The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1901-01-11
CHAPTER vi.

CHAPTER vi.
We returned to Nigo Bay in less than
four months and with us large COM
pany of other ships. all bearing grain,
for which the failure of the Spanish
wheat crop promised a profitable mar
ket. We neither sold our cargo, how
ever, nor did succeed in carrying off
my sweetheart. And this is how it
happened:
Scarcely had we anchored when a
negro page came off to the ship in a
small boat. bringing me note from
IneZ.
She was in sore trouble through her
love for me. for Don Miguel had for
hidden her to have anything more, to
do with me and had locked her in her
room to make sure that his commands
We're obeyed. And there was even
worse news than this in the letter Or
ders, she told me. had been received
the whole way, and the words Trim
sails, the watchw hardly once fell on
our ears. Wonderful good fortune,
this, but it cost our captain the greater
part of his crew, who declared that
the ship was bewitched-and l was
more than half inclined to agree with
them.
This was the reason for their fears:
When we We're lying at Venice, our
captain went to Finn who dealt in
charms and for the sum of 19 ducats
bought from him that which would
raise a favoring gale. 1t was wrapped
in skin case marked all over with
cabalistic designs whose meaning none
of us understood. What it contained
cannot say, for no man on the brig
dared to ris.i his eyesight by gazing at
the wizards charm after It's maker
had warned him to keep aloof. But
this know, that while that bag was
nailed to the masthead we never want
ed for n fair wind to watt us home
/ Yet there We're signs that the Eye
device that eased us of the just labors
of sea working. Almost every night
while we We're in the more southern
ATTITUDES pale blue lights would fly
down to us out of the darkness and
perch on yardarm or masthead. They
We're Corpos SantOS-holy bodies-and
we knew that they had come to threat
greeted then with psalm they held
their places as though they did not
hear word of our singing.
We younger ones gazed at the omens
with wonder and little more, but the
older seamen were strangely disQuiet-
ed, and as soon as we dropped anchor
in the Thames and the wages had been
paid more than 30 of them left the ship
for good. would have followed them,
for trusted to their older experience
in such things. but Alec, as usual, ridi-
culed my superstition and said he
meant to stay. so | had to Stit1e my
qualms and stay too.
We We're rewarded for our boldness,
for the captain not only appointed us
after house, but undertook to teach us
all the mysteries Of navigation and.
seamanship. so that at the end of the
voyage we We're either of us competent
to take the command off, vessel our
selves. And thus in the event it proved
that our captains deal with the devil
was the beginning of our rapid rise in
the calling we had chosen.
I We stuck TO the Surrey Hills for sew
eral voyages after This, until at last we
suffered so much in a brush with a
couple of piratical rascals from Salleel
that, though we beat them off after
tough battle the ship was so much
knocked about that on our return home
she was pronounced unfit for another
voyage. And SO we We're out of
berth Alec would have shipped from
the Thames again for foreign parts at
once, but suggested that we should
have little fun on shore first. We
staid few days, therefore, in London,
and then, finding that our money was
walk around the south coast of Eng
land
After a few unimportant adventures
we arrived in time at Bristol, and there
the emptiness of our purses compelled
us to take ship once more. We got
berths on board the Severn at Bristol,
but our vessel had not got clear of the
red waves of the Bristol channel when
opposite Bideford if my memory
does not fail me-an accident happened
to her which gave us another step up
the ladder of fortune Our captain
died of stroke, and Alec, who had
been deep sea pilot, stepped into his
shoes. and became the second in COM