and then turned\nsaucily away, looked over the side, and hummed on.\n\n\"Ask her, for mercy's sake--ask her, Captain Leigh!\"\n\n\"My child,\" said Amyas, speaking in Indian, \"how is it you sing that so\nmuch better than any other English? Did you ever hear it before?\"\n\nAyacanora looked up at him puzzled, and shook her head; and then--\n\n\"If you tell Indian to Ayacanora, she dumb. She must be English girl\nnow, like poor Lucy.\"\n\n\"Well then,\" said Amyas, \"do you recollect, Ayacanora--do you\nrecollect--what shall I say? anything that happened when you were a\nlittle girl?\"\n\nShe paused awhile; and then moving her hands overhead--\n\n\"Trees--great trees like the Magdalena--always nothing but trees--wild\nand bad everything. Ayacanora won't talk about that.\"\n\n\"Do you mind anything that grew on those trees?\" asked Yeo, eagerly.\n\nShe laughed. \"Silly! Flowers and fruit, and nuts--grow on all trees, and\nmonkey-cups too. Ayacanora climbed up after them--when she was wild. I\nwon't tell any more.\"\n\n\"But who taught you to call them monkey-cups?\" asked Yeo, trembling with\nexcitement.\n\n\"Monkey's drink; mono drink.\"\n\n\"Mono?\" said Yeo, foiled on one cast, and now trying another. \"How did\nyou know the beasts were called monos?\"\n\n\"She might have heard it coming down with us,\" said Cary, who had joined\nthe group.\n\n\"Ay, monos,\" said she, in a self-justifying tone. \"Faces like little\nmen, and tails. And one very dirty black one, with a beard, say Amen in\na tree to all the other monkeys, just like Sir John on Sunday.\"\n\nThis allusion to Brimblecombe and the preaching apes upset all but old\nYeo.\n\n\"But don't you recollect any Christians?--white people?\"\n\nShe was silent.\n\n\"Don't you mind a white lady?\"\n\n\"Um?\"\n\n\"A woman, a very pretty woman, with hair like his?\" pointing to Amyas.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"What do you mind, then, beside those Indians?\" added Yeo, in despair.\n\nShe turned her back on him peevishly, as if tired with the efforts of\nher memory.\n\n\"Do try to remember,\" said Amyas; and she set to work again at once.\n\n\"Ayacanora mind great monkeys--black, oh, so high,\" and she held up her\nhand above her head, and made a violent gesture of disgust.\n\n\"Monkeys? what, with tails?\"\n\n\"No, like man. Ah! yes--just like Cooky there--dirty Cooky!\"\n\nAnd that hapless son of Ham, who happened to be just crossing the\nmain-deck, heard a marlingspike, which by ill luck was lying at hand,\nflying past his ears.\n\n\"Ayacanora, if you heave any more things at Cooky, I must have you\nwhipped,\" said Amyas, without, of course, any such intention.\n\n\"I'll kill you, then,\" answered she, in the most matter-of-fact tone.\n\n\"She must mean negurs,\" said Yeo; \"I wonder where she saw them, now.\nWhat if it were they Cimaroons?\"\n\n\"But why should any one who had seen whites forget them, and yet\nremember negroes?\" asked Cary.\n\n\"Let us try again. Do you mind no great monkeys but those black ones?\"\nasked Amyas.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said, after a while,--\"devil.\"\n\n\"Devil?\" asked all three, who, of course, were by no means free from the\nbelief that the fiend did actually appear to the Indian conjurors, such\nas had brought up the girl.\n\n\"Ay, him Sir John tell about on Sundays.\"\n\n\"Save and help us!\" said Yeo; \"and what was he like unto?\"\n\nShe made various signs to intimate that he had a monkey's face, and\na gray beard like Yeo's. So far so good: but now came a series of\nmanipulations about her pretty little neck, which set all their fancies\nat fault.\n\n\"I know,\" said Cary, at last, bursting into a great laugh. \"Sir Urian\nhad a ruff on, as I live! Trunk-hose too, my fair dame? Stop--I'll make\nsure. Was his neck like the senor commandant's, the Spaniard?\"\n\nAyacanora clapped her hands at finding herself understood, and the\nquestioning went on.\n\n\"The 'devil' appeared like a monkey, with a gray beard, in a\nruff;--humph!--\"\n\n\"Ay!\" said she in good enough Spanish, \"Mono de Panama; viejo diablo de\nPanama.\"\n\nYeo threw up his hands with a shriek--\"Oh Lord of all mercies! Those\nwere the last words of Mr. John Oxenham! Ay--and the devil is surely\nnone other than the devil Don Francisco Xararte! Oh dear! oh dear! oh\ndear! my sweet young lady! my pretty little maid! and don't you know me?\nDon't you know Salvation Yeo, that carried you over the mountains,\nand used to climb for the monkey-cups for you, my dear young lady? And\nWilliam Penberthy too, that used to get you flowers; and your poor dear\nfather, that was just like Mr. Cary there, only he had a black beard,\nand black curls, and swore terribly in his speech, like a Spaniard, my\ndear young lady?\"\n\nAnd the honest fellow, falling on his knees, covered Ayacanora's hands\nwith kisses; while all the crew, fancying him gone suddenly mad, crowded\naft.\n\n\"Steady, men, and don't vex him!\" said Amyas. \"He thinks that he has\nfound his little maid at last.\"\n\n\"And so do I, Amyas, as I live,\" said Cary.\n\n\"Steady, steady, my masters all! If this turn out a wrong scent after\nall, his wits will crack. Mr. Yeo, can't you think of any other token?\"\n\nYeo stamped impatiently. \"What need then? it's her, I tell ye, and\nthat's enough! What a beauty she's grown! Oh dear! where were my eyes\nall this time, to behold her, and not to see her! 'Tis her very mortal\nself, it is! And don't you mind me, my dear, now? Don't you mind\nSalvation Yeo, that taught you to sing 'Heave my mariners all, O!'\na-sitting on a log by the boat upon the sand, and there was a sight of\nred lilies grew on it in the moss, dear, now, wasn't there? and we made\nposies of them to put in your hair, now?\"--And the poor old man ran on\nin a supplicating, suggestive tone, as if he could persuade the girl\ninto becoming the person whom he sought.\n\nAyacanora had watched him, first angry, then amused, then attentive, and\nat last with the most intense earnestness. Suddenly she grew crimson,\nand snatching her hands from the old man's, hid her face in them, and\nstood.\n\n\"Do you remember anything of all this, my child?\" asked Amyas, gently.\n\nShe lifted up her eyes suddenly to his, with a look of imploring agony,\nas if beseeching him to spare her. The death of a whole old life,\nthe birth of a whole new life, was struggling in that beautiful face,\nchoking in that magnificent throat, as she threw back her small head,\nand drew in her breath, and dashed her locks back from her temples, as\nif seeking for fresh air. She shuddered, reeled, then fell weeping on\nthe bosom, not of Salvation Yeo, but of Amyas Leigh.\n\nHe stood still a minute or two, bearing that fair burden, ere he could\nrecollect himself. Then,--\n\n\"Ayacanora, you are not yet mistress of yourself, my child. You were\nbetter to go down, and see after poor Lucy, and we will talk about it\nall to-morrow.\"\n\nShe gathered herself up instantly, and with eyes fixed on the deck slid\nthrough the group, and disappeared below.\n\n\"Ah!\" said Yeo, with a tone of exquisite sadness; \"the young to the\nyoung! Over land and sea, in the forests and in the galleys, in battle\nand prison, I have sought her! And now!--\"\n\n\"My good friend,\" said Amyas, \"neither are you master of yourself yet.\nWhen she comes round again, whom will she love and thank but you?\"\n\n\"You, sir! She owes all to you; and so do I. Let me go below, sir. My\nold wits are shaky. Bless you, sir, and thank you for ever and ever!\"\n\nAnd Yeo grasped Amyas's hand, and went down to his cabin, from which he\ndid not reappear for many hours.\n\nFrom that day Ayacanora was a new creature. The thought that she was\nan Englishwoman; that she, the wild Indian, was really one of the\ngreat white people whom she had learned to worship, carried in it some\nregenerating change: she regained all her former stateliness, and with\nit a self-restraint, a temperance, a softness which she had never shown\nbefore. Her dislike to Cary and Jack vanished. Modest and distant as\never, she now took delight in learning from them about England and\nEnglish people; and her knowledge of our customs gained much from the\nsomewhat fantastic behaviour which Amyas thought good, for reasons\nof his own, to assume toward her. He assigned her a handsome cabin to\nherself, always addressed her as madam, and told Cary, Brimblecombe, and\nthe whole crew that as she was a lady and a Christian, he expected them\nto behave to her as such. So there was as much bowing and scraping\non the poop as if it had been a prince's court: and Ayacanora, though\nsorely puzzled and chagrined at Amyas's new solemnity, contrived to\nimitate it pretty well (taking for granted that it was the right thing);\nand having tolerable masters in the art of manners (for both Amyas and\nCary were thoroughly well-bred men), profited much in all things, except\nin intimacy with Amyas, who had, cunning fellow, hit on this parade of\ngood manners, as a fresh means of increasing the distance between him\nand her. The crew, of course, though they were a little vexed at losing\ntheir pet, consoled themselves with the thought that she was a \"real\nborn lady,\" and Mr. Oxenham's daughter, too; and there was not a man on\nboard who did not prick up his ears for a message if she approached him,\nor one who would not have, I verily believe, jumped overboard to do her\na pleasure.\n\nOnly Yeo kept sorrowfully apart. He never looked at her, spoke to her,\nmet her even, if he could. His dream had vanished. He had found her! and\nafter all, she did not care for him? Why should she?\n\nBut it was hard to have hunted a bubble for years, and have it break\nin his hand at last. \"Set not your affections on things on the earth,\"\nmurmured Yeo to himself, as he pored over his Bible, in the vain hope of\nforgetting his little maid.\n\nBut why did Amyas wish to increase the distance between himself and\nAyacanora? Many reasons might be given: I deny none of them. But the\nmain one, fantastic as it may seem, was simply, that while she had\ndiscovered herself to be an Englishwoman, he had discovered her to be a\nSpaniard. If her father were seven times John Oxenham (and even that the\nperverse fellow was inclined to doubt), her mother was a Spaniard--Pah!\none of the accursed race; kinswoman--perhaps, to his brother's\nmurderers! His jaundiced eyes could see nothing but the Spanish element\nin her; or, indeed, in anything else. As Cary said to him once, using a\ncant phrase of Sidney's, which he had picked up from Frank, all heaven\nand earth were \"spaniolated,\" to him. He seemed to recollect nothing but\nthat Heaven had \"made Spaniards to be killed, and him to kill them.\" If\nhe had not been the most sensible of John Bulls, he would certainly have\nforestalled the monomania of that young Frenchman of rank, who, some\neighty years after him, so maddened his brain by reading of the Spanish\ncruelties, that he threw up all his prospects and turned captain of\nfilibusters in the West Indies, for the express purpose of ridding them\nof their tyrants; and when a Spanish ship was taken, used to relinquish\nthe whole booty to his crew, and reserve for himself only the pleasure\nof witnessing his victims' dying agonies.\n\nBut what had become of that bird-like song of Ayacanora's which had\nastonished them on the banks of the Meta, and cheered them many a time\nin their anxious voyage down the Magdalena? From the moment that she\nfound out her English parentage, it stopped. She refused utterly to sing\nanything but the songs and psalms which she picked up from the English.\nWhether it was that she despised it as a relic of her barbarism, or\nwhether it was too maddening for one whose heart grew heavier and\nhumbler day by day, the nightingale notes were heard no more.\n\nSo homeward they ran, before a favoring southwest breeze: but long\nere they were within sight of land, Lucy Passmore was gone to her rest\nbeneath the Atlantic waves.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nHOW AMYAS CAME HOME THE THIRD TIME\n\n     \"It fell about the Martinmas,\n         When nights were lang and mirk,\n     That wife's twa sons cam hame again,\n         And their hats were o' the birk.\n\n     \"It did na graw by bush or brae,\n         Nor yet in ony shough;\n     But by the gates o' paradise\n         That birk grew fair eneugh.\"\n\n                The Wife of Usher's Well.\n\nIt is the evening of the 15th of February, 1587, and Mrs. Leigh (for\nwe must return now to old scenes and old faces) is pacing slowly up and\ndown the terrace-walk at Burrough, looking out over the winding river,\nand the hazy sand-hills, and the wide western sea, as she has done every\nevening, be it fair weather or foul, for three weary years. Three years\nand more are past and gone, and yet no news of Frank and Amyas, and\nthe gallant ship and all the gallant souls therein; and loving eyes in\nBideford and Appledore, Clovelly and Ilfracombe, have grown hollow with\nwatching and with weeping for those who have sailed away into the West,\nas John Oxenham sailed before them, and have vanished like a dream, as\nhe did, into the infinite unknown. Three weary years, and yet no word.\nOnce there was a flush of hope, and good Sir Richard (without Mrs.\nLeigh's knowledge), had sent a horseman posting across to Plymouth, when\nthe news arrived that Drake, Frobisher, and Carlisle had returned with\ntheir squadron from the Spanish Main. Alas! he brought back great news,\nglorious news; news of the sacking of Cartagena, San Domingo, Saint\nAugustine; of the relief of Raleigh's Virginian Colony: but no news of\nthe Rose, and of those who had sailed in her. And Mrs. Leigh bowed her\nhead, and worshipped, and said, \"The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken\naway; blessed be the name of the Lord!\"\n\nHer hair was now grown gray; her cheeks were wan; her step was feeble.\nShe seldom went from home, save to the church, and to the neighboring\ncottages. She never mentioned her sons' names; never allowed a word to\npass her lips, which might betoken that she thought of them; but every\nday, when the tide was high, and red flag on the sandhills showed that\nthere was water over the bar, she paced the terrace-walk, and devoured\nwith greedy eyes the sea beyond in search of the sail which never came.\nThe stately ships went in and out as of yore; and white sails hung off\nthe bar for many an hour, day after day, month after month, year after\nyear: but an instinct within told her that none of them were the sails\nshe sought. She knew that ship, every line of her, the cut of every\ncloth; she could have picked it out miles away, among a whole fleet, but\nit never came, and Mrs. Leigh bowed her head and worshipped, and went\nto and fro among the poor, who looked on her as an awful being, and one\nwhom God had brought very near to Himself, in that mysterious heaven of\nsorrow which they too knew full well. And lone women and bed-ridden men\nlooked in her steadfast eyes, and loved them, and drank in strength from\nthem; for they knew (though she never spoke of her own grief) that she\nhad gone down into the fiercest depths of the fiery furnace, and was\nwalking there unhurt by the side of One whose form was as of the Son\nof God. And all the while she was blaming herself for her \"earthly\"\nlongings, and confessing nightly to Heaven that weakness which she could\nnot shake off, which drew her feet at each high tide to the terrace-walk\nbeneath the row of wind-clipt trees.\n\nBut this evening Northam is in a stir. The pebble ridge is thundering\nfar below, as it thundered years ago: but Northam is noisy enough\nwithout the rolling of the surge. The tower is rocking with the pealing\nbells: the people are all in the streets shouting and singing round\nbonfires. They are burning the pope in effigy, drinking to the queen's\nhealth, and \"So perish all her enemies!\" The hills are red with bonfires\nin every village; and far away, the bells of Bideford are answering\nthe bells of Northam, as they answered them seven years ago, when Amyas\nreturned from sailing round the world. For this day has come the news\nthat Mary Queen of Scots is beheaded in Fotheringay; and all England,\nlike a dreamer who shakes off some hideous nightmare, has leapt up in\none tremendous shout of jubilation, as the terror and the danger of\nseventeen anxious years is lifted from its heart for ever.\n\nYes, she is gone, to answer at a higher tribunal than that of the\nEstates of England, for all the noble English blood which has been\npoured out for her; for all the noble English hearts whom she has\ntempted into treachery, rebellion, and murder. Elizabeth's own words\nhave been fulfilled at last, after years of long-suffering,--\n\n     \"The daughter of debate,\n       That discord aye doth sow,\n     Hath reap'd no gain where former rule\n       Hath taught still peace to grow.\"\n\nAnd now she can do evil no more. Murder and adultery, the heart which\nknew no forgiveness, the tongue which could not speak truth even for its\nown interest, have past and are perhaps atoned for; and her fair face\nhangs a pitiful dream in the memory even of those who knew that either\nshe, or England, must perish.\n\n     \"Nothing is left of her\n     Now, but pure womanly.\"\n\nAnd Mrs. Leigh, Protestant as she is, breathes a prayer, that the Lord\nmay have mercy on that soul, as \"clear as diamond, and as hard,\" as she\nsaid of herself. That last scene, too, before the fatal block--it could\nnot be altogether acting. Mrs. Leigh had learned many a priceless lesson\nin the last seven years; might not Mary Stuart have learned something\nin seventeen? And Mrs. Leigh had been a courtier, and knew, as far as a\nchaste Englishwoman could know (which even in those coarser days was not\nvery much), of that godless style of French court profligacy in which\npoor Mary had had her youthful training, amid the Medicis, and the\nGuises, and Cardinal Lorraine; and she shuddered, and sighed to\nherself\"--To whom little is given, of them shall little be required!\"\nBut still the bells pealed on and would not cease.\n\nWhat was that which answered them from afar out of the fast darkening\ntwilight? A flash, and then the thunder of a gun at sea.\n\nMrs. Leigh stopped. The flash was right outside the bar. A ship in\ndistress it could not be. The wind was light and westerly. It was a\nhigh spring-tide, as evening floods are always there. What could it be?\nAnother flash, another gun. The noisy folks of Northam were hushed at\nonce, and all hurried into the churchyard which looks down on the broad\nflats and the river.\n\nThere was a gallant ship outside the bar. She was running in, too, with\nall sails set. A large ship; nearly a thousand tons she might be; but\nnot of English rig. What was the meaning of it? A Spanish cruiser about\nto make reprisals for Drake's raid along the Cadiz shore! Not that,\nsurely. The Don had no fancy for such unscientific and dare-devil\nwarfare. If he came, he would come with admiral, rear-admiral, and\nvice-admiral, transports, and avisos, according to the best-approved\nmethods, articles, and science of war. What could she be?\n\nEasily, on the flowing tide and fair western wind, she has slipped\nup the channel between the two lines of sandhill. She is almost off\nAppledore now. She is no enemy; and if she be a foreigner, she is a\ndaring one, for she has never veiled her topsails,--and that, all know,\nevery foreign ship must do within sight of an English port, or stand the\nchance of war; as the Spanish admiral found, who many a year since\nwas sent in time of peace to fetch home from Flanders Anne of Austria,\nPhilip the Second's last wife.\n\nFor in his pride he sailed into Plymouth Sound without veiling topsails,\nor lowering the flag of Spain. Whereon, like lion from his den, out\nrushed John Hawkins the port admiral, in his famous Jesus of Lubec\n(afterwards lost in the San Juan d'Ulloa fight), and without argument or\nparley, sent a shot between the admiral's masts; which not producing the\ndesired effect, alongside ran bold Captain John, and with his next\nshot, so says his son, an eye-witness, \"lackt the admiral through and\nthrough;\" whereon down came the offending flag; and due apologies were\nmade, but not accepted for a long time by the stout guardian of her\nmajesty's honor. And if John Hawkins did as much for a Spanish fleet in\ntime of peace, there is more than one old sea-dog in Appledore who will\ndo as much for a single ship in time of war, if he can find even an iron\npot to burn powder withal.\n\nThe strange sail passed out of sight behind the hill of Appledore; and\nthen there rose into the quiet evening air a cheer, as from a hundred\nthroats. Mrs. Leigh stood still, and listened. Another gun thundered\namong the hills; and then another cheer.\n\nIt might have been twenty minutes before the vessel hove in sight again\nround the dark rocks of the Hubbastone, as she turned up the Bideford\nriver. Mrs. Leigh had stood that whole time perfectly motionless, a pale\nand scarcely breathing statue, her eyes fixed upon the Viking's rock.\n\nRound the Hubbastone she came at last. There was music on board, drums\nand fifes, shawms and trumpets, which wakened ringing echoes from every\nknoll of wood and slab of slate. And as she opened full on Burrough\nHouse, another cheer burst from her crew, and rolled up to the hills\nfrom off the silver waters far below, full a mile away.\n\nMrs. Leigh walked quickly toward the house, and called her maid,--\n\n\"Grace, bring me my hood. Master Amyas is come home!\"\n\n\"No, surely? O joyful sound! Praised and blessed be the Lord, then;\npraised and blessed be the Lord! But, madam, however did you know that?\"\n\n\"I heard his voice on the river; but I did not hear Mr. Frank's with\nhim, Grace!\"\n\n\"Oh, be sure, madam, where the one is the other is. They'd never part\ncompany. Both come home or neither, I'll warrant. Here's your hood,\nmadam.\"\n\nAnd Mrs. Leigh, with Grace behind her, started with rapid steps towards\nBideford.\n\nWas it true? Was it a dream? Had the divine instinct of the mother\nenabled her to recognize her child's voice among all the rest, and at\nthat enormous distance; or was her brain turning with the long effort of\nher supernatural calm?\n\nGrace asked herself, in her own way, that same question many a time\nbetween Burrough and Bideford. When they arrived on the quay the\nquestion answered itself.\n\nAs they came down Bridgeland Street (where afterwards the tobacco\nwarehouses for the Virginia trade used to stand, but which then was but\na row of rope-walks and sailmakers' shops), they could see the strange\nship already at anchor in the river. They had just reached the lower end\nof the street, when round the corner swept a great mob, sailors, women,\n'prentices, hurrahing, questioning, weeping, laughing: Mrs. Leigh\nstopped; and behold, they stopped also.\n\n\"Here she is!\" shouted some one; \"here's his mother!\"\n\n\"His mother? Not their mother!\" said Mrs. Leigh to herself, and turned\nvery pale; but that heart was long past breaking.\n\nThe next moment the giant head and shoulders of Amyas, far above the\ncrowd, swept round the corner.\n\n\"Make a way! Make room for Madam Leigh!\"--And Amyas fell on his knees at\nher feet.\n\nShe threw her arms round his neck, and bent her fair head over his,\nwhile sailors, 'prentices, and coarse harbor-women were hushed into holy\nsilence, and made a ring round the mother and the son.\n\nMrs. Leigh asked no question. She saw that Amyas was alone.\n\nAt last he whispered, \"I would have died to save him, mother, if I\ncould.\"\n\n\"You need not tell me that, Amyas Leigh, my son.\"\n\nAnother silence.\n\n\"How did he die?\" whispered Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"He is a martyr. He died in the----\"\n\nAmyas could say no more.\n\n\"The Inquisition?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nA strong shudder passed through Mrs. Leigh's frame, and then she lifted\nup her head.\n\n\"Come home, Amyas. I little expected such an honor--such an honor--ha!\nha! and such a fair young martyr, too; a very St. Stephen! God, have\nmercy on me; and let me not go mad before these folk, when I ought to be\nthanking Thee for Thy great mercies! Amyas, who is that?\"\n\nAnd she pointed to Ayacanora, who stood close behind Amyas, watching\nwith keen eyes the whole.\n\n\"She is a poor wild Indian girl--my daughter, I call her. I will tell\nyou her story hereafter.\"\n\n\"Your daughter? My grand-daughter, then. Come hither, maiden, and be my\ngrand-daughter.\"\n\nAyacanora came obedient, and knelt down, because she had seen Amyas\nkneel.\n\n\"God forbid, child! kneel not to me. Come home, and let me know whether\nI am sane or mazed, alive or dead.\"\n\nAnd drawing her hood over her face, she turned to go back, holding Amyas\ntight by one hand, and Ayacanora by the other.\n\nThe crowd let them depart some twenty yards in respectful silence, and\nthen burst into a cheer which made the old town ring.\n\nMrs. Leigh stopped suddenly.\n\n\"I had forgotten, Amyas. You must not let me stand in the way of your\nduty. Where are your men?\"\n\n\"Kissed to death by this time; all of them, that is, who are left.\"\n\n\"Left?\"\n\n\"We went out a hundred, mother, and we came home forty-four--if we are\nat home. Is it a dream, mother? Is this you? and this old Bridgeland\nStreet again? As I live, there stands Evans the smith, at his door,\ntankard in hand, as he did when I was a boy!\"\n\nThe brawny smith came across the street to them; but stopped when he saw\nAmyas, but no Frank.\n\n\"Better one than neither, madam!\" said he, trying a rough comfort. Amyas\nshook his hand as he passed him; but Mrs. Leigh neither heard nor saw\nhim nor any one.\n\n\"Mother,\" said Amyas, when they were now past the causeway, \"we are rich\nfor life.\"\n\n\"Yes; a martyr's death was the fittest for him.\"\n\n\"I have brought home treasure untold.\"\n\n\"What, my boy?\"\n\n\"Treasure untold. Cary has promised to see to it to-night.\"\n\n\"Very well. I would that he had slept at our house. He was a kindly lad,\nand loved Frank. When did he?\"--\n\n\"Three years ago, and more. Within two months of our sailing.\"\n\n\"Ah! Yes, he told me so.\"\n\n\"Told you so?\"\n\n\"Yes; the dear lad has often come to see me in my sleep; but you never\ncame. I guessed how it was--as it should be.\"\n\n\"But I loved you none the less, mother!\"\n\n\"I know that, too: but you were busy with the men, you know, sweet;\nso your spirit could not come roving home like his, which was free.\nYes--all as it should be. My maid, and do you not find it cold here in\nEngland, after those hot regions?\"\n\n\"Ayacanora's heart is warm; she does not think about cold.\"\n\n\"Warm? perhaps you will warm my heart for me, then.\"\n\n\"Would God I could do it, mother!\" said Amyas, half reproachfully.\n\nMrs. Leigh looked up in his face, and burst into a violent flood of\ntears.\n\n\"Sinful! sinful that I am!\"\n\n\"Blessed creature!\" cried Amyas, \"if you speak so I shall go mad.\nMother, mother, I have been dreading this meeting for months. It has\nbeen a nightmare hanging over me like a horrible black thunder-cloud; a\ngreat cliff miles high, with its top hid in the clouds, which I had to\nclimb, and dare not. I have longed to leap overboard, and flee from it\nlike a coward into the depths of the sea.--The thought that you might\nask me whether I was not my brother's keeper--that you might require his\nblood at my hands--and now, now! when it comes! to find you all love,\nand trust, and patience--mother, mother, it's more than I can bear!\" and\nhe wept violently.\n\nMrs. Leigh knew enough of Amyas to know that any burst of this kind,\nfrom his quiet nature, betokened some very fearful struggle; and the\nloving creature forgot everything instantly, in the one desire to soothe\nhim.\n\nAnd soothe him she did; and home the two went, arm in arm together,\nwhile Ayacanora held fast, like a child, by the skirt of Mrs. Leigh's\ncloak. The self-help and daring of the forest nymph had given place to\nthe trembling modesty of the young girl, suddenly cast on shore in a new\nworld, among strange faces, strange hopes, and strange fears also.\n\n\"Will your mother love me?\" whispered she to Amyas, as she went in.\n\n\"Yes; but you must do what she tells you.\"\n\nAyacanora pouted.\n\n\"She will laugh at me, because I am wild.\"\n\n\"She never laughs at any one.