University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.

Scott.

The Skipper returned to his vessel in no gentle
mood, for, in the language of the ballad, “an angry
man was he.” Springing alertly from the small boat
to the deck of the brigantine, he peevishly flung down
his weapon and cloak, and paced to and fro, with a
hurried step, for some moments in silence. “Give
me drink!—some wine!” he exclaimed at length;
and when a boy, in obedience to this order, brought
him what he had called for, and he had put the liquid
to his lips, he shouted in a tone that made the lad
tremble, as he threw the glass upon the deck and
shivered it into fragments, “knave! why dost thou
bring me this weak stuff? I would have aqua vitæ,
fool!” The stronger potation being supplied, he

eagerly swallowed a draught, and then threw himself
upon the seat at the stern of the vessel, where,
for a considerable space, he sat with his eyes fixed
upon the broad field of water around him. By degrees
the fever of his passion subsided into a sullen
thoughtfulness, and he began to meditate, with a more
self-possessed consistency of view, over the condition
of his affairs. He recurred to the slight put
upon him by the maiden, the Secretary's reproof,
the contemptuous and insulting rejection of his suit
by the Collector, and, bitterest of all these topics of
exacerbation, his defeat in the duel by an antagonist
whose prowess he had persuaded himself to hold
in derision. Verheyden's triumph over him, as he
was obliged to confess it, struck like an arrow into
his heart: that so light and dainty a minion, as he
deemed the Secretary, might win such a victory,
and then boast of it to the maiden!—this reflection
wrought up to fire the ardour of his hatred and
brought his meditation to one stern conclusion—that
of revenge.

“I renounce them, their tribe and generation!” he
said, mutteringly. “From this day forth, I renounce
them and all they consort with—Anthony Warden
and his cronies; yes—his Lordship and the rest. I
abjure all fellowship with them, but such fellowship
as my sword may maintain. The maiden!—not so
fast, master!” he continued, with a smile that betrayed
the true devil of his nature: “scornful
mistress, it would be over charitable to give thee up.
Bonny damsel, thou shalt dance a corant yet to my
bidding—and on the deck of my merry Escalfador;

but it shall be beneath a warmer sun than thy pride
has been nursed in: by my hand, you shall, wench,
if there be virtue in these honest cut-throats of mine!
And Master Collector shall be cared for. I thank
thee, father Pierre, for thy considerateness:—didst
thou not let me into a secret touching the royal
order? Faith, did you, holy father! and I will make
profit of it. Oh, this excellent church quarrel too!
I will join Master Chiseldine and Coode, and teach
them devilish inventions! Ha! that's thought worth
the nursing—Coode and the Fendalls! We shall have
blows struck; we shall have good store of cutlass and
hanger-work, pistol-play and dagger! Bravo! there
will be feasting for a hungry man! To it, pell-mell,
like gentlemen of the Coast—sink, burn, blow-up—
stab and hack—ravish and run! St. Iago, but there
is a merry sequence for you! Why need the Brotherhood
hover over the nestlings of Peru, when we have
such dainty deviltries in the temperate zone? I will
straight about this plot of mischief, whilst my blood
is warm enough to hatch it. Ho! Roche! order me
two men into the shallop—I would visit the Port.”

Whilst the Skipper, in this amiable temper, was
making his way towards the town, I may take the
opportunity to give my reader a brief history of certain
persons and events with which our tale is now
connected.

Josias Fendall, when the Lord Protector had
seized upon the Proprietary's rights in Maryland,
had the address to obtain the appointment of Lieutenant-General
of the province, which he held under
this authority, until, by an act of treachery to those

