For God and Gold

CHAPTER XIV

How the next day passed with me I cannot say. I spent it, I know, in my library, pacing up and down and thinking over and over again of all that had happened since last the sun rose.

I remember angrily putting away the divinity books which lay on my table, and taking down others at random. But they would not speak to me as they used, or perhaps I could not hear them for the din of self-reproach in my head.

Many times I tried to think what lucky chance it was that brought Harry to the inn; but I could not guess, nor did I ever know, till the Sergeant told me he came there by hazard, on his way from the Popish gentleman's house, for a cup of spiced wine, because they were wet, and seeing in the stable my horse and his wife's pillion-saddle, had guessed the bitter truth, which the hostess speedily confirmed.

After a heavy night's rest had soothed me I arose at a late hour, and saw things more clearly. I took down my Phædo Platonis, and read in it till I began to see right from wrong again. Gradually it seemed to me that there was but one thing to do. I would ride over to Ashtead once more, see Harry, and tell him I was going away, I knew not for how long or where, but to some land in which I could learn the lesson his travels had taught him. So I would crave his pardon in years to come, and take my leave of all I loved.

It was towards evening that I slowly crossed the park and came to the little wicket that opened into the pretty Italian garden which Harry had made for his wife. There I tied my horse, as I had often done before, and entered.

The terraces on either hand, where in grotesque solemnity the cognisance of his house frowned from many a half-hidden pedestal, were ablaze with the first flowers of spring. Celandine, fritillary, flower-de-luce, and all were there, like pretty laughing maids who knew their beauty and waywardly transgressed the trim stone mouldings, within which their luxuriance could not be content. From a wide-mouthed dragon's head the water spouted with a pleasant tinkle into the glassy basin that occupied the midst; the little trout that played there were springing merrily for the evening flies; whilst from the ivy and honeysuckle that was fast covering the enclosing walls, and from the blossom-laden pear trees in the orchard hard by, the birds were singing the requiem of the dying day.

At the end towards the house, between two vases that overflowed with woodruff, a flight of steps led upwards to the grassy terrace before Mrs. Waldyve's parlour. One lattice of her bow window was open, and as I mounted the steps I could hear the low sound of singing within. Very sad it came to me amidst the gay carolling of the birds; so sad, that I could not choose but go softly across the little velvet lawn and peep between the mullions.

All, what a sight was there! Rocking herself to and fro in her chair miserably sat Mrs. Waldyve, with hair and dress disordered. Her face was pale, her eyes hollow with weeping, and on her knees slumbered her little son. As though there was no world but in that small peaceful face, she leant over it and now and again touched the tiny brow with her lips. Singing ever the same mournful song, she rocked herself and leaned over the baby.

I could hear the words she sang—some which her grief had made for her—and as I listened I cursed all in heaven and earth, and above all myself. For thus she sang a lullaby to her son:—

'Sleep, baby, sleep, for so thou canst,
    Thou hast no sins to shrive;
Lully, lully, my babe, hope is not dead,
    Love keepeth hope alive.

'Sleep, baby, sleep, he will come back,
    Back, honey-sweet, to the hive;
Lully, lully, my babe, love is not dead,
    Thou keepest love alive.'

Those words told me true what had befallen. I should have known well enough, even had it not been for the letter she held crushed in her hand, and kissed, as I watched her. It was easy to guess what it said, though I could not read the words. Years after I saw it again. She herself showed it me, long afterwards, when all was healed. It still bore witness then how she had crushed it in her grief; it was still blistered with her tears. And this is what was written there:—

To Mrs. WALDYVE, my own sweet Wife.

You shall receive, dear wife, my parting words in these my parting lines. If I ever held your love, as indeed I think I did, it was by the poor things my sword had done. Now I go, I know not whither, to see if haply I may win it again to me beyond the seas, or at least forget a little of what I have lost.

My love I leave you, though I know it is a little thing to you, yet hoping, when I am gone, you will find some place for it, if only it be when you kneel to pray for our boy.

I would not that my last gift should be reproaches, dear Nan. Such are not for me, seeing it was by my own shortcoming that I could not keep your love. But first I send you all the thanks my heart can conceive or my pen express for your many cares and troubles taken for me, whom unworthy you strove to love.

And secondly, I would commend to you my poor child, for his father's sake, whom in his happiest times I trow you loved and would have loved still had he been worthy.

I cannot write much,—God knows how hardly I wrote even thus far. The everlasting, infinite, universal God, that is goodness itself, keep you and yours, have mercy on me, and teach me to forgive those who have wronged me; amongst whom, believe me, Nan, from my heart, I hold you not one. My wife, farewell. Bless my poor boy, pray your all-conquering prayers for him. My true God hold you both in His arms.—Your most loving, unworthy husband, HARRY WALDYVE.

From Rochester, this 30th day of April 1572.

I cannot but rejoice that I then knew no more of that letter than that by her kissing of it it was from him, and by the words of her song that it told how he was gone. My heart was already so seared and torn with shame at my work that, had I known how pathetic was his farewell, how deep and noble his sorrow, how touching his self-reproaches, and his straining in the anguish of his misery after the lost faith of his childhood, I know not how I should have borne the pain.

What to do now I could not think. To go in to her was impossible. As she sat there grieving with her baby upon her knees and the letter in her hand, she seemed to me a holy thing, more purely sanctified in her motherhood and grief to him she had lost than ever was vestal to her goddess. All faith and reverence I thought had left me, yet I could have worshipped that mother and child as devoutly as ever a poor Papist bowed before the Virgin's shrine. Still there was a holiness about them I dared not profane, even with my worship. I felt a thing too unclean even to stand on the steps of the altar where she was now enshrined, and I crept away like the guilty thief I was.

Hardly less difficult was it to go and leave her alone in the desert I had made of the fair garden, where but for me she might have dwelt so happily. To go was cowardly; it was sacrilege to stay. I had no guide to show me my way, no friend whom I could consult. Wearily, rather drifting than with any set purpose, I descended the steps, passed by the tinkling water, through the perfume-laden air, closed the wicket behind me, and so rode home, my errand undone.

He was gone! I knew not whither; and there was no one of whom I could seek counsel. I would have gone to Mr. Drake to tell him all and seek comfort, but the thought of the good man's hard Calvinism repelled me now. He would not understand. As for Mr. Cartwright, he was still less to be thought of. For very shame, I dared not confess to his holy ears the depth to which I had fallen, even could I have hoped for sympathy from him. No, there was none to ease me of my burden.