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Ayacanora. \"Well, I shall not be afraid of her. I thought\nshe would have been tall like you; but she is not even as big as me.\"\n\nThis hardly sounded hopeful for the prospect of Ayacanora's obedience;\nbut ere twenty-four hours had passed, Mrs. Leigh had won her over\nutterly; and she explained her own speech by saying that she thought so\ngreat a man ought to have a great mother. She had expected, poor thing,\nin her simplicity, some awful princess with a frown like Juno's own, and\nfound instead a healing angel.\n\nHer story was soon told to Mrs. Leigh, who of course, woman-like,\nwould not allow a doubt as to her identity. And the sweet mother never\nimprinted a prouder or fonder kiss upon her son's forehead, than\nthat with which she repaid his simple declaration, that he had kept\nunspotted, like a gentleman and a Christian, the soul which God had put\ninto his charge.\n\n\"Then you have forgiven me, mother?\"\n\n\"Years ago I said in this same room, what should I render to the Lord\nfor having given me two such sons? And in this room I say it once again.\nTell me all about my other son, that I may honor him as I honor you.\"\n\nAnd then, with the iron nerve which good women have, she made him give\nher every detail of Lucy Passmore's story and of all which had happened\nfrom the day of their sailing to that luckless night at Guayra. And when\nit was done, she led Ayacanora out, and began busying herself about the\ngirl's comforts, as calmly as if Frank and Amyas had been sleeping in\ntheir cribs in the next room.\n\nBut she had hardly gone upstairs, when a loud knock at the door was\nfollowed by its opening hastily; and into the hall burst, regardless of\netiquette, the tall and stately figure of Sir Richard Grenville.\n\nAmyas dropped on his knees instinctively. The stern warrior was quite\nunmanned; and as he bent over his godson, a tear dropped from that iron\ncheek, upon the iron cheek of Amyas Leigh.\n\n\"My lad! my glorious lad! and where have you been? Get up, and tell me\nall. The sailors told me a little, but I must hear every word. I knew\nyou would do something grand. I told your mother you were too good a\nworkman for God to throw away. Now, let me have the whole story. Why, I\nam out of breath! To tell truth, I ran three-parts of the way hither.\"\n\nAnd down the two sat, and Amyas talked long into the night; while Sir\nRichard, his usual stateliness recovered, smiled stern approval at each\ndeed of daring; and when all was ended, answered with something like a\nsigh:\n\n\"Would God that I had been with you every step! Would God, at least,\nthat I could show as good a three-years' log-book, Amyas, my lad!\"\n\n\"You can show a better one, I doubt not.\"\n\n\"Humph! With the exception of one paltry Spanish prize, I don't know\nthat the queen is the better, or her enemies the worse, for me, since we\nparted last in Dublin city.\"\n\n\"You are too modest, sir.\"\n\n\"Would that I were; but I got on in Ireland, I found, no better than my\nneighbors; and so came home again, to find that while I had been wasting\nmy time in that land of misrule, Raleigh had done a deed to which I can\nsee no end. For, lad, he has found (or rather his two captains, Amadas\nand Barlow, have found for him) between Florida and Newfoundland, a\ncountry, the like of which, I believe, there is not on the earth for\nclimate and fertility. Whether there be gold there, I know not, and it\nmatters little; for there is all else on earth that man can want; furs,\ntimber, rivers, game, sugar-canes, corn, fruit, and every commodity\nwhich France, Spain, or Italy can yield, wild in abundance; the savages\ncivil enough for savages, and, in a word, all which goes to the making\nof as noble a jewel as her majesty's crown can wear. The people call it\nWingandacoa; but we, after her majesty, Virginia.\"\n\n\"You have been there, then?\"\n\n\"The year before last, lad; and left there Ralf Lane, Amadas, and some\ntwenty gentlemen, and ninety men, and, moreover, some money of my own,\nand some of old Will Salterne's, which neither of us will ever see\nagain. For the colony, I know not how, quarrelled with the Indians (I\nfear I too was over-sharp with some of them for stealing--if I was, God\nforgive me!), and could not, forsooth, keep themselves alive for twelve\nmonths; so that Drake, coming back from his last West Indian voyage,\nafter giving them all the help he could, had to bring the whole party\nhome. And if you will believe it, the faint-hearted fellows had not been\ngone a fortnight, before I was back again with three ships and all that\nthey could want. And never was I more wroth in my life, when all I found\nwas the ruins of their huts, which (so rich is the growth there) were\nalready full of great melons, and wild deer feeding thereon--a pretty\nsight enough, but not what I wanted just then. So back I came; and being\nin no overgood temper, vented my humors on the Portugals at the Azores,\nand had hard fights and small booty. So there the matter stands, but not\nfor long; for shame it were if such a paradise, once found by Britons,\nshould fall into the hands of any but her majesty; and we will try again\nthis spring, if men and money can be found. Eh, lad?\"\n\n\"But the prize?\"\n\n\"Ah! that was no small make-weight to our disasters, after all. I\nsighted her for six days' sail from the American coast: but ere we could\nlay her aboard it fell dead calm. Never a boat had I on board--they\nwere all lost in a gale of wind--and the other ships were becalmed two\nleagues astern of me. There was no use lying there and pounding her till\nshe sank; so I called the carpenter, got up all the old chests, and with\nthem and some spars we floated ourselves alongside, and only just in\ntime. For the last of us had hardly scrambled up into the chains, when\nour crazy Noah's ark went all aboard, and sank at the side, so that if\nwe had been minded to run away, Amyas, we could not; whereon, judging\nvalor to be the better part of discretion (as I usually do), we fell to\nwith our swords and had her in five minutes, and fifty thousand pounds'\nworth in her, which set up my purse again, and Raleigh's too, though I\nfear it has run out again since as fast as it ran in.\"\n\nAnd so ended Sir Richard's story.\n\nAmyas went the next day to Salterne, and told his tale. The old man had\nheard the outlines of it already: but he calmly bade him sit down, and\nlistened to all, his chin upon his hand, his elbows on his knees. His\ncheek never blanched, his lips never quivered throughout. Only when\nAmyas came to Rose's marriage, he heaved a long breath, as if a weight\nwas taken off his heart.\n\n\"Say that again, sir!\"\n\nAmyas said it again, and then went on; faltering, he hinted at the\nmanner of her death.\n\n\"Go on, sir! Why are you afraid? There is nothing to be ashamed of\nthere, is there?\"\n\nAmyas told the whole with downcast eyes, and then stole a look at his\nhearer's face. There was no sign of emotion: only somewhat of a proud\nsmile curled the corners of that iron mouth.\n\n\"And her husband?\" asked he, after a pause.\n\n\"I am ashamed to have to tell you, sir, that the man still lives.\"\n\n\"Still lives, sir?\"\n\n\"Too true, as far as I know. That it was not my fault, my story bears me\nwitness.\"\n\n\"Sir, I never doubted your will to kill him. Still lives, you say? Well,\nso do rats and adders. And now, I suppose, Captain Leigh, your worship\nis minded to recruit yourself on shore a while with the fair lass whom\nyou have brought home (as I hear) before having another dash at the\ndevil and his kin!\"\n\n\"Do not mention that young lady's name with mine, sir; she is no more to\nme than she is to you; for she has Spanish blood in her veins.\"\n\nSalterne smiled grimly.\n\n\"But I am minded at least to do one thing, Mr. Salterne, and that is, to\nkill Spaniards, in fair fight, by land and sea, wheresoever I shall meet\nthem. And, therefore, I stay not long here, whithersoever I may be bound\nnext.\"\n\n\"Well, sir, when you start, come to me for a ship, and the best I have\nis at your service; and, if she do not suit, command her to be fitted as\nyou like best; and I, William Salterne, will pay for all which you shall\ncommand to be done.\"\n\n\"My good sir, I have accounts to square with you after a very different\nfashion. As part-adventurer in the Rose, I have to deliver to you your\nshare of the treasure which I have brought home.\"\n\n\"My share, sir? If I understood you, my ship was lost off the coast of\nthe Caracas three years agone, and this treasure was all won since?\"\n\n\"True; but you, as an adventurer in the expedition, have a just claim\nfor your share, and will receive it.\"\n\n\"Captain Leigh, you are, I see, as your father was before you, a just\nand upright Christian man: but, sir, this money is none of mine, for it\nwas won in no ship of mine.--Hear me, sir! And if it had been, and\nthat ship\"--(he could not speak her name)--\"lay safe and sound now by\nBideford quay, do you think, sir, that William Salterne is the man to\nmake money out of his daughter's sin and sorrow, and to handle the price\nof blood? No, sir! You went like a gentleman to seek her, and like a\ngentleman, as all the world knows, you have done your best, and I thank\nyou: but our account ends there. The treasure is yours, sir; I have\nenough, and more than enough, and none, God help me, to leave it to, but\ngreedy and needy kin, who will be rather the worse than the better for\nit. And if I have a claim in law for aught--which I know not, neither\nshall ever ask--why, if you are not too proud, accept that claim as a\nplain burgher's thank-offering to you, sir, for a great and a noble love\nwhich you and your brother have shown to one who, though I say it, to my\nshame, was not worthy thereof.\"\n\n\"She was worthy of that and more, sir. For if she sinned like a woman,\nshe died like a saint.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir!\" answered the old man, with a proud smile; \"she had the right\nEnglish blood in her, I doubt not; and showed it at the last. But now,\nsir, no more of this. When you need a ship, mine is at your service;\ntill then, sir, farewell, and God be with you.\"\n\nAnd the old man rose, and with an unmoved countenance, bowed Amyas\nto the door. Amyas went back and told Cary, bidding him take half of\nSalterne's gift: but Cary swore a great oath that he would have none of\nit.\n\n\"Heir of Clovelly, Amyas, and want to rob you? I who have lost\nnothing,--you who have lost a brother! God forbid that I should ever\ntouch a farthing beyond my original share!\"\n\nThat evening a messenger from Bideford came running breathless up to\nBurrough Court. The authorities wanted Amyas's immediate attendance, for\nhe was one of the last, it seemed, who had seen Mr. Salterne alive.\n\nSalterne had gone over, as soon as Amyas departed, to an old\nacquaintance; signed and sealed his will in their presence with a firm\nand cheerful countenance, refusing all condolence; and then gone home,\nand locked himself into Rose's room. Supper-time came, and he did not\nappear. The apprentices could not make him answer, and at last called\nin the neighbors, and forced the door. Salterne was kneeling by his\ndaughter's bed; his head was upon the coverlet; his Prayer-book was\nopen before him at the Burial Service; his hands were clasped in\nsupplication; but he was dead and cold.\n\nHis will lay by him. He had left all his property among his poor\nrelations, saving and excepting all money, etc., due to him as owner and\npart-adventurer of the ship Rose, and his new bark of three hundred tons\nburden, now lying East-the-water; all which was bequeathed to Captain\nAmyas Leigh, on condition that he should re-christen that bark the\nVengeance,--fit her out with part of the treasure, and with her sail\nonce more against the Spaniard, before three years were past.\n\nAnd this was the end of William Salterne, merchant.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\nHOW THE VIRGINIA FLEET WAS STOPPED BY THE QUEEN'S COMMAND\n\n     \"The daughter of debate,\n        That discord still doth sow,\n     Shall reap no gain where former rule\n        Hath taught still peace to grow.\n     No foreign banish'd wight\n        Shall anker in this port\n     Our realm it brooks no stranger's force;\n        Let them elsewhere resort.\"\n\n                        QU. ELIZABETH. 1569.\n\nAnd now Amyas is settled quietly at home again; and for the next twelve\nmonths little passes worthy of record in these pages. Yeo has installed\nhimself as major domo, with no very definite functions, save those of\nwalking about everywhere at Amyas's heels like a lank gray wolf-hound,\nand spending his evenings at the fireside, as a true old sailor\ndoes, with his Bible on his knee, and his hands busy in manufacturing\nnumberless nicknacks, useful and useless, for every member of the\nfamily, and above all for Ayacanora, whom he insults every week by\nhumbly offering some toy only fit for a child; at which she pouts, and\nis reproved by Mrs. Leigh, and then takes the gift, and puts it away\nnever to look at it again. For her whole soul is set upon being\nan English maid; and she runs about all day long after Mrs. Leigh,\ninsisting upon learning the mysteries of the kitchen and the still-room,\nand, above all, the art of making clothes for herself, and at last for\neverybody in Northam. For first, she will be a good housewife, like Mrs.\nLeigh; and next a new idea has dawned on her: that of helping others.\nTo the boundless hospitality of the savage she has been of course\naccustomed: but to give to those who can give nothing in return, is a\nnew thought. She sees Mrs. Leigh spending every spare hour in working\nfor the poor, and visiting them in their cottages. She sees Amyas, after\npublic thanks in church for his safe return, giving away money, food,\nwhat not, in Northam, Appledore, and Bideford; buying cottages and\nmaking them almshouses for worn-out mariners; and she is told that\nthis is his thank-offering to God. She is puzzled; her notion of\na thank-offering was rather that of the Indians, and indeed of the\nSpaniards,--sacrifices of human victims, and the bedizenment of the\nGreat Spirit's sanctuary with their skulls and bones. Not that Amyas,\nas a plain old-fashioned churchman, was unmindful of the good old\ninstinctive rule, that something should be given to the Church itself;\nfor the vicar of Northam was soon resplendent with a new surplice, and\nwhat was more, the altar with a splendid flagon and salver of plate\n(lost, I suppose, in the civil wars) which had been taken in the great\ngalleon. Ayacanora could understand that: but the almsgiving she could\nnot, till Mrs. Leigh told her, in her simple way, that whosoever gave\nto the poor, gave to the Great Spirit; for the Great Spirit was in them,\nand in Ayacanora too, if she would be quiet and listen to him, instead\nof pouting, and stamping, and doing nothing but what she liked. And the\npoor child took in that new thought like a child, and worked her fingers\nto the bone for all the old dames in Northam, and went about with Mrs.\nLeigh, lovely and beloved, and looked now and then out from under her\nlong black eyelashes to see if she was winning a smile from Amyas. And\non the day on which she won one, she was good all day; and on the day on\nwhich she did not, she was thoroughly naughty, and would have worn out\nthe patience of any soul less chastened than Mrs. Leigh's. But as for\nthe pomp and glory of her dress, there was no keeping it within bounds;\nand she swept into church each Sunday bedizened in Spanish finery, with\nsuch a blaze and rustle, that the good vicar had to remonstrate humbly\nwith Mrs. Leigh on the disturbance which she caused to the eyes and\nthoughts of all his congregation. To which Ayacanora answered, that she\nwas not thinking about them, and they need not think about her; and that\nif the Piache (in plain English, the conjuror), as she supposed, wanted\na present, he might have all her Mexican feather-dresses; she would\nnot wear them--they were wild Indian things, and she was an English\nmaid--but they would just do for a Piache; and so darted upstairs,\nbrought them down, and insisted so stoutly on arraying the vicar\ntherein, that the good man beat a swift retreat. But he carried off\nwith him, nevertheless, one of the handsomest mantles, which, instead\nof selling it, he converted cleverly enough into an altar-cloth; and for\nseveral years afterwards, the communion at Northam was celebrated upon a\nblaze of emerald, azure, and crimson, which had once adorned the sinful\nbody of some Aztec prince.\n\nSo Ayacanora flaunted on; while Amyas watched her, half amused, half in\nsimple pride of her beauty; and looked around at all gazers, as much as\nto say, \"See what a fine bird I have brought home!\"\n\nAnother great trouble which she gave Mrs. Leigh was her conduct to the\nladies of the neighborhood. They came, of course, one and all, not only\nto congratulate Mrs. Leigh, but to get a peep at the fair savage; but\nthe fair savage snubbed them all round, from the vicar's wife to Lady\nGrenville herself, so effectually, that few attempted a second visit.\n\nMrs. Leigh remonstrated, and was answered by floods of tears. \"They only\ncome to stare at a poor wild Indian girl, and she would not be made a\nshow of. She was like a queen once, and every one obeyed her; but here\nevery one looked down upon her.\" But when Mrs. Leigh asked her, whether\nshe would sooner go back to the forests, the poor girl clung to her like\na baby, and entreated not to be sent away, \"She would sooner be a slave\nin the kitchen here, than go back to the bad people.\"\n\nAnd so on, month after month of foolish storm and foolish sunshine; but\nshe was under the shadow of one in whom was neither storm nor sunshine,\nbut a perpetual genial calm of soft gray weather, which tempered down\nto its own peacefulness all who entered its charmed influence; and the\noutbursts grew more and more rare, and Ayacanora more and more rational,\nthough no more happy, day by day.\n\nAnd one by one small hints came out which made her identity certain, at\nleast in the eyes of Mrs. Leigh and Yeo. After she had become familiar\nwith the sight of houses, she gave them to understand that she had seen\nsuch things before. The red cattle, too, seemed not unknown to her;\nthe sheep puzzled her for some time, and at last she gave Mrs. Leigh to\nunderstand that they were too small.\n\n\"Ah, madam,\" quoth Yeo, who caught at every straw, \"it is because she\nhas been accustomed to those great camel sheep (llamas they call them)\nin Peru.\"\n\nBut Ayacanora's delight was a horse. The use of tame animals at all was\na daily wonder to her; but that a horse could be ridden was the crowning\nmiracle of all; and a horse she would ride, and after plaguing Amyas for\none in vain (for he did not want to break her pretty neck), she proposed\nconfidentially to Yeo to steal one, and foiled in that, went to the\nvicar and offered to barter all her finery for his broken-kneed pony.\nBut the vicar was too honest to drive so good a bargain, and the matter\nended, in Amyas buying her a jennet, which she learned in a fortnight to\nride like a very Gaucho.\n\nAnd now awoke another curious slumbering reminiscence. For one day, at\nLady Grenville's invitation, the whole family went over to Stow; Mrs.\nLeigh soberly on a pillion behind the groom, Ayacanora cantering round\nand round upon the moors like a hound let loose, and trying to make\nAmyas ride races with her. But that night, sleeping in the same room\nwith Mrs. Leigh, she awoke shrieking, and sobbed out a long story how\nthe \"Old ape of Panama,\" her especial abomination, had come to her\nbedside and dragged her forth into the courtyard, and how she had\nmounted a horse and ridden with an Indian over great moors and high\nmountains down into a dark wood, and there the Indian and the horses\nvanished, and she found herself suddenly changed once more into a\nlittle savage child. So strong was the impression, that she could not be\npersuaded that the thing had not happened, if not that night, at least\nsome night or other. So Mrs. Leigh at last believed the same, and told\nthe company next morning in her pious way how the Lord had revealed in\na vision to the poor child who she was, and how she had been exposed in\nthe forests by her jealous step-father, and neither Sir Richard nor his\nwife could doubt but that hers was the true solution. It was probable\nthat Don Xararte, though his home was Panama, had been often at Quito,\nfor Yeo had seen him come on board the Lima ship at Guayaquil, one\nof the nearest ports. This would explain her having been found by the\nIndians beyond Cotopaxi, the nearest peak of the Eastern Andes, if, as\nwas but too likely, the old man, believing her to be Oxenham's child,\nhad conceived the fearful vengeance of exposing her in the forests.\n\nOther little facts came to light one by one. They were all connected\n(as was natural in a savage) with some animal or other natural object.\nWhatever impressions her morals or affections had received, had been\nerased by the long spiritual death of that forest sojourn; and Mrs.\nLeigh could not elicit from her a trace of feeling about her mother, or\nrecollection of any early religious teaching. This link, however, was\nsupplied at last, and in this way.\n\nSir Richard had brought home an Indian with him from Virginia. Of his\noriginal name I am not sure, but he was probably the \"Wanchese\" whose\nname occurs with that of \"Manteo.\"\n\nThis man was to be baptized in the church at Bideford by the name of\nRaleigh, his sponsors being most probably Raleigh himself, who may have\nbeen there on Virginian business, and Sir Richard Grenville. All the\nnotabilities of Bideford came, of course, to see the baptism of the\nfirst \"Red man\" whose foot had ever trodden British soil, and the mayor\nand corporation-men appeared in full robes, with maces and tipstaffs, to\ndo honor to that first-fruits of the Gospel in the West.\n\nMrs. Leigh went, as a matter of course, and Ayacanora would needs go\ntoo. She was very anxious to know what they were going to do with the\n\"Carib.\"\n\n\"To make him a Christian.\"\n\n\"Why did they not make her one?\"\n\nBecause she was one already. They were sure that she had been christened\nas soon as she was born. But she was not sure, and pouted a good deal\nat the chance of an \"ugly red Carib\" being better off than she was.\nHowever, all assembled duly; the stately son of the forest, now\ntransformed into a footman of Sir Richard's, was standing at the font;\nthe service was half performed when a heavy sigh, or rather groan, made\nall eyes turn, and Ayacanora sank fainting upon Mrs. Leigh's bosom.\n\nShe was carried out, and to a neighboring house; and when she came to\nherself, told a strange story. How, as she was standing there trying to\nrecollect whether she too had ever been baptized, the church seemed\nto grow larger, the priest's dress richer; the walls were covered with\npictures, and above the altar, in jewelled robes, stood a lady, and in\nher arms a babe. Soft music sounded in her ears; the air was full (on\nthat she insisted much) of fragrant odor which filled the church like\nmist; and through it she saw not one, but many Indians, standing by the\nfont; and a lady held her by the hand, and she was a little girl again.\n\nAnd after, many questionings, so accurate was her recollection, not only\nof the scene, but of the building, that Yeo pronounced:\n\n\"A christened woman she is, madam, if Popish christening is worth\ncalling such, and has seen Indians christened too in the Cathedral\nChurch at Quito, the inside whereof I know well enough, and too well,\nfor I sat there three mortal hours in a San Benito, to hear a friar\npreach his false doctrines, not knowing whether I was to be burnt or not\nnext day.\"\n\nSo Ayacanora went home to Burrough, and Raleigh the Indian to\nSir Richard's house. The entry of his baptism still stands,\ncrooked-lettered, in the old parchment register of the Bideford baptisms\nfor 1587-3:\n\n     \"Raleigh, a Winganditoian: March 26.\"\n\nHis name occurs once more, a year and a month after:\n\n     \"Rawly, a Winganditoian, April 1589.\"\n\nBut it is not this time among the baptisms. The free forest wanderer has\npined in vain for his old deer-hunts amid the fragrant cedar woods,\nand lazy paddlings through the still lagoons, where water-lilies sleep\nbeneath the shade of great magnolias, wreathed with clustered vines; and\nnow he is away to \"happier hunting-grounds,\" and all that is left of\nhim below sleeps in the narrow town churchyard, blocked in with dingy\nhouses, whose tenants will never waste a sigh upon the Indian's grave.\nThere the two entries stand, unto this day; and most pathetic they have\nseemed to me; a sort of emblem and first-fruits of the sad fate of that\nworn-out Red race, to whom civilization came too late to save, but not\ntoo late to hasten their decay.\n\nBut though Amyas lay idle, England did not. That spring saw another and\na larger colony sent out by Raleigh to Virginia, under the charge of one\nJohn White. Raleigh had written more than once, entreating Amyas to take\nthe command, which if he had done, perhaps the United States had begun\nto exist twenty years sooner than they actually did. But his mother had\nbound him by a solemn promise (and who can wonder at her for asking, or\nat him for giving it?) to wait at home with her twelve months at least.\nSo, instead of himself, he sent five hundred pounds, which I suppose\nare in Virginia (virtually at least) until this day; for they never came\nback again to him.\n\nBut soon came a sharper trial of Amyas's promise to his mother; and\none which made him, for the first time in his life, moody, peevish, and\nrestless, at the thought that others were fighting Spaniards, while\nhe was sitting idle at home. For his whole soul was filling fast with\nsullen malice against Don Guzman. He was losing the \"single eye,\" and\nhis whole body was no longer full of light. He had entered into the\ndarkness in which every man walks who hates his brother; and it lay upon\nhim like a black shadow day and night. No company, too, could be more\nfit to darken that shadow than Salvation Yeo's. The old man grew more\nstern in his fanaticism day by day, and found a too willing listener in\nhis master; and Mrs. Leigh was (perhaps for the first and last time\nin her life) seriously angry, when she heard the two coolly debating\nwhether they had not committed a grievous sin in not killing the Spanish\nprisoners on board the galleon.\n\nIt must be said, however (as the plain facts set down in this book\ntestify), that if such was the temper of Englishmen at that day,\nthe Spaniards had done a good deal to provoke it; and were just then\nattempting to do still more.\n\nFor now we are approaching the year 1588, \"which an astronomer of\nKonigsberg, above a hundred years before, foretold would be an admirable\nyear, and the German chronologers presaged would be the climacterical\nyear of the world.\"\n\nThe prophecies may stand for what they are worth; but they were at least\nfulfilled. That year was, indeed, the climacterical year of the world;\nand decided once and for all the fortunes of the European nations, and\nof the whole continent of America.\n\nNo wonder, then, if (as has happened in each great crisis of the human\nrace) some awful instinct that The Day of the Lord was at hand, some dim\nfeeling that there was war in heaven, and that the fiends of darkness\nand the angels of light were arrayed against each other in some mighty\nstruggle for the possession of the souls of men, should have tried\nto express itself in astrologic dreams, and, as was the fashion then,\nattributed to the \"rulers of the planetary houses\" some sympathy with\nthe coming world-tragedy.