who had procured his preferment, he was able to
secure to himself the same post by the commission of
Cecilius, when in the decline of Cromwell's power the
government was restored to its rightful owner. Having,
in turn, attempted to betray the Proprietary,
and to usurp an independent control in the government,
he was expelled from office; in consequence
of which he engaged in a rebellion which, after a
troublesome contest, ended in his banishment. The
clemency of the Proprietary eventually restored him
to the province, where, before the lapse of many
months, he fell into his old practices and again embroiled
himself with the authorities. He was a man
of an eager, seditious temper; a skilful dissembler in
conduct; bold in action and dissolute in manners,
although sufficiently crafty to conceal his excesses
from public observation. He was now, in his old
age, the ringleader of the present troubles; and some
months anterior to the opening of this narrative, his
threats of violence against the Proprietary as well as
certain well-founded suspicions of a design to over-throw
the provincial government by force, had led to
his arrest for treason. He was, consequently, as we
have hinted in a former chapter, at this moment, a
close prisoner in the gaol. His brother, Samuel Fendall,
upon this event, took upon himself to stir up his
friends to the enterprise of a rescue; but this had
produced no better result than to lodge Samuel in
the same prison with his kinsman. The Protestant
party,—I mean that portion of them who had been
active in sustaining the violent measures set on foot
by the Fendalls—headed by John Coode, Kenelm
Chiseldine and some others, hotly resented this persecution,
as they deemed the imprisonment of their
friends. They had seduced into their association
George Godfrey, a weak-minded yet daring man who
held the post of Lieutenant of the Rangers in the service
of the Proprietary, and who in this station found
many secret opportunities to promote the purposes of
the malcontent party. John Coode himself was, at
this epoch, smarting under the exasperation of a
personal indignity which he had recently received
from the Proprietary in an arrest,—from which he
was released upon bail—for coarse and insulting
conduct to the Chancellor. He had hitherto cunningly
avoided or successfully concealed all open
participation in the plot which was hatching against
the present domination of the province, although he
had not, as we have heretofore seen, escaped the suspicion
of foul designs. He was a member of the
House of Burgesses, and, in the session which had
just terminated, had rendered himself conspicuous
for a keen, vindictive, and (as he was sustained by
the popular party) successful war of vituperation
against Lord Baltimore and his council.

About four o'clock in the afternoon, this Captain
John Coode, according to a custom which he was
prone to indulge, was found seated on a bench that
stood at the door of the Crow and Archer, recreating
his outward man with the solace of a tankard of ale
and a pipe, whilst his inward self was absorbed with a
rumination that spread its bland repose over every
lineament of his ruddy and somewhat pimpled visage.
A limner who took pleasure in the study of the externals

of character would have halted with satisfaction
before this notable personage. He might have
been, at this epoch, about forty-five. His figure was
sturdy, broad in the chest and supported by short
legs that bowed a little outward. His face had that
jollity of aspect which comes from an unthrifty commerce
with the wine cup; and his eye, though somewhat
clouded and sensitive to the light, twinkled
with a sharp expression of cunning and malice. His
dress was of sober brown, retaining a general resemblance
to the fashion of Cromwell's day, which
had not yet fallen into entire disuse. It was composed
of a coat the skirts of which, sparingly decorated
with black braid, depended, both in front and
rear, to the knee; ample breeches and wide boots;
conical, broad-brimmed hat, and a double-hilted
Andrew Ferrara hanging from a leathern girdle.

At the moment I have introduced him to the view
of my reader, his meditation was interrupted by the
arrival of a horseman,—a tall, athletic person, in
the prime of manhood, equipped partly in the manner
of a wood ranger, as was indicated by the hatchet
and knife in his belt and the carbine slung across his
shoulder, and partly in that of a dragoon—betokened
by his horseman's sword and the pistols at his
saddle-bow.

“Master Coode, your servant,” was the greeting
of the rider whilst he dismounted and flung the rein
carelessly upon the neck of his steed, whose head
drooped and sides panted with the toil of his recent
journey: “Your ale is like to grow flat from a lack
of thirst:—I can supply that commodity,” he said,

as he took up the tankard and deliberately drained it
to the bottom.

“By G—, Lieutenant, you had as well help yourself
without my leave!” exclaimed Coode with a
laugh. “Where in the d—l are you from now?”

“From Potapaco and the parts above,” replied
Godfrey, (for it was no other than the Lieutenant of
the Rangers:) “that painted devil Manahoton and
his wild cats have been prowling around the upper
settlements. There have been throat-cutting and
scalping again. Red haired Tom Galloway was
waylaid on his road to Zacaiah Fort, and the savages
stole into his plantation and have murdered his wife
and children. Nothing but speed and bottom saved
me to-day: a party with that son of Tiquassino's—
Robin Hood, they call him—at least I suspect him
for it, from a limp which I saw in the fellow's walk
—lay in cover and fired at me, just over there at the
head of Britton's bay. They must have been in
liquor, for they popped their pieces so much at random,
as to strike wide both of me and my horse. I
gave them a parting volley, as far as pistols and carbine
served and then bade them good by.”

