 | CHAPTER VI. Tales of the Spanish seas |  |
6. CHAPTER VI.
Broadly and brightly dawned the morning,
which followed the departure of the buccaneers,
upon the forest-girdled wall of St. Augustine.
The sun shone blithely, and freshly
the sea-breeze blew. The small waves, crisped
by the lightsome air, danced glittering in the
sunlight; while thousands of white gulls were
on the wing, fanning the wavelets with their
silver pinions. Jocund and merry was the
scene; and heavy must that heart have been,
which yielded not to the sweet soothing influences
of the time and seasons. Heavy was
every heart, and downcast every eye, of those
who were abroad on that fair morning. The
bells of many a church and convent were
ringing,
“With a deep sound to and fro—
Heavily to the heart they go.”
moored in shore, under the covering guns of
battery and bastion, the colors waved at half-mast
in honor to the dead, whose obsequies
were even now in process.
And now the city gates flew open, and a
long train of monks and friars, chanting the
mournful miserere, with crosslet and with
crosier, censer, and pix, and crucifix swept
forth from the wide portals. Then upborne
on the stalwart shoulders of four great Spanish
captains, whose plumes and sword-knots of
pure white betokened the brief years of him
they mourned, followed the coffin of the young
Melendez! Words cannot paint the agony
which overshadowed the bold lineaments, and
bowed to earth the manly frame of Juan, following
to his last home the last male scion of
his immemorial race. Bravely, however, manfully
he struggled with his tortures, and subdued
them. Steadfastly did he gaze, with a
fixed tearless eye, upon the disappearing coffin;
as with heart-sickening sound the dull clods of
unconsecrated earth—for unanointed he had
fallen, unhouseled, and unshriven—rattled
upon its hollow lid; one quick spasm shook
his every limb—distorted every feature, as the
last sod was flattened down over that cherished
head, which now perceived, felt, suffered
nothing. The soldiers gathered round the
grave—flash after flash—roar after roar—the
volleyed honors of their musketry burst over
the dull ears that heard them not, nor heeded.
father lightened forth from the cloud of grief
which had oppressed it—he drew his long
bright rapier from its scabbard, stretched it forth
slowly above his son's low bed, and then uplifting
it, with his eyes glaring upward, flung
his left hand abroad; and with distended chest,
beut brows, and head erect, stood for a second's
space motionless, stern, and silent, though his
lips quivered as with inward prayer, sublime
and awful in the might of self-controlling energy
and pride. Then with a loud clear
voice—
“Hear!” he exclaimed—“Hear thou! Maker
of all things, Judge of all men, hear! I,
Juan de Melendez de Aviles, noble of Spain,
and knight of Calatrava, swear! hear, on the
grave of the last male of the proud name I bear
—here, with my foot upon the sod that covers
that young head—with my sword in my hand,
I swear: never, while life is left me, never, by
day nor by night, fasting or feasting, mirthful
or in the hour of woe, to cease from plotting,
from pursuing, from revenging!—never until
this sword is crimson to the hilt with the heart-blood
of him who slew thee—thee, innocent
and helpless that thou wert, mine own and
only one. If ever I unbelt the brand, if ever I
withdraw me from the chace, if ever I relent,
or spare, or pardon, till that the sword, the
faggot, and the gallows have, each and all,
been glutted with the lives of thy destroyers—
if ever, oh! my son, I forget to avenge thee—
may my flesh feed the vulture and the wolf—
my soul be yielded to man's everlasting foe!”
He paused, and as the sounds of his last
accents died away—moved by one common
impulse, a dozen of the cavaliers who had accompanied
the funeral train, and who bareheaded,
but with flashing eyes and inflamed
visages, had listened to the father's imprecation,
unsheathed at once their swords, and pointing
them to heaven, chorused that awful oath by
one deep, heartfelt, and unanimous “amen!”
“For us—for us, and our sons after us,” they
cried, “be thine oath binding!—never to
spare, nor pardon, nor relent!—never to cease
from hunting to destruction the murderers of
thy dead son—the ravishers of thy living
daughter—never, so help us God, St. Jago, and
our honor!”
The mournful ceremonial was concluded; a
massive cross of stone was pitched into the
sand at that grave's head, marking the spot
where he slumbers now so soundly, that hapless
but high-hearted boy—the spot, where
yesterday he bore so soldierly and well the
tortures which had slain him. The military
music of the garrison struck up—the very
trumpeters, inflamed by the sympathetic indignation
which blazed forth so vividly from these
untamed and fearless cavaliers, struck up, unbidden,
that famous tune of old, the “War
song of the Cid”—the soldiers clashing their
arms in unison, and the wild cadences of the
shrill brass piercing each ear and stirring every
heart, they marched back to the city full of
exulting valor, parched with the thirst of vengeance.