\n\nBut, for the wise, there needed no conjunction of planets to tell them\nthat the day was near at hand, when the long desultory duel between\nSpain and England would end, once and for all, in some great\ndeath-grapple. The war, as yet, had been confined to the Netherlands, to\nthe West Indies, and the coasts and isles of Africa; to the quarters,\nin fact, where Spain was held either to have no rights, or to have\nforfeited them by tyranny. But Spain itself had been respected by\nEngland, as England had by Spain; and trade to Spanish ports went on as\nusual, till, in the year 1585, the Spaniard, without warning, laid an\nembargo on all English ships coming to his European shores. They were to\nbe seized, it seemed, to form part of an enormous armament, which was to\nattack and crush, once and for all--whom? The rebellious Netherlanders,\nsaid the Spaniards: but the queen, the ministry, and, when it was just\nnot too late, the people of England, thought otherwise. England was the\ndestined victim; so, instead of negotiating, in order to avoid fighting,\nthey fought in order to produce negotiation. Drake, Frobisher, and\nCarlisle, as we have seen, swept the Spanish Main with fire and sword,\nstopping the Indian supplies; while Walsingham (craftiest, and yet most\nhonest of mortals) prevented, by some mysterious financial operation,\nthe Venetian merchants from repairing the Spaniards' loss by a loan; and\nno Armada came that year.\n\nIn the meanwhile, the Jesuits, here and abroad, made no secret, among\ntheir own dupes, of the real objects of the Spanish armament. The\nimpious heretics,--the Drakes and Raleighs, Grenvilles and Cavendishes,\nHawkinses and Frobishers, who had dared to violate that hidden sanctuary\nof just half the globe, which the pope had bestowed on the defender of\nthe true faith,--a shameful ruin, a terrible death awaited them, when\ntheir sacrilegious barks should sink beneath the thunder of Spanish\ncannon, blessed by the pope, and sanctified with holy water and prayer\nto the service of \"God and his Mother.\" Yes, they would fall, and\nEngland with them. The proud islanders, who had dared to rebel against\nSt. Peter, and to cast off the worship of \"Mary,\" should bow their\nnecks once more under the yoke of the Gospel. Their so-called queen,\nillegitimate, excommunicate, contumacious, the abettor of free-trade,\nthe defender of the Netherlands, the pillar of false doctrine throughout\nEurope, should be sent in chains across the Alps, to sue for her life at\nthe feet of the injured and long-suffering father of mankind, while\nhis nominee took her place upon the throne which she had long since\nforfeited by her heresy.\n\n\"What nobler work? How could the Church of God be more gloriously\npropagated? How could higher merit be obtained by faithful Catholics?\nIt must succeed. Spain was invincible in valor, inexhaustible in wealth.\nHeaven itself offered them an opportunity. They had nothing now to fear\nfrom the Turk, for they had concluded a truce with him; nothing from the\nFrench, for they were embroiled in civil war. The heavens themselves\nhad called upon Spain to fulfil her heavenly mission, and restore to\nthe Church's crown this brightest and richest of her lost jewels. The\nheavens themselves called to a new crusade. The saints, whose altars\nthe English had rifled and profaned, called them to a new crusade. The\nVirgin Queen of Heaven, whose boundless stores of grace the English\nspurned, called them to a new crusade. Justly incensed at her own wrongs\nand indignities, that 'ever-gracious Virgin, refuge of sinners, and\nmother of fair love, and holy hope,' adjured by their knightly honor all\nvaliant cavaliers to do battle in her cause against the impious harlot\nwho assumed her titles, received from her idolatrous flatterers the\nhomage due to Mary alone, and even (for Father Parsons had asserted it,\ntherefore it must be true) had caused her name to be substituted for\nthat of Mary in the Litanies of the Church. Let all who wore within a\nmanly heart, without a manly sword, look on the woes of 'Mary,'--her\nshame, her tears, her blushes, her heart pierced through with daily\nwounds, from heretic tongues, and choose between her and Elizabeth!\"\n\nSo said Parsons, Allen, and dozens more; and said more than this, too,\nand much which one had rather not repeat; and were somewhat surprised\nand mortified to find that their hearers, though they granted the\npremises, were too dull or carnal to arrive at the same conclusion. The\nEnglish lay Romanists, almost to a man, had hearts sounder than their\nheads, and, howsoever illogically, could not help holding to the strange\nsuperstition that, being Englishmen, they were bound to fight for\nEngland. So the hapless Jesuits, who had been boasting for years past\nthat the persecuted faithful throughout the island would rise as one man\nto fight under the blessed banner of the pope and Spain, found that the\nfaithful, like Demas of old, forsook them and \"went after this present\nworld;\" having no objection, of course, to the restoration of Popery:\nbut preferring some more comfortable method than an invasion which would\ninevitably rob them of their ancestral lands and would seat needy and\ngreedy Castilians in their old country houses, to treat their tenants as\nthey had treated the Indians of Hispaniola, and them as they had treated\nthe caciques.\n\nBut though the hearts of men in that ungodly age were too hard to melt\nat the supposed woes of the Mary who reigned above, and too dull to turn\nrebels and traitors for the sake of those thrones and principalities in\nsupra-lunar spheres which might be in her gift: yet there was a Mary\nwho reigned (or ought to reign) below, whose woes (like her gifts) were\nsomewhat more palpable to the carnal sense. A Mary who, having every\ncomfort and luxury (including hounds and horses) found for her by the\nEnglish Government, at an expense which would be now equal to some\ntwenty thousand a year, could afford to employ the whole of her jointure\nas Queen Dowager of France (probably equal to fifty thousand a year\nmore), in plotting the destruction of the said government, and the\nmurder of its queen; a Mary who, if she prospered as she ought, might\nhave dukedoms, and earldoms, fair lands and castles to bestow on her\nfaithful servants; a Mary, finally, who contrived by means of an angel\nface, a serpent tongue, and a heart (as she said herself) as hard as\na diamond, to make every weak man fall in love with her, and, what was\nworse, fancy more or less that she was in love with him.\n\nOf her the Jesuits were not unmindful; and found it convenient, indeed,\nto forget awhile the sorrows of the Queen of Heaven in those of the\nQueen of Scots. Not that they cared much for those sorrows; but they\nwere an excellent stock-in-trade. She was a Romanist; she was \"beautiful\nand unfortunate,\" a virtue which, like charity, hides the multitude of\nsins; and therefore she was a convenient card to play in the great game\nof Rome against the Queen and people of England; and played the poor\ncard was, till it got torn up by over-using. Into her merits or demerits\nI do not enter deeply here. Let her rest in peace.\n\nTo all which the people of England made a most practical and terrible\nanswer. From the highest noble to the lowest peasant, arose one\nsimultaneous plebiscitum: \"We are tired of these seventeen years of\nchicanery and terror. This woman must die: or the commonweal of England\nperish!\" We all know which of the two alternatives was chosen.\n\nAll Europe stood aghast: but rather with astonishment at English\naudacity, than with horror at English wickedness. Mary's own French\nkinsfolk had openly given her up as too bad to be excused, much less\nassisted. Her own son blustered a little to the English ambassador;\nfor the majesty of kings was invaded: whereon Walsingham said in open\ncouncil, that \"the queen should send him a couple of hounds, and that\nwould set all right.\" Which sage advice (being acted on, and some deer\nsent over and above) was so successful that the pious mourner, having\nrun off (Randolph says, like a baby to see the deer in their cart),\nreturned for answer that he would \"thereafter depend wholly upon her\nmajesty, and serve her fortune against all the world; and that he only\nwanted now two of her majesty's yeoman prickers, and a couple of her\ngrooms of the deer.\" The Spaniard was not sorry on the whole for the\ncatastrophe; for all that had kept him from conquering England long ago\nwas the fear lest, after it was done, he might have had to put the crown\nthereof on Mary's head, instead of his own. But Mary's death was as\nconvenient a stalking-horse to him as to the pope; and now the Armada\nwas coming in earnest.\n\nElizabeth began negotiating; but fancy not that she does nothing more,\nas the following letter testifies, written about midsummer, 1587.\n\n\n\"F. Drake to Captain Amyas Leigh. This with haste.\n\n\"DEAR LAD,\n\n\"As I said to her most glorious majesty, I say to you now. There are two\nways of facing an enemy. The one to stand off, and cry, 'Try that again,\nand I'll strike thee'; the other to strike him first, and then, 'Try\nthat at all, and I'll strike thee again.' Of which latter counsel her\nmajesty so far approves, that I go forthwith (tell it not in Gath) down\nthe coast, to singe the king of Spain's beard (so I termed it to her\nmajesty, she laughing), in which if I leave so much as a fishing-boat\nafloat from the Groyne unto Cadiz, it will not be with my good will, who\nintend that if he come this year, he shall come by swimming and not by\nsailing. So if you are still the man I have known you, bring a good ship\nround to Plymouth within the month, and away with me for hard blows and\nhard money, the feel of both of which you know pretty well by now.\n\n\"Thine lovingly,\n\n\"F. Drake.\"\n\n\nAmyas clutched his locks over this letter, and smoked more tobacco the\nday he got it than had ever before been consumed at once in England. But\nhe kept true to his promise; and this was his reply:--\n\n\n\n\"Amyas Leigh to the Worshipful Sir F. Drake, Admiral of her Majesty's\nFleet in Plymouth.\n\n\"MOST HONORED SIR,\n\n\"A magician keeps me here, in bilboes for which you have no picklock;\nnamely, a mother who forbids. The loss is mine: but Antichrist I can\nfight any year (for he will not die this bout, nor the next), while my\nmother--but I will not trouble your patience more than to ask from you\nto get me news, if you can, from any prisoners of one Don Guzman Maria\nMagdalena Sotomayor de Soto; whether he is in Spain or in the Indies;\nand what the villain does, and where he is to be found. This only I\nentreat of you, and so remain behind with a heavy heart.\n\n\"Yours to command in all else, and I would to Heaven, in this also,\n\n\"AMYAS LEIGH.\"\n\n\nI am sorry to have to say, that after having thus obeyed his mother,\nMaster Amyas, as men are too apt to do, revenged himself on her by being\nmore and more cross and disagreeable. But his temper amended much,\nwhen, a few months after, Drake returned triumphant, having destroyed\na hundred sail in Cadiz alone, taken three great galleons with immense\nwealth on board, burnt the small craft all along the shore, and offered\nbattle to Santa Cruz at the mouth of the Tagus. After which it is\nunnecessary to say, that the Armada was put off for yet another year.\n\nThis news, indeed, gave Amyas little comfort; for he merely observed,\ngrumbling, that Drake had gone and spoiled everybody else's sport: but\nwhat cheered him was news from Drake that Don Guzman had been heard of\nfrom the captain of one of the galleons; that he was high in favor in\nSpain, and commandant of soldiers on board one of the largest of the\nmarquis's ships.\n\nAnd when Amyas heard that, a terrible joy took possession of him. When\nthe Armada came, as come it would, he should meet his enemy at last! He\ncould wait now patiently: if--and he shuddered at himself, as he found\nhimself in the very act of breathing a prayer that Don Guzman might not\ndie before that meeting.\n\nIn the meanwhile, rumor flew thousand-tongued through the length and\nbreadth of the land; of vast preparations going on in Spain and Italy;\nof timber felled long before for some such purpose, brought down to the\nsea, and sawn out for shipbuilding; of casting of cannon, and drilling\nof soldiers; of ships in hundreds collecting at Lisbon; of a crusade\npreached by Pope Sixtus the Fifth, who had bestowed the kingdom of\nEngland on the Spaniard, to be enjoyed by him as vassal tributary to\nRome; of a million of gold to be paid by the pope, one-half down at\nonce, the other half when London was taken; of Cardinal Allen writing\nand printing busily in the Netherlands, calling on all good Englishmen\nto carry out, by rebelling against Elizabeth, the bull of Sixtus the\nFifth, said (I blush to repeat it) to have been dictated by the Holy\nGhost; of Inquisitors getting ready fetters and devil's engines of all\nsorts; of princes and noblemen, flocking from all quarters, gentlemen\nselling their private estates to fit out ships; how the Prince of\nMelito, the Marquess of Burgrave, Vespasian Gonzaga, John Medicis,\nAmadas of Savoy, in short, the illegitimate sons of all the southern\nprinces, having no lands of their own, were coming to find that\nnecessary of life in this pleasant little wheat-garden. Nay, the Duke of\nMedina Sidonia had already engaged Mount-Edgecombe for himself, as the\nfairest jewel of the south; which when good old Sir Richard Edgecombe\nheard, he observed quietly, that in 1555 he had the pleasure of\nreceiving at his table at one time the admirals of England, Spain, and\nthe Netherlands, and therefore had experience in entertaining Dons; and\nmade preparations for the visit by filling his cellars with gunpowder,\nwith a view to a house-warming and feu-de-joie on the occasion. But as\nold Fuller says, \"The bear was not yet killed, and Medina Sidonia might\nhave catched a great cold, had he no other clothes to wear than the skin\nthereof.\"\n\nSo flew rumor, false and true, till poor John Bull's wits were well-nigh\nturned: but to the very last, after his lazy fashion, he persuaded\nhimself that it would all come right somehow; that it was too great news\nto be true; that if it was true, the expedition was only meant for the\nNetherlands; and, in short, sat quietly over his beef and beer for many\na day after the French king had sent him fair warning, and the queen,\nthe ministry, and the admirals had been assuring him again and again\nthat he, and not the Dutchman, was the destined prey of this great\nflight of ravenous birds.\n\nAt last the Spaniard, in order that there should be no mistake about the\nmatter, kindly printed a complete bill of the play, to be seen still in\nVan Meteran, for the comfort of all true Catholics, and confusion of all\npestilent heretics; which document, of course, the seminary priests used\nto enforce the duty of helping the invaders, and the certainty of their\nsuccess; and from their hands it soon passed into those of the devout\nladies, who were not very likely to keep it to themselves; till John\nBull himself found his daughters buzzing over it with very pale faces\n(as young ladies well might who had no wish to follow the fate of\nthe damsels of Antwerp), and condescending to run his eye through it,\ndiscovered, what all the rest of Europe had known for months past, that\nhe was in a very great scrape.\n\nWell it was for England, then, that her Tudor sovereigns had compelled\nevery man (though they kept up no standing army) to be a trained\nsoldier. Well it was that Elizabeth, even in those dangerous days of\nintrigue and rebellion, had trusted her people enough, not only to leave\nthem their weapons, but (what we, forsooth, in these more \"free\" and\n\"liberal\" days dare not do) to teach them how to use them. Well it\nwas, that by careful legislation for the comfort and employment of \"the\nmasses\" (term then, thank God, unknown), she had both won their hearts,\nand kept their bodies in fighting order. Well it was that, acting as\nfully as Napoleon did on \"la carriere ouverte aux talens,\" she had\nraised to the highest posts in her councils, her army, and her navy, men\nof business, who had not been ashamed to buy and sell as merchants and\nadventurers. Well for England, in a word, that Elizabeth had pursued\nfor thirty years a very different course from that which we have been\npursuing for the last thirty, with one exception, namely, the leaving as\nmuch as possible to private enterprise.\n\nThere we have copied her: would to Heaven that we had in some other\nmatters! It is the fashion now to call her a despot: but unless every\nmonarch is to be branded with that epithet whose power is not as\ncircumscribed as Queen Victoria's is now, we ought rather to call her\nthe most popular sovereign, obeyed of their own free will by the freest\nsubjects which England has ever seen; confess the Armada fight to have\nbeen as great a moral triumph as it was a political one; and (now that\nour late boasting is a little silenced by Crimean disasters) inquire\nwhether we have not something to learn from those old Tudor times, as\nto how to choose officials, how to train a people, and how to defend a\ncountry.\n\nTo return to the thread of my story.\n\nJanuary, 1587-8, had well-nigh run through, before Sir Richard Grenville\nmade his appearance on the streets of Bideford. He had been appointed in\nNovember one of the council of war for providing for the safety of the\nnation, and the West Country had seen nothing of him since. But one\nmorning, just before Christmas, his stately figure darkened the old\nbay-window at Burrough, and Amyas rushed out to meet him, and bring him\nin, and ask what news from Court.\n\n\"All good news, dear lad, and dearer madam. The queen shows the spirit\nof a very Boadicea or Semiramis; ay, a very Scythian Tomyris, and if she\nhad the Spaniard before her now, would verily, for aught I know, feast\nhim as the Scythian queen did Cyrus, with 'Satia te sanguine, quod\nsitisti.'\"\n\n\"I trust her most merciful spirit is not so changed already,\" said Mrs.\nLeigh.\n\n\"Well, if she would not do it, I would, and ask pardon afterwards, as\nRaleigh did about the rascals at Smerwick, whom Amyas knows of. Mrs.\nLeigh, these are times in which mercy is cruelty. Not England alone,\nbut the world, the Bible, the Gospel itself, is at stake; and we must do\nterrible things, lest we suffer more terrible ones.\"\n\n\"God will take care of world and Bible better than any cruelty of ours,\ndear Sir Richard.\"\n\n\"Nay, but, Mrs. Leigh, we must help Him to take care of them! If those\nSmerwick Spaniards had not been--\"\n\n\"The Spaniard would not have been exasperated into invading us.\"\n\n\"And we should not have had this chance of crushing him once and for\nall; but the quarrel is of older standing, madam, eh, Amyas? Amyas, has\nRaleigh written to you of late?\"\n\n\"Not a word, and I wonder why.\"\n\n\"Well; no wonder at that, if you knew how he has been laboring. The\nwonder is, whence he got the knowledge wherewith to labor; for he never\nsaw sea-work to my remembrance.\"\n\n\"Never saw a shot fired by sea, except ours at Smerwick, and that\nbrush with the Spaniards in 1579, when he sailed for Virginia with Sir\nHumphrey; and he was a mere crack then.\"\n\n\"So you consider him as your pupil, eh? But he learnt enough in the\nNetherland wars, and in Ireland too, if not of the strength of ships,\nyet still of the weakness of land forces; and would you believe it, the\nman has twisted the whole council round his finger, and made them give\nup the land defences to the naval ones.\"\n\n\"Quite right he, and wooden walls against stone ones for ever! But as\nfor twisting, he would persuade Satan, if he got him alone for half an\nhour.\"\n\n\"I wish he would sail for Spain then, just now, and try the powers of\nhis tongue,\" said Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"But are we to have the honor, really?\"\n\n\"We are, lad. There were many in the council who were for disputing the\nlanding on shore, and said--which I do not deny--that the 'prentice\nboys of London could face the bluest blood in Spain. But Raleigh argued\n(following my Lord Burleigh in that) that we differed from the Low\nCountries, and all other lands, in that we had not a castle or town\nthroughout, which would stand a ten days' siege, and that our ramparts,\nas he well said, were, after all, only a body of men. So, he argued, as\nlong as the enemy has power to land where he will, prevention, rather\nthan cure, is our only hope; and that belongs to the office, not of an\narmy, but of a fleet. So the fleet was agreed on, and a fleet we shall\nhave.\"\n\n\"Then here is his health, the health of a true friend to all bold\nmariners, and myself in particular! But where is he now?\"\n\n\"Coming here to-morrow, as I hope--for he left London with me, and so\ndown by us into Cornwall, to drill the train-bands, as he is bound\nto do, being Seneschal of the Duchies and Lieutenant-General of the\ncounty.\"\n\n\"Besides Lord Warden of the Stanneries! How the man thrives!\" said Mrs.\nLeigh.\n\n\"How the man deserves to thrive!\" said Amyas; \"but what are we to do?\"\n\n\"That is the rub. I would fain stay and fight the Spaniards.\"\n\n\"So would I; and will.\"\n\n\"But he has other plans in his head for us.\"\n\n\"We can make our own plans without his help.\"\n\n\"Heyday, Amyas! How long? When did he ask you to do a thing yet and you\nrefuse him?\"\n\n\"Not often, certainly; but Spaniards I must fight.\"\n\n\"Well, so must I, boy: but I have given a sort of promise to him,\nnevertheless.\"\n\n\"Not for me too, I hope?\"\n\n\"No: he will extract that himself when he comes; you must come and sup\nto-morrow, and talk it over.\"\n\n\"Be talked over, rather. What chestnut does the cat want us monkeys to\npull out of the fire for him now, I wonder?\"\n\n\"Sir Richard Grenville is hardly accustomed to be called a monkey,\" said\nMrs. Leigh.\n\n\"I meant no harm; and his worship knows it, none better: but where is\nRaleigh going to send us, with a murrain?\"\n\n\"To Virginia. The settlers must have help: and, as I trust in God, we\nshall be back again long before this armament can bestir itself.\"\n\nSo Raleigh came, saw, and conquered. Mrs. Leigh consented to Amyas's\ngoing (for his twelve-month would be over ere the fleet could start)\nupon so peaceful and useful an errand; and the next five months were\nspent in continual labor on the part of Amyas and Grenville, till seven\nships were all but ready in Bideford river, the admiral whereof was\nAmyas Leigh.\n\nBut that fleet was not destined ever to see the shores of the New World:\nit had nobler work to do (if Americans will forgive the speech) than\neven settling the United States.\n\nIt was in the long June evenings, in the year 1588; Mrs. Leigh sat in\nthe open window, busy at her needle-work; Ayacanora sat opposite to her,\non the seat of the bay, trying diligently to read \"The History of the\nNine Worthies,\" and stealing a glance every now and then towards the\ngarden, where Amyas stalked up and down as he had used to do in happier\ndays gone by. But his brow was contracted now, his eyes fixed on the\nground, as he plodded backwards and forwards, his hands behind his back,\nand a huge cigar in his mouth, the wonder of the little boys of Northam,\nwho peeped in stealthily as they passed the iron-work gates, to see the\nback of the famous fire-breathing captain who had sailed round the world\nand been in the country of headless men and flying dragons, and then\npopped back their heads suddenly, as he turned toward them in his walk.\nAnd Ayacanora looked, and looked, with no less admiration than the\nurchins at the gate: but she got no more of an answering look from Amyas\nthan they did; for his head was full of calculations of tonnage and\nstowage, of salt pork and ale-barrels, and the packing of tools and\nseeds; for he had promised Raleigh to do his best for the new colony,\nand he was doing it with all his might; so Ayacanora looked back again\nto her book, and heaved a deep sigh. It was answered by one from Mrs.\nLeigh.\n\n\"We are a melancholy pair, sweet chuck,\" said the fair widow. \"What is\nmy maid sighing about, there?\"\n\n\"Because I cannot make out the long words,\" said Ayacanora, telling a\nvery white fib.\n\n\"Is that all? Come to me, and I will tell you.\"\n\nAyacanora moved over to her, and sat down at her feet.\n\n\"H--e, he, r--o, ro, i--c--a--l, heroical,\" said Mrs. Leigh.\n\n\"But what does that mean?\"\n\n\"Grand, good, and brave, like--\"\n\nMrs. Leigh was about to have said the name of one who was lost to her\non earth. His fair angelic face hung opposite upon the wall. She paused\nunable to pronounce his name; and lifted up her eyes, and gazed on the\nportrait, and breathed a prayer between closed lips, and drooped her\nhead again.\n\nHer pupil caught at the pause, and filled it up for herself--\n\n\"Like him?\" and she turned her head quickly toward the window.\n\n\"Yes, like him, too,\" said Mrs. Leigh, with a half-smile at the gesture.\n\"Now, mind your book. Maidens must not look out of the window in school\nhours.\"\n\n\"Shall I ever be an English girl?\" asked Ayacanora.\n\n\"You are one now, sweet; your father was an English gentleman.\"\n\nAmyas looked in, and saw the two sitting together.\n\n\"You seem quite merry there,\" said he.\n\n\"Come in, then, and be merry with us.\"\n\nHe entered, and sat down; while Ayacanora fixed her eyes most\nsteadfastly on her book.\n\n\"Well, how goes on the reading?\" said he; and then, without waiting for\nan answer--\"We shall be ready to clear out this day week, mother, I do\nbelieve; that is, if the hatchets are made in time to pack them.\"\n\n\"I hope they will be better than the last,\" said Mrs. Leigh. \"It seems\nto me a shameful sin to palm off on poor ignorant savages goods which we\nshould consider worthless for ourselves.\"\n\n\"Well, it's not over fair: but still, they are a sight better than they\never had before. An old hoop is better than a deer's bone, as Ayacanora\nknows,--eh?\"\n\n\"I don't know anything about it,\" said she, who was always nettled at\nthe least allusion to her past wild life. \"I am an English girl now, and\nall that is gone--I forget it.\"\n\n\"Forget it?\" said he, teasing her for want of something better to do.\n\"Should not you like to sail with us, now, and see the Indians in the\nforests once again?\"\n\n\"Sail with you?\" and she looked up eagerly.\n\n\"There! I knew it! She would not be four-and-twenty hours ashore, but\nshe would be off into the woods again, bow in hand, like any runaway\nnymph, and we should never see her more.\"\n\n\"It is false, bad man!\" and she burst into violent tears, and hid her\nface in Mrs. Leigh's lap.\n\n\"Amyas, Amyas, why do you tease the poor fatherless thing?\"\n\n\"I was only jesting, I'm sure,\" said Amyas, like a repentant schoolboy.\n\"Don't cry now, don't cry, my child, see here,\" and he began fumbling in\nhis pockets; \"see what I bought of a chapman in town to-day, for you, my\nmaid, indeed, I did.\"\n\nAnd out he pulled some smart kerchief or other, which had taken his\nsailor's fancy.\n\n\"Look at it now, blue, and crimson, and green, like any parrot!\" and he\nheld it out.\n\nShe looked round sharply, snatched it out of his hand, and tore it to\nshreds.\n\n\"I hate it, and I hate you!\" and she sprang up and darted out of the\nroom.\n\n\"Oh, boy, boy!\" said Mrs. Leigh, \"will you kill that poor child? It\nmatters little for an old heart like mine, which has but one or two\nchords left whole, how soon it be broken altogether; but a young heart\nis one of God's precious treasures, Amyas, and suffers many a long pang\nin the breaking; and woe to them who despise Christ's little ones!\"\n\n\"Break your heart, mother?\"\n\n\"Never mind my heart, dear son; yet how can you break it more surely\nthan by tormenting one whom I love, because she loves you?\"\n\n\"Tut! play, mother, and maids' tempers. But how can I break your heart?\nWhat have I done? Have I not given up going again to the West Indies for\nyour sake? Have I not given up going to Virginia, and now again settled\nto go after all, just because you commanded? Was it not your will? Have\nI not obeyed you, mother, mother? I will stay at home now, if you will.\nI would rather rust here on land, I vow I would, than grieve you--\" and\nhe threw himself at his mother's knees.\n\n\"Have I asked you not to go to Virginia? No, dear boy, though every\nthought of a fresh parting seems to crack some new fibre within me, you\nmust go! It is your calling. Yes; you were not sent into the world to\namuse me, but to work. I have had pleasure enough of you, my darling,\nfor many a year, and too much, perhaps; till I shrank from lending you\nto the Lord. But He must have you. . . . It is enough for the poor old\nwidow to know that her boy is what he is, and to forget all her anguish\nday by day, for joy that a man is born into the world. But, Amyas,\nAmyas, are you so blind as not to see that Ayacanora--\"\n\n\"Don't talk about her, poor child. Talk about yourself.