“I dare be sworn they were stirred up to these
attacks,” replied Coode. “These bloody Papists
have set a mark upon us all, and not only rouse the
savages against us, but disguise themselves, and
murder and burn with as hot a hand as the worst
red devil of them all. Whilst Charles Calvert is
allowed to hector it over the good people of the
province, we may hope for nothing better. Did
you see Will Clements?”

“I did, and have news from him that the Huttons
and Hatfields, with twenty more on the Virginia side,
are ready to cross the river at the first signal.”

“Have a care, Lieutenant,” whispered Coode, as
he cast his eye towards the quay; “here comes a
boat with that fellow Cocklescraft, one of his Lordship's
lurchers. It would do you no good to be seen
in parley with me. We meet to-night, at Chiseldine's.
Let me see you there: and now, away to
your own concerns.”

“I will not fail to go to Chiseldine's, worthy Master
Coode,” replied the Lieutenant, whilst he now
turned aside to look after his beast.

“What ho! Garret Weasel, send me some one to
this horse!” he cried out as he thrust his head into
the door of the inn.

Instead of the innkeeper, the summons was answered
by Matty Scamper who, with a courtesy, announced
that both Master Garret and the landlady were
abroad; and upon being made acquainted with the
Lieutenant's wish, took upon herself the business of
ostler and led off the jaded steed to the stable, whilst
Godfrey entered the hostel. At the same instant
Cocklescraft arrived at the door.

“Perhaps you could tell me, Master Coode,” he
inquired, “whether Kenelm Chiseldine is likely to be
at home?”

“Faith, most unlikely as I should guess,” replied
the burgess with a leer at the questioner. “Whilst
his Lordship allows the savages to shoot down and
scalp the honest people of the province, here under

his very nose, a wise man will learn who his visiter
may be, before he will allow himself to be seen.”

“Master Chiseldine has nothing to fear from me,”
said Cocklescraft. “I would I might see him,” he
added with an earnestness that forcibly attracted
Coode's attention.

“Why what, in the devil's name, have you to do
with Kenelm Chiseldine?”

“More than you suspect, sir. I would speak with
him on affairs of importance. It perhaps may concern
you to hear what I have to say.”

“God's wounds, man!—speak out, if thou hast
aught to say against me or my friends. This shall
be a free land for speech, Master Cocklescraft—free
to all men: it is so already, let me tell you, to us
who wear our swords—however his Lordship and
his Lordship's brangling church-bullies would fain
force it down our throats to be silent, with what you
call sedition.”

“Your flurry is but spent breath, Master Coode.
If you will allow me an instant's private speech
with you, I will open myself in somewhat that
may be for your interest to hear. The bench of a
public tavern does not well become the matter of my
speaking.”

“Ha, a private conference and on matter of moment!”
ejaculated Coode. “Then follow me, Master
Cocklescraft, by the Town House path, amongst
the cedars on yon bank. Now, sir, you may speak
your mind though it were enough to hang a country
side,” said Coode, as he strode slowly in advance of

the Skipper until they found themselves enveloped by
the thicket of cedar.

“I have heard it whispered,” quoth the Skipper,
“since my arrival in the port, that you and others
have been brewing mischief, and are like to come to
scratches with his Lordship's men of the buff.”

“And dost thou come to me with this fool's errand,
Master Skipper?” interrupted the burgess. “Are
you sent hither, sirrah, to drain me of a secret which
you may commend to the notice of the Proprietary
for your own advancement in his good favour? By
my hilt, I have a mind to rap thee about the pate
with my whinyard!”

“Tush, cool thy courage, valiant Captain, or
spend it where it may give thee more profit. I come
to thicken thy hell-broth with new spices of my own
devising,—not to mar it. I say again, I have heard
it whispered that you have bloody fancies in the
wind. I care not to inquire what they are, but
knowing thou hast no good will towards the Council
and their friends, I have a hand to help in any devil's
crotchet your plot may give life to. Besides, the
Olive Branch is a more spiteful imp than she looks to
be,—and you may, perchance, stand in need, hereafter,
of a salt water help-mate. I can commend
her to thy liking, Captain Coode.”