A few hours later in the day, a dozen horses
led to and fro before the doors of a large building,
with a considerable crowd of grooms and
servitors and several sentinels on duty, betokened
something of more than ordinary import
to be in process of enactment. It was the
government house, before the gates of which
that concourse was assembled; and in an upper
chamber, the governor, with his chief officers,
was sitting in high council. Melendez,
as became his station no more than his skill
and mature wisdom, presided at the board;
Pedro, Gutierrez, and the veteran Diego were
seated the nearest to his person; the captains
of the four caravellas now at anchor in the
bay lent their co-operating aid, and the bold
youth, Don Amadis Ferrajo, though scarce
entitled by his years to such proud eminence,
had earned, by the brilliant reputation of his
impetuous valor, a place there which he filled
with as much of dignity as did the stateliest
veteran of them all. At the lower end of the
long table were placed two secretaries fully
engaged in minuting the orders of the council;
while just below a sort of bar, that ran across
the council chamber, two Spanish veterans,
well armed with sword and halberd, watched
over a young stalwart negro, who stood between
them, entirely naked, except a cloth
about his loins, and a pair of Indian moccasins
upon his feet, with manacles of steel upon his
hands, but with a high free port and bold demeanor.
In a recess, likewise, below the bar,
usually covered by a curtain, which was now
drawn up, a fearful-looking instrument, composed
of many wheels and springs of steel,
over which leaned a truculent dark-visaged
ruffin, showed the full means to which the
council had recourse to elicit truth from stubborn
prisoners or unwilling witnesses.
Pointing to this recess, with its appalling
contents, Don Juan was in the act of speaking
to the prisoner, when he was interrupted by
his saying, in very tolerable Spanish.
“There is no need of that, your Excellency!
—without compulsion I am ready to declare
all that I know of these buccaneers—for that I
do know something of them, it were quite
needless to deny. I have dealt with then often
—sold them my fish and vegetables; and very
liberal buyers are they too—somewhat rough
handed at odd times, but what of that—if they
did slice off my old comrade Xavier's ears for
selling a raw Englishman a lot of gulls for
wildfowl, they gave him gold enough to buy
his freedom afterward. Yes? yes! I know all
their haunts—and I will tell the truth—yes! I
hold—now they have carried off the fair young
Senora, who had ever a sweet smile and a kind
word for the poor blacks. As for the proud
young Don, they might have tortured him to
all eternity, ere I would have told aught against
them—but now, now that they have carried off
Teresa—”
“This to me, dog?”—Melendez interrupted
him, in tones that revealed the violence of his
feelings—“Know you to whom you speak?
This to me, to me, villain? Seize him, you
halberdiers, strip him, and drag him to the
rack. By the bones of St. James of Compostella,
he shall taste straightway of these tortures
he prates about so glibly!—yes! by the
sacred souls of the martyrs, he shall die under
them!”
“For Heaven's sake, hold, your Excellency,?'—Diego
whispered in his ear—“or we
shall get no word from him. I know the
knave of old! He is as stubborn as an old
mule of Arragon, and has, I believe, no more
feeling than a fish. Suffer his insolence, for
God's sake—so by his guidance we may save
your daughter.”
“You say very well, Sir Don Diego”—interrupted
the free black, who had overheard
him—“You say very well and wisely. For
if he gave me one wrench on that cursed rack
I would not speak one word to him; and if he
were to kill me, you know, that would bring
him no nearer to recovering his daughter. No!
no! it is no use to hurt me—not the least in
the world. Besides, I did not mean to vex
him when I spoke—I was thinking aloud only,
and wouldn't have said it, if I'd thought—not
but what it was quite true. I wont deny that
it was quite true. But lord! it would be no
use racking me—you'd just as well get Spanish
words out of a big old alligator down in the
castle ditch, as you'd get anything but curses
out of me by all your torturing. But as I said
before—I'll tell you all the truth, and bring
you right upon them, now that they've carried
off Teresa. Yes! yes! I know where they
're gone, and I'll carry all of you after them—
but not with those big caravellas—they draw
quite too much water. But you can take the
ships' boats in, and mount some heavy guns in
the long fishing pirogues—and then—yes! yes!
then you can catch the rogues, and kill them—
and eat them if you like, too, for that matter—
but I suppose you don't care so much about
that—and save the pretty Senora—for I don't
think they've done her much harm yet—he's
an honest chap, is that Ringwood, to be such
an infernal thief—and pay them for screwing
the young Don, down there. Yes! yes! that
will be better much better that racking me;
now won't it?” and he burst into a yell of
most obstreperous laughter.