\"\n\n\"How long have I been worth talking about? No, Amyas, you must see it;\nand if you will not see it now, you will see it one day in some sad and\nfearful prodigy; for she is not one to die tamely. She loves you, Amyas,\nas a woman only can love.\"\n\n\"Loves me? Well, of course. I found her, and brought her home; and I\ndon't deny she may think that she owes me somewhat--though it was no\nmore than a Christian man's duty. But as for her caring much for me,\nmother, you measure every one else's tenderness by your own.\"\n\n\"Think that she owes you somewhat? Silly boy, this is not gratitude,\nbut a deeper affection, which may be more heavenly than gratitude, as\nit may, too, become a horrible cause of ruin. It rests with you, Amyas,\nwhich of the two it will be.\"\n\n\"You are in earnest?\"\n\n\"Have I the heart or the time to jest?\"\n\n\"No, no, of course not; but, mother, I thought it was not comely for\nwomen to fall in love with men?\"\n\n\"Not comely, at least, to confess their love to men. But she has never\ndone that, Amyas; not even by a look or a tone of voice, though I have\nwatched her for months.\"\n\n\"To be sure, she is as demure as any cat when I am in the way. I only\nwonder how you found it out.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said she, smiling sadly, \"even in the saddest woman's soul there\nlinger snatches of old music, odors of flowers long dead and turned to\ndust--pleasant ghosts, which still keep her mind attuned to that which\nmay be in others, though in her never more; till she can hear her own\nwedding-hymn re-echoed in the tones of every girl who loves, and sees\nher own wedding-torch re-lighted in the eyes of every bride.\"\n\n\"You would not have me marry her?\" asked blunt, practical Amyas.\n\n\"God knows what I would have--I know not; I see neither your path nor\nmy own--no, not after weeks and months of prayer. All things beyond are\nwrapped in mist; and what will be, I know not, save that whatever else\nis wrong, mercy at least is right.\"\n\n\"I'd sail to-morrow, if I could. As for marrying her, mother--her birth,\nmind me--\"\n\n\"Ah, boy, boy! Are you God, to visit the sins of the parents upon the\nchildren?\"\n\n\"Not that. I don't mean that; but I mean this, that she is half a\nSpaniard, mother; and I cannot!--Her blood may be as blue as King\nPhilip's own, but it is Spanish still! I cannot bear the thought that my\nchildren should have in their veins one drop of that poison.\"\n\n\"Amyas! Amyas!\" interrupted she, \"is this not, too, visiting the\nparents' sins on the children?\"\n\n\"Not a whit; it is common sense,--she must have the taint of their\nbloodthirsty humor. She has it--I have seen it in her again and again.\nI have told you, have I not? Can I forget the look of her eyes as\nshe stood over that galleon's captain, with the smoking knife in her\nhand.--Ugh! And she is not tamed yet, as you can see, and never will\nbe:--not that I care, except for her own sake, poor thing!\"\n\n\"Cruel boy! to impute as a blame to the poor child, not only the errors\nof her training, but the very madness of her love!\"\n\n\"Of her love?\"\n\n\"Of what else, blind buzzard? From the moment that you told me the story\nof that captain's death, I knew what was in her heart--and thus it is\nthat you requite her for having saved your life!\"\n\n\"Umph! that is one word too much, mother. If you don't want to send me\ncrazy, don't put the thing on the score of gratitude or duty. As it is,\nI can hardly speak civilly to her (God forgive me!) when I recollect\nthat she belongs to the crew who murdered him\"--and he pointed to the\npicture, and Mrs. Leigh shuddered as he did so.\n\n\"You feel it! You know you feel it, tender-hearted, forgiving angel as\nyou are; and what do you think I must feel?\"\n\n\"Oh, my son, my son!\" cried she, wringing her hands, \"if I be wretch\nenough to give place to the devil for a moment, does that give you a\nright to entertain and cherish him thus day by day?\"\n\n\"I should cherish him with a vengeance, if I brought up a crew of\nchildren who could boast of a pedigree of idolaters and tyrants, hunters\nof Indians, and torturers of women! How pleasant to hear her telling\nMaster Jack, 'Your illustrious grand-uncle the pope's legate, was\nthe man who burned Rose Salterne at Cartagena;' or Miss Grace, 'Your\ngreat-grandfather of sixteen quarterings, the Marquis of this, son of\nthe Grand-equerry that, and husband of the Princess t'other, used to\nfeed his bloodhounds, when beef was scarce, with Indians' babies!' Eh,\nmother? These things are true, and if you can forget them, I cannot. Is\nit not enough to have made me forego for awhile my purpose, my business,\nthe one thing I live for, and that is, hunting down the Spaniards as I\nwould adders or foxes, but you must ask me over and above to take one to\nmy bosom?\"\n\n\"Oh, my son, my son! I have not asked you to do that; I have only\ncommanded you, in God's name, to be merciful, if you wish to obtain\nmercy. Oh, if you will not pity this poor maiden, pity yourself; for God\nknows you stand in more need of it than she does!\"\n\nAmyas was silent for a minute or two; and then,--\n\n\"If it were not for you, mother, would God that the Armada would come!\"\n\n\"What, and ruin England?\"\n\n\"No! Curse them! Not a foot will they ever set on English soil, such a\nwelcome would we give them. If I were but in the midst of that fleet,\nfighting like a man--to forget it all, with a galleon on board of me to\nlarboard, and another to starboard--and then to put a linstock in the\nmagazine, and go aloft in good company--I don't care how soon it comes,\nmother, if it were not for you.\"\n\n\"If I am in your way, Amyas, do not fear that I shall trouble you long.\"\n\n\"Oh, mother, mother, do not talk in that way! I am half-mad, I think,\nalready, and don't know what I say. Yes, I am mad; mad at heart, though\nnot at head. There's a fire burning me up, night and day, and nothing\nbut Spanish blood will put it out.\"\n\n\"Or the grace of God, my poor wilful child! Who comes to the door?--so\nquickly, too?\"\n\nThere was a loud hurried knocking, and in another minute a serving-man\nhurried in with a letter.\n\n\"This to Captain Amyas Leigh with haste, haste!\"\n\nIt was Sir Richard's hand. Amyas tore it open; and \"a loud laugh laughed\nhe.\"\n\n\"The Armada is coming! My wish has come true, mother!\"\n\n\"God help us, it has! Show me the letter.\"\n\nIt was a hurried scrawl.\n\n\n\"DR. GODSON,--Walsingham sends word that the Ada. sailed from Lisbon to\nthe Groyne the 18. of May. We know no more, but have commandment to stay\nthe ships. Come down, dear lad, and give us counsel; and may the Lord\nhelp His Church in this great strait.\n\n\"Your loving godfather,\n\n\"R. G.\"\n\n\n\"Forgive me, mother, mother, once for all!\" cried Amyas, throwing his\narms round her neck.\n\n\"I have nothing to forgive, my son, my son! And shall I lose thee,\nalso?\"\n\n\"If I be killed, you will have two martyrs of your blood, mother!--\"\n\nMrs. Leigh bowed her head, and was silent. Amyas caught up his hat and\nsword, and darted forth toward Bideford.\n\nAmyas literally danced into Sir Richard's hall, where he stood talking\nearnestly with various merchants and captains.\n\n\"Gloria, gloria! gentles all! The devil is broke loose at last; and now\nwe know where to have him on the hip!\"\n\n\"Why so merry, Captain Leigh, when all else are sad?\" said a gentle\nvoice by his side.\n\n\"Because I have been sad a long time, while all else were merry, dear\nlady. Is the hawk doleful when his hood is pulled off, and he sees the\nheron flapping right ahead of him?\"\n\n\"You seem to forget the danger and the woe of us weak women, sir?\"\n\n\"I don't forget the danger and the woe of one weak woman, madam, and she\nthe daughter of a man who once stood in this room,\" said Amyas, suddenly\ncollecting himself, in a low stern voice. \"And I don't forget the danger\nand the woe of one who was worth a thousand even of her. I don't forget\nanything, madam.\"\n\n\"Nor forgive either, it seems.\"\n\n\"It will be time to talk of forgiveness after the offender has repented\nand amended; and does the sailing of the Armada look like that?\"\n\n\"Alas, no! God help us!\"\n\n\"He will help us, madam,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"Admiral Leigh,\" said Sir Richard, \"we need you now, if ever. Here are\nthe queen's orders to furnish as many ships as we can; though from these\ngentlemen's spirit, I should say the orders were well-nigh needless.\"\n\n\"Not a doubt, sir; for my part, I will fit my ship at my own charges,\nand fight her too, as long as I have a leg or an arm left.\"\n\n\"Or a tongue to say, never surrender, I'll warrant!\" said an old\nmerchant. \"You put life into us old fellows, Admiral Leigh: but it\nwill be a heavy matter for those poor fellows in Virginia, and for my\ndaughter too, Madam Dare, with her young babe, as I hear, just born.\"\n\n\"And a very heavy matter,\" said some one else, \"for those who have\nventured their money in these cargoes, which must lie idle, you see, now\nfor a year maybe--and then all the cost of unlading again--\"\n\n\"My good sir,\" said Grenville, \"what have private interests to do\nwith this day? Let us thank God if He only please to leave us the bare\nfee-simple of this English soil, the honor of our wives and daughters,\nand bodies safe from rack and fagot, to wield the swords of freemen in\ndefence of a free land, even though every town and homestead in England\nwere wasted with fire, and we left to rebuild over again all which our\nancestors have wrought for us in now six hundred years.\"\n\n\"Right, sir!\" said Amyas. \"For my part, let my Virginian goods rot\non the quay, if the worst comes to the worst. I begin unloading the\nVengeance to-morrow; and to sea as soon as I can fill up my crew to a\ngood fighting number.\"\n\nAnd so the talk ran on; and ere two days were past, most of the\nneighboring gentlemen, summoned by Sir Richard, had come in, and great\nwas the bidding against each other as to who should do most. Cary and\nBrimblecombe, with thirty tall Clovelly men, came across the bay, and\nwithout even asking leave of Amyas, took up their berths as a matter of\ncourse on board the Vengeance. In the meanwhile, the matter was taken\nup by families. The Fortescues (a numberless clan) offered to furnish\na ship; the Chichesters another, the Stukelys a third; while the\nmerchantmen were not backward. The Bucks, the Stranges, the Heards,\njoyfully unloaded their Virginian goods, and replaced them with powder\nand shot; and in a week's time the whole seven were ready once more for\nsea, and dropped down into Appledore pool, with Amyas as their admiral\nfor the time being (for Sir Richard had gone by land to Plymouth to join\nthe deliberations there), and waited for the first favorable wind to\nstart for the rendezvous in the Sound.\n\nAt last, upon the twenty-first of June, the clank of the capstans rang\nmerrily across the flats, and amid prayers and blessings, forth sailed\nthat gallant squadron over the bar, to play their part in Britain's\nSalamis; while Mrs. Leigh stood watching as she stood once before,\nbeside the churchyard wall: but not alone this time; for Ayacanora stood\nby her side, and gazed and gazed, till her eyes seemed ready to burst\nfrom their sockets. At last she turned away with a sob,--\n\n\"And he never bade me good-bye, mother!\"\n\n\"God forgive him! Come home and pray, my child; there is no other rest\non earth than prayer for woman's heart!\"\n\nThey were calling each other mother and daughter then? Yes. The sacred\nfire of sorrow was fast burning out all Ayacanora's fallen savageness;\nand, like a Phoenix, the true woman was rising from those ashes, fair,\nnoble, and all-enduring, as God had made her.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\n\nHOW THE ADMIRAL JOHN HAWKINS TESTIFIED AGAINST CROAKERS\n\n     \"Oh, where be these gay Spaniards,\n     Which make so great a boast O?\n     Oh, they shall eat the gray-goose feather,\n       And we shall eat the roast O!\"\n\n                                  Cornish Song.\n\nWhat if the spectators who last summer gazed with just pride upon the\nnoble port of Plymouth, its vast breakwater spanning the Sound, its\narsenals and docks, its two estuaries filled with gallant ships, and\nwatched the great screw-liners turning within their own length by force\ninvisible, or threading the crowded fleets with the ease of the tiniest\nboat,--what if, by some magic turn, the nineteenth century, and all the\nmagnificence of its wealth and science, had vanished--as it may vanish\nhereafter--and they had found themselves thrown back three hundred years\ninto the pleasant summer days of 1588?\n\nMount Edgecombe is still there, beautiful as ever: but where are the\ndocks, and where is Devonport? No vast dry-dock roofs rise at the\nwater's edge. Drake's island carries but a paltry battery, just raised\nby the man whose name it bears; Mount Wise is a lone gentleman's house\namong fields; the citadel is a pop-gun fort, which a third-class steamer\nwould shell into rubble for an afternoon's amusement. And the shipping,\nwhere are they? The floating castles of the Hamoaze have dwindled to\na few crawling lime-hoys; and the Catwater is packed, not as now, with\nmerchant craft, but with the ships who will to-morrow begin the greatest\nsea-fight which the world has ever seen.\n\nThere they lie, a paltry squadron enough in modern eyes; the largest of\nthem not equal in size to a six-and-thirty-gun frigate, carrying less\nweight of metal than one of our new gun-boats, and able to employ even\nthat at not more than a quarter of our modern range. Would our modern\nspectators, just come down by rail for a few hours, to see the cavalry\nembark, and return tomorrow in time for dinner, have looked down upon\nthat petty port, and petty fleet, with a contemptuous smile, and begun\nsome flippant speech about the progress of intellect, and the triumphs\nof science, and our benighted ancestors? They would have done so, doubt\nit not, if they belonged to the many who gaze on those very triumphs\nas on a raree-show to feed their silly wonder, or use and enjoy them\nwithout thankfulness or understanding, as the ox eats the clover thrust\ninto his rack, without knowing or caring how it grew. But if any of them\nwere of the class by whom those very triumphs have been achieved; the\nthinkers and the workers, who, instead of entering lazily into other\nmen's labors, as the mob does, labor themselves; who know by hard\nexperience the struggles, the self-restraints, the disappointments, the\nslow and staggering steps, by which the discoverer reaches to his prize;\nthen the smile of those men would not have been one of pity, but rather\nof filial love. For they would have seen in those outwardly paltry\narmaments the potential germ of that mightier one which now loads the\nBlack Sea waves; they would have been aware, that to produce it, with\nsuch materials and knowledge as then existed, demanded an intellect, an\nenergy, a spirit of progress and invention, equal, if not superior, to\nthose of which we now so loudly boast.\n\nBut if, again, he had been a student of men rather than of machinery,\nhe would have found few nobler companies on whom to exercise his\ndiscernment, than he might have seen in the little terrace bowling-green\nbehind the Pelican Inn, on the afternoon of the nineteenth of July.\nChatting in groups, or lounging over the low wall which commanded a\nview of the Sound and the shipping far below, were gathered almost\nevery notable man of the Plymouth fleet, the whole posse comitatus\nof \"England's forgotten worthies.\" The Armada has been scattered by a\nstorm. Lord Howard has been out to look for it, as far as the Spanish\ncoast; but the wind has shifted to the south, and fearing lest the Dons\nshould pass him, he has returned to Plymouth, uncertain whether the\nArmada will come after all or not. Slip on for a while, like Prince Hal,\nthe drawer's apron; come in through the rose-clad door which opens\nfrom the tavern, with a tray of long-necked Dutch glasses, and a silver\ntankard of wine, and look round you at the gallant captains, who are\nwaiting for the Spanish Armada, as lions in their lair might wait for\nthe passing herd of deer.\n\nSee those five talking earnestly, in the centre of a ring, which longs\nto overhear, and yet is too respectful to approach close. Those soft\nlong eyes and pointed chin you recognize already; they are Walter\nRaleigh's. The fair young man in the flame-colored doublet, whose arm\nis round Raleigh's neck, is Lord Sheffield; opposite them stands, by\nthe side of Sir Richard Grenville, a man as stately even as he, Lord\nSheffield's uncle, the Lord Charles Howard of Effingham, lord high\nadmiral of England; next to him is his son-in-law, Sir Robert Southwell,\ncaptain of the Elizabeth Jonas: but who is that short, sturdy, plainly\ndressed man, who stands with legs a little apart, and hands behind his\nback, looking up, with keen gray eyes, into the face of each speaker?\nHis cap is in his hands, so you can see the bullet head of crisp brown\nhair and the wrinkled forehead, as well as the high cheek bones, the\nshort square face, the broad temples, the thick lips, which are yet firm\nas granite. A coarse plebeian stamp of man: yet the whole figure and\nattitude are that of boundless determination, self-possession, energy;\nand when at last he speaks a few blunt words, all eyes are turned\nrespectfully upon him;--for his name is Francis Drake.\n\nA burly, grizzled elder, in greasy sea-stained garments, contrasting\noddly with the huge gold chain about his neck, waddles up, as if he had\nbeen born, and had lived ever since, in a gale of wind at sea. The upper\nhalf of his sharp dogged visage seems of brick-red leather, the lower of\nbadger's fur; and as he claps Drake on the back, and, with a broad Devon\ntwang, shouts, \"be you a coming to drink your wine, Francis Drake, or\nbe you not?--saving your presence, my lord;\" the lord high admiral only\nlaughs, and bids Drake go and drink his wine; for John Hawkins, admiral\nof the port, is the patriarch of Plymouth seamen, if Drake be their\nhero, and says and does pretty much what he likes in any company on\nearth; not to mention that to-day's prospect of an Armageddon fight has\nshaken him altogether out of his usual crabbed reserve, and made him\noverflow with loquacious good-humor, even to his rival Drake.\n\nSo they push through the crowd, wherein is many another man whom one\nwould gladly have spoken with face to face on earth. Martin Frobisher\nand John Davis are sitting on that bench, smoking tobacco from long\nsilver pipes; and by them are Fenton and Withrington, who have both\ntried to follow Drake's path round the world, and failed, though by no\nfault of their own. The man who pledges them better luck next time,\nis George Fenner, known to \"the seven Portugals,\" Leicester's pet, and\ncaptain of the galleon which Elizabeth bought of him. That short prim\nman in the huge yellow ruff, with sharp chin, minute imperial, and\nself-satisfied smile, is Richard Hawkins, the Complete Seaman, Admiral\nJohn's hereafter famous and hapless son. The elder who is talking with\nhim is his good uncle William, whose monument still stands, or should\nstand, in Deptford Church; for Admiral John set it up there but one year\nafter this time; and on it record how he was, \"A worshipper of the true\nreligion, an especial benefactor of poor sailors, a most just arbiter\nin most difficult causes, and of a singular faith, piety, and prudence.\"\nThat, and the fact that he got creditably through some sharp work at\nPorto Rico, is all I know of William Hawkins: but if you or I, reader,\ncan have as much or half as much said of us when we have to follow him,\nwe shall have no reason to complain.\n\nThere is John Drake, Sir Francis' brother, ancestor of the present stock\nof Drakes; and there is George, his nephew, a man not overwise, who has\nbeen round the world with Amyas; and there is Amyas himself, talking\nto one who answers him with fierce curt sentences, Captain Barker of\nBristol, brother of the hapless Andrew Barker who found John Oxenham's\nguns, and, owing to a mutiny among his men, perished by the Spaniards in\nHonduras, twelve years ago. Barker is now captain of the Victory, one of\nthe queen's best ships; and he has his accounts to settle with the Dons,\nas Amyas has; so they are both growling together in a corner, while all\nthe rest are as merry as the flies upon the vine above their heads.\n\nBut who is the aged man who sits upon a bench, against the sunny south\nwall of the tavern, his long white beard flowing almost to his waist,\nhis hands upon his knees, his palsied head moving slowly from side to\nside, to catch the scraps of discourse of the passing captains? His\ngreat-grandchild, a little maid of six, has laid her curly head upon his\nknees, and his grand-daughter, a buxom black-eyed dame of thirty, stands\nby him and tends him, half as nurse, and half, too, as showman, for he\nseems an object of curiosity to all the captains, and his fair nurse has\nto entreat again and again, \"Bless you, sir, please now, don't give him\nno liquor, poor old soul, the doctor says.\" It is old Martin Cockrem,\nfather of the ancient host, aged himself beyond the years of man, who\ncan recollect the bells of Plymouth ringing for the coronation of Henry\nthe Eighth, and who was the first Englishman, perhaps, who ever set foot\non the soil of the New World. There he sits, like an old Druid Tor of\nprimeval granite amid the tall wheat and rich clover crops of a modern\nfarm. He has seen the death of old Europe and the birth-throes of the\nnew. Go to him, and question him; for his senses are quick as ever;\nand just now the old man seems uneasy. He is peering with rheumy eyes\nthrough the groups, and seems listening for a well-known voice.\n\n\"There 'a be again! Why don't 'a come, then?\"\n\n\"Quiet, gramfer, and don't trouble his worship.\"\n\n\"Here an hour, and never speak to poor old Martin! I say, sir\"--and the\nold man feebly plucks Amyas's cloak as he passes. \"I say, captain, do 'e\ntell young master old Martin's looking for him.\"\n\n\"Marcy, gramfer, where's your manners? Don't be vexed, sir, he'm a'most\na babe, and tejous at times, mortal.\"\n\n\"Young master who?\" says Amyas, bending down to the old man, and smiling\nto the dame to let him have his way.\n\n\"Master Hawkins; he'm never been a-near me all day.\"\n\nOff goes Amyas; and, of course, lays hold of the sleeve of young Richard\nHawkins; but as he is in act to speak, the dame lays hold of his,\nlaughing and blushing.\n\n\"No, sir, not Mr. Richard, sir; Admiral John, sir, his father; he always\ncalls him young master, poor old soul!\" and she points to the grizzled\nbeard and the face scarred and tanned with fifty years of fight and\nstorm.\n\nAmyas goes to the Admiral, and gives his message.\n\n\"Mercy on me! Where be my wits? Iss, I'm a-coming,\" says the old hero in\nhis broadest Devon, waddles off to the old man, and begins lugging at\na pocket. \"Here, Martin, I've got mun, I've got mun, man alive; but his\nLordship keept me so. Lookee here, then! Why, I do get so lusty of late,\nMartin, I can't get to my pockets!\"\n\nAnd out struggle a piece of tarred string, a bundle of papers, a\nthimble, a piece of pudding-tobacco, and last of all, a little paper of\nMuscovado sugar--then as great a delicacy as any French bonbons would be\nnow--which he thrusts into the old man's eager and trembling hand.\n\nOld Martin begins dipping his finger into it, and rubbing it on his\ntoothless gums, smiling and nodding thanks to his young master; while\nthe little maid at his knee, unrebuked, takes her share also.\n\n\"There, Admiral Leigh; both ends meet--gramfers and babies! You and I\nshall be like to that one day, young Samson!\"\n\n\"We shall have slain a good many Philistines first, I hope.\"\n\n\"Amen! so be it; but look to mun! so fine a sailor as ever drank liquor;\nand now greedy after a hit of sweet trade! 'tis piteous like; but I\nbring mun a hit whenever I come, and he looks for it. He's one of my own\nflesh like, is old Martin. He sailed with my father Captain Will, when\nthey was both two little cracks aboard of a trawler; and my father\nwent up, and here I am--he didn't, and there he is. We'm up now, we\nHawkinses. We may be down again some day.\"\n\n\"Never, I trust,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"'Tain't no use trusting, young man: you go and do. I do hear too much\nof that there from my lad. Let they ministers preach till they'm black\nin the face, works is the trade!\" with a nudge in Amyas's ribs. \"Faith\ncan't save, nor charity nether. There, you tell with him, while I go\nplay bowls with Drake. He'll tell you a sight of stories. You ask him\nabout good King Hal, now, just--\"\n\nAnd off waddled the Port Admiral.\n\n\"You have seen good King Henry, then, father?\" said Amyas, interested.\n\nThe old man's eyes lighted at once, and he stopped mumbling his sugar.\n\n\"Seed mun? Iss, I reckon. I was with Captain Will when he went to meet\nthe Frenchman there to Calais--at the Field, the Field--\"\n\n\"The Field of the Cloth of Gold, gramfer,\" suggested the dame.\n\n\"That's it. Seed mun? Iss, fegs. Oh, he was a king! The face o' mun like\na rising sun, and the back o' mun so broad as that there\" (and he held\nout his palsied arms), \"and the voice of mun! Oh, to hear mun swear if\nhe was merry, oh, 'tas royal!--Seed mun? Iss, fegs! And I've seed mun do\nwhat few has; I've seed mun christle like any child.\"\n\n\"What--cry?\" said Amyas. \"I shouldn't have thought there was much cry in\nhim.\"\n\n\"You think what you like--\"\n\n\"Gramfer, gramfer, don't you be rude, now--\n\n\"Let him go on,\" said Amyas.\n\n\"I seed mun christle; and, oh dear, how he did put hands on mun's face;\nand 'Oh, my gentlemen,' says he, 'my gentlemen! Oh, my gallant men!'\nThem was his very words.\"\n\n\"But when?\"\n\n\"Why, Captain Will had just come to the Hard--that's to Portsmouth--to\nspeak with mun, and the barge Royal lay again the Hard--so; and our boot\nalongside--so; and the king he standth as it might be there, above my\nhead, on the quay edge, and she come in near abreast of us, looking most\nroyal to behold, poor dear! and went to cast about. And Captain Will,\nsaith he, 'Them lower ports is cruel near the water;' for she had not\nmore than a sixteen inches to spare in the nether overloop, as I heard\nafter. And saith he, 'That won't do for going to windward in a say,\nMartin.' And as the words came out of mun's mouth, your worship, there\nwas a bit of a flaw from the westward, sharp like, and overboard goeth\nmy cap, and hitth against the wall, and as I stooped to pick it up, I\nheard a cry, and it was all over!\"\n\n\"He is telling of the Mary Rose, sir.\"\n\n\"I guessed so.\"\n\n\"All over: and the cry of mun, and the screech of mun! Oh, sir, up to\nthe very heavens! And the king he screeched right out like any maid, 'Oh\nmy gentlemen, oh my gallant men!' and as she lay on her beam-ends, sir,\nand just a-settling, the very last souls I seen was that man's father,\nand that man's. I knowed mun by their armor.\"\n\nAnd he pointed to Sir George Carew and Sir Richard Grenville.\n\n\"Iss! Iss! Drowned like rattens. Drowned like rattens!\"\n\n\"Now; you mustn't trouble his worship any more.\"\n\n\"Trouble? Let him tell till midnight, I shall be well pleased,\" said\nAmyas, sitting down on the bench by him. \"Drawer! ale--and a parcel of\ntobacco.\"\n\nAnd Amyas settled himself to listen, while the old man purred to\nhimself--\n\n\"Iss. They likes to hear old Martin. All the captains look upon old\nMartin.\"\n\n\"Hillo, Amyas!\" said Cary, \"who's your friend? Here's a man been telling\nme wonders about the River Plate. We should go thither for luck there\nnext time.\"\n\n\"River Plate?\" said old Martin. \"It's I knows about the River Plate;\nnone so well. Who'd ever been there, nor heard of it nether, before\nCaptain Will and me went, and I lived among the savages a whole year;\nand audacious civil I found 'em if they 'd had but shirts to their\nbacks; and so was the prince o' mun, that Captain Will brought home to\nKing Henry; leastwise he died on the voyage; but the wild folk took it\ncruel well, for you see, we was always as civil with them as Christians,\nand if we hadn't been, I should not have been here now.\"\n\n\"What year was that?