He was gone; and I must follow,—follow and bring him back to her, and then rid them for ever of my accursed presence. That was all I could think of. And on the morrow, after committing my affairs to old Miles's hands, I rode to Gravesend, and so came next day by river to London, whither I heard from the boatmen he had gone.

As I have said, I came to London drifting, rather than with any set purpose. As soon as I had sought for Harry at my Lord of Bedford's, and at the lodging where he was wont to lie when in London, and found no news of him, I was at a loss what to do. I had no friends in London that I knew of, nor was I so much as acquainted with any there except my merchant and old Mr. Follet, who had a lodging in Warwick Court, where he was of easy access to his scholars, both those about the Court and those who were sons to wealthy citizens.

To him I was resolved to go, not so much in hope to hear of Harry, as trusting in my forlorn state to receive comfort from him, when I remembered how peaceful and content was his life, and yet without any comfort of religion that I was ever able to discover.

I found him polished and kindly and gentle as ever, and bound still in willing servitude to his 'Apology.' He welcomed me very warmly, refusing any denial that I would sup with him. Our first commendation over, he fell to asking me of my life and work, so that we easily came to talk of those deep matters wherein my trouble lay.

'I cannot but rejoice, my dear Jasper,' said the old scholar, bending on me his intelligent, clear eyes, 'that you have come to your present state. It was always my desire that you should see that as a rule or touchstone of right living, nay, if you will, as a virgula divina, or divining rod, whereby to discover the pure water of life, religion is in no comparison with scholarship. So long as men shall pursue religion as a chief end, so long shall they be ever athirst and rage in these present fevers that now be. I hold there are three special points in education, or the leading forth of life, the same being, truth in religion, honesty in living, and right order in learning. I name them in the order in which the three are now commonly held, yet you know, as I do, that in order of excellence these points should be reversed.'

'Then you would not have a scholar,' said I, 'lay aside religion altogether?'

'I see no need for that,' he answered. 'It was not so in the past golden days of scholarship, before Reformation violently killed the old kindly tolerance of the Romish Church. Side by side they could not exist, so Rome grew hard perforce, and Geneva as hard to withstand her. And so the good old days were ended, even the days when a man would first take heed that his order of learning was rightly governed according to the precepts of the immortal Stagirite, from which, secondly, would flow, by the bestowing of such leisure as remained, a sufficient honesty in living, the whole being sweetened and tempered with such truth of religion as came of itself, without straining, out of the other two. It is this straining after God that so troubles the world and burns up scholarship. They draw the Ardour of Heaven too near, whereby the inflammable principles, whereof He is in a great measure composed, so heat men's blood and set their stomachs on fire, that cool scholarship itself is set in a blaze, and serves but to feed the fires of controversy, whereby learning, honesty, and religion itself are fast being consumed.'

'Surely, then, it were better,' said I, 'to shut out this disturbing element that makes life so turbid; better to deafen our ears to this note which sets all our harmony awry.'

'No, Jasper,' answered Mr. Follet, 'that is impossible. That far-off note is your octavo, as Pythagoras taught. You, with your spiritual nature, will always hear it sounding in unison with that which you yourself are making as you live your Life. If there is discord in your ears, it is that you are sounding some other note awry between your fundamental earthly note and His in the empyrean. By your scholarship I judge your first harmony must be dia-trion to the orbit of Mercury, which is science; and thus, if you would have concord, your next must be dia-pente to the orbit of Mars, which is manhood and knightly adventure. So can you reach through your full dia-pason to God, and sound your third and just fifth in complete and peaceful harmony with the universe. So I would advise you, if the music of your life has seemed meagre. But, above all, beware of the fourth, which is the orbit of Venus, that shall bring you nothing but most jarring discord, wherein you shall find no rest.'

The old man looked out at me from his clear eyes so shrewdly that, although I could only guess at his meaning, I felt he had divined the true cause of my discomfort. How far he had learned it I cannot say, yet I could not help calling to mind the many times I had written to him concerning my most pleasant studies with Mrs. Waldyve. I found in my old tutor a strange mingling of shrewd worldly knowledge and unreal speculation which drew me nearer to him than I had ever had wit to be in my boyhood. It is true I hoped to get little help from his medley of philosophies, yet his conversation fascinated me in spite of the half-mystic vagueness that seemed to be growing on him with his old age, and I stayed with him till a late hour.

Whether right or wrong for others, his own way of thought had brought him to an old age of profound peace, most enviable to me in the tempestuous flood of doubt that had overwhelmed my life since the dams of my faith, which I had deemed so secure, had burst. Moreover, his whole discourse was so seasoned with spicery from the writings of the ancients, and above all his beloved Aristotle, that it was very pleasant to hear, though beyond what my memory will bear to write.

Moreover I wished to speak with him about his 'Apology,' which he had not once mentioned. No one but myself can truly know how great must have been his sympathy with my troubled state, or how much he must have denied himself to minister to it, when for two hours he never once spoke of his manuscript. At last, moved to pity because of his exceeding kindness, I asked him how it fared.

'Bravely, bravely, my dear discipulus,' said he with beaming face. 'It has been long in getting set forth because of the great growth which it has attained by reason of the weighty arguments I continually found. Still the day for the great purging of scholarship is very near. I am near to finishing the Latin text, in which form I have been weightily advised the work should appear, although I had purposed otherwise for the glory of the English tongue. The Right Honourable the Earl of Bedford has promised to receive the dedicatory epistle, so that I doubt not, with so noble and learned a sponsor, my child shall find an honourable reception in the courts of science.'

This and much more to like purpose he spoke till I took my leave, much comforted by his kindliness, yet little relieved of my inward sickness.

Lashmer, who had been passing the time of my visit with Mr. Follet's servant, came to my chamber as usual to untruss me when we reached our lodging. He seemed full of something, which after a little painful repressing he poured forth.

'Did your worship hear whither he had gone?' asked he.

'Whither who had gone?' said I.

'Was not your worship seeking news of Mr. Waldyve?' he asked again.

'Certes, I was,' said I; 'but that is no concern of yours.'

'No, sir, none,' he answered, 'save that I hold all that concerns you concerns your faithful servant; but since it is not so, let it pass.'

So he fell into a sullen silence, till I, feeling he held news, could refrain no longer from asking what he meant.

'Nay, I meant nothing, sir,' said he. 'A gentleman's movements are nothing to me; but since I thought Mr. Follet would have told you whither he had gone, I made bold to inquire; for he was ever a most kind gentleman to me; but since there is offence in it, let it pass.'

'But what made you think Mr. Follet should know this?' I asked sharply.