“May we trust—think you, good Diego—in
this knowledge that he boasts of?” whispered
Melendez to his veteran counsellor.
“Unquestionably may we”—answered the
other, in the same low tones. “There's not a
bayou or lagoon, a river or salt creek in all
Florida he does not know as well as his own
hat—nor a sand key, or solitary rock along the
coast, but he has once and again explored it.
Besides he is in league of amity with the red
Indians, the wild Seminoles; and if he chooses
he can bring out the warriors of their tribe to
aid us. He is a faithful knave, too, and a valiant;
though somewhat bold of speech, and to
the windward not a little of due reverence for
his superiors—yet no man ever heard him tell
a lie, or break a promise! Best place full trust
in him! Heard you not what he said of the Senora?
since she was but a child he loved her—
and he knows, as I hear, right well the character
of the great English Rover.”
“Well, fellow, you can guide us, as you
say, and will. Well then, suppose we trust
you, shall we set forth, and how?”
“You shall set sail to-night—directly”—
answered the negro promptly—“with your
four caravellas; and make all speed quite
round Cape Florida—and then run sixty miles
up, close along the coast—then get out all the
boats, and man them full; and take along with
you fifteen or twenty big pirogues the fishermen
came in this morning after the storm, filled
full of soldiers, and with heavy guns. There
is a narrow—oh very narrow—creek, not ten
yards quite across, puts in there from the sea,
covered with manchinell and mangroves so no
eye can discover it—up that you shall row
twenty, aye, nigh thirty miles, and there you
will find a big clear lake, with fort, and village,
and feluccas—there live the pirates! their
stronghold.”
“And you can pilot us? So be it, then!”
“No! no!” replied the black, “pilot you I
could very well; but that won't do!—no! no!
if you go up alone, the pirates fire on you from
the bush, cut you up quite, beat you all to the
devil—no! no! my comrade Xavier, he best
must pilot you. I must get out old Tigertail—the
great chief of the Seminoles, with his
red warriors, and go quiet quite through the
forest—so when you take them front, we fall
upon their back, and shoot them every way—
destroy them altogether. Don Amadis go
along with us—he'll go along with black
Antonio, he'll go—he fears not anything!—
take fifty musket men, and with the Indians
we'll do—yes! yes! we'll do quite well, and
save Teresa!”
“He's right, your Excellency, black Antonio
is right,” exclaimed the eager Amadis.
“I'll go with him, by St. Jago! He shames
us all for wisdom!—and hark, Antonio, I'll
take a hundred men, not fifty—a hundred of
my own old Castilians. Where will you find
speak.”
“Xavier's below, Don Amadis, he was along
with me when these kind gentlemen,” looking
toward the halberdiers, “laid hold of me, and
he wont stir, till he sees me! And for the Indians,
never fear but I can find them—get you
your men into marching trim, with lots of ball
and ammunition; and let each soldier bring a
spare firelock with him, so can we arm a hundred
of the Seminoles, and meet me at the land
gate by sunset, and we'll get under weigh at
once”'
“Hold! hold!” replied Melendez, evidently
speaking in great agitation and much doubt,
“this will not do, I fear, no! no! It will be
quite impossible to act in concert; we shall
fall on at different times, and so be beaten in
detail.”
“Not so, fair sir,” the negro answered eagerly,
“the Indian runners will watch all your
movements from the shore, and bring us word
into the bush, when you have pulled up into
the stream, and how you prosper!—no fear
but we can act in concert!”
For a few moments the stern governor mused
deeply, the dark expression and hard lines of
his bold visage showing no tokens of incertitude
or agitation; yet the broad hand, which
he had laid upon the board, quivered perceptibly,
and he kept beating his heel with a quick
nervous action against the footstool, which was
placed before his honorary chair.
“Remove the negro,” he said at length,
raising his eyes slowly from the floor on which
they had been riveted—“treat him with kindness,
but keep strict ward on him—begone!”
A little bustle took place, while the halberdiers
were leading off Antonio, and the secretaries,
in obedience to a signal from Don Juan,
were withdrawing from the chamber. The
moment it ceased, however, Melendez rose
from his seat; and casting his eyes round the
circle as if to read the thought of each of his
advisers, addressed them firmly, with a voice,
low-pitched indeed, and perhaps somewhat
subdued, but steady withal and unfaltering.