\"\n\n\"In the fifteen thirty: but I was there afore, and learnt the speech\no' mun; and that's why Captain Will left me to a hostage, when he tuked\ntheir prince.\"\n\n\"Before that?\" said Cary; \"why, the country was hardly known before\nthat.\"\n\nThe old man's eyes flashed up in triumph.\n\n\"Knowed? Iss, and you may well say that! Look ye here! Look to mun!\" and\nhe waved his hand round--\"There's captains! and I'm the father of 'em\nall now, now poor Captain Will's in gloory; I, Martin Cockrem! . . .\nIss, I've seen a change. I mind when Tavistock Abbey was so full\no' friars, and goolden idols, and sich noxious trade, as ever was a\nwheat-rick of rats. I mind the fight off Brest in the French wars--Oh,\nthat was a fight, surely!--when the Regent and the French Carack were\nburnt side by side, being fast grappled, you see, because of Sir Thomas\nKnivet; and Captain Will gave him warning as he ran a-past us, saying,\nsays he--\"\n\n\"But,\" said Amyas, seeing that the old man was wandering away, \"what do\nyou mind about America?\"\n\n\"America? I should think so! But I was a-going to tell you of the\nRegent--and seven hundred Englishmen burnt and drowned in her, and nine\nhundred French in the Brest ship, besides what we picked up. Oh dear!\nBut about America.\"\n\n\"Yes, about America. How are you the father of all the captains?\"\n\n\"How? you ask my young master! Why, before the fifteen thirty, I was up\nthe Plate with Cabot (and a cruel fractious ontrustful fellow he was,\nlike all they Portingals), and bid there a year and more, and up the\nParaguaio with him, diskivering no end; whereby, gentles, I was the\nfirst Englishman, I hold, that ever sot a foot on the New World, I was!\"\n\n\"Then here's your health, and long life, sir!\" said Amyas and Cary.\n\n\"Long life? Iss, fegs, I reckon, long enough a'ready! Why, I mind the\nbeginning of it all, I do. I mind when there wasn't a master mariner\nto Plymouth, that thought there was aught west of the Land's End except\nherrings. Why, they held them, pure wratches, that if you sailed right\nwest away far enough, you'd surely come to the edge, and fall over\ncleve. Iss--'Twas dark parts round here, till Captain Will arose; and\nthe first of it I mind was inside the bar of San Lucar, and he and I\nwere boys about a ten year old, aboord of a Dartmouth ship, and went\nfor wine, and there come in over the bar he that was the beginning of it\nall.\"\n\n\"Columbus?\"\n\n\"Iss, fegs, he did, not a pistol-shot from us; and I saw mun stand on\nthe poop, so plain as I see you; no great shakes of a man to look\nto nether; there's a sight better here, to plase me, and we was\ndisappointed, we lads, for we surely expected to see mun with a goolden\ncrown on, and a sceptre to a's hand, we did, and the ship o' mun all\nover like Solomon's temple for gloory. And I mind that same year, too,\nseeing Vasco da Gama, as was going out over the bar, when he found\nthe Bona Speranza, and sailed round it to the Indies. Ah, that was the\nmaking of they rascally Portingals, it was! . . . And our crew told what\nthey seen and heerd: but nobody minded sich things. 'Twas dark parts,\nand Popish, then; and nobody knowed nothing, nor got no schooling, nor\ncared for nothing, but scrattling up and down alongshore like to prawns\nin a pule. Iss, sitting in darkness, we was, and the shadow of death,\ntill the day-spring from on high arose, and shined upon us poor\nout-o'-the-way folk--The Lord be praised! And now, look to mun!\" and he\nwaved his hand all round--\"Look to mun! Look to the works of the Lord!\nLook to the captains! Oh blessed sight! And one's been to the Brazils,\nand one to the Indies, and the Spanish Main, and the North-West, and the\nRooshias, and the Chinas, and up the Straits, and round the Cape,\nand round the world of God, too, bless His holy name; and I seed the\nbeginning of it; and I'll see the end of it too, I will! I was born into\nthe old times: but I'll see the wondrous works of the new, yet, I will!\nI'll see they bloody Spaniards swept off the seas before I die, if my\nold eyes can reach so far as outside the Sound. I shall, I knows it. I\nsays my prayers for it every night; don't I, Mary? You'll bate mun, sure\nas Judgment, you'll bate mun! The Lord'll fight for ye. Nothing'll stand\nagainst ye. I've seed it all along--ever since I was with young master\nto the Honduras. They can't bide the push of us! You'll bate mun off\nthe face of the seas, and be masters of the round world, and all that\ntherein is. And then, I'll just turn my old face to the wall, and depart\nin peace, according to his word.\n\n\"Deary me, now, while I've been telling with you, here've this little\nmaid been and ate up all my sugar!\"\n\n\"I'll bring you some more,\" said Amyas; whom the childish bathos of the\nlast sentence moved rather to sighs than laughter.\n\n\"Will ye, then? There's a good soul, and come and tell with old Martin.\nHe likes to see the brave young gentlemen, a-going to and fro in their\nships, like Leviathan, and taking of their pastime therein. We had\nno such ships to our days. Ah, 'tis grand times, beautiful times\nsurely--and you'll bring me a bit sugar?\"\n\n\"You were up the Plate with Cabot?\" said Cary, after a pause. \"Do you\nmind the fair lady Miranda, Sebastian de Hurtado's wife?\"\n\n\"What! her that was burnt by the Indians? Mind her? Do you mind the sun\nin heaven? Oh, the beauty! Oh, the ways of her! Oh, the speech of her!\nNever was, nor never will be! And she to die by they villains; and all\nfor the goodness of her! Mind her? I minded naught else when she was on\ndeck.\"\n\n\"Who was she?\" asked Amyas of Cary.\n\n\"A Spanish angel, Amyas.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" said Amyas. \"So much the worse for her, to be born into a\nnation of devils.\"\n\n\"They'em not all so bad as that, yer honor. Her husband was a proper\ngallant gentleman, and kind as a maid, too, and couldn't abide that De\nSolis's murderous doings.\"\n\n\"His wife must have taught it him, then,\" said Amyas, rising. \"Where did\nyou hear of these black swans, Cary?\"\n\n\"I have heard of them, and that's enough,\" answered he, unwilling to\nstir sad recollections.\n\n\"And little enough,\" said Amyas. \"Will, don't talk to me. The devil is\nnot grown white because he has trod in a lime-heap.\"\n\n\"Or an angel black because she came down a chimney,\" said Cary; and so\nthe talk ended, or rather was cut short; for the talk of all the groups\nwas interrupted by an explosion from old John Hawkins.\n\n\"Fail? Fail? What a murrain do you here, to talk of failing? Who made\nyou a prophet, you scurvy, hang-in-the-wind, croaking, white-livered son\nof a corby-crow?\"\n\n\"Heaven help us, Admiral Hawkins, who has put fire to your culverins in\nthis fashion?\" said Lord Howard.\n\n\"Who? my lord! Croakers! my lord! Here's a fellow calls himself the\ncaptain of a ship, and her majesty's servant, and talks about failing,\nas if he were a Barbican loose-kirtle trying to keep her apple-squire\nashore! Blurt for him, sneak-up! say I.\"\n\n\"Admiral John Hawkins,\" quoth the offender, \"you shall answer this\nlanguage with your sword.\"\n\n\"I'll answer it with my foot; and buy me a pair of horn-tips to my\nshoes, like a wraxling man. Fight a croaker? Fight a frog, an owl! I\nfight those that dare fight, sir!\"\n\n\"Sir, sir, moderate yourself. I am sure this gentleman will show himself\nas brave as any, when it comes to blows: but who can blame mortal man\nfor trembling before so fearful a chance as this?\"\n\n\"Let mortal man keep his tremblings to himself, then, my lord, and not\nbe like Solomon's madmen, casting abroad fire and death, and saying, it\nis only in sport. There is more than one of his kidney, your lordship,\nwho have not been ashamed to play Mother Shipton before their own\nsailors, and damp the poor fellows' hearts with crying before they're\nhurt, and this is one of them. I've heard him at it afore, and I'll\npresent him, with a vengeance, though I'm no church-warden.\"\n\n\"If this is really so, Admiral Hawkins--\"\n\n\"It is so, my lord! I heard only last night, down in a tavern below,\nsuch unbelieving talk as made me mad, my lord; and if it had not been\nafter supper, and my hand was not oversteady, I would have let out a\npottle of Alicant from some of their hoopings, and sent them to Dick\nSurgeon, to wrap them in swaddling-clouts, like whining babies as\nthey are. Marry come up, what says Scripture? 'He that is fearful and\nfaint-hearted among you, let him go and'--what? son Dick there? Thou'rt\npious, and read'st thy Bible. What's that text? A mortal fine one it is,\ntoo.\"\n\n\"'He that is fearful and faint-hearted among you, let him go back,'\"\nquoth the Complete Seaman. \"Captain Merryweather, as my father's\ncommand, as well as his years, forbid his answering your challenge, I\nshall repute it an honor to entertain his quarrel myself--place, time,\nand weapons being at your choice.\"\n\n\"Well spoken, son Dick!--and like a true courtier, too! Ah! thou hast\nthe palabras, and the knee, and the cap, and the quip, and the innuendo,\nand the true town fashion of it all--no old tarry-breeks of a sea-dog,\nlike thy dad! My lord, you'll let them fight?\"\n\n\"The Spaniard, sir; but no one else. But, captains and gentlemen,\nconsider well my friend the Port Admiral's advice; and if any man's\nheart misgives him, let him, for the sake of his country and his queen,\nhave so much government of his tongue to hide his fears in his own\nbosom, and leave open complaining to ribalds and women. For if the\nsailor be not cheered by his commander's cheerfulness, how will the\nignorant man find comfort in himself? And without faith and hope, how\ncan he fight worthily?\"\n\n\"There is no croaking aboard of us, we will warrant,\" said twenty\nvoices, \"and shall be none, as long as we command on board our own\nships.\"\n\nHawkins, having blown off his steam, went back to Drake and the bowls.\n\n\"Fill my pipe, Drawer--that croaking fellow's made me let it out, of\ncourse! Spoil-sports! The father of all manner of troubles on earth,\nbe they noxious trade of croakers! 'Better to meet a bear robbed of her\nwhelps,' Francis Drake, as Solomon saith, than a fule who can't keep his\nmouth shut. What brought Mr. Andrew Barker to his death but croakers?\nWhat stopped Fenton's China voyage in the '82, and lost your nephew\nJohn, and my brother Will, glory and hard cash too, but croakers? What\nsent back my Lord Cumberland's armada in the '86, and that after they'd\nproved their strength, too, sixty o' mun against six hundred Portugals\nand Indians; and yet wern't ashamed to turn round and come home\nempty-handed, after all my lord's expenses that he had been at? What\nbut these same beggarly croakers, that be only fit to be turned into\nyellow-hammers up to Dartymoor, and sit on a tor all day, and cry 'Very\nlittle bit of bread, and no chee-e-ese!' Marry, sneak-up! say I again.\"\n\n\"And what,\" said Drake, \"would have kept me, if I'd let 'em, from ever\nsailing round the world, but these same croakers? I hanged my best\nfriend for croaking, John Hawkins, may God forgive me if I was wrong,\nand I threatened a week after to hang thirty more; and I'd have done it,\ntoo, if they hadn't clapped tompions into their muzzles pretty fast.\"\n\n\"You'm right, Frank. My old father always told me--and old King Hal\n(bless his memory!) would take his counsel among a thousand;--'And, my\nson,' says he to me, 'whatever you do, never you stand no croaking; but\nhang mun, son Jack, hang mun up for an ensign. There's Scripture for\nit,' says he (he was a mighty man to his Bible, after bloody Mary's\ndays, leastwise), 'and 'tis written,' says he, 'It's expedient that one\nman die for the crew, and that the whole crew perish not; so show you\nno mercy, son Jack, or you'll find none, least-wise in they manner of\ncattle; for if you fail, they stamps on you, and if you succeeds, they\ntakes the credit of it to themselves, and goes to heaven in your shoes.'\nThose were his words, and I've found mun true.--Who com'th here now?\"\n\n\"Captain Fleming, as I'm a sinner.\"\n\n\"Fleming? Is he tired of life, that he com'th here to look for a halter?\nI've a warrant out against mun, for robbing of two Flushingers on the\nhigh seas, now this very last year. Is the fellow mazed or drunk, then?\nor has he seen a ghost? Look to mun!\"\n\n\"I think so, truly,\" said Drake. \"His eyes are near out of his head.\"\n\nThe man was a rough-bearded old sea-dog, who had just burst in from the\ntavern through the low hatch, upsetting a drawer with all his glasses,\nand now came panting and blowing straight up to the high admiral,--\n\n\"My lord, my lord! They'm coming! I saw them off the Lizard last night!\"\n\n\"Who? my good sir, who seem to have left your manners behind you.\"\n\n\"The Armada, your worship--the Spaniard; but as for my manners, 'tis no\nfault of mine, for I never had none to leave behind me.\"\n\n\"If he has not left his manners behind,\" quoth Hawkins, \"look out for\nyour purses, gentlemen all! He's manners enough, and very bad ones they\nbe, when he com'th across a quiet Flushinger.\"\n\n\"If I stole Flushingers' wines, I never stole negurs' souls, Jack\nHawkins; so there's your answer. My lord, hang me if you will; life's\nshort and death's easy 'specially to seamen; but if I didn't see the\nSpanish fleet last sun-down, coming along half-moon wise, and full seven\nmile from wing to wing, within a four mile of me, I'm a sinner.\"\n\n\"Sirrah,\" said Lord Howard, \"is this no fetch, to cheat us out of your\npardon for these piracies of yours?\"\n\n\"You'll find out for yourself before nightfall, my lord high admiral.\nAll Jack Fleming says is, that this is a poor sort of an answer to a man\nwho has put his own neck into the halter for the sake of his country.\"\n\n\"Perhaps it is,\" said Lord Howard. \"And after all, gentlemen, what can\nthis man gain by a lie, which must be discovered ere a day is over,\nexcept a more certain hanging?\"\n\n\"Very true, your lordship,\" said Hawkins, mollified. \"Come here, Jack\nFleming--what wilt drain, man? Hippocras or Alicant, Sack or John\nBarleycorn, and a pledge to thy repentance and amendment of life.\"\n\n\"Admiral Hawkins, Admiral Hawkins, this is no time for drinking.\"\n\n\"Why not, then, my lord? Good news should be welcomed with good wine.\nFrank, send down to the sexton, and set the bells a-ringing to cheer up\nall honest hearts. Why, my lord, if it were not for the gravity of my\noffice, I could dance a galliard for joy!\"\n\n\"Well, you may dance, port admiral: but I must go and plan, but God give\nto all captains such a heart as yours this day!\"\n\n\"And God give all generals such a head as yours! Come, Frank Drake,\nwe'll play the game out before we move. It will be two good days before\nwe shall be fit to tackle them, so an odd half-hour don't matter.\"\n\n\"I must command the help of your counsel, vice-admiral,\" said Lord\nCharles, turning to Drake.\n\n\"And it's this, my good lord,\" said Drake, looking up, as he aimed his\nbowl. \"They'll come soon enough for us to show them sport, and yet slow\nenough for us to be ready; so let no man hurry himself. And as example\nis better than precept, here goes.\"\n\nLord Howard shrugged his shoulders, and departed, knowing two things:\nfirst, that to move Drake was to move mountains; and next, that when the\nself-taught hero did bestir himself, he would do more work in an hour\nthan any one else in a day. So he departed, followed hastily by most of\nthe captains; and Drake said in a low voice to Hawkins:\n\n\"Does he think we are going to knock about on a lee-shore all the\nafternoon and run our noses at night--and dead up-wind, too--into the\nDons' mouths? No, Jack, my friend. Let Orlando-Furioso-punctilio-fire-\neaters go and get their knuckles rapped. The following game is the game,\nand not the meeting one. The dog goes after the sheep, and not afore\nthem, lad. Let them go by, and go by, and stick to them well to\nwindward, and pick up stragglers, and pickings, too, Jack--the prizes,\nJack!\"\n\n\"Trust my old eyes for not being over-quick at seeing signals, if I be\nhanging in the skirts of a fat-looking Don. We'm the eagles, Drake; and\nwhere the carcase is, is our place, eh?\"\n\nAnd so the two old sea-dogs chatted on, while their companions dropped\noff one by one, and only Amyas remained.\n\n\"Eh, Captain Leigh, where's my boy Dick?\"\n\n\"Gone off with his lordship, Sir John.\"\n\n\"On his punctilios too, I suppose, the young slashed-breeks. He's half\na Don, that fellow, with his fine scholarship, and his fine manners,\nand his fine clothes. He'll get a taking down before he dies, unless he\nmends. Why ain't you gone too, sir?\"\n\n\"I follow my leader,\" said Amyas, filling his pipe.\n\n\"Well said, my big man,\" quoth Drake. \"If I could lead you round the\nworld, I can lead you up Channel, can't I?--Eh? my little bantam-cock of\nthe Orinoco? Drink, lad! You're over-sad to-day.\"\n\n\"Not a whit,\" said Amyas. \"Only I can't help wondering whether I shall\nfind him after all.\"\n\n\"Whom? That Don? We'll find him for you, if he's in the fleet. We'll\nsqueeze it out of our prisoners somehow. Eh, Hawkins? I thought all the\ncaptains had promised to send you news if they heard of him.\"\n\n\"Ay, but it's ill looking for a needle in a haystack. But I shall find\nhim. I am a coward to doubt it,\" said Amyas, setting his teeth.\n\n\"There, vice-admiral, you're beaten, and that's the rubber. Pay up\nthree dollars, old high-flyer, and go and earn more, like an honest\nadventurer.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Drake, as he pulled out his purse, \"we'll walk down now,\nand see about these young hot-heads. As I live, they are setting to tow\nthe ships out already! Breaking the men's backs over-night, to make them\nfight the lustier in the morning! Well, well, they haven't sailed round\nthe world, Jack Hawkins.\"\n\n\"Or had to run home from San Juan d'Ulloa with half a crew.\n\n\"Well, if we haven't to run out with half crews. I saw a sight of our\nlads drunk about this morning.\"\n\n\"The more reason for waiting till they be sober. Besides, if everybody's\ncaranting about to once each after his own men, nobody'll find nothing\nin such a scrimmage as that. Bye, bye, Uncle Martin. We'm going to blow\nthe Dons up now in earnest.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\nTHE GREAT ARMADA\n\n     \"Britannia needs no bulwarks,\n        No towers along the steep,\n     Her march is o'er the mountain wave,\n        Her home is on the deep.\"\n\n        CAMPBELL, Ye Mariners of England.\n\nAnd now began that great sea-fight which was to determine whether Popery\nand despotism, or Protestantism and freedom, were the law which God had\nappointed for the half of Europe, and the whole of future America. It\nis a twelve days' epic, worthy, as I said in the beginning of this book,\nnot of dull prose, but of the thunder-roll of Homer's verse: but having\nto tell it, I must do my best, rather using, where I can, the words of\ncontemporary authors than my own.\n\n\"The Lord High Admirall of England, sending a pinnace before, called\nthe Defiance, denounced war by discharging her ordnance; and presently\napproaching with in musquet-shot, with much thundering out of his own\nship, called the Arkroyall (alias the Triumph), first set upon the\nadmirall's, as he thought, of the Spaniards (but it was Alfonso de\nLeon's ship). Soon after, Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher played stoutly\nwith their ordnance on the hindmost squadron, which was commanded by\nRecalde.\" The Spaniards soon discover the superior \"nimbleness of the\nEnglish ships;\" and Recalde's squadron, finding that they are getting\nmore than they give, in spite of his endeavors, hurry forward to join\nthe rest of the fleet. Medina the Admiral, finding his ships scattering\nfast, gathers them into a half-moon; and the Armada tries to keep solemn\nway forward, like a stately herd of buffaloes, who march on across the\nprairie, disdaining to notice the wolves which snarl around their track.\nBut in vain. These are no wolves, but cunning hunters, swiftly horsed,\nand keenly armed, and who will \"shamefully shuffle\" (to use Drake's own\nexpression) that vast herd from the Lizard to Portland, from Portland\nto Calais Roads; and who, even in this short two hours' fight, have made\nmany a Spaniard question the boasted invincibleness of this Armada.\n\nOne of the four great galliasses is already riddled with shot, to the\ngreat disarrangement of her \"pulpits, chapels,\" and friars therein\nassistant. The fleet has to close round her, or Drake and Hawkins\nwill sink her; in effecting which manoeuvre, the \"principal galleon of\nSeville,\" in which are Pedro de Valdez and a host of blue-blooded Dons,\nruns foul of her neighbor, carries away her foremast, and is, in spite\nof Spanish chivalry, left to her fate. This does not look like victory,\ncertainly. But courage! though Valdez be left behind, \"our Lady,\" and\nthe saints, and the bull Caena Domini (dictated by one whom I dare not\nname here), are with them still, and it were blasphemous to doubt. But\nin the meanwhile, if they have fared no better than this against a\nthird of the Plymouth fleet, how will they fare when those forty\nbelated ships, which are already whitening the blue between them and the\nMewstone, enter the scene to play their part?\n\nSo ends the first day; not an English ship, hardly a man, is hurt.\nIt has destroyed for ever, in English minds, the prestige of boastful\nSpain. It has justified utterly the policy which the good Lord Howard\nhad adopted by Raleigh's and Drake's advice, of keeping up a running\nfight, instead of \"clapping ships together without consideration,\" in\nwhich case, says Raleigh, \"he had been lost, if he had not been better\nadvised than a great many malignant fools were, who found fault with his\ndemeanor.\"\n\nBe that as it may, so ends the first day, in which Amyas and the other\nBideford ships have been right busy for two hours, knocking holes in a\nhuge galleon, which carries on her poop a maiden with a wheel, and bears\nthe name of Sta. Catharina. She had a coat of arms on the flag at her\nsprit, probably those of the commandant of soldiers; but they were shot\naway early in the fight, so Amyas cannot tell whether they were De\nSoto's or not. Nevertheless, there is plenty of time for private\nrevenge; and Amyas, called off at last by the admiral's signal, goes\nto bed and sleeps soundly.\n\nBut ere he has been in his hammock an hour, he is awakened by Cary's\ncoming down to ask for orders.\n\n\"We were to follow Drake's lantern, Amyas; but where it is, I can't\nsee, unless he has been taken up aloft there among the stars for a new\nDrakium Sidus.\"\n\nAmyas turns out grumbling: but no lantern is to be seen; only a sudden\nexplosion and a great fire on board some Spaniard, which is gradually\ngot under, while they have to lie-to the whole night long, with nearly\nthe whole fleet.\n\nThe next morning finds them off Torbay; and Amyas is hailed by a\npinnace, bringing a letter from Drake, which (saving the spelling, which\nwas somewhat arbitrary, like most men's in those days) ran somewhat\nthus:--\n\n\n\"DEAR LAD,--I have been wool-gathering all night after five great hulks,\nwhich the Pixies transfigured overnight into galleons, and this morning\nagain into German merchantmen. I let them go with my blessing; and\ncoming back, fell in (God be thanked!) with Valdez' great galleon;\nand in it good booty, which the Dons his fellows had left behind, like\nfaithful and valiant comrades, and the Lord Howard had let slip past\nhim, thinking her deserted by her crew. I have sent to Dartmouth a sight\nof noblemen and gentlemen, maybe a half-hundred; and Valdez himself, who\nwhen I sent my pinnace aboard must needs stand on his punctilios, and\npropound conditions. I answered him, I had no time to tell with him; if\nhe would needs die, then I was the very man for him; if he would live,\nthen, buena querra. He sends again, boasting that he was Don Pedro\nValdez, and that it stood not with his honor, and that of the Dons in\nhis company. I replied, that for my part, I was Francis Drake, and my\nmatches burning. Whereon he finds in my name salve for the wounds of\nhis own, and comes aboard, kissing my fist, with Spanish lies of holding\nhimself fortunate that he had fallen into the hands of fortunate Drake,\nand much more, which he might have kept to cool his porridge. But I have\nmuch news from him (for he is a leaky tub); and among others, this,\nthat your Don Guzman is aboard of the Sta. Catharina, commandant of her\nsoldiery, and has his arms flying at her sprit, beside Sta. Catharina at\nthe poop, which is a maiden with a wheel, and is a lofty built ship of\n3 tier of ordnance, from which God preserve you, and send you like luck\nwith.\n\n\"Your deare Friend and Admirall,\n\n\"F. Drake.\n\n\"She sails in this squadron of Recalde. The Armada was minded to smoke\nus out of Plymouth; and God's grace it was they tried not: but their\norders from home are too strait, and so the slaves fight like a bull\nin a tether, no farther than their rope, finding thus the devil a hard\nmaster, as do most in the end. They cannot compass our quick handling\nand tacking, and take us for very witches. So far so good, and better\nto come. You and I know the length of their foot of old. Time and light\nwill kill any hare, and they will find it a long way from Start to\nDunkirk.\"\n\n\n\"The admiral is in a gracious humor, Leigh, to have vouchsafed you so\nlong a letter.\"\n\n\"St. Catherine! why, that was the galleon we hammered all yesterday!\"\nsaid Amyas, stamping on the deck.\n\n\"Of course it was. Well, we shall find her again, doubt not. That\ncunning old Drake! how he has contrived to line his own pockets, even\nthough he had to keep the whole fleet waiting for him.\"\n\n\"He has given the lord high admiral the dor, at all events.\"\n\n\"Lord Howard is too high-hearted to stop and plunder, Papist though he\nis, Amyas.\"\n\nAmyas answered by a growl, for he worshipped Drake, and was not too just\nto Papists.\n\nThe fleet did not find Lord Howard till nightfall; he and Lord Sheffield\nhad been holding on steadfastly the whole night after the Spanish\nlanterns, with two ships only. At least there was no doubt now of the\nloyalty of English Roman Catholics, and indeed, throughout the fight,\nthe Howards showed (as if to wipe out the slurs which had been cast on\ntheir loyalty by fanatics) a desperate courage, which might have thrust\nless prudent men into destruction, but led them only to victory. Soon a\nlarge Spaniard drifts by, deserted and partly burnt. Some of the men are\nfor leaving their place to board her; but Amyas stoutly refuses. He has\n\"come out to fight, and not to plunder; so let the nearest ship to her\nhave her luck without grudging.\" They pass on, and the men pull long\nfaces when they see the galleon snapped up by their next neighbor,\nand towed off to Weymouth, where she proves to be the ship of Miguel\nd'Oquenda, the vice-admiral, which they saw last night, all but blown up\nby some desperate Netherland gunner, who, being \"misused,\" was minded to\npay off old scores on his tyrants.\n\nAnd so ends the second day; while the Portland rises higher and clearer\nevery hour. The next morning finds them off the island. Will they try\nPortsmouth, though they have spared Plymouth? The wind has shifted\nto the north, and blows clear and cool off the white-walled downs of\nWeymouth Bay. The Spaniards turn and face the English. They must mean\nto stand off and on until the wind shall change, and then to try for\nthe Needles. At least, they shall have some work to do before they round\nPurbeck Isle.\n\nThe English go to the westward again: but it is only to return on the\nopposite tack; and now begin a series of manoeuvres, each fleet trying\nto get the wind of the other; but the struggle does not last long, and\nere noon the English fleet have slipped close-hauled between the Armada\nand the land, and are coming down upon them right before the wind.\n\nAnd now begins a fight most fierce and fell. \"And fight they did\nconfusedly, and with variable fortunes; while, on the one hand, the\nEnglish manfully rescued the ships of London, which were hemmed in\nby the Spaniards; and, on the other side, the Spaniards as stoutly\ndelivered Recalde being in danger.