'Nay, sir, I pray you let it pass. I have no longer desire to know what concerns me not.'

'But I have desire to know what you meant, sirrah.'

'Then, saving your displeasure, it was a foolish idle whim of mine, that am but a dunce and unlearned, to think that since Mr. Waldyve was with Mr. Follet yesterday he would have given your worship news of him. It was a stupid, foolish fancy, so I pray you let it pass.'

'Mr. Waldyve with Mr. Follet yesterday, say you?' I cried, as soon as I recovered breath. 'Why, how know you this, Lashmer?'

'Nay, I know it not,' said he, making occasion of my anxiety to have revenge for my sharpness.

'What a plague makes you say it then?'

'Why, sir, because Mr. Follet's man knows it, and Mr. Follet's man told me how Mr. Waldyve was with his master for the space of two hours save a thimbleful of sand yesterday about supper-time, during all which time he had to wait, for good manners' sake, though like to die of a watery mouth for thinking of a roasted rabbit and a dish of prunes that were bespoke for him and two other blades at the "Portcullis" tavern hard by.'

'Pace! pace! draw rein on your galloping tongue, good Lashmer, and tell me whither he has gone.'

'If I could, sir, but I cannot; nor Mr. Follet, nor Mr. Follet's man neither, for in truth he told none of them anything, save that they were not like to see him for a good space to come.'

'Then leave me, Lashmer, and good-night. Go to your bed now, and find a kind thought for a heart-sick master.'

'Heaven save your worship, and pardon a malapert servitor,' said Lashmer, and left me to my thoughts.

First, I think, I pondered over Mr. Follet's great tenderness with me, when as I felt he must have known all. Then I tried to come to conclusions with myself what I was to do. The more I pondered the more it seemed useless to search farther for Harry, and the more I dwelt on what Mr. Follet had said to me of sounding the note of Mars's orbit as a cure for my discords.

I felt shamed, moreover, to think that my old tutor knew all. I felt I could no more go back and face him; nay, I felt as though every one knew my shame, and a desire grew in me to fly far away from it all. I began to reason with myself as to what good end it would serve to find Harry, and now it seemed that even if I could find him I dared not face him. My bold resolves were melting to cowardice in the heat of my remorse, and utterly purposeless and alone I crept with a broken spirit to my bed.

CHAPTER XV

Next day I stayed within all the morning. Harry was in London, and though I had come thither to seek him, I dared not stir abroad for fear of meeting him. I dined in my lodging, sending Lashmer to the tavern for a quart of claret.

The food and the wine must have put new heart in me; for after they were done I sallied forth alone, resolved to prosecute my search. Still dreading success, I wandered eastward along the Strand. Many gallants, most splendid with new-fashioned hats and hose, were loitering along the way I went. I followed the stream, and so, passing Temple Bar and over the Fleet Bridge, I came through Ludgate before St. Paul's Church.

I stood a while admiring the grandeur of the front and the lofty tower. For then, being untravelled, I was unlearned in architecture, and saw not how rude were its proportions and barbarous its ornament beside the new style.

Many gallants went by me as I watched, laughing, and passed on into the church. Harry had often told me how it was a place of great resort, so I followed, thinking perhaps to find what I looked for and dreaded to see. The floor of the long and lofty nave was thronged with gallants and would-be gallants, strolling up and down, and laughing and talking with one another; while between the piers of clustered columns which supported the soaring roof-groins and dim triforium knots of men were gathered, who seemed for the most part to be merchants. From time to time I could see a bond or account-book fluttering white amidst their sober robes, but all was done with as little noise and bustle as could well be.

For it must be known that Paul's was not then the den of thieves it is now. It was not so long since the Queen's proclamation had been issued against such as should transact business, or make any fray, or shoot any hand-gun or dag within the precincts. It was still had in memory, though little regarded, and the place was not wholly disorderly.

Yet was it sufficiently out of order to see so gay a company glowing in their bright clothes of 'popinjay blue,' 'devil-in-the-head,' 'lusty gallant,' and I know not what other outlandish new-fashioned hues, and to hear their laughter rolling round the gray old walls, and the clink of their spurs and rapiers on the pavement, and the rustle of their silks and taffeta as they walked.

Wrapped as I was in myself, and shut off by my shame from all men, that thoughtless throng only made my sense of loneliness keener. Far more in sympathy with me than any creature there was the tall temple itself, which, stripped long since of all its altars and Popish adornments, seemed to look down in lofty contempt upon the irreverent crowd which insulted its ancient dignity. Solemn and sad and alone it seemed to wait in patient confidence for the day when their little paltry lives would have passed away to oblivion, and its days of worship would come again.

That there were many there more loyal with their tongues than in ought else I could see as I went forward and came near Duke Humphrey's tomb. Here the proclamation seemed wellnigh forgotten. Round the battered effigy the throng was thicker and full of ruffling loud-voiced swaggerers, who, from their ruffianly carriage and most vile Smithfield oaths, made me think their gentility much belied the bravery of their clothes. It was a thing I then first noted, and have since much grieved over, that men of low station nowadays take to wearing garments of gentleman's cut, no matter how common or ill-made, so long as they be as good as their scrapings, or stealings, or borrowings will buy.

Not wishing to mingle with this lewd throng I turned aside between the columns, that I might so pass into the aisle and avoid them. But before I could carry out my purpose I felt myself hustled roughly into the aisle by some one who thrust violently by me.

'Body of Bacchus!' said a loud, gruff voice, 'know you not better, base countryman, than to hustle a gentleman so?'

I turned and saw glaring at me a tall ruffian whom I had noted in the throng. He was dressed in garish and faded garments very vilely pinked and guarded, and wore on his head a most desperate hat. As though to give him a warlike note, his clothes were thrown on in a slovenly way, and his moustache frounced out so shock and bristling that it seemed from each hair-end a crackling oath must start with every word he said. I felt little inclined for a brawl, least of all in that place, though to quarrel with any man would perhaps have been a comfort in my present state; so I civilly told him I was sorry to have stood in his way.

'What, base minion!' said he very fierce, with a whole fusilada of oaths, 'think you to pass so lightly from a gentleman's wrath?'

'I pray you, sir, be content,' I replied as quietly as I could, for it seemed very silly to quarrel with such a mountebank. 'If I wronged your gentility it was unwittingly, and I crave your pardon.'

'Stay, rude rustic,' said he, stepping before me as I turned away, and clapping his hand to a rapier of extravagant length. 'This shall not serve you. Craving of pardons shall not serve you, nor your pardonnez-mois neither. A gentleman must have satisfaction by rule and circumstance, after the teaching of the inestimable Signor Rocco.'

