2. CHAPTER II.
RIBAULT'S FORTUNES AT SELOOE.
It was on the twenty-eighth of August, the day on which the
Spaniards celebrated the festival of St. Augustine, that the Adelantado
entered the mouth of the Selooe or Dolphin River. He
was attracted by the aspect of the place, and here resolved to
establish a settlement and fortress. He gave the name of the
Saint to the settlement. Having landed a portion of his forces,
he found himself welcomed by the savages, whom he treated with
kindness and who requited him with assurances of friendship.
From them he learned something of the French settlements, and
of their vessels at the mouth of the May River, and he resolved
to attempt the surprise of his enemies. We have seen the failure
of this attempt. Disappointed in his first desire, like the tiger
who returns to crouch again within the jungle from which he has
unsuccessfully sprung, Melendez made his way back to the waters
of the Selooe, where he proposed to plant his settlement, and
which his troops were already beginning to entrench. Here he
employed himself in taking formal possession in the name of the
King of Spain, and having celebrated the Divine mysteries in a
manner at once solemn and ostentatious, he swore his officers to
fidelity in the prosecution of the expedition, upon the Holy
Sacrament.
It was while most busy with his preparations, that the fleet of
Ribault made its appearance at the mouth of the river. The
two heaviest of the Spanish vessels, being relieved of their armament
and troops, which had been transferred to the land, had
been despatched, on the approach of the threatened danger, with
all haste to Hispaniola. The two other vessels, at the bar or entrance
of the harbor, were unequal to the conflict with the superior
squadron of Ribault. Melendez was embarked in one of
them, and the three lighter vessels of the French, built especially
for penetrating shallow waters, were pressing forward to the certain
capture of their prey, for which there seemed no possibility
of escape. Melendez felt all his danger, but he had prepared
himself for a deadly struggle, and was especially confident in the
enthusiastic conviction that himself and his design were equally the
concern of Providence. It would seem that fortune was solicicitous
to justify the convictions of so much self-esteem. Ribault's
extreme caution in sounding the bar to which his vessels were
approaching, lost him two precious hours; but for which his
conquest must have been certain. There was no hope, else, unless
in some such miraculous protection as that upon which the
Spanish general seemed to count. Had these two vessels been
taken and Melendez a prisoner, the descent upon the dismayed
troops on shore, not yet entrenched, and in no preparation for
the conflict with an equal or superior enemy, and the annihilation
of the settlement must have ensued. The consequence
of such an event might have changed the whole destinies of Florida,
might have established the Huguenot colonies firmly upon
the soil, and given to the French such a firm possession of the
land, as might have kept the
fleur-de-lis waving from its summits
to this very day. But the miracle was not wanting
which the Spanish Adelantado expected. In the very moment
when the hands of Ribault, were stretched to seize his prizes, the
sudden roar of the hurricane came booming along the deep. The
sea rose between the assailant and his prey,—the storm parted
them, and while the feebler vessels of Melendez, partially under
the security of the land, swept back towards the settlement
which he had made on shore, the brigantines and bateaux of Ribault
were forced to rejoin their greater vessels, and they all
bore away to sea before the gale. Under the wild norther that
rushed down upon his squadron, Ribault with a groan of rage
and disappointment, abandoned the conquest which seemed already
in his grasp.
Melendez promptly availed himself of the Providential event,
to insist among his people upon the efficiency of his prayers.
They had previously been desponding. They felt their isolation,
and exaggerated its danger. The departure of their ships
for Hispaniola, their frequent previous disasters, the dispersion
of nearly two thirds of the squadron with which they had left the
port of Cadiz, but three months before; the labors and privations
which already began to press upon them with a novel
force; all conspired to dispirit them, and made them despair of
a progress in which they were likely to suffer the buffetings only,
without any of the rewards of fortune;—and when they beheld
the approaching squadron of the French, in force so superior as
to leave no doubt of the capture of their only remaining vessels,
they yielded themselves up to a feeling of utter self-abandonment,
to which the stern, grave self-reliance of Melendez afforded no
encouragement. But when, with broad sweep of arm, he pointed
to the awful rising of the great billows of the sea, the wild
raging of cloud and storm in the heavens, the scudding flight
of the trembling ships of Ribault, their white wings gradually
disappearing in distance and darkness like feeble birds borne
recklessly forward in the wild fury of the tempest, he could, with
wonderful potency, appeal to his people to acknowledge the
wonders that the Lord had done for them that day.
“Call you this the cause of our king only, in which we are
engaged my brethren? Oh! shallow vanity! And yet, you say
rightly. It is the cause of our king—the greatest of all kings—
the king of kings; and he will make it triumphant in all lands,
even though the base and the timid shall despair equally of themselves
and of Him! We shall never, my brethren, abandon this
cause to which we have sworn our souls, in life and death, without
incurring the eternal malediction of the Most High God,
forever blessed be his name! We are surrounded by enemies, my
friends; we are few and we are feeble; but what is our might,
when the tempest rises like a wall between us and our foes, and
in our greatest extremity, the hand of God stretches forth from
the cloud, and plucks us safely from the danger. Be of good
heart, then; put on a fearless courage; believe that the cause is
holy in which ye strive, and the God of Battles will most surely
range himself upon our side!”
Loud cries of exultation from his people answered this address.
A thousand voices renewed their vows of fidelity, and pledged
themselves to follow blindly wherever he should lead. He commanded
that a solemn mass of the Holy Spirit should be said that
night, and that all the army should be present. He vouchsafed
no farther words. Nothing, he well knew, that he could say,
could possibly add to the miraculous event that had saved their
vessels, before their own eyes, in the very moment of destruction.
“Our prayers, our faith, my brethren; to these we owe
the saving mercies of the Blessed Jesus!”