\" \"Never was heard such thundering of\nordnance on both sides, which notwithstanding from the Spaniards\nflew for the most part over the English without harm. Only Cock, an\nEnglishman\" (whom Prince claims, I hope rightfully, as a worthy of\nDevon), \"died with honor in the midst of the enemies in a small ship of\nhis. For the English ships, being far the lesser, charged the enemy with\nmarvellous agility; and having discharged their broadsides, flew forth\npresently into the deep, and levelled their shot directly, without\nmissing, at those great and unwieldy Spanish ships.\" \"This was the most\nfurious and bloody skirmish of all\" (though ending only, it seems, in\nthe capture of a great Venetian and some small craft), \"in which the\nlord admiral fighting amidst his enemies' fleet, and seeing one of his\ncaptains afar off (Fenner by name, he who fought the seven Portugals at\nthe Azores), cried, 'O George, what doest thou? Wilt thou now frustrate\nmy hope and opinion conceived of thee? Wilt thou forsake me now?' With\nwhich words he being enflamed, approached, and did the part of a most\nvaliant captain;\" as, indeed, did all the rest.\n\nNight falls upon the floating volcano; and morning finds them far past\nPurbeck, with the white peak of Freshwater ahead; and pouring out past\nthe Needles, ship after ship, to join the gallant chase. For now from\nall havens, in vessels fitted out at their own expense, flock the\nchivalry of England; the Lords Oxford, Northumberland, and Cumberland,\nPallavicin, Brooke, Carew, Raleigh, and Blunt, and many another\nhonorable name, \"as to a set field, where immortal fame and honor was to\nbe attained.\" Spain has staked her chivalry in that mighty cast; not a\nnoble house of Arragon or Castile but has lent a brother or a son--and\nshall mourn the loss of one: and England's gentlemen will measure their\nstrength once for all against the Cavaliers of Spain. Lord Howard has\nsent forward light craft into Portsmouth for ammunition: but they will\nscarce return to-night, for the wind falls dead, and all the evening the\ntwo fleets drift helpless with the tide, and shout idle defiance at each\nother with trumpet, fife, and drum.\n\nThe sun goes down upon a glassy sea, and rises on a glassy sea again.\nBut what day is this? The twenty-fifth, St. James's-day, sacred to the\npatron saint of Spain. Shall nothing be attempted in his honor by\nthose whose forefathers have so often seen him with their bodily eyes,\ncharging in their van upon his snow-white steed, and scattering Paynims\nwith celestial lance? He might have sent them, certainly, a favoring\nbreeze; perhaps, he only means to try their faith; at least the galleys\nshall attack; and in their van three of the great galliasses (the fourth\nlies half-crippled among the fleet) thrash the sea to foam with three\nhundred oars apiece; and see, not St. James leading them to victory, but\nLord Howard's Triumph, his brother's Lion, Southwell's Elizabeth Jonas,\nLord Sheffield's Bear, Barker's Victory, and George Fenner's Leicester,\ntowed stoutly out, to meet them with such salvoes of chain-shot,\nsmashing oars, and cutting rigging, that had not the wind sprung up\nagain toward noon, and the Spanish fleet come up to rescue them, they\nhad shared the fate of Valdez and the Biscayan. And now the fight\nbecomes general. Frobisher beats down the Spanish admiral's mainmast;\nand, attacked himself by Mexia and Recalde, is rescued by Lord Howard;\nwho, himself endangered in his turn, is rescued in his turn; \"while\nafter that day\" (so sickened were they of the English gunnery) \"no\ngalliasse would adventure to fight.\"\n\nAnd so, with variable fortune, the fight thunders on the livelong\nafternoon, beneath the virgin cliffs of Freshwater; while myriad\nsea-fowl rise screaming up from every ledge, and spot with their black\nwings the snow-white wall of chalk; and the lone shepherd hurries down\nthe slopes above to peer over the dizzy edge, and forgets the wheatear\nfluttering in his snare, while he gazes trembling upon glimpses of tall\nmasts and gorgeous flags, piercing at times the league-broad veil of\nsulphur-smoke which welters far below.\n\nSo fares St. James's-day, as Baal's did on Carmel in old time, \"Either\nhe is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is on a journey; or peradventure\nhe sleepeth, and must be awaked.\" At least, the only fire by which he\nhas answered his votaries, has been that of English cannon: and the\nArmada, \"gathering itself into a roundel,\" will fight no more, but make\nthe best of its way to Calais, where perhaps the Guises' faction may\nhave a French force ready to assist them, and then to Dunkirk, to join\nwith Parma and the great flotilla of the Netherlands.\n\nSo on, before \"a fair Etesian gale,\" which follows clear and bright\nout of the south-southwest, glide forward the two great fleets, past\nBrighton Cliffs and Beachy Head, Hastings and Dungeness. Is it a battle\nor a triumph? For by sea Lord Howard, instead of fighting is rewarding;\nand after Lord Thomas Howard, Lord Sheffield, Townsend, and Frobisher\nhave received at his hands that knighthood, which was then more\nhonorable than a peerage, old Admiral Hawkins kneels and rises up Sir\nJohn, and shaking his shoulders after the accolade, observes to the\nrepresentative of majesty, that his \"old woman will hardly know herself\nagain, when folks call her My Lady.\"\n\nAnd meanwhile the cliffs are lined with pike-men and musketeers, and by\nevery countryman and groom who can bear arms, led by their squires and\nsheriffs, marching eastward as fast as their weapons let them, towards\nthe Dover shore. And not with them alone. From many a mile inland come\ndown women and children, and aged folk in wagons, to join their feeble\nshouts, and prayers which are not feeble, to that great cry of mingled\nfaith and fear which ascends to the throne of God from the spectators of\nBritain's Salamis.\n\nLet them pray on. The danger is not over yet, though Lord Howard has had\nnews from Newhaven that the Guises will not stir against England, and\nSeymour and Winter have left their post of observation on the Flemish\nshores, to make up the number of the fleet to an hundred and forty\nsail--larger, slightly, than that of the Spanish fleet, but of not more\nthan half the tonnage, or one third the number of men. The Spaniards are\ndispirited and battered, but unbroken still; and as they slide to their\nanchorage in Calais Roads on the Saturday evening of that most memorable\nweek, all prudent men know well that England's hour is come, and that\nthe bells which will call all Christendom to church upon the morrow\nmorn, will be either the death-knell or the triumphal peal of the\nReformed faith throughout the world.\n\nA solemn day that Sabbath must have been in country and in town. And\nmany a light-hearted coward, doubtless, who had scoffed (as many did) at\nthe notion of the Armada's coming, because he dare not face the thought,\ngave himself up to abject fear, \"as he now plainly saw and heard that of\nwhich before he would not be persuaded.\" And many a brave man, too, as\nhe knelt beside his wife and daughters, felt his heart sink to the very\npavement, at the thought of what those beloved ones might be enduring a\nfew short days hence, from a profligate and fanatical soldiery, or from\nthe more deliberate fiendishness of the Inquisition. The massacre of St.\nBartholomew, the fires of Smithfield, the immolation of the Moors,\nthe extermination of the West Indians, the fantastic horrors of the\nPiedmontese persecution, which make unreadable the too truthful pages\nof Morland,--these were the spectres, which, not as now, dim and distant\nthrough the mist of centuries, but recent, bleeding from still gaping\nwounds, flitted before the eyes of every Englishman, and filled his\nbrain and heart with fire.\n\nHe knew full well the fate in store for him and his. One false step, and\nthe unspeakable doom which, not two generations afterwards, befell the\nLutherans of Magdeburg, would have befallen every town from London to\nCarlisle. All knew the hazard, as they prayed that day, and many a day\nbefore and after, throughout England and the Netherlands. And none knew\nit better than she who was the guiding spirit of that devoted land,\nand the especial mark of the invaders' fury; and who, by some Divine\ninspiration (as men then not unwisely held), devised herself the daring\nstroke which was to anticipate the coming blow.\n\nBut where is Amyas Leigh all this while? Day after day he has been\nseeking the Sta. Catharina in the thickest of the press, and cannot come\nat her, cannot even hear of her: one moment he dreads that she has sunk\nby night, and balked him of his prey; the next, that she has repaired\nher damages, and will escape him after all. He is moody, discontented,\nrestless, even (for the first time in his life) peevish with his men. He\ncan talk of nothing but Don Guzman; he can find no better employment,\nat every spare moment, than taking his sword out of the sheath, and\nhandling it, fondling it, talking to it even, bidding it not to fail him\nin the day of vengeance. At last, he has sent to Squire, the armorer,\nfor a whetstone, and, half-ashamed of his own folly, whets and polishes\nit in bye-corners, muttering to himself. That one fixed thought of\nselfish vengeance has possessed his whole mind; he forgets England's\npresent need, her past triumph, his own safety, everything but his\nbrother's blood. And yet this is the day for which he has been longing\never since he brought home that magic horn as a fifteen years boy; the\nday when he should find himself face to face with an invader, and\nthat invader Antichrist himself. He has believed for years with Drake,\nHawkins, Grenville, and Raleigh, that he was called and sent into the\nworld only to fight the Spaniard: and he is fighting him now, in such a\ncause, for such a stake, within such battle-lists, as he will never\nsee again: and yet he is not content, and while throughout that gallant\nfleet, whole crews are receiving the Communion side by side, and rising\nwith cheerful faces to shake hands, and to rejoice that they are sharers\nin Britain's Salamis, Amyas turns away from the holy elements.\n\n\"I cannot communicate, Sir John. Charity with all men? I hate, if ever\nman hated on earth.\"\n\n\"You hate the Lord's foes only, Captain Leigh.\"\n\n\"No, Jack, I hate my own as well.\"\n\n\"But no one in the fleet, sir?\"\n\n\"Don't try to put me off with the same Jesuit's quibble which that false\nknave Parson Fletcher invented for one of Doughty's men, to drug his\nconscience withal when he was plotting against his own admiral. No,\nJack, I hate one of whom you know; and somehow that hatred of him keeps\nme from loving any human being. I am in love and charity with no man,\nSir John Brimblecombe--not even with you! Go your ways in God's name,\nsir! and leave me and the devil alone together, or you'll find my words\nare true.\"\n\nJack departed with a sigh, and while the crew were receiving the\nCommunion on deck, Amyas sate below in the cabin sharpening his sword,\nand after it, called for a boat and went on board Drake's ship to ask\nnews of the Sta. Catharina, and listened scowling to the loud chants and\ntinkling bells, which came across the water from the Spanish fleet. At\nlast, Drake was summoned by the lord admiral, and returned with a secret\ncommission, which ought to bear fruit that night; and Amyas, who had\ngone with him, helped him till nightfall, and then returned to his own\nship as Sir Amyas Leigh, Knight, to the joy and glory of every soul on\nboard, except his moody self.\n\nSo there, the livelong summer Sabbath-day, before the little high-walled\ntown and the long range of yellow sandhills, lie those two mighty\narmaments, scowling at each other, hardly out of gunshot. Messenger\nafter messenger is hurrying towards Bruges to the Duke of Parma, for\nlight craft which can follow these nimble English somewhat better than\ntheir own floating castles; and, above all, entreating him to put to sea\nat once with all his force. The duke is not with his forces at Dunkirk,\nbut on the future field of Waterloo, paying his devotions to St. Mary\nof Halle in Hainault, in order to make all sure in his Pantheon, and\nalready sees in visions of the night that gentle-souled and pure-lipped\nsaint, Cardinal Allen, placing the crown of England on his head. He\nreturns for answer, first, that his victual is not ready; next, that his\nDutch sailors, who have been kept at their post for many a week at the\nsword's point, have run away like water; and thirdly, that over and\nabove all, he cannot come, so \"strangely provided\" of great ordnance and\nmusketeers are those five-and-thirty Dutch ships, in which round-sterned\nand stubborn-hearted heretics watch, like terriers at a rat's hole, the\nentrance of Nieuwport and Dunkirk. Having ensured the private patronage\nof St. Mary of Halle, he will return to-morrow to make experience of its\neffects: but only hear across the flats of Dixmude the thunder of the\nfleets, and at Dunkirk the open curses of his officers. For while he\nhas been praying and nothing more, the English have been praying, and\nsomething more; and all that is left for the Prince of Parma is, to\nhang a few purveyors, as peace offerings to his sulking army, and then\n\"chafe,\" as Drake says of him, \"like a bear robbed of her whelps.\"\n\nFor Lord Henry Seymour has brought Lord Howard a letter of command from\nElizabeth's self; and Drake has been carrying it out so busily all that\nSunday long, that by two o'clock on the Monday morning, eight fire-ships\n\"besmeared with wild-fire, brimstone, pitch, and resin, and all their\nordnance charged with bullets and with stones,\" are stealing down the\nwind straight for the Spanish fleet, guided by two valiant men of Devon,\nYoung and Prowse. (Let their names live long in the land!) The ships are\nfired, the men of Devon steal back, and in a moment more, the heaven is\nred with glare from Dover Cliffs to Gravelines Tower; and weary-hearted\nBelgian boors far away inland, plundered and dragooned for many a\nhideous year, leap from their beds, and fancy (and not so far wrongly\neither) that the day of judgment is come at last, to end their woes, and\nhurl down vengeance on their tyrants.\n\nAnd then breaks forth one of those disgraceful panics, which so often\nfollow overweening presumption; and shrieks, oaths, prayers, and\nreproaches, make night hideous. There are those too on board who\nrecollect well enough Jenebelli's fire-ships at Antwerp three years\nbefore, and the wreck which they made of Parma's bridge across the\nScheldt. If these should be like them! And cutting all cables, hoisting\nany sails, the Invincible Armada goes lumbering wildly out to sea, every\nship foul of her neighbor.\n\nThe largest of the four galliasses loses her rudder, and drifts helpless\nto and fro, hindering and confusing. The duke, having (so the Spaniards\nsay) weighed his anchor deliberately instead of leaving it behind him,\nruns in again after awhile, and fires a signal for return: but his\ntruant sheep are deaf to the shepherd's pipe, and swearing and praying\nby turns, he runs up Channel towards Gravelines picking up stragglers\non his way, who are struggling as they best can among the flats and\nshallows: but Drake and Fenner have arrived as soon as he. When Monday's\nsun rises on the quaint old castle and muddy dykes of Gravelines town,\nthe thunder of the cannon recommences, and is not hushed till night.\nDrake can hang coolly enough in the rear to plunder when he thinks fit;\nbut when the battle needs it, none can fight more fiercely, among the\nforemost; and there is need now, if ever. That Armada must never be\nallowed to re-form. If it does, its left wing may yet keep the English\nat bay, while its right drives off the blockading Hollanders from\nDunkirk port, and sets Parma and his flotilla free to join them, and to\nsail in doubled strength across to the mouth of Thames.\n\nSo Drake has weighed anchor, and away up Channel with all his squadron,\nthe moment that he saw the Spanish fleet come up; and with him Fenner\nburning to redeem the honor which, indeed, he had never lost; and ere\nFenton, Beeston, Crosse, Ryman, and Lord Southwell can join them, the\nDevon ships have been worrying the Spaniards for two full hours into\nconfusion worse confounded.\n\nBut what is that heavy firing behind them? Alas for the great galliasse!\nShe lies, like a huge stranded whale, upon the sands where now stands\nCalais pier; and Amyas Preston, the future hero of La Guayra, is\npounding her into submission, while a fleet of hoys and drumblers look\non and help, as jackals might the lion.\n\nSoon, on the south-west horizon, loom up larger and larger two mighty\nships, and behind them sail on sail. As they near a shout greets the\nTriumph and the Bear; and on and in the lord high admiral glides stately\ninto the thickest of the fight.\n\nTrue, we have still but some three-and-twenty ships which can cope at\nall with some ninety of the Spaniards: but we have dash, and daring, and\nthe inspiration of utter need. Now, or never, must the mighty struggle\nbe ended. We worried them off Portland; we must rend them in pieces\nnow; and in rushes ship after ship, to smash her broadsides through and\nthrough the wooden castles, \"sometimes not a pike's length asunder,\"\nand then out again to re-load, and give place meanwhile to another. The\nsmaller are fighting with all sails set; the few larger, who, once in,\nare careless about coming out again, fight with top-sails loose, and\ntheir main and foreyards close down on deck, to prevent being boarded.\nThe duke, Oquenda, and Recalde, having with much ado got clear of the\nshallows, bear the brunt of the fight to seaward; but in vain. The day\ngoes against them more and more, as it runs on. Seymour and Winter have\nbattered the great San Philip into a wreck; her masts are gone by the\nboard; Pimentelli in the San Matthew comes up to take the mastiffs\noff the fainting bull, and finds them fasten on him instead; but the\nEvangelist, though smaller, is stouter than the Deacon, and of all the\nshot poured into him, not twenty \"lackt him thorough.\" His masts are\ntottering; but sink or strike he will not.\n\n\"Go ahead, and pound his tough hide, Leigh,\" roars Drake off the poop\nof his ship, while he hammers away at one of the great galliasses. \"What\nright has he to keep us all waiting?\"\n\nAmyas slips in as best he can between Drake and Winter; as he passes he\nshouts to his ancient enemy,--\n\n\"We are with you, sir; all friends to-day!\" and slipping round Winter's\nbows, he pours his broadside into those of the San Matthew, and then\nglides on to re-load; but not to return. For not a pistol shot to\nleeward, worried by three or four small craft, lies an immense galleon;\nand on her poop--can he believe his eyes for joy?--the maiden and the\nwheel which he has sought so long!\n\n\"There he is!\" shouts Amyas, springing to the starboard side of the\nship. The men, too, have already caught sight of that hated sign; a\ncheer of fury bursts from every throat.\n\n\"Steady, men!\" says Amyas, in a suppressed voice. \"Not a shot! Re-load,\nand be ready; I must speak with him first;\" and silent as the grave,\namid the infernal din, the Vengeance glides up to the Spaniard's\nquarter.\n\n\"Don Guzman Maria Magdalena Sotomayor de Soto!\" shouts Amyas from the\nmizzen rigging, loud and clear amid the roar.\n\nHe has not called in vain. Fearless and graceful as ever, the tall,\nmail-clad figure of his foe leaps up upon the poop-railing, twenty feet\nabove Amyas's head, and shouts through his vizor,--\n\n\"At your service, sir whosoever you may be.\"\n\nA dozen muskets and arrows are levelled at him; but Amyas frowns them\ndown. \"No man strikes him but I. Spare him, if you kill every other soul\non board. Don Guzman! I am Captain Sir Amyas Leigh; I proclaim you a\ntraitor and a ravisher, and challenge you once more to single combat,\nwhen and where you will.\"\n\n\"You are welcome to come on board me, sir,\" answers the Spaniard, in a\nclear, quiet tone; \"bringing with you this answer, that you lie in your\nthroat;\" and lingering a moment out of bravado, to arrange his scarf, he\nsteps slowly down again behind the bulwarks.\n\n\"Coward!\" shouts Amyas at the top of his voice.\n\nThe Spaniard re-appears instantly. \"Why that name, senor, of all\nothers?\" asks he in a cool, stern voice.\n\n\"Because we call men cowards in England, who leave their wives to be\nburnt alive by priests.\"\n\nThe moment the words had passed Amyas's lips, he felt that they were\ncruel and unjust. But it was too late to recall them. The Spaniard\nstarted, clutched his sword-hilt, and then hissed back through his\nclosed vizor,--\n\n\"For that word, sirrah, you hang at my yardarm, if Saint Mary gives me\ngrace.\"\n\n\"See that your halter be a silken one, then,\" laughed Amyas, \"for I\nam just dubbed knight.\" And he stepped down as a storm of bullets rang\nthrough the rigging round his head; the Spaniards are not as punctilious\nas he.\n\n\"Fire!\" His ordnance crash through the stern-works of the Spaniard; and\nthen he sails onward, while her balls go humming harmlessly through his\nrigging.\n\nHalf-an-hour has passed of wild noise and fury; three times has the\nVengeance, as a dolphin might, sailed clean round and round the Sta.\nCatharina, pouring in broadside after broadside, till the guns are\nleaping to the deck-beams with their own heat, and the Spaniard's sides\nare slit and spotted in a hundred places. And yet, so high has been his\nfire in return, and so strong the deck defences of the Vengeance, that a\nfew spars broken, and two or three men wounded by musketry, are all her\nloss. But still the Spaniard endures, magnificent as ever; it is the\nbattle of the thresher and the whale; the end is certain, but the work\nis long.\n\n\"Can I help you, Captain Leigh?\" asked Lord Henry Seymour, as he passes\nwithin oar's length of him, to attack a ship ahead. \"The San Matthew has\nhad his dinner, and is gone on to Medina to ask for a digestive to it.\"\n\n\"I thank your lordship: but this is my private quarrel, of which I\nspoke. But if your lordship could lend me powder--\"\n\n\"Would that I could! But so, I fear, says every other gentleman in the\nfleet.\"\n\nA puff of wind clears away the sulphurous veil for a moment; the sea is\nclear of ships towards the land; the Spanish fleet are moving again up\nChannel, Medina bringing up the rear; only some two miles to their right\nhand, the vast hull of the San Philip is drifting up the shore with the\ntide, and somewhat nearer the San Matthew is hard at work at her pumps.\nThey can see the white stream of water pouring down her side.\n\n\"Go in, my lord, and have the pair,\" shouts Amyas.\n\n\"No, sir! Forward is a Seymour's cry. We will leave them to pay the\nFlushingers' expenses.\" And on went Lord Henry, and on shore went the\nSan Philip at Ostend, to be plundered by the Flushingers; while the\nSan Matthew, whose captain, \"on a hault courage,\" had refused to save\nhimself and his gentlemen on board Medina's ship, went blundering\nmiserably into the hungry mouths of Captain Peter Vanderduess and four\nother valiant Dutchmen, who, like prudent men of Holland, contrived to\nkeep the galleon afloat till they had emptied her, and then \"hung up her\nbanner in the great church of Leyden, being of such a length, that being\nfastened to the roof, it reached unto the very ground.\"\n\nBut in the meanwhile, long ere the sun had set, comes down the darkness\nof the thunderstorm, attracted, as to a volcano's mouth, to that vast\nmass of sulphur-smoke which cloaks the sea for many a mile; and heaven's\nartillery above makes answer to man's below. But still, through smoke\nand rain, Amyas clings to his prey. She too has seen the northward\nmovement of the Spanish fleet, and sets her topsails; Amyas calls to\nthe men to fire high, and cripple her rigging: but in vain: for three or\nfour belated galleys, having forced their way at last over the shallows,\ncome flashing and sputtering up to the combatants, and take his fire\noff the galleon. Amyas grinds his teeth, and would fain hustle into the\nthick of the press once more, in spite of the galleys' beaks.\n\n\"Most heroical captain,\" says cary, pulling a long face, \"if we do, we\nare stove and sunk in five minutes; not to mention that Yeo says he has\nnot twenty rounds of great cartridge left.\"\n\nSo, surely and silent, the Vengeance sheers off, but keeps as near\nas she can to the little squadron, all through the night of rain and\nthunder which follows. Next morning the sun rises on a clear sky, with\na strong west-north-west breeze, and all hearts are asking what the day\nwill bring forth.\n\nThey are long past Dunkirk now; the German Ocean is opening before them.\nThe Spaniards, sorely battered, and lessened in numbers, have, during\nthe night, regained some sort of order. The English hang on their skirts\na mile or two behind. They have no ammunition, and must wait for more.\nTo Amyas's great disgust, the Sta. Catharina has rejoined her fellows\nduring the night.\n\n\"Never mind,\" says Cary; \"she can neither dive nor fly, and as long as\nshe is above water, we--What is the admiral about?\"\n\nHe is signalling Lord Henry Seymour and his squadron. Soon they\ntack, and come down the wind for the coast of Flanders. Parma must be\nblockaded still; and the Hollanders are likely to be too busy with their\nplunder to do it effectually. Suddenly there is a stir in the Spanish\nfleet. Medina and the rearmost ships turn upon the English. What can it\nmean? Will they offer battle once more? If so, it were best to get\nout of their way, for we have nothing wherewith to fight them. So the\nEnglish lie close to the wind. They will let them pass, and return to\ntheir old tactic of following and harassing.\n\n\"Good-bye to Seymour,\" says Cary, \"if he is caught between them and\nParma's flotilla. They are going to Dunkirk.\"\n\n\"Impossible! They will not have water enough to reach his light craft.\nHere comes a big ship right upon us! Give him all you have left, lads;\nand if he will fight us, lay him alongside, and die boarding.\"\n\nThey gave him what they had, and hulled him with every shot; but his\nhuge side stood silent as the grave. He had not wherewithal to return\nthe compliment.\n\n\"As I live, he is cutting loose the foot of his mainsail! the villain\nmeans to run.\"\n\n\"There go the rest of them! Victoria!\" shouted Cary, as one after\nanother, every Spaniard set all the sail he could.\n\nThere was silence for a few minutes throughout the English fleet;\nand then cheer upon cheer of triumph rent the skies. It was over. The\nSpaniard had refused battle, and thinking only of safety, was pressing\ndownward toward the Straits again. The Invincible Armada had cast away\nits name, and England was saved.\n\n\"But he will never get there, sir,\" said old Yeo, who had come upon deck\nto murmur his Nunc Domine, and gaze upon that sight beyond all human\nfaith or hope: \"Never, never will he weather the Flanders shore, against\nsuch a breeze as is coming up. Look to the eye of the wind, sir, and see\nhow the Lord is fighting for His people!\"\n\nYes, down it came, fresher and stiffer every minute out of the gray\nnorth-west, as it does so often after a thunder-storm; and the sea began\nto rise high and white under the \"Claro Aquilone,\" till the Spaniards\nwere fain to take in all spare canvas, and lie-to as best they could;\nwhile the English fleet, lying-to also, awaited an event which was in\nGod's hands and not in theirs.\n\n\"They will be all ashore on Zealand before the afternoon,\" murmured\nAmyas; \"and I have lost my labor! Oh, for powder, powder, powder! to go\nin and finish it at once!\"\n\n\"Oh, sir,\" said Yeo, \"don't murmur against the Lord in the very day of\nHis mercies. It is hard, to be sure; but His will be done.\"\n\n\"Could we not borrow powder from Drake there?\"\n\n\"Look at the sea, sir!\"\n\nAnd, indeed, the sea was far too rough for any such attempt. The\nSpaniards neared and neared the fatal dunes, which fringed the shore for\nmany a dreary mile; and Amyas had to wait weary hours, growling like a\ndog who has had the bone snatched out of his mouth, till the day wore\non; when, behold, the wind began to fall as rapidly as it had risen. A\nsavage joy rose in Amyas's heart.\n\n\"They are safe! safe for us! Who will go and beg us powder? A cartridge\nhere and a cartridge there?--anything to set to work again!