“Gentlemen,” he began, “and comrades. I
am a father, as ye know; and, as a father,
must feel deeply the appalling situation of my
most wretched child—must burn to rescue her
from the pollution which, if it have not tainted,
surrounds at least, and threatens her. I am a
soldier likewise, and governor of this fair town;
and, as such, am in honor bound and duty to
fetter down all private sentiments obedient to
my military devoir!—am bound to provide,
before all things, for the good state and safety
of this my loyal government. I am hard set,
and look to all of you for council. Should we
adopt the negro's plan, and trust to his guidance—as,
if we move at all in this same business,
I see not how we can do else—there is
good cause to hope! great cause to fear. If
he be trustworthy, and if his plan succeed, we
shall preserve Teresa—root out, and utterly
destroy a nest of pestilent accursed pirates, and
win great booty, and no small renown! If on
the other hand we fail—which we may do
right easily—our whole force must be annihilated—nor
is this all! We must so weaken
the garrison here at St. Augustine, for to make
any head against them we shall need every
man that we can muster—that if we be beaten,
and the buccaneers follow, as they doubtless
will, the blow, they might well win the city!
Thus stands the case—there is a mighty gain!
there is a mighty peril! I can not—I dare not
decide!—for I cannot distinguish, so fiercely is
my soul disturbed, between a parent's passion
and a leader's duty! Speak ye in order, then!
Diego—first! and oh speak honestly and
freely!”
Before he had sat down, the old greyheaded
warrior started to his feet; and cool although
he was, and guarded for the most part, he
spoke as hotly now—as passionately as a
boy!
“The question, gentlemen, is this—this absolutely!
ONLY! Whether we shall give up a
woman—a Christian maid—a Spanish lady—
to the brutal violence of these incarnate fiends
—without one blow—one effort to relieve her;
or march with all our power to liberate her if
we may! to die for her if we may not! Being
myself a Spaniard, a soldier, and a knight, I
have but one reply to this question, and see not
how a Juan could find a second! we must essay
it with all our best endeavors, and leave
the rest to God!”
“Not for the maiden's sake alone,” exclaimed
Gutierrez eagerly, “though that were
ample cause! but as I see the matter, in duty
to our king we stand bound to avenge the insult
offered to his flag, in duty to humanity to
hunt out wretches, who set its every dictate at
defiance, in duty to the laws of common policy
to strike at the foe in his own place of strength,
rather than wait his pleasure to assault our
weakness!”
“Besides,” cried Pedro, “we are far stronger
than our ordinary power by aid of these stout
caravellas—their crews will double our effective
strength!”
“I brought with me, a private volunteer, one
hundred picked Castilians, bound to no duties,
save at mine own will,” cried Amadis, with
fiery vehemence; “if not a soldier else stir
from the city gates, I, with my men, march out
to-night at sunset!”
“And I,” exclaimed the elder and superior
of the four Spanish sea captains, “as in obedience
to my broad letters of commission, shall
sail this night with my four frigates, to take
burn, sink, and by all means, destroy and harass
the foemen of my king and country!
boat service; leaving enough behind to work
and guard the caravellas! Do you, Sir Governor,
embark six hundred more of your best
veterans on board us, press every fisherman and
mariner to follow us, with every boat, pirogue,
or galley, they can find; let this young cavalier
go with his followers to join the Indians, and
my life on the issue!”
“Be it so, gentlemen! Fair thanks to all
for your good courtesy! and may God guard
the right. You, Don Diego, I leave here—nay,
it must be so, my good friend—lieutenant in
my absence. Pedro, Gutierrez, let the drums
beat to arms!—muster the garrison in the great
square! pick out six hundred, the youngest and
best soldiers!—let each man have his morion
and breast plate, but no back piece, brassards
or taslets; each man a musket with a hundred
round of cartridge, broadsword and dagger,
and two pistols! Ye gentlemen of the
marine will see them on board straightway!
A word with thee, Don Amadis! Ye to your
duties, gentlemen, anon I will be with ye!”
“Amadis,” he continued, as soon as they
were left alone, “win her and wear her! If
God give you the grace to rescue her, before
God shall you wed her. Get your men under
arms, take with you black Antonio, and God
speed you!”
Trumpets pealed wildly through the streets
—the drums rolled long and loud—and, with
the clash of arms and tramp of marshalled footsteps,
the veterans of the garrison were mustered!
Before the sun set, the tall caravellas
had cleared the landlocked bay, staggering out
to sea with a fair breeze, each stitch of canvas
set that they could carry; and his last glances
fell upon the little party of Don Amadis, filing
away under the guidance of the faithful negro,
into the pathless forest.
| CHAPTER VI. Tales of the Spanish seas | |