I found myself by this time hemmed in by a throng of his fellows, as ruffianly and hectoring as himself, none of whom I dare have sworn could ever have afforded so much as their noses inside Signor Rocco's 'College,' so I thought best to make an end.

'Come then, sir,' said I, 'to a fitting place, and I will presently give you your desire.'

'Nay, but first name your friends,' my opponent replied. 'For know, base scullion, that town-bred gentlemen fight by rule and circumstance, and not like two rams in field, without supporters.'

'Yes, pretty shepherd,' cried the throng jeeringly, 'name first your friend, if you want a gentleman to walk with you.'

I now saw my evil case and what a trick was put on me, and knew not what to do. To draw my rapier, Harry's rapier, on this vermin was farthest from my thoughts. Yet the throng hustled me closer, and my bully swaggered and threatened loudly.

'I have no friend here,' said I, 'unless any gentleman among you will stand by me.'

'Hark to the scurvy rustic,' they cried, in answer to my look around to them. 'A pox on your familiarity. You will get no friend here.'

'Nay, my dry-livered lubbers, that he will,' cried a clear jolly voice, and I turned to see Frank Drake and another gentleman break through the throng to my side. 'What is it, Jasper? Stand back, ye lubberly porpoises, and give a seaman sea-room.'

'Stand back, I pray you, gentlemen,' cried my bully very condescending; 'I knew not that I spoke with a friend of Captain Drake's.'

'Or maybe you would not have spoken so loud, my pot-valiant Hercules,' said Frank's friend.

'What is all the coil about, Jasper?' said Frank again, while my bully tried to outstare the gentleman.

''Tis nothing,' said I. 'He wanted two friends for me, to help give him satisfaction for having been at the pain of jostling me.'

'Give him a tester, sir,' said Frank's friend, 'to buy sack withal. That is the best satisfaction for his most barrel-bellied worship.'

'No, gentlemen,' said my bully with great pomp, finding he could not outstare his new adversary, 'it is satisfaction enough to know the gentleman is a friend of the most valiant Captain Drake. I know of no quarrel here that a skin of muscadine will not assuage. I pray you, let me conduct you to a very honest tavern hard by where I am known, and where I will see you served with the best.'

'Most courtly offered!' said the gentleman. 'And peradventure your most sweet honesty will see us served also with very honest dice and very honest cards. 'Tis a pity we are promised elsewhere, but so it is, and we must perforce pray your valourship to bestow on us instead a full measure of your most delectable absence.'

'By the soul of Bacchus,' said the bully, swelling with contempt, 'were it not for the proclamation, blood should flow for this;' but we all laughed at him, and he strode away with his nose in the air, as proud as Alexander after Granicus. So we were rid of him and his fellows, who followed on his heels all growling, 'Were it not for the proclamation,' and swearing like drovers between their teeth.

'A happy meeting, Jasper,' said Frank. 'Yonder go as arrant a lot of thieves as any in all London. Be better acquainted with my friend, Mr. John Oxenham. A fellow-adventurer, Oxenham, Mr. Festing, but not, to my grief, a shipmate.'

'Pity you will not sail with us, Mr. Festing,' said Mr. Oxenham with a winning courtesy of manner. 'A man who can stand up to a throng of swaggerers like that should try his hand on Spaniards.'

'Why, so he has,' cried Frank,' and to their cost; but now he will be doing nothing but ram home most portentous charges of words into paper ordnance with a quill rammer. Heaven knows what giants they will bring down when they go off!'

We all laughed together, for I cannot say what it was to me to meet these two in the midst of my loneliness. I gladly accepted their invitation to a tavern, where we could talk in peace. For not only was I overjoyed to be with Frank again, but I was much taken with Mr. Oxenham.

He was a tall, well-dressed man with a very handsome face, and such courageous eyes that I did not wonder they had daunted the Paul's man. 'Tis true I should have liked him better had it not been for an amorous look he wore over all his manliness. Yet who was I to judge him for that? His talk was very pleasant, for he had been a rover from his youth, and spoke of what he had seen freely, without boasting. We sat drinking a long time, and talked of the glories of the West and a sailor's life, for which he had conceived a romantic enthusiasm.

'Ah, Mr. Festing,' burst out Mr. Oxenham at last, 'it is a pity you will not sail with us to the West, since you are bent on travel. I envy you your learning in these things, but none who have not seen can picture their glory. Compared with them, to potter about Europe from one pestered town to another, from one crowded country to another, is like the paddling of a duckling in a puddle beside the everlasting flight of the god-like albatross, that never lights, not even for love. This old world is gray, and worn, and stifling. Over there it is all colour and sunlight and freedom; where the golden land brings forth without labour, and he who will may pass through and enjoy. Why, when once you come to that Paradise where all is so wide and fresh and lovely, you lift your hands in wonder, as you look back to this dull corner far away, that your life can ever have been so little as to come within the bounds of such a prison; you shall hardly believe there was ever room here for aught large enough to cause a moment's grief or joy for your expanded soul. There you can see Nature and know at last what beauty is. There at last you shall drink her fragrant breath, feel the richness of her warm embrace, revel in the azure and rose colour and golden sheen that make up her divine beauty, and lie in her arms to know at last what it means to say, "This is delight."'

'And think, lad,' cried Frank, who hardly, I think, can have seen with Mr. Oxenham's eyes, 'think that it is Spaniards who have ravished this rich beauty. It is these idolatrous hell-hounds of Antichrist who have possessed this Shulamite woman whom the Lord had reserved as a bride for his saints. It will be a glorious smiting of them. Their lust has made them sleepy and womanish. They are puffed up into silly security with their Spanish pride. Why, man, they will leave whole estates in charge of one slave, and send out trains of a hundred Indians or more laden with gold with but a single negro over them. I know it all now. I know every way in and out, and every course and time their ships will sail, and I know harbours, lad, where none could ever find us, where we can lie in wait and pounce out like cats on the good things that come by. And then they have not a walled town on the coast, that I know of. We can swoop down on the Dons and be away again, made men, or ever they have time to wake up out of their beds. Why will not men see what there is to be done, if they will only do? One such stroke as I have in mind will do more to undo Antichrist than all your thinking. Yet you scholars will not see it, but will not cease your idle disputing and dreaming till the angels shall come down and cry to you in voice of thunder, "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven?"'

His words struck me very deep, and I began to see how idle was our scholars' contempt for men of action. So, with ever-growing interest, I listened as we talked together till long after supper, and Frank unfolded every detail of his plan in his honest practical way. Mr. Oxenham, moreover, ceased not to paint his glowing pictures not only of what was known of those regions, but also of the fairyland beyond, where no Christian had yet trod,—the unknown lands where he set my fancy playing with his till my imagination, on which I had already heaped so much that was inflammable from my books, was all on fire.

As for my reason, Frank's sound sense was enough to satisfy that, and his taunt at my standing still and gazing up into heaven while others were doing touched my pride nearly. What wonder, then, that when the time came to bid them good-night, when I saw before me my lonely lodging, when I pictured the blank morrow and all my life beyond, empty of hope or joy or fellowship, when they urged me once more most earnestly to sail with them, that I could not resist!

They were pressing on me the very course in which I could follow Mr. Follet's strangely-worded advice more fully and nobly than I had ever dreamed. In place of my faith a sense of destiny seemed to have come to me, and to be speaking clearly in this chance meeting. If there was anything in man's harmony with the music of the spheres, sure it was the wild adventurous war-note of the universal gamut that I heard far off in the height of heaven sounding low and clear for my soul's response.

My quest for Harry was forgotten, and with it whatever else tied me to the old life, which now began to seem but a body of death. For that strange voice had come over the wide ocean and whispered its witching summons in my ear also. I could not choose but obey.

So we three joined hands and drank a cup on my resolve, and one more was added to the throng who day by day were leaving all to taste the ripe lips of this New Helen in the West.

CHAPTER XVI

It was arranged that I should go out as gentleman adventurer; and since I did not wish to be without place, and had some little knowledge of business, gained by always managing my own estate so as to make it yield the fullest return, I begged and got the office of merchant to the expedition.

I was soon tried in my new post, for Frank was earnest to get back to Plymouth to speed the fitting out of the ships and the building of the pinnaces, which we were to carry with us in pieces. So I was left to purchase the arms and other furniture which was still lacking. This had been the only occasion of his staying in London, which being left in my hands he was free to depart, and this he accordingly did, taking Mr. Oxenham with him.

From my constant fear of meeting Harry, which was greater than ever since I had resolved to fly, I stirred abroad no more than my business demanded.

Yet I was obliged often to go into the city, for there was still a great deal to be done. Money was in no way lacking, both by reason of the success of Frank's two former voyages, which had lined his pockets well, and of the support he got elsewhere. Nothing was to be wanting from the complete furniture of a man-of-war in either ship; and our captain, who, both on his person and his ship, would always have the best, had furnished me with a long schedule of muskets, calivers, targets, pikes, partisans, bows, and artificers' tools, as well as cloth and other provision for a whole year, all of which things I was bidden to purchase of different merchants as far as possible, that no wind of our preparations should be blown into the Spanish ambassador's ears.

Such time as I was not thus engaged I spent very profitably in Signor Rocco's new College of Fence in Warwick Lane. I had learned that Harry did not resort thither, so, since it was near my lodging, I was able to enjoy my best-loved pastime and see much excellent rapier-play that was new to me, whereby the pain of my delay in London was a little eased.

Thus by avoiding other public places, and above all Paul's, at the end of a fortnight I found my work complete without the meeting I dreaded; and with a lighter heart than I had borne for many a day I took ship at Radcliffe with all my lading, and so came to Plymouth after a slow passage on the afternoon of Friday, the 23d of May.

The three brothers, for Joseph Drake was of the expedition as well as John, received me with open arms, and much commended my pains when the arms and furniture came to be stowed on board. They informed me that as merchant I was to sail in the admiral with Frank, of which I was very glad.

It seemed that everything was prepared, and that, as they had only stayed for my coming, we were to weigh on the morrow. Nothing could have been more to my mind. So eager was I to leave my old life behind that I hardly accepted their invitation to go ashore to gather the men who were yet to come aboard. Yet I did at last for good-fellowship, and started with them to the sound of a demi-culverin and a flourish of our trumpets, for a signal to the mariners to embark.

As we rowed I saw another boat making for the Swan, which lay a good way from the Pasha. They hailed us as we passed, so that I knew they were some of our company; but I could not notice them much, for Frank just then took occasion to point out Mount Edgcombe to me and I looked the other way.

Our passage from tavern to tavern to beat up the stragglers was like a triumph. Indeed I think Plymouth was then, and maybe still is, flat drunk with the western wine. A crowd followed on our heels, cheering us as we went; the citizens came out from their suppers to pledge us lustily with brimming tankards; and as for smiles of hostesses and wenches in the taverns I had enough showered on myself alone, being a gentleman adventurer in the expedition, as would wellnigh satisfy a regiment of horse a whole campaign, as such things go now.

What with these oglings and smirkings of the pretty Plymouth lasses and our constant pledgings, I could have been as jolly as any piece of tar-yarn there had it not been for the grievous sights I saw, and our pain therefrom in getting our men aboard, though I think a very willing crew.

Most had pledged once or twice too often, and were for ever taking leave and never departing; some could not have gone if they had been willing, at least not on their own legs; others were in pledge, for commodities they had never seen, to cogging hosts, who held their boots or sword or breeches as security. Some even we could by no means come at, save by help of a magistrate's warrant to search some dishonest alehouse.

Frank told me what I saw was of no account by the side of what sometimes happened.

'Why, lad,' said he, 'I have known it take two days and all the magistrates in the borough to gather a company, and then not see it done. Nay, it is not an unheard-of thing for this scandal to be the utter overthrow of a voyage, and general undoing of owners, victuallers, and company. Mine are all picked lads, or you should not have seen us come off so easily.'

'I marvel,' said I, and I still do, 'that some among our great lord-admirals have not taken order to end these things, which seem a great scandal to the reputation of our sea-service no less than an injury to the commonwealth, and ought to be reformed.'

'That is well enough,' answered Frank, 'and much to be wished; but to keep a mariner at such times from his ale is a thing more lightly attempted than easily accomplished.'

Mr. Oxenham was little help to us. Indeed he had so many pouting lips to kiss in this his own fair town of Plymouth, and so many dainty waists to encircle, that I began to think nothing but a warrant or a file of pikes would ever get him aboard.

Still it was done at last, and the sun rose gloriously next morning upon us with our company complete. It was Whitsunday Eve, and the whole town seemed to have made holiday to bid us God-speed that sunny May morning.

It was a fair sight to see the hills around in their fresh spring garb crowding down to the harbour, which seemed to spread out its shining arms to embrace them. The Hoe was thronged with a great mass of people in their gayest clothes; every point beside was bright with colour, and a score of small fry were cleaving the clear waters about us.

We stood off and on awhile to give them a good sight of us, and bid the fair town 'Farewell' with our great pieces and our music. I think Frank was very proud of his ships, and well he might be, for never can have been a smarter sight in Plymouth harbour than we were that day as we beat to and fro with our great flags of St. George at the main-tops, and our silk streamers down to the blue water, and now and again a white puff from our castles as we answered the ordnance from the platform saluting us.

Cheer after cheer went up from the shore folk between each discharge till we could no longer hear them, and stood out to sea, fairly started at last on that most memorable adventure. I say memorable, for surely never was so great a service undertaken with so small a power. We were, men and boys, all told, but seventy-three souls, being forty-seven in the admiral and twenty-six in the vice-admiral, under John Drake, and only one of us all that was not under thirty.

The wind was very favourable at north-east, and we stood on all that day and next night. In the morning when I came on deck I found we were going under easy sail, only a cable's length from our vice-admiral. A boat was towing alongside of us, and I saw that some one must have come aboard from the Swan.

I went aft to our captain's cabin to see what it might mean. I knocked at the door. Frank's cheery voice bade me enter. I opened and went in. Heaven save me from such a moment again! My heart stood still, my brain swam, for there beside Frank sat Harry, with Sergeant Culverin at his back!

He sprang to his feet as I shut the door behind me, and stood glaring at me with his hand on his rapier.

'Sit down, Harry!' cried Frank; 'I will have no brawling here.'

Harry took no notice, but stood with his breath coming very fast and hard just as before.

'Sit down, sir,' thundered our captain; 'wilt mutiny in my own cabin? Hark ye, sir, on my ship there is no difference between a gentleman and a cook's boy when it comes to giving orders. Sit down now, and take your hand from that weapon, or I shall presently take order to have you in irons.'

'You are right, Frank, quite right,' said Harry with an effort as he slowly sat himself down. 'But how can you have done us this unkindness?'

'Frank, Frank,' said I, finding voice at last, 'you know not what you have done.' With that I tottered to the seat on the opposite side of the table to Harry. I felt undone and crushed. My long grieving and much brooding on my shame had told on me more than I guessed. And now to find after my cowardly flight I had fallen into a trap a hundredfold more dreadful than that I had sought to escape, to find my new hopes shattered at a blow and this awful trial before me, was more than I could bear, and in utter broken despair I buried my face in my arms upon the table to hide my tears.

'I know well enough what I have done,' said Frank, after he had left us thus in silence for some moments. 'Do you think that when two good lads, fast friends, come to me each separately from the side of one fair lady, haggard and woe-begone, and tell me that they want to journey they care not whither, so long as it be far from England, do you think then I know not what it means? Why, man, I have a score such aboard now. For though many think that the greater the thief and blasphemer the better the soldier, yet say I for my work give me, next to him who sails for love of God, the honest lad that sails for love of a lass. As I judge they are half and half aboard our ships now. So think you I could not read the old tale, when I saw it writ so plain? And had it not been so, I should yet have known; for there comes to me an honest worthy soldier who knew better than I.

'"Captain Drake," says he, "here is a mighty storm blowing between two valiant gentlemen, who after long and loving consort have parted company, so that they cannot come together again without most nice navigation. I pray you take command," says he.

'"How do they bear, Sergeant?" says I.

'"Cry you mercy there, captain," says he; "I am no pilot of gentlemen's quarrels, yet I can give you certain just observations, whence peradventure you may take their bearings yourself."'

Therewith Frank repeated the whole story as he had it from the Sergeant, till he came to Harry's flight from the inn. Then in a low earnest voice he told clearly, as though it were passing before his eyes, what the Sergeant had seen me do outside with Harry's rapier. I felt so shamed to hear it now that I would have stayed him, but felt I could not speak.

'So, gentlemen,' said our captain, when he ended the tale,' I knew it was a quarrel that might be healed, and knew nothing more sovereign in such a case than the lusty sea. I have known many so healed, when they get far away and see what a little thing it is they wrestled for, beside the prizes a brave lad can win over sea. That is what I have done, and I know I am right; and if you be true men, I would have you shake hands before you leave this cabin.'

The sound of Harry's hard breathing had ceased as Frank got on with his tale, and since he described the scene in the inn-yard I felt my brother's eyes had been fixed upon me. Now I heard him rise, and felt his hand laid upon my shoulder.

'Poor lad,' said he very gently, 'poor lad! what fearful suffering, what a terrible war must have been in your good heart! Why did I not know it and help you to victory? You have won alone. I know it now, but God forgive me, with what carnage of your soul, which but for my folly I could have stayed. We have both sinned, and grievously we have both been punished; let us now lay down the scourge.'

I looked up, hardly daring to face him. Yet when I saw his look was filled with pity I took courage. Rising to my feet I took his hands and pressed them hard, but I could not speak. So putting his arm through mine, he led me to the door.

'Come,' said he, 'we will go talk together. While our captain finishes writing his instructions we will try to instruct each other how best to show ourselves worthy of her.'

I think we both went out very humbled. Not only because Frank had so imperiously bent us to his will and shown us what children we were beside him, but also because he had compared us to the love-sick boys of the crew, and our story to their love squabbles. Yet how could we deny it was different? It was indeed hard to confess how little different it was, and, as I say, we both went out with our pride, the mainstay of quarrels, much humbled.

We had both, I know, tried honestly that our quarrel should end here, yet was the rent too wide and deep to be mended so easily. His arm seemed to sit uneasily in mine, and ere we had gone a few paces he took some excuse of a point coming untied to draw it away.

Like strangers at last we sat down and tried to talk, but it was very difficult. I would have given my tongue to have gone on with the tale where Frank ended, and to have told Harry how I had seen his dear wife mourning over her child for his loss. Yet half from shame to confess I had gone back to Ashtead, and half in fear of adding to his grief by telling him what abiding love he had left, I held my peace, and we fell to talking in false notes about the voyage, till, to our great relief, Harry was summoned to Frank's cabin to receive his orders for Captain John Drake. As soon as I was alone Sergeant Culverin came up to me with his elaborate salute.

'I trust you will forgive my freedom, your worship,' said he.

'Forgive, Sergeant!' I answered. 'I have nothing to forgive; I have only thanks for the good work you have done.'

'Nay,' said he, 'I did nothing; no more than that astrolabe with which Mr. Oxenham yonder is taking our position. I was but a poor instrument for Captain Drake to shape your courses withal.'

'Still I must thank you, Sergeant, from my heart.'

'I pray you, sir, if you love me, say no more. Let us pass to other things. How does this most uncivil motion sort with your worship's stomach?'

'Well enough, Sergeant; does it quarrel with yours?' I asked, for he looked a little pale.

'To be plain with you, sir, the sea and I are not so good friends as we hope to become. Last night was most evil to me in yonder fly-boat—Swan, they call it; yet for liveliness Sparrow would sort better with its nature. There was, moreover, a mariner of the watch who would increase my load by singing continually a most woeful, ancient ballad of pilgrims at sea. Thus it ran, sir:—

'"Thus meanwhile the pilgrims lie,
And have their bowlies fast them by,
And cry after hot Malvoisie,
    Their health for to restore.
And some would have a salted toast,
For they might eat nor sodden nor roast;
A man might soon pay for their cost
    As for one day or twain."

And more very sickly stuff to like intent, sir, to a very doleful tune.'

'I fear, Sergeant,' said I, 'your voyage to the Indies will not be as pleasant as you could desire.'

'Indeed, sir,' said he, 'I wish we could fetch thither a-horseback, being, as I think, the only honourable manner of going for gentlemen. Still, since it has pleased God to put this shifty, rude, uncourtly sea betwixt us and the Indies, we must e'en make shift with a ship.'

'I am sorry for you, Sergeant,' I answered. 'A horse indeed would have been a conveyance you better understood.'

'Well, it is not so much that,' said the Sergeant. 'For when I was sergeant-groom under the Signor John Peter Pugliano, esquire of the Emperor's stables, the word always went that a man who could manage a horse could manage anything, save it were a woman, by your worship's leave. So I think a ship will not come amiss to me, being in relation to a horse but a wet lifeless thing.'

'But yet, Sergeant,' said I, 'of a wholly different nature.'

'I know not that, sir,' said he. 'The ancients were wiser than we in these matters, saving your worship's learning, and, as I have been told, placed amongst their ensigns military the horse, as being sacred to the god Neptune as well as to Mars, and the symbol of immoderate fury of attack on sea as well as on land. Moreover in your tilting of one ship against another you have an image or imitation of the crowning glory of horsemanship.'

'But we English do not use this method,' I answered, 'and hold it only fit for Turks and Spaniards, and such like, who, having no skill in sailing and seamanship, are compelled to use galleys propelled with oars.'

'Mass!' said Culverin, 'had I known that I should have sailed even less willingly than I did. What you say may be right, yet I hold that to sail with a lance at your bows is the more honourable and soldierly method. But let that pass. Doubtless by further contemplation I shall discover further similitudes between the horse and the ship. Since I hear what you say, sir, I see nothing in which they are alike save in respect of their prancing—a quality I would gladly forego in the present case, seeing that I am like to find little comfort in it.'

As we spoke Harry came out of the captain's cabin, and Sergeant Culverin had to leave to accompany his master back to the Swan. My brother, good heart, did his best to bid me farewell as of old, but what between my shamefacedness to see his careworn look and damped spirit, and his own too recent sense of the great wrong I had done him, our leave-taking was cold and formal, for all he tried so hard to forgive.

CHAPTER XVII

Our wind held so fair and steady at north-east that on the ninth day we sighted Porto Santo in the Madeiras, and two days later the Canaries. So persuaded was our captain of a very good passage, and so earnest to give the Spaniards no inkling of our purpose, that he would not touch for water, but held on without once dropping anchor or striking sail till the thirty-fifth day.

In spite of the terrible shock my sudden meeting with Harry had given to my spirits, and in spite of my despair at being condemned to face my shame and sorrow for I knew not how many months, I could not but feel a calm grow over me as we proceeded. None can tell, save he who has tried it, what it is to a perturbed spirit to sail on day after day over those sunny seas with all the magic of the West before. Less and less I brooded over the old life, and more and more on the glory of the new, till, as Frank had said, the past seemed to grow small, and a faint hope arose in me that my crime was not too great for pardon, seeing that I knew how hard my brother would try to forgive.

I employed myself in studying navigation and the Spanish tongue with Frank, nor were ship duties wanting, for it was ever our captain's way to have the gentlemen tally on a rope as well as the meanest mariner when need was.

He hated nothing so much as idleness, and those who had no work had always to find play, which he himself was not slow in furnishing.

'I know nothing,' he used to say, 'that breeds discontent and faint hearts like the union of these two, dullness and idleness.'

So with games, and music, and rummaging and cleaning arms, our spirits were kept up when they were like to sink for want of work. Frank was very earnest about this on our present voyage, for as we neared the Indies the hands, being young, began to frighten themselves with tales of the great strength and richness of the Indian cities, until, had it not been for Frank's care in stopping and preventing such idle talk with other inducements, they would have come to think Nombre de Dios as big as London and as strong as Berwick.

Nor were we allowed to lose sight of the godly purpose of our enterprise. Prayers were ordered every day night and morning, which our captain read very earnestly, never forgetting a prayer to God for the Queen's Majesty, her most honourable council, and the speedy 'making' of our voyage, the same having a very good effect, for the half at least of the crew were as good Puritans as himself.

Thus it was in a very hopeful and godly state that, on the evening of the thirty-fifth day we saw the Isle of Guadeloupe towering on the horizon like a priceless jewel in the setting sun. With all our music and many a gay flourish of our trumpets we saluted it, and that night as we lay a-hull our musicians gave us a double portion of melody.

With the first morning light we ran in and anchored off a little rocky island three leagues off Dominica, where we lay three days to refresh our men. And here we landed and wandered at will, to taste for the first time the surpassing loveliness of the tropics.

How shall I tell of those first days in the Indies? My pen seems a dumb dead thing when I think of it. Much as I had thought, and dreamed, and read of them, this waking, this seeing was far beyond all. On either hand the heights of Guadeloupe and Dominica towered serenely out of their soft beds of lustrous green. The glittering waters between were studded with island gems ablaze with every bright hue which God has made, that we may taste the glory which is to come. All about us was the hum of bright flies, the sparkle of feather and gorgeous flowers, and the rustle of the scented air through the crowded canes as it passed on to wave with dreamy motion the heavy crowns of the slender palms. And over all, with faint and soothing voice, there came in through the dense growth of vine and brake the deep-toned booming of the surf.

Such is the pale shadow that I have power to paint of the banquet on which our souls feasted as we lay in the deserted huts which the Indians, who came there to fish, had built. So rich and heavenly was that world that I could not wonder how men were led on to think that a little farther, only a little farther, must be a land where gold and gems would be as the sand and pebbles here, nay, where beyond some glittering hill they would see the open gates of Paradise.

Not only by the memory of all that beauty does the time live in my mind, but also because it was here I first had real speech with my wronged brother. As we lay in those Dryad's bowers our sorrow seemed so far away and little in this New World, so dim beside its dazzling glory, that it was for a time half forgotten amidst the thousand new things that crowded our thoughts. Like two Sileni we lay, as Mr. Oxenham had said, in the arms of lady Nature, and all that was sad melted in the glow of her luxuriant life.

We had no spirit for the revels of our comrades, for chasing the bright-hued birds, or plucking the gleaming flowers. We were both happier to lie looking over the sea where our dainty ships rocked, and dreamily talk over Harry's Italianate notions that rose unbidden here. Being to me now of undreamed-of interest, since my old faith was gone, they were a subject we could talk on more as we used to do.

'Surely,' I remember him saying, 'surely that Italian friar was right who told me that the soul was not in the body. Can you not feel here, Jasper, how great a thing it is? Can you not feel how there is something that binds you like a brother to all this music of bird and leaf and air and sea? What can it be but the great soul of the universe. That is it, and the friar was right. It is that great soul which is not in our bodies, rather are our bodies in the soul—the soul that is yours and mine and hers and God's.'

So would our speech always come back to our sorrow and part us again. Yet were we too drunken with the western wine to feel the past too deeply. Thus, then, once or twice during our stay there we had speech of these things, and I began to hope still more that some day we might be the same again together, and, moreover, to feel that I was beginning to understand what it was he thought of the great universal secret.

On the third day after our coming to the island we sailed again, greatly refreshed, and in two days more we had sight of Tierra-Firme, being the high land above Santa Marta, but came not near the shore, that we might not be seen. So without sight of Carthagena we passed on, till on the 12th of July we dropped anchor off the haven whither we were bound.

It was a spot our captain had noted on his voyage the last year, not only as being sheltered by two high points from the winds and a very commodious harbour, but also because no Spaniard had any dwelling between this place and Santiago de Tolu on the one hand and Nombre de Dios on the other, the nearest being at least thirty-five leagues distant. Moreover, there was an abundance of food there, both fish in the sea and fowls in the woods around, the most plentiful being certain birds like to our pheasants, which the Spaniards in those regions call guans and curassows. It was by reason of the great store of these delicate fowls that our captain named the place Port Pheasant.

It must be remembered we had our three pinnaces to set up, for in them we were to make our attack. It was most necessary then to have a hidden place for this work, and it was not a little his knowledge of this secret haven that gave our captain his great hopes of success. He judged no one knew it but himself and those who had been with him in his previous voyage. Being thus perfectly secure, Frank rowed in to see how best to bring the ships to moorings there, and I went in the boat.

No place could have been better fitted to our purpose. The headlands were but half a cable's length apart, and so overhung with a dense growth of brakes and trees, all strange to me, that little could be seen beyond save the climbing hills on the mainland. But as soon as we rowed in I could see what a paradise it was.

Before us opened a rounded haven, from eight to ten cables' length every way. The waves died languidly away towards the shore in ever-lessening ripples, as though hushed by the surpassing beauty of the place. Where, with loving whispers, they lapped the golden beach, they reflected a picture more dazzling than my eyes had ever seen. Heaped up in wild profusion was a tangled mass of every hue of green that clothed to the water's edge the gently swelling hills. Wherever the rocks could find a place to peep, their own rich colour was almost hidden by hanging bunches of scarlet flowers. Huge rough tree-trunks I could get a glimpse of here and there, with great sinews of rugged bark that stood boldly out from them, and were lost in the glowing brakes which covered the ground. In the branches fluttered birds that mocked the radiance of the flowers, while on every point the crested and bronze-hued pheasants plumed themselves, and screamed defiance one against the other. Lost to all else but this fairyland I was hardly plunged, as it were, into some delicious dream, when I was rudely awakened.

''Vast rowing, lads,' said Frank suddenly, in quick, hushed tones. 'Look! What's yonder?'

His keen eye was the first to see it. I looked where he pointed, and in a moment my paradise was tumbled to earth. Away in the trees rose a thin blue cloud of smoke. There was no mistaking it; the hand of man must be there. 'Whose was it?' was what we each asked ourselves with melancholy foreboding.

Our captain, though as disappointed as any of us to see a cuckoo in his nest, seemed nothing daunted. Rowing back quickly to the ships, he ordered out our other boat, and manning both to their full holding, not forgetting muskets, bows, and pikes, returned speedily to land.

No sooner were we ashore than we could see many traces of men having been there very lately. There were black spots where fires had been, and marks of fresh clearing in the brakes. Setting ourselves in order, we cautiously went forward along a track that seemed to lead to the fire, Frank leading the way in spite of all our efforts to dissuade him.

We had not gone far before we came to a tree in the midst of the track, so great that four men at full stretch could not have girdled it about. I saw Frank stop suddenly and look up on the trunk.

'Ah, Jack Garrett, Jack Garrett,' said he, 'what game is this you have been coursing with my hounds?'

I followed his eyes and saw a leaden plate nailed to the tree, on which were graven these words:

CAPTAIN DRAKE.

If you fortune to come to this port, make hast away! For the Spaniards which you had with you here the last year have bewrayed this place, and taken away all that you left here.

I depart from hence, this present 7th of July 1572.

Your very loving friend,
            JOHN GARRETT.

'My thanks, Jack Garrett, for your kindly warning,' cried Frank. 'A true Plymouth man are you, though you did whistle away some of my best hounds. See what comes,' he continued, turning to me, 'of sparing these false Spaniards' lives. It is enough to make a man cut the throat of every prisoner he takes—a thing, by God's help, I will never do, whatever it cost me. May they have their reward for their treachery, though, by God's mercy, we are too well furnished to be hurt by the loss of any gear they stole.'

'Where will you go now, then?' I asked.

'No whither, my lad,' said he. 'Here I purposed to set up my pinnaces, and here I will do it. The Spaniards are not here now, and if they keep away but two days, I shall order things so that, by God's help, they shall rue their coming, if that is their mind.'

He was very cheerful and resolute with it all, and made us so too, yet I know he was sorely tried, by his frequent speaking of God's name, which was always his way at times when he felt need of all his courage, as indeed he did now; for though we found the place deserted, the fire we had seen being but the remains of Garrett's work, left perhaps as a signal to us to be on our guard, yet there was no telling when the Spaniards would be down on us.