\"\n\nCary volunteered, and returned in a couple of hours with some quantity:\nbut he was on board again only just in time, for the south-wester had\nrecovered the mastery of the skies, and Spaniards and English were\nmoving away; but this time northward. Whither now? To Scotland? Amyas\nknew not, and cared not, provided he was in the company of Don Guzman de\nSoto.\n\nThe Armada was defeated, and England saved. But such great undertakings\nseldom end in one grand melodramatic explosion of fireworks, through\nwhich the devil arises in full roar to drag Dr. Faustus forever into the\nflaming pit. On the contrary, the devil stands by his servants to the\nlast, and tries to bring off his shattered forces with drums beating and\ncolors flying; and, if possible, to lull his enemies into supposing that\nthe fight is ended, long before it really is half over. All which the\ngood Lord Howard of Effingham knew well, and knew, too, that Medina had\none last card to play, and that was the filial affection of that dutiful\nand chivalrous son, James of Scotland. True, he had promised faith to\nElizabeth: but that was no reason why he should keep it. He had been\nhankering and dabbling after Spain for years past, for its absolution\nwas dear to his inmost soul; and Queen Elizabeth had had to warn him,\nscold him, call him a liar, for so doing; so the Armada might still find\nshelter and provision in the Firth of Forth. But whether Lord Howard\nknew or not, Medina did not know, that Elizabeth had played her card\ncunningly, in the shape of one of those appeals to the purse, which, to\nJames's dying day, overweighed all others save appeals to his vanity.\n\"The title of a dukedom in England, a yearly pension of 5000 pounds, a\nguard at the queen's charge, and other matters\" (probably more hounds\nand deer), had steeled the heart of the King of Scots, and sealed the\nFirth of Forth. Nevertheless, as I say, Lord Howard, like the rest of\nElizabeth's heroes, trusted James just as much as James trusted others;\nand therefore thought good to escort the Armada until it was safely past\nthe domains of that most chivalrous and truthful Solomon. But on the\n4th of August, his fears, such as they were, were laid to rest. The\nSpaniards left the Scottish coast and sailed away for Norway; and the\ngame was played out, and the end was come, as the end of such matters\ngenerally comes, by gradual decay, petty disaster, and mistake; till\nthe snow-mountain, instead of being blown tragically and heroically to\natoms, melts helplessly and pitiably away.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\n\nHOW AMYAS THREW HIS SWORD INTO THE SEA\n\n     \"Full fathom deep thy father lies;\n        Of his bones are corals made;\n     Those are pearls which were his eyes;\n        Nothing of him that doth fade,\n     But doth suffer a sea-change\n        Into something rich and strange;\n     Fairies hourly ring his knell,\n     Hark! I hear them.  Ding dong bell.\"\n\n                           The Tempest.\n\nYes, it is over; and the great Armada is vanquished. It is lulled for\nawhile, the everlasting war which is in heaven, the battle of Iran and\nTuran, of the children of light and of darkness, of Michael and his\nangels against Satan and his fiends; the battle which slowly and seldom,\nonce in the course of many centuries, culminates and ripens into a\nday of judgment, and becomes palpable and incarnate; no longer a mere\nspiritual fight, but one of flesh and blood, wherein simple men may\nchoose their sides without mistake, and help God's cause not merely with\nprayer and pen, but with sharp shot and cold steel. A day of judgment\nhas come, which has divided the light from the darkness, and the sheep\nfrom the goats, and tried each man's work by the fire; and, behold, the\ndevil's work, like its maker, is proved to have been, as always, a lie\nand a sham, and a windy boast, a bladder which collapses at the merest\npinprick. Byzantine empires, Spanish Armadas, triple-crowned papacies,\nRussian despotisms, this is the way of them, and will be to the end of\nthe world. One brave blow at the big bullying phantom, and it vanishes\nin sulphur-stench; while the children of Israel, as of old, see the\nEgyptians dead on the sea-shore,--they scarce know how, save that God\nhas done it, and sing the song of Moses and of the Lamb.\n\nAnd now, from England and the Netherlands, from Germany and Geneva, and\nthose poor Vaudois shepherd-saints, whose bones for generations past\n\n     \"Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold;\"\n\nto be, indeed, the seed of the Church, and a germ of new life, liberty,\nand civilization, even in these very days returning good for evil to\nthat Piedmont which has hunted them down like the partridges on the\nmountains;--from all of Europe, from all of mankind, I had almost said,\nin which lay the seed of future virtue and greatness, of the destinies\nof the new-discovered world, and the triumphs of the coming age of\nscience, arose a shout of holy joy, such as the world had not heard\nfor many a weary and bloody century; a shout which was the prophetic\nbirth-paean of North America, Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific\nIslands, of free commerce and free colonization over the whole earth.\n\n\"There was in England, by the commandment of her majesty,\" says Van\nMeteran, \"and likewise in the United Provinces, by the direction of the\nStates, a solemn festival day publicly appointed, wherein all persons\nwere solemnly enjoined to resort unto ye Church, and there to render\nthanks and praises unto God, and ye preachers were commanded to exhort\nye people thereunto. The aforesaid solemnity was observed upon the 29th\nof November: which day was wholly spent in fasting, prayer, and giving\nof thanks.\n\n\"Likewise the Queen's Majesty herself, imitating ye ancient Romans, rode\ninto London in triumph, in regard of her own and her subjects' glorious\ndeliverance. For being attended upon very solemnly by all ye principal\nEstates and officers of her Realm, she was carried through her said City\nof London in a triumphant Chariot, and in robes of triumph, from her\nPalace unto ye said Cathedral Church of St. Paul, out of ye which ye\nEnsigns and Colours of ye vanquished Spaniards hung displayed. And\nall ye Citizens of London, in their liveries, stood on either side ye\nstreet, by their several Companies, with their ensigns and banners, and\nthe streets were hanged on both sides with blue Cloth, which, together\nwith ye foresaid banners, yielded a very stately and gallant prospect.\nHer Majestie being entered into ye Church together with her Clergy and\nNobles, gave thanks unto God, and caused a public Sermon to be preached\nbefore her at Paul's Cross; wherein none other argument was handled,\nbut that praise, honour, and glory might be rendered unto God, and that\nGod's Name might be extolled by thanksgiving. And with her own princely\nvoice she most Christianly exhorted ye people to do ye same; whereunto\nye people, with a loud acclamation, wished her a most long and happy\nlife to ye confusion of her foes.\"\n\nYes, as the medals struck on the occasion said, \"It came, it saw, and it\nfled!\" And whither? Away and northward, like a herd of frightened deer,\npast the Orkneys and Shetlands, catching up a few hapless fishermen as\nguides; past the coast of Norway, there, too, refused water and food by\nthe brave descendants of the Vikings; and on northward ever towards the\nlonely Faroes, and the everlasting dawn which heralds round the Pole the\nmidnight sun.\n\nTheir water is failing; the cattle must go overboard; and the wild\nnorthern sea echoes to the shrieks of drowning horses. They must\nhomeward at least, somehow, each as best he can. Let them meet again\nat Cape Finisterre, if indeed they ever meet. Medina Sidonia, with some\nfive-and twenty of the soundest and best victualled ships, will lead\nthe way, and leave the rest to their fate. He is soon out of sight; and\nforty more, the only remnant of that mighty host, come wandering wearily\nbehind, hoping to make the south-west coast of Ireland, and have help,\nor, at least, fresh water there, from their fellow Romanists. Alas for\nthem!--\n\n     \"Make Thou their way dark and slippery,\n     And follow them up ever with Thy storm.\"\n\nFor now comes up from the Atlantic, gale on gale; and few of that\nhapless remnant reached the shores of Spain.\n\nAnd where are Amyas and the Vengeance all this while?\n\nAt the fifty-seventh degree of latitude, the English fleet, finding\nthemselves growing short of provision, and having been long since out of\npowder and ball, turn southward toward home, \"thinking it best to leave\nthe Spaniard to those uncouth and boisterous northern seas.\" A few\npinnaces are still sent onward to watch their course: and the English\nfleet, caught in the same storms which scattered the Spaniards, \"with\ngreat danger and industry reached Harwich port, and there provide\nthemselves of victuals and ammunition,\" in case the Spaniards should\nreturn; but there is no need for that caution. Parma, indeed, who cannot\nbelieve that the idol at Halle, after all his compliments to it, will\nplay him so scurvy a trick, will watch for weeks on Dunkirk dunes,\nhoping against hope for the Armada's return, casting anchors, and\nspinning rigging to repair their losses.\n\n     \"But lang, lang may his ladies sit,\n     With their fans intill their hand,\n     Before they see Sir Patrick Spens\n     Come sailing to the land.\"\n\nThe Armada is away on the other side of Scotland, and Amyas is following\nin its wake.\n\nFor when the lord high admiral determined to return, Amyas asked\nleave to follow the Spaniard; and asked, too, of Sir John Hawkins,\nwho happened to be at hand, such ammunition and provision as could be\nafforded him, promising to repay the same like an honest man, out of\nhis plunder if he lived, out of his estate if he died; lodging for that\npurpose bills in the hands of Sir John, who, as a man of business,\ntook them, and put them in his pocket among the thimbles, string, and\ntobacco; after which Amyas, calling his men together, reminded them once\nmore of the story of the Rose of Torridge and Don Guzman de Soto, and\nthen asked:\n\n\"Men of Bideford, will you follow me? There will be plunder for those\nwho love plunder; revenge for those who love revenge; and for all of us\n(for we all love honor) the honor of having never left the chase as long\nas there was a Spanish flag in English seas.\"\n\nAnd every soul on board replied, that they would follow Sir Amyas Leigh\naround the world.\n\nThere is no need for me to detail every incident of that long and weary\nchase; how they found the Sta. Catharina, attacked her, and had to sheer\noff, she being rescued by the rest; how when Medina's squadron left the\ncrippled ships behind, they were all but taken or sunk, by thrusting\ninto the midst of the Spanish fleet to prevent her escaping with Medina;\nhow they crippled her, so that she could not beat to windward out into\nthe ocean, but was fain to run south, past the Orkneys, and down through\nthe Minch, between Cape Wrath and Lewis; how the younger hands were\nready to mutiny, because Amyas, in his stubborn haste, ran past two or\nthree noble prizes which were all but disabled, among others one of\nthe great galliasses, and the two great Venetians, La Ratta and La\nBelanzara--which were afterwards, with more than thirty other vessels,\nwrecked on the west coast of Ireland; how he got fresh water, in spite\nof certain \"Hebridean Scots\" of Skye, who, after reviling him in an\nunknown tongue, fought with him awhile, and then embraced him and his\nmen with howls of affection, and were not much more decently clad, nor\nmore civilized, than his old friends of California; how he pacified his\nmen by letting them pick the bones of a great Venetian which was going\non shore upon Islay (by which they got booty enough to repay them for\nthe whole voyage), and offended them again by refusing to land and\nplunder two great Spanish wrecks on the Mull of Cantire (whose crews, by\nthe by, James tried to smuggle off secretly into Spain in ships of his\nown, wishing to play, as usual, both sides of the game at once; but\nthe Spaniards were stopped at Yarmouth till the council's pleasure was\nknown--which was, of course, to let the poor wretches go on their way,\nand be hanged elsewhere); how they passed a strange island, half black,\nhalf white, which the wild people called Raghary, but Cary christened it\n\"the drowned magpie;\" how the Sta. Catharina was near lost on the Isle\nof Man, and then put into Castleton (where the Manx-men slew a whole\nboat's-crew with their arrows), and then put out again, when Amyas\nfought with her a whole day, and shot away her mainyard; how the\nSpaniard blundered down the coast of Wales, not knowing whither he went;\nhow they were both nearly lost on Holyhead, and again on Bardsey Island;\nhow they got on a lee shore in Cardigan Bay, before a heavy westerly\ngale, and the Sta. Catharina ran aground on Sarn David, one of those\nstrange subaqueous pebble-dykes which are said to be the remnants of the\nlost land of Gwalior, destroyed by the carelessness of Prince Seithenin\nthe drunkard, at whose name each loyal Welshman spits; how she got off\nagain at the rising of the tide, and fought with Amyas a fourth time;\nhow the wind changed, and she got round St. David's Head;--these, and\nmany more moving incidents of this eventful voyage, I must pass over\nwithout details, and go on to the end; for it is time that the end\nshould come.\n\nIt was now the sixteenth day of the chase. They had seen, the evening\nbefore, St. David's Head, and then the Welsh coast round Milford\nHaven, looming out black and sharp before the blaze of the inland\nthunder-storm; and it had lightened all round them during the fore part\nof the night, upon a light south-western breeze.\n\nIn vain they had strained their eyes through the darkness, to catch, by\nthe fitful glare of the flashes, the tall masts of the Spaniard. Of\none thing at least they were certain, that with the wind as it was, she\ncould not have gone far to the westward; and to attempt to pass them\nagain, and go northward, was more than she dare do. She was probably\nlying-to ahead of them, perhaps between them and the land; and when, a\nlittle after midnight, the wind chopped up to the west, and blew stiffly\ntill day break, they felt sure that, unless she had attempted the\ndesperate expedient of running past them, they had her safe in the mouth\nof the Bristol Channel. Slowly and wearily broke the dawn, on such a day\nas often follows heavy thunder; a sunless, drizzly day, roofed with low\ndingy cloud, barred and netted, and festooned with black, a sign that\nthe storm is only taking breath awhile before it bursts again; while all\nthe narrow horizon is dim and spongy with vapor drifting before a chilly\nbreeze. As the day went on, the breeze died down, and the sea fell to a\nlong glassy foam-flecked roll, while overhead brooded the inky sky, and\nround them the leaden mist shut out alike the shore and the chase.\n\nAmyas paced the sloppy deck fretfully and fiercely. He knew that the\nSpaniard could not escape; but he cursed every moment which lingered\nbetween him and that one great revenge which blackened all his soul.\nThe men sate sulkily about the deck, and whistled for a wind; the sails\nflapped idly against the masts; and the ship rolled in the long troughs\nof the sea, till her yard-arms almost dipped right and left.\n\n\"Take care of those guns. You will have something loose next,\" growled\nAmyas.\n\n\"We will take care of the guns, if the Lord will take care of the wind,\"\nsaid Yeo.\n\n\"We shall have plenty before night,\" said Cary, \"and thunder too.\"\n\n\"So much the better,\" said Amyas. \"It may roar till it splits the\nheavens, if it does but let me get my work done.\"\n\n\"He's not far off, I warrant,\" said Cary. \"One lift of the cloud, and we\nshould see him.\"\n\n\"To windward of us, as likely as not,\" said Amyas. \"The devil fights\nfor him, I believe. To have been on his heels sixteen days, and not sent\nthis through him yet!\" And he shook his sword impatiently.\n\nSo the morning wore away, without a sign of living thing, not even a\npassing gull; and the black melancholy of the heaven reflected itself\nin the black melancholy of Amyas. Was he to lose his prey after all?\nThe thought made him shudder with rage and disappointment. It was\nintolerable. Anything but that.\n\n\"No, God!\" he cried, \"let me but once feel this in his accursed heart,\nand then--strike me dead, if Thou wilt!\"\n\n\"The Lord have mercy on us,\" cried John Brimblecombe. \"What have you\nsaid?\"\n\n\"What is that to you, sir? There, they are piping to dinner. Go down. I\nshall not come.\"\n\nAnd Jack went down, and talked in a half-terrified whisper of Amyas's\nominous words.\n\nAll thought that they portended some bad luck, except old Yeo.\n\n\"Well, Sir John,\" said he, \"and why not? What better can the Lord do\nfor a man, than take him home when he has done his work? Our captain is\nwilful and spiteful, and must needs kill his man himself; while for me,\nI don't care how the Don goes, provided he does go. I owe him no grudge,\nnor any man. May the Lord give him repentance, and forgive him all his\nsins: but if I could but see him once safe ashore, as he may be ere\nnightfall, on the Mortestone or the back of Lundy, I would say, 'Lord,\nnow lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace,' even if it were the\nlightning which was sent to fetch me.\"\n\n\"But, master Yeo, a sudden death?\"\n\n\"And why not a sudden death, Sir John? Even fools long for a short life\nand a merry one, and shall not the Lord's people pray for a short death\nand a merry one? Let it come as it will to old Yeo. Hark! there's the\ncaptain's voice!\"\n\n\"Here she is!\" thundered Amyas from the deck; and in an instant all were\nscrambling up the hatchway as fast as the frantic rolling of the ship\nwould let them.\n\nYes. There she was. The cloud had lifted suddenly, and to the south a\nragged bore of blue sky let a long stream of sunshine down on her tall\nmasts and stately hull, as she lay rolling some four or five miles to\nthe eastward: but as for land, none was to be seen.\n\n\"There she is; and here we are,\" said Cary; \"but where is here? and\nwhere is there? How is the tide, master?\"\n\n\"Running up Channel by this time, sir.\"\n\n\"What matters the tide?\" said Amyas, devouring the ship with terrible\nand cold blue eyes. \"Can't we get at her?\"\n\n\"Not unless some one jumps out and shoves behind,\" said Cary. \"I shall\ndown again and finish that mackerel, if this roll has not chucked it to\nthe cockroaches under the table.\"\n\n\"Don't jest, Will! I can't stand it,\" said Amyas, in a voice which\nquivered so much that Cary looked at him. His whole frame was trembling\nlike an aspen. Cary took his arm, and drew him aside.\n\n\"Dear old lad,\" said he, as they leaned over the bulwarks, \"what is\nthis? You are not yourself, and have not been these four days.\"\n\n\"No. I am not Amyas Leigh. I am my brother's avenger. Do not reason\nwith me, Will: when it is over I shall be merry old Amyas again,\" and he\npassed his hand over his brow.\n\n\"Do you believe,\" said he, after a moment, \"that men can be possessed by\ndevils?\"\n\n\"The Bible says so.\"\n\n\"If my cause were not a just one, I should fancy I had a devil in me. My\nthroat and heart are as hot as the pit. Would to God it were done, for\ndone it must be! Now go.\"\n\nCary went away with a shudder. As he passed down the hatchway he looked\nback. Amyas had got the hone out of his pocket, and was whetting away\nagain at his sword-edge, as if there was some dreadful doom on him, to\nwhet, and whet forever.\n\nThe weary day wore on. The strip of blue sky was curtained over again,\nand all was dismal as before, though it grew sultrier every moment; and\nnow and then a distant mutter shook the air to westward. Nothing could\nbe done to lessen the distance between the ships, for the Vengeance had\nhad all her boats carried away but one, and that was much too small\nto tow her: and while the men went down again to finish dinner, Amyas\nworked on at his sword, looking up every now and then suddenly at the\nSpaniard, as if to satisfy himself that it was not a vision which had\nvanished.\n\nAbout two Yeo came up to him.\n\n\"He is ours safely now, sir. The tide has been running to the eastward\nfor this two hours.\"\n\n\"Safe as a fox in a trap. Satan himself cannot take him from us!\"\n\n\"But God may,\" said Brimblecombe, simply.\n\n\"Who spoke to you, sir? If I thought that He--There comes the thunder at\nlast!\"\n\nAnd as he spoke an angry growl from the westward heavens seemed to\nanswer his wild words, and rolled and loudened nearer and nearer, till\nright over their heads it crashed against some cloud-cliff far above,\nand all was still.\n\nEach man looked in the other's face: but Amyas was unmoved.\n\n\"The storm is coming,\" said he, \"and the wind in it. It will be\nEastward-ho now, for once, my merry men all!\"\n\n\"Eastward-ho never brought us luck,\" said Jack in an undertone to Cary.\nBut by this time all eyes were turned to the north-west, where a black\nline along the horizon began to define the boundary of sea and air, till\nnow all dim in mist.\n\n\"There comes the breeze.\"\n\n\"And there the storm, too.\"\n\nAnd with that strangely accelerating pace which some storms seem to\npossess, the thunder, which had been growling slow and seldom far away,\nnow rang peal on peal along the cloudy floor above their heads.\n\n\"Here comes the breeze. Round with the yards, or we shall be taken\naback.\"\n\nThe yards creaked round; the sea grew crisp around them; the hot air\nswept their cheeks, tightened every rope, filled every sail, bent her\nover. A cheer burst from the men as the helm went up, and they staggered\naway before the wind, right down upon the Spaniard, who lay still\nbecalmed.\n\n\"There is more behind, Amyas,\" said Cary. \"Shall we not shorten sail a\nlittle?\"\n\n\"No. Hold on every stitch,\" said Amyas. \"Give me the helm, man.\nBoatswain, pipe away to clear for fight.\"\n\nIt was done, and in ten minutes the men were all at quarters, while\nthe thunder rolled louder and louder overhead, and the breeze freshened\nfast.\n\n\"The dog has it now. There he goes!\" said Cary.\n\n\"Right before the wind. He has no liking to face us.\"\n\n\"He is running into the jaws of destruction,\" said Yeo. \"An hour more\nwill send him either right up the Channel, or smack on shore somewhere.\"\n\n\"There! he has put his helm down. I wonder if he sees land?\"\n\n\"He is like a March hare beat out of his country,\" said Cary, \"and don't\nknow whither to run next.\"\n\nCary was right. In ten minutes more the Spaniard fell off again, and\nwent away dead down wind, while the Vengeance gained on him fast.\nAfter two hours more, the four miles had diminished to one, while the\nlightning flashed nearer and nearer as the storm came up; and from the\nvast mouth of a black cloud-arch poured so fierce a breeze that Amyas\nyielded unwillingly to hints which were growing into open murmurs, and\nbade shorten sail.\n\nOn they rushed with scarcely lessened speed, the black arch following\nfast, curtained by the flat gray sheet of pouring rain, before which the\nwater was boiling in a long white line; while every moment behind the\nwatery veil, a keen blue spark leapt down into the sea, or darted zigzag\nthrough the rain.\n\n\"We shall have it now, and with a vengeance; this will try your tackle,\nmaster,\" said Cary.\n\nThe functionary answered with a shrug, and turned up the collar of his\nrough frock, as the first drops flew stinging round his ears. Another\nminute and the squall burst full upon them, in rain, which cut like\nhail--hail which lashed the sea into froth, and wind which whirled off\nthe heads of the surges, and swept the waters into one white seething\nwaste. And above them, and behind them and before them, the lightning\nleapt and ran, dazzling and blinding, while the deep roar of the thunder\nwas changed to sharp ear-piercing cracks.\n\n\"Get the arms and ammunition under cover, and then below with you all,\"\nshouted Amyas from the helm.\n\n\"And heat the pokers in the galley fire,\" said Yeo, \"to be ready if the\nrain puts our linstocks out. I hope you'll let me stay on deck, sir, in\ncase--\"\n\n\"I must have some one, and who better than you? Can you see the chase?\"\n\nNo; she was wrapped in the gray whirlwind. She might be within half a\nmile of them, for aught they could have seen of her.\n\nAnd now Amyas and his old liegeman were alone. Neither spoke; each knew\nthe other's thoughts, and knew that they were his own. The squall blew\nfiercer and fiercer, the rain poured heavier and heavier. Where was the\nSpaniard?\n\n\"If he has laid-to, we may overshoot him, sir!\"\n\n\"If he has tried to lay-to, he will not have a sail left in the\nbolt-ropes, or perhaps a mast on deck. I know the stiff-neckedness of\nthose Spanish tubs. Hurrah! there he is, right on our larboard bow!\"\n\nThere she was indeed, two musket-shots' off, staggering away with canvas\nsplit and flying.\n\n\"He has been trying to hull, sir, and caught a buffet,\" said Yeo,\nrubbing his hands. \"What shall we do now?\"\n\n\"Range alongside, if it blow live imps and witches, and try our luck\nonce more. Pah! how this lightning dazzles!\"\n\nOn they swept, gaining fast on the Spaniard. \"Call the men up, and to\nquarters; the rain will be over in ten minutes.\"\n\nYeo ran forward to the gangway; and sprang back again, with a face white\nand wild--\n\n\"Land right ahead! Port your helm, sir! For the love of God, port your\nhelm!\"\n\nAmyas, with the strength of a bull, jammed the helm down, while Yeo\nshouted to the men below.\n\nShe swung round. The masts bent like whips; crack went the fore-sail\nlike a cannon. What matter? Within two hundred yards of them was the\nSpaniard; in front of her, and above her, a huge dark bank rose through\nthe dense hail, and mingled with the clouds; and at its foot, plainer\nevery moment, pillars and spouts of leaping foam.\n\n\"What is it, Morte? Hartland?\"\n\nIt might be anything for thirty miles.\n\n\"Lundy!\" said Yeo. \"The south end! I see the head of the Shutter in the\nbreakers! Hard a-port yet, and get her close-hauled as you can, and the\nLord may have mercy on us still! Look at the Spaniard!\"\n\nYes, look at the Spaniard!\n\nOn their left hand, as they broached-to, the wall of granite sloped down\nfrom the clouds toward an isolated peak of rock, some two hundred feet\nin height. Then a hundred yards of roaring breaker upon a sunken shelf,\nacross which the race of the tide poured like a cataract; then, amid a\ncolumn of salt smoke, the Shutter, like a huge black fang, rose waiting\nfor its prey; and between the Shutter and the land, the great galleon\nloomed dimly through the storm.\n\nHe, too, had seen his danger, and tried to broach-to. But his clumsy\nmass refused to obey the helm; he struggled a moment, half hid in foam;\nfell away again, and rushed upon his doom.\n\n\"Lost! lost! lost!\" cried Amyas madly, and throwing up his hands, let go\nthe tiller. Yeo caught it just in time.\n\n\"Sir! sir! What are you at? We shall clear the rock yet.\"\n\n\"Yes!\" shouted Amyas, in his frenzy; \"but he will not!\"\n\nAnother minute. The galleon gave a sudden jar, and stopped. Then one\nlong heave and bound, as if to free herself. And then her bows lighted\nclean upon the Shutter.\n\nAn awful silence fell on every English soul. They heard not the roaring\nof wind and surge; they saw not the blinding flashes of the lightning;\nbut they heard one long ear-piercing wail to every saint in heaven rise\nfrom five hundred human throats; they saw the mighty ship heel over from\nthe wind, and sweep headlong down the cataract of the race, plunging her\nyards into the foam, and showing her whole black side even to her keel,\ntill she rolled clean over, and vanished for ever and ever.\n\n\"Shame!\" cried Amyas, hurling his sword far into the sea, \"to lose my\nright, my right! when it was in my very grasp! Unmerciful!\"\n\nA crack which rent the sky, and made the granite ring and quiver; a\nbright world of flame, and then a blank of utter darkness, against which\nstood out, glowing red-hot every mast, and sail, and rock, and Salvation\nYeo as he stood just in front of Amyas, the tiller in his hand. All\nred-hot, transfigured into fire; and behind, the black, black night.\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nA whisper, a rustling close beside him, and Brimblecombe's voice said\nsoftly:\n\n\"Give him more wine, Will; his eyes are opening.\"\n\n\"Hey day?\" said Amyas, faintly, \"not past the Shutter yet! How long she\nhangs in the wind!\"\n\n\"We are long past the Shutter, Sir Amyas,\" said Brimblecombe.\n\n\"Are you mad? Cannot I trust my own eyes?\"\n\nThere was no answer for awhile.\n\n\"We are past the Shutter, indeed,\" said Cary, very gently, \"and lying in\nthe cove at Lundy.\"\n\n\"Will you tell me that that is not the Shutter, and that the\nDevil's-limekiln, and that the cliff--that villain Spaniard only\ngone--and that Yeo is not standing here by me, and Cary there forward,\nand--why, by the by, where are you, Jack Brimblecombe, who were talking\nto me this minute?\"\n\n\"Oh, Sir Amyas Leigh, dear Sir Amyas Leigh,\" blubbered poor Jack, \"put\nout your hand, and feel where you are, and pray the Lord to forgive you\nfor your wilfulness!\"\n\nA great trembling fell upon Amyas Leigh; half fearfully he put out his\nhand; he felt that he was in his hammock, with the deck beams close\nabove his head. The vision which had been left upon his eye-balls\nvanished like a dream.\n\n\"What is this? I must be asleep? What has happened? Where am I?\"\n\n\"In your cabin, Amyas,\" said Cary.\n\n\"What? And where is Yeo?\"\n\n\"Yeo is gone where he longed to go, and as he longed to go. The same\nflash which struck you down, struck him dead.\"\n\n\"Dead? Lightning? Any more hurt? I must go and see. Why, what is this?\"\nand Amyas passed his hand across his eyes. \"It is all dark--dark, as I\nlive!\" And he passed his hand over his eyes again.\n\nThere was another dead silence. Amyas broke it.\n\n\"Oh, God!\" shrieked the great proud sea-captain, \"Oh, God, I am blind!\nblind! blind!\" And writhing in his great horror, he called to Cary to\nkill him and put him out of his misery, and then wailed for his\nmother to come and help him, as if he had been a boy once more; while\nBrimblecombe and Cary, and the sailors who crowded round the cabin-door,\nwept as if they too had been boys once more.\n\nSoon his fit of frenzy passed off, and he sank back exhausted.\n\nThey lifted him into their remaining boat, rowed him ashore, carried him\npainfully up the hill to the old castle, and made a bed for him on\nthe floor, in the very room in which Don Guzman and Rose Salterne had\nplighted their troth to each other, five wild years before.\n\nThree miserable days were passed within that lonely tower. Amyas,\nutterly unnerved by the horror of his misfortune, and by the\nover-excitement of the last few weeks, was incessantly delirious; while\nCary, and Brimblecombe, and the men nursed him by turns, as sailors\nand wives only can nurse; and listened with awe to his piteous\nself-reproaches and entreaties to Heaven to remove that woe, which,\nas he shrieked again and again, was a just judgment on him for his\nwilfulness and ferocity. The surgeon talked, of course, learnedly about\nmelancholic humors, and his liver's being \"adust by the over-pungency\nof the animal spirits,\" and then fell back on the universal panacea of\nblood-letting, which he effected with fear and trembling during a short\ninterval of prostration; encouraged by which he attempted to administer\na large bolus of aloes, was knocked down for his pains, and then thought\nit better to leave Nature to her own work. In the meanwhile, Cary had\nsent off one of the island skiffs to Clovelly, with letters to his\nfather, and to Mrs. Leigh, entreating the latter to come off to the\nisland: but the heavy westerly winds made that as impossible as it was\nto move Amyas on board, and the men had to do their best, and did it\nwell enough.\n\nOn the fourth day his raving ceased: but he was still too weak to be\nmoved. Toward noon, however, he called for food, ate a little, and\nseemed revived.\n\n\"Will,\" he said, after awhile, \"this room is as stifling as it is dark.\nI feel as if I should be a sound man once more if I could but get one\nsnuff of the sea-breeze.\"\n\nThe surgeon shook his head at the notion of moving him: but Amyas was\nperemptory.\n\n\"I am captain still, Tom Surgeon, and will sail for the Indies, if I\nchoose. Will Cary, Jack Brimblecombe, will you obey a blind general?\"\n\n\"What you will in reason,\" said they both at once.\n\n\"Then lead me out, my masters, and over the down to the south end.\nTo the point at the south end I must go; there is no other place will\nsuit.\"\n\nAnd he rose firmly to his feet, and held out his hands for theirs.\n\n\"Let him have his humor,\" whispered Cary. \"It may be the working off of\nhis madness.\"\n\n\"This sudden strength is a note of fresh fever, Mr. Lieutenant,\"\nsaid the surgeon, \"and the rules of the art prescribe rather a fresh\nblood-letting.\"\n\nAmyas overheard the last word, and broke out:\n\n\"Thou pig-sticking Philistine, wilt thou make sport with blind Samson?\nCome near me to let blood from my arm, and see if I do not let blood\nfrom thy coxcomb. Catch him, Will, and bring him me here!\"\n\nThe surgeon vanished as the blind giant made a step forward; and they\nset forth, Amyas walking slowly, but firmly, between his two friends.\n\n\"Whither?\" asked Cary.\n\n\"To the south end. The crag above the Devil's-limekiln. No other place\nwill suit.\"\n\nJack gave a murmur, and half-stopped, as a frightful suspicion crossed\nhim.\n\n\"That is a dangerous place!\"\n\n\"What of that?\" said Amyas, who caught his meaning in his tone. \"Dost\nthink I am going to leap over cliff? I have not heart enough for that.\nOn, lads, and set me safe among the rocks.\"\n\nSo slowly, and painfully, they went on, while Amyas murmured to himself:\n\n\"No, no other place will suit; I can see all thence.\"\n\nSo on they went to the point, where the cyclopean wall of granite cliff\nwhich forms the western side of Lundy, ends sheer in a precipice of some\nthree hundred feet, topped by a pile of snow-white rock, bespangled with\ngolden lichens. As they approached, a raven, who sat upon the topmost\nstone, black against the bright blue sky, flapped lazily away, and sank\ndown the abysses of the cliff, as if he scented the corpses underneath\nthe surge. Below them from the Gull-rock rose a thousand birds, and\nfilled the air with sound; the choughs cackled, the hacklets wailed,\nthe great blackbacks laughed querulous defiance at the intruders, and a\nsingle falcon, with an angry bark, dashed out from beneath their feet,\nand hung poised high aloft, watching the sea-fowl which swung slowly\nround and round below.\n\nIt was a glorious sight upon a glorious day. To the northward the glens\nrushed down toward the cliff, crowned with gray crags, and carpeted with\npurple heather and green fern; and from their feet stretched away to\nthe westward the sapphire rollers of the vast Atlantic, crowned with a\nthousand crests of flying foam. On their left hand, some ten miles to\nthe south, stood out against the sky the purple wall of Hartland cliffs,\nsinking lower and lower as they trended away to the southward along the\nlonely ironbound shores of Cornwall, until they faded, dim and blue,\ninto the blue horizon forty miles away.\n\nThe sky was flecked with clouds, which rushed toward them fast upon the\nroaring south-west wind; and the warm ocean-breeze swept up the cliffs,\nand whistled through the heather-bells, and howled in cranny and in\ncrag,\n\n     \"Till the pillars and clefts of the granite\n        Rang like a God-swept lyre;\"\n\nwhile Amyas, a proud smile upon his lips, stood breasting that genial\nstream of airy wine with swelling nostrils and fast-heaving chest,\nand seemed to drink in life from every gust. All three were silent for\nawhile; and Jack and Cary, gazing downward with delight upon the glory\nand the grandeur of the sight, forgot for awhile that their companion\nsaw it not. Yet when they started sadly, and looked into his face, did\nhe not see it? So wide and eager were his eyes, so bright and calm his\nface, that they fancied for an instant that he was once more even as\nthey.\n\nA deep sigh undeceived them. \"I know it is all here--the dear old sea,\nwhere I would live and die. And my eyes feel for it; feel for it--and\ncannot find it; never, never will find it again forever! God's will be\ndone!\"\n\n\"Do you say that?\" asked Brimblecombe, eagerly.\n\n\"Why should I not? Why have I been raving in hell-fire for I know not\nhow many days, but to find out that, John Brimblecombe, thou better man\nthan I?\"\n\n\"Not that last: but Amen! Amen! and the Lord has indeed had mercy upon\nthee!\" said Jack, through his honest tears.\n\n\"Amen!\" said Amyas. \"Now set me where I can rest among the rocks\nwithout fear of falling--for life is sweet still, even without eyes,\nfriends--and leave me to myself awhile.\"\n\nIt was no easy matter to find a safe place; for from the foot of the\ncrag the heathery turf slopes down all but upright, on one side to a\ncliff which overhangs a shoreless cove of deep dark sea, and on the\nother to an abyss even more hideous, where the solid rock has sunk away,\nand opened inland in the hillside a smooth-walled pit, some sixty feet\nsquare and some hundred and fifty in depth, aptly known then as now,\nas the Devil's-limekiln; the mouth of which, as old wives say, was once\nclosed by the Shutter-rock itself, till the fiend in malice hurled it\ninto the sea, to be a pest to mariners. A narrow and untrodden cavern at\nthe bottom connects it with the outer sea; they could even then hear the\nmysterious thunder and gurgle of the surge in the subterranean adit,\nas it rolled huge boulders to and fro in darkness, and forced before it\ngusts of pent-up air. It was a spot to curdle weak blood, and to make\nweak heads reel: but all the fitter on that account for Amyas and his\nfancy.\n\n\"You can sit here as in an arm-chair,\" said Cary, helping him down to\none of those square natural seats so common in the granite tors.\n\n\"Good; now turn my face to the Shutter. Be sure and exact. So. Do I face\nit full?\"\n\n\"Full,\" said Cary.\n\n\"Then I need no eyes wherewith to see what is before me,\" said he, with\na sad smile. \"I know every stone and every headland, and every wave too,\nI may say, far beyond aught that eye can reach. Now go, and leave me\nalone with God and with the dead!\"\n\nThey retired a little space and watched him. He never stirred for many\nminutes; then leaned his elbows on his knees, and his head upon his\nhands, and so was still again. He remained so long thus, that the pair\nbecame anxious, and went towards him. He was asleep, and breathing quick\nand heavily.\n\n\"He will take a fever,\" said Brimblecombe, \"if he sleeps much longer\nwith his head down in the sunshine.\"\n\n\"We must wake him gently if we wake him at all.\" And Cary moved forward\nto him.\n\nAs he did so, Amyas lifted his head, and turning it to right and left,\nfelt round him with his sightless eyes.\n\n\"You have been asleep, Amyas.\"\n\n\"Have I? I have not slept back my eyes, then. Take up this great useless\ncarcase of mine, and lead me home. I shall buy me a dog when I get to\nBurrough, I think, and make him tow me in a string, eh? So! Give me your\nhand. Now march!\"\n\nHis guides heard with surprise this new cheerfulness.\n\n\"Thank God, sir, that your heart is so light already,\" said good Jack;\n\"it makes me feel quite upraised myself, like.\"\n\n\"I have reason to be cheerful, Sir John; I have left a heavy load behind\nme. I have been wilful, and proud, and a blasphemer, and swollen with\ncruelty and pride; and God has brought me low for it, and cut me off\nfrom my evil delight. No more Spaniard-hunting for me now, my masters.\nGod will send no such fools as I upon His errands.\"\n\n\"You do not repent of fighting the Spaniards.\"\n\n\"Not I: but of hating even the worst of them. Listen to me, Will and\nJack. If that man wronged me, I wronged him likewise. I have been a\nfiend when I thought myself the grandest of men, yea, a very avenging\nangel out of heaven. But God has shown me my sin, and we have made up\nour quarrel forever.\"\n\n\"Made it up?\"\n\n\"Made it up, thank God. But I am weary. Set me down awhile, and I will\ntell you how it befell.\"\n\nWondering, they set him down upon the heather, while the bees hummed\nround them in the sun; and Amyas felt for a hand of each, and clasped it\nin his own hand, and began:\n\n\"When you left me there upon the rock, lads, I looked away and out to\nsea, to get one last snuff of the merry sea-breeze, which will never\nsail me again. And as I looked, I tell you truth, I could see the water\nand the sky; as plain as ever I saw them, till I thought my sight was\ncome again. But soon I knew it was not so; for I saw more than man could\nsee; right over the ocean, as I live, and away to the Spanish Main. And\nI saw Barbados, and Grenada, and all the isles that we ever sailed by;\nand La Guayra in Caracas, and the Silla, and the house beneath it where\nshe lived. And I saw him walking with her on the barbecue, and he loved\nher then. I saw what I saw; and he loved her; and I say he loves her\nstill.\n\n\"Then I saw the cliffs beneath me, and the Gull-rock, and the Shutter,\nand the Ledge; I saw them, William Cary, and the weeds beneath the merry\nblue sea. And I saw the grand old galleon, Will; she has righted with\nthe sweeping of the tide. She lies in fifteen fathoms, at the edge of\nthe rocks, upon the sand; and her men are all lying around her, asleep\nuntil the judgment-day.\"\n\nCary and Jack looked at him, and then at each other. His eyes were\nclear, and bright, and full of meaning; and yet they knew that he\nwas blind. His voice was shaping itself into a song. Was he inspired?\nInsane? What was it? And they listened with awe-struck faces, as the\ngiant pointed down into the blue depths far below, and went on.\n\n\"And I saw him sitting in his cabin, like a valiant gentleman of Spain;\nand his officers were sitting round him, with their swords upon the\ntable at the wine. And the prawns and the crayfish and the rockling,\nthey swam in and out above their heads: but Don Guzman he never heeded,\nbut sat still, and drank his wine. Then he took a locket from his bosom;\nand I heard him speak, Will, and he said: 'Here's the picture of my fair\nand true lady; drink to her, senors all.' Then he spoke to me, Will,\nand called me, right up through the oar-weed and the sea: 'We have had\na fair quarrel, senor; it is time to be friends once more. My wife and\nyour brother have forgiven me; so your honor takes no stain.' And I\nanswered, 'We are friends, Don Guzman; God has judged our quarrel and\nnot we.' Then he said, 'I sinned, and I am punished.' And I said, 'And,\nsenor, so am I.' Then he held out his hand to me, Cary; and I stooped to\ntake it, and awoke.\"\n\nHe ceased: and they looked in his face again. It was exhausted, but\nclear and gentle, like the face of a new-born babe. Gradually his head\ndropped upon his breast again; he was either swooning or sleeping, and\nthey had much ado to get him home. There he lay for eight-and-forty\nhours, in a quiet doze; then arose suddenly, called for food, ate\nheartily, and seemed, saving his eyesight, as whole and sound as ever.\nThe surgeon bade them get him home to Northam as soon as possible,\nand he was willing enough to go. So the next day the Vengeance sailed,\nleaving behind a dozen men to seize and keep in the queen's name any\ngoods which should be washed up from the wreck.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII\n\nHOW AMYAS LET THE APPLE FALL\n\n     \"Would you hear a Spanish lady,\n       How she woo'd an Englishman?\n     Garments gay and rich as may be,\n        Deck'd with jewels had she on.\"\n\n                   Elizabethan Ballad.\n\nIt was the first of October. The morning was bright and still; the skies\nwere dappled modestly from east to west with soft gray autumn cloud, as\nif all heaven and earth were resting after those fearful summer months\nof battle and of storm. Silently, as if ashamed and sad, the Vengeance\nslid over the bar, and passed the sleeping sand-hills and dropped her\nanchor off Appledore, with her flag floating half-mast high; for the\ncorpse of Salvation Yeo was on board.\n\nA boat pulled off from the ship, and away to the western end of the\nstrand; and Cary and Brimblecombe helped out Amyas Leigh, and led him\nslowly up the hill toward his home.\n\nThe crowd clustered round him, with cheers and blessings, and sobs of\npity from kind-hearted women; for all in Appledore and Bideford knew\nwell by this time what had befallen him.\n\n\"Spare me, my good friends,\" said Amyas, \"I have landed here that I\nmight go quietly home, without passing through the town, and being made\na gazing-stock. Think not of me, good folks, nor talk of me; but come\nbehind me decently, as Christian men, and follow to the grave the body\nof a better man than I.\"\n\nAnd, as he spoke, another boat came off, and in it, covered with the\nflag of England, the body of Salvation Yeo.\n\nThe people took Amyas at his word; and a man was sent on to Burrough, to\ntell Mrs. Leigh that her son was coming. When the coffin was landed\nand lifted, Amyas and his friends took their places behind it as chief\nmourners, and the crew followed in order, while the crowd fell in behind\nthem, and gathered every moment; till ere they were halfway to Northam\ntown, the funeral train might number full five hundred souls.\n\nThey had sent over by a fishing-skiff the day before to bid the sexton\ndig the grave; and when they came into the churchyard, the parson stood\nready waiting at the gate.\n\nMrs. Leigh stayed quietly at home; for she had no heart to face the\ncrowd; and though her heart yearned for her son, yet she was well\ncontent (when was she not content?) that he should do honor to his\nancient and faithful servant; so she sat down in the bay-window, with\nAyacanora by her side; and when the tolling of the bell ceased, she\nopened her Prayer-book, and began to read the Burial-service.\n\n\"Ayacanora,\" she said, \"they are burying old Master Yeo, who loved you,\nand sought you over the wide, wide world, and saved you from the teeth\nof the crocodile. Are you not sorry for him, child, that you look so gay\nto-day?\"\n\nAyacanora blushed, and hung down her head; she was thinking of nothing,\npoor child, but Amyas.\n\nThe Burial-service was done; the blessing said; the parson drew back:\nbut the people lingered and crowded round to look at the coffin, while\nAmyas stood still at the head of the grave. It had been dug by his\ncommand, at the west end of the church, near by the foot of the tall\ngray windswept tower, which watches for a beacon far and wide over land\nand sea. Perhaps the old man might like to look at the sea, and see\nthe ships come out and in across the bar, and hear the wind, on winter\nnights, roar through the belfry far above his head. Why not? It was but\na fancy: and yet Amyas felt that he too should like to be buried in such\na place; so Yeo might like it also.\n\nStill the crowd lingered; and looked first at the grave and then at\nthe blind giant who stood over it, as if they felt, by instinct, that\nsomething more ought to come. And something more did come. Amyas drew\nhimself up to his full height, and waved his hand majestically, as one\nabout to speak; while the eyes of all men were fastened on him.\n\nTwice he essayed to begin; and twice the words were choked upon his\nlips; and then,--\n\n\"Good people all, and seamen, among whom I was bred, and to whom I come\nhome blind this day, to dwell with you till death--Here lieth the flower\nand pattern of all bold mariners; the truest of friends, and the most\nterrible of foes; unchangeable of purpose, crafty of council, and swift\nof execution; in triumph most sober, in failure (as God knows I have\nfound full many a day) of endurance beyond mortal man. Who first of all\nBritons helped to humble the pride of the Spaniard at Rio de la Hacha\nand Nombre, and first of all sailed upon those South Seas, which shall\nbe hereafter, by God's grace, as free to English keels as is the bay\noutside. Who having afterwards been purged from his youthful sins by\nstrange afflictions and torments unspeakable, suffered at the hands of\nthe Popish enemy, learned therefrom, my masters, to fear God, and to\nfear naught else; and having acquitted himself worthily in his place and\ncalling as a righteous scourge of the Spaniard, and a faithful soldier\nof the Lord Jesus Christ, is now exalted to his reward, as Elijah was of\nold, in a chariot of fire unto heaven: letting fall, I trust and pray,\nupon you who are left behind the mantle of his valor and his godliness,\nthat so these shores may never be without brave and pious mariners, who\nwill count their lives as worthless in the cause of their Country, their\nBible, and their Queen. Amen.\"\n\nAnd feeling for his companions' hands he walked slowly from the\nchurchyard, and across the village street, and up the lane to Burrough\ngates; while the crowd made way for him in solemn silence, as for an\nawful being, shut up alone with all his strength, valor, and fame, in\nthe dark prison-house of his mysterious doom.\n\nHe seemed to know perfectly when they had reached the gates, opened the\nlock with his own hands, and went boldly forward along the gravel path,\nwhile Cary and Brimblecombe followed him trembling; for they expected\nsome violent burst of emotion, either from him or his mother, and the\ntwo good fellows' tender hearts were fluttering like a girl's. Up to\nthe door he went, as if he had seen it; felt for the entrance, stood\ntherein, and called quietly, \"Mother!\"\n\nIn a moment his mother was on his bosom.\n\nNeither spoke for awhile. She sobbing inwardly, with tearless eyes, he\nstanding firm and cheerful, with his great arms clasped around her.\n\n\"Mother!\" he said at last, \"I am come home, you see, because I needs\nmust come. Will you take me in, and look after this useless carcase? I\nshall not be so very troublesome, mother,--shall I?\" and he looked down,\nand smiled upon her, and kissed her brow.\n\nShe answered not a word, but passed her arm gently round his waist, and\nled him in.\n\n\"Take care of your head, dear child, the doors are low.\" And they went\nin together.\n\n\"Will! Jack!\" called Amyas, turning round: but the two good fellows had\nwalked briskly off.\n\n\"I'm glad we are away,\" said Cary; \"I should have made a baby of myself\nin another minute, watching that angel of a woman. How her face worked\nand how she kept it in!\"\n\n\"Ah, well!\" said Jack, \"there goes a brave servant of the queen's cut\noff before his work was a quarter done. Heigho! I must home now, and see\nmy old father, and then--\"\n\n\"And then home with me,\" said Cary. \"You and I never part again! We have\npulled in the same boat too long, Jack; and you must not go spending\nyour prize-money in riotous living. I must see after you, old Jack\nashore, or we shall have you treating half the town in taverns for a\nweek to come.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Cary!\" said Jack, scandalized.\n\n\"Come home with me, and we'll poison the parson, and my father shall\ngive you the rectory.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Cary!\" said Jack.\n\nSo the two went off to Clovelly together that very day.\n\nAnd Amyas was sitting all alone. His mother had gone out for a few\nminutes to speak to the seamen who had brought up Amyas's luggage, and\nset them down to eat and drink; and Amyas sat in the old bay-window,\nwhere he had sat when he was a little tiny boy, and read \"King Arthur,\"\nand \"Fox's Martyrs,\" and \"The Cruelties of the Spaniards.\" He put out\nhis hand and felt for them; there they lay side by side, just as they\nhad lain twenty years before. The window was open; and a cool air\nbrought in as of old the scents of the four-season roses, and rosemary,\nand autumn gilliflowers. And there was a dish of apples on the table: he\nknew it by their smell; the very same old apples which he used to gather\nwhen he was a boy. He put out his hand, and took them, and felt them\nover, and played with them, just as if the twenty years had never been:\nand as he fingered them, the whole of his past life rose up before him,\nas in that strange dream which is said to flash across the imagination\nof a drowning man; and he saw all the places which he had ever seen, and\nheard all the words which had ever been spoken to him--till he came to\nthat fairy island on the Meta; and he heard the roar of the cataract\nonce more, and saw the green tops of the palm-trees sleeping in the\nsunlight far above the spray, and stept amid the smooth palm-trunks\nacross the flower-fringed boulders, and leaped down to the gravel beach\nbeside the pool: and then again rose from the fern-grown rocks the\nbeautiful vision of Ayacanora--Where was she? He had not thought of her\ntill now. How he had wronged her! Let be; he had been punished, and the\naccount was squared. Perhaps she did not care for him any longer. Who\nwould care for a great blind ox like him, who must be fed and tended\nlike a baby for the rest of his lazy life? Tut! How long his mother\nwas away! And he began playing again with his apples, and thought about\nnothing but them, and his climbs with Frank in the orchard years ago.\n\nAt last one of them slipt through his fingers, and fell on the floor. He\nstooped and felt for it: but he could not find it. Vexatious! He turned\nhastily to search in another direction, and struck his head sharply\nagainst the table.\n\nWas it the pain, or the little disappointment? or was it the sense of\nhis blindness brought home to him in that ludicrous commonplace way,\nand for that very reason all the more humiliating? or was it the sudden\nrevulsion of overstrained nerves, produced by that slight shock? Or had\nhe become indeed a child once more? I know not; but so it was, that he\nstamped on the floor with pettishness, and then checking himself, burst\ninto a violent flood of tears.\n\nA quick rustle passed him; the apple was replaced in his hand, and\nAyacanora's voice sobbed out:\n\n\"There! there it is! Do not weep! Oh, do not weep! I cannot bear it!\nI will get you all you want! Only let me fetch and carry for you, tend\nyou, feed you, lead you, like your slave, your dog! Say that I may be\nyour slave!\" and falling on her knees at his feet, she seized both his\nhands, and covered them with kisses.\n\n\"Yes!\" she cried, \"I will be your slave! I must be! You cannot help it!\nYou cannot escape from me now! You cannot go to sea! You cannot turn\nyour back upon wretched me. I have you safe now! Safe!\" and she clutched\nhis hands triumphantly. \"Ah! and what a wretch I am, to rejoice in that!\nto taunt him with his blindness! Oh, forgive me! I am but a poor wild\ngirl--a wild Indian savage, you know: but--but--\" and she burst into\ntears.\n\nA great spasm shook the body and soul of Amyas Leigh; he sat quite\nsilent for a minute, and then said solemnly:\n\n\"And is this still possible? Then God have mercy upon me a sinner!\"\n\nAyacanora looked up in his face inquiringly: but before she could speak\nagain, he had bent down, and lifting her as the lion lifts the lamb,\npressed her to his bosom, and covered her face with kisses.\n\nThe door opened. There was the rustle of a gown; Ayacanora sprang from\nhim with a little cry, and stood, half-trembling, half-defiant, as if to\nsay, \"He is mine now; no one dare part him from me!\"\n\n\"Who is it?\" asked Amyas.\n\n\"Your mother.\"\n\n\"You see that I am bringing forth fruits meet for repentance, mother,\"\nsaid he, with a smile.\n\nHe heard her approach. Then a kiss and a sob passed between the women;\nand he felt Ayacanora sink once more upon his bosom.\n\n\"Amyas, my son,\" said the silver voice of Mrs. Leigh, low, dreamy, like\nthe far-off chimes of angels' bells from out the highest heaven, \"fear\nnot to take her to your heart again; for it is your mother who has laid\nher there.\"\n\n\"It is true, after all,\" said Amyas to himself. \"What God has joined\ntogether, man cannot put asunder.\"\n\n      *    *    *    *    *\n\nFrom that hour Ayacanora's power of song returned to her; and day by\nday, year after year, her voice rose up within that happy home, and\nsoared, as on a skylark's wings, into the highest heaven, bearing with\nit the peaceful thoughts of the blind giant back to the Paradises of the\nWest, in the wake of the heroes who from that time forth sailed out to\ncolonize another and a vaster England, to the heaven-prospered cry of\nWestward-Ho!"