Coode gazed with a steadfast and incredulous eye,
for some moments, in the face of the Skipper. At
last he asked—“Art thou in earnest, Master Cocklescraft?—By
G— if thou comest here to entrap me, I
will have thee so bestowed that the kites shall feed

upon thy bowels before the breath be out of thy
body!”

“And so they may, if I deceive you,” replied the
Skipper, coolly. “Put me to the proof, Captain,—
put me to the proof, and if I fail thou mayst fatten
all the kites of St. Mary's with my body.”

“Are you willing to say this before witnesses?”
inquired Coode.

“A legion—if they hate the friends of the Council
as I hate them.”

“Then come to-night to Master Chiseldine's. You
shall find me and others there. Until then, it may
be wise that we hold no more discourse together.
And so now we part.”

Cocklescraft promised to keep the appointment,
and took his leave of the burgess who walked onward
to the Town House. Here, Coode found Willy of
the Flats busy in setting up against the trunk of the
mulberry a sheet of paper, designed, according to
the custom of the town, to advertise some matter of
interest to the inhabitants. To the question “What
have you in the wind, Willy?”—the fiddler's reply
was an invitation to the Captain to inform himself by
a perusal of the paper. He accordingly read as
follows:

“On the common, behind the Town House in St.
Marie's City, by permission of an order of Council,
as above recited, a trial of skill shall be performed
between Stark Whittle and Sergeant Gilbert Travers,
two masters of the Noble Science of Defence, at
four of the clock in the afternoon of Thursday the
twenty-third of October instant.

“I, Stark Whittle, of the town of Stratford, England,
who have fought thirty-one times at Hockley in
the Hole, at Portugal and in divers parts of the West
Indies, and never left a stage to any man, do invite
Gilbert Travers to meet and exercise at the several
weapons following, viz:

Back Sword, Sword and Buckler,
Sword and Dagger, Case of Falchons,
Single Falchon.

“This promises well, for a fair sport, Willy,” said
Coode; “they are both pretty fellows with the
sword. Who has set this matter of foot?”

“I heard, an it please your worship,” replied the
fiddler; “it is near a fortnight since,—that Stark
Whittle and the Sergeant, being together at an ale-drinking,
on an afternoon, at Master Weasel's ordinary,
and having got into a merry pin, must needs
fall into an argument, and thereupon into a debate,
as men commonly do now-a-days, upon church
matters. Whereupon Stark,—you know, Master
Coode,” said Willy, touching the burgess on the rib
with his knuckle and speaking, in a confidential tone,
with a short dry laugh,—“Stark is a born devil on
our side of the question,—whereupon he raises his
voice against the mumbling of masses, as he calls it,
and the pictures and images and the rest of the trumpery;—while
the Sergeant sticks up, like a true soldier,
for the army of martyrs and the canons and
what not besides. So, when words got high, and
Stark began to be puzzled by some of Gilbert's quiddities
which he learned from the priests,—he whips
off from the church and turns the discourse upon
sword-craft. And thereupon, after some crowing
by Gilbert, Stark takes him short with a challenge
to play a prize—which the Sergeant accepted,

out of hand. Then it was left to Colonel Talbot to
bring it to the Council, and the next thing I hear of
it is that Colonel Talbot sends me here to set this
writing, concerning the whole matter, against the
mulberry before the Town House door.”

Before Willy had got through this account of the
origin of Stark Whittle's challenge, Godfrey had
come to the spot.

“We may find an occasion in this prize fight that
shall jump with our plot, Lieutenant,” said Coode.
“What think you Richard Cocklescraft had to tell
me?”

“I cannot guess.”

“Why, that these shavelings who meddle so much
in the affairs of the province and rule the Council,
are downright knaves;—that his Lordship is no better
than a sneaking dotard; the Council themselves
but white-livered whelps of the litter of Babylon,
and that the whole brood of craw thumpers, taking
in master and serving-man all round, are but scurvy
thieves who deserve, each and all, to be set in the
stocks. Now, there is a wise Skipper!—a clear-sighted,
conscientious wight, who has seen his errors
and confesses them honestly! This Master Cocklescraft
has promised me to meet us at Chiseldine's to-night,
which I put it to him to do by way of test to
his honesty. If he come not there, I shall hold that
he has cozened me with a base, juggling, papistical
lie. And in that case, George Godfrey, I desire you
to set thy mark upon him;—dost hear? So, until
we meet again at Master Chiseldine's, good even,
Lieutenant.”

The residence of Chiseldine stood upon the river,
a short distance beyond the upper limits of the town,
from which it was separated by the small creek
which I have heretofore described as bounding the
common. This creek at its embouchure where it
crossed the river beach, was reduced into a narrow
strait, scarcely, in the ordinary state of the tides,
beyond the compass of an active man's leap. Here
a small bridge gave to the townspeople access at all
times to the dwelling house of Master Chiseldine.

When the twilight had subsided, some three or four
visiters were found assembled under this roof, and
their number in the course of an hour was gradually
increased to as many more. Amongst these, Coode
and Godfrey were the first to arrive; they were
soon followed by a person of no small influence in
stimulating the disorders of that time,—the Reverend
Master Yeo—an active and subtle churchman of the
English church, whose emaciated figure, meek countenance
and puritanical simplicity of costume, contrasted
with a restless and passion-fraught eye, presented
an impersonation of a busy, political ecclesiastic.
The host, Master Kenelm Chiseldine, though
a young man, had already arrived at some authority
in the House of Burgesses by his persevering and
zealous hostility to the Proprietary, and had, through
the popularity which generally follows resistance to
the established order of things, obtained such a control
over the course of that unhappy dissension which
agitated the peace of the province, as entitled him
to be considered, in modern phrase, one of the
leaders of the movement. He now appeared in this

conclave, in that mixed character of burgher and
soldier—partially armed, though professing the pursuits
of a man of peace—which the disturbances of
the period had rendered common amongst the inhabitants.
Conspicuous, at least for his estimate of
himself, in this assemblage, whither the love of having
something to do, and a thirst for a patriot's immortality
had lured him, was little Corporal Abbot
the tailor—a wight remarkable for the vast disproportion
between the smallness of his person and the
greatness of his aspirations, and still more remarkable
for an upspringing walk and an ambitious, erect
carriage of the head. Stricken with the grandeur of
Lieutenant Godfrey's achievements, and emulous of
like glory in the field of Mars, he had, by degrees,
wormed himself into an intimacy with the Lieutenant,
who one day, in a freak, settled the little hero's
destiny, by enlisting him for a special campaign with
the Rangers. In the course of this tour of duty,
which lasted sixty days, Ned Abbot had the good
fortune to capture three Indian women, whom he took
for warriors belonging to the tribe of King Tiquassino—a
chief whose name diffused a common terror
through the province. The Rangers conspired to
magnify the hazard and glory of this exploit, and
his commander exalted him to the honourable and
responsible duties of a corporal. Ever since that
event, the tailor looked upon himself as a martialist
approved in battle and entitled to boast of his prowess.
Being thus seduced into the list of fame, he became
a devoted adherent of the Lieutenant, and, as is
customary amongst the votaries of greater men than
even Lieutenant George Godfrey, he suffered himself
to be embarked in all the hazards and committed to
all the consequences of his leader's political imbroglios.
The corporal's time was divided between the
needle and the broadsword;—at one season, when
work was slack, playing the man of war in bloodless
forays, and at another, when fighting was superabundant,
stitching doublets and patching decayed
jerkins, with a commendable tranquillity of spirit.

Such were the principal personages who were now
convened to deliberate upon the course of that secret
rebellion which, in a few years later than this period,
terminated in what is known in the history of Maryland
as the Protestant Revolution. Their more immediate
purpose was to devise measures for the rescue
or liberation of the Fendalls. Towards the
accomplishment of this design, the discontented in
various parts of the province had associated under
private forms of organization, and held themselves
in readiness to obey the signal for an out-break,
whenever the leaders amongst the burgesses should
determine the fit moment to have arrived. When
these persons were once banded together in arms,
their plan was to drive matters to an immediate issue
with the Proprietary, by seizing the Fort, and even
by assailing his person. Their general scheme of
rebellion was supposed to derive its hopes of success
not only from the increasing bitterness which daily
grew up between the two religious sects, but from
the avowed inclination of the Court at White Hall to
give an established church to the province, and to
restrain the exercise of religious toleration against

the catholic party. Add to this the fact that a preponderating