Part 23 (1/2)

Why?”

”'Cause the pilot o' the _Spit-silver_ he knowed un. He say the plague broke out in the Low Countries, and the old Don took and tended that Gallego servant o' his and then he died--not o' the pestilence--just wore out like. I reckon maybe he told Mus' Drake. I didn't.”

Silence fell. Then Will said thoughtfully, ”He won't be Mus' Drake much longer--by rights--but you never know what a woman'll do. She keep her presents and her favors for them that ha'n't earned 'em--as a rule.”

Moone presently hummed half aloud,

”When I served my master I got my Sunday pudden, When I served the Company I got my bread and cheese.

When I served the Queen I got hanged for a pirate, All along o'sailin' on the Carib Seas!”

It was a reckless jest, for every one knew that if Elizabeth were dead or married to a Catholic or at peace with Spain when they saw England again, it was extremely likely that the gallows would be their reward.

But here, at any rate, was one spot not yet haunted by the Spanish spectre.

The Indians, persuaded at last that the white chief was not a G.o.d, insisted on making him their King. They crowned him with a headdress of brilliant feathers, in all due ceremony, hung a chain of beads about his neck, and looked on with the utmost reverence while Drake fixed to a large upright post a tablet claiming the land for the Queen of England, and a silver sixpence with the portrait of Elizabeth and the Tudor rose.

Securely hidden under the tablet in a hollow of the wood were memoranda concerning the direction in which, according to the Indians, gold was to be found in the streams,--plenty of gold. When she was ready to the last rope's end the little s.h.i.+p spread her wings and sailed straight across the Pacific, round the Cape of Good Hope, home to England.

Battered and scarred but still seaworthy the _Golden Hynde_ crept into Plymouth Sound, where Drake heard that the plague was in the seaport.

Using this for excuse not to land until he knew his footing, he anch.o.r.ed behind Saint Nicholas Island and sent letters to Court.

The sea-dogs who patrolled the Narrow Seas in Elizabeth's time understood her better than her courtiers did. To Drake she was still the keen-minded woman who, like the jeweled silent birds he had seen in tropical jungles, sat in her palace, with enemies all about her alert and observant, and ready to seize her if she came within their grasp. He knew her waywardness to be half a.s.sumed, since to let an enemy know what he can count on is fatal. He had not much doubt of her action, but he must wait for her to give him his cue.

Within a week came her answer. She demurely suggested that she should be pleased to see any curiosities which her good Captain had brought home.

Drake went up to London, and with him a pack train laden with the cream of his spoil. The Spanish Amba.s.sador Mendoza came with furious letters from Philip demanding the pirate's head. A Spanish force landed that very week in Ireland. Burleigh and the peace party were desperate. All that Mendoza could get out of Elizabeth was an order to Edmund Tremayne at Plymouth to register the cargo of the _Golden Hynde_ and send it up to London that she might see how much the pirate had really taken. At the same time Drake himself went down with her private letter to Tremayne telling him to look another way while her captain got his share of the bullion. Meanwhile she suggested that Philip call his Spaniards out of Ireland. Philip snarled that they were private volunteers.

Elizabeth replied, so was Drake. An inquiry was held, and not a single act of cruelty or destruction of property could be proved against any of Drake's crews. The men were richly rewarded by their Admiral; the _Golden Hynde_ came up to Deptford; a list of the plunder was returned to Mendoza; and London waited, excited and curious.

Out of this diplomatic tangle Elizabeth took her own way, as she usually did. On April 4, 1581, she suggested to Drake that she would be his guest at a banquet on board the little, worm-eaten s.h.i.+p. All the court was there, and a mult.i.tude of on-lookers besides, for those were the days when royalty sometimes dined in public. After the banquet, the like of which, as Mendoza wrote his master, had not been seen in England since the time of her father, Elizabeth requested Drake to hand her the sword she had given him before he left England. ”The King of Spain demands the head of Captain Drake,” she said with a little laugh, ”and here am I to strike it off.” As Drake knelt at her command she handed the sword to Marchaumont, the envoy of her French suitor, asking that since she was a woman and not trained to the use of weapons, he should give the accolade. This open defiance of Philip thus involved in her action the second Catholic power of Europe before all the world. Then, as Marchaumont gave the three strokes appointed the Queen spoke out clearly, while men thrilled with sudden presage of great days to come,--

”Rise up,--Sir Francis Drake!”

A WATCH-DOG OF ENGLAND

Where the Russian Bear stirs blindly in the leash of a mailed hand, Bright in the frozen suns.h.i.+ne, the domes of Moscow stand,

Scarlet and blue and crimson, blazing across the snow As they did in the Days of Terror, three hundred years ago.

Courtiers bending before him, envoys from near and far, Sat in his Hall of Audience Ivan the Terrible Tsar,

(He of the knout and torture, poison and sword and flame) Yet unafraid before him the English envoy came.

And he was Sir Jeremy Bowes, born of that golden time When in the soil of Conquest blossomed the flower of Rhyme.

Dauntless he fronted the Presence,--and the courtiers whispered low, ”Doth Elizabeth send us madmen, to tempt the torture so?”

”Have you heard of that foolhardy Frenchman?” Ivan the Terrible said,-- ”He came before me covered,--I nailed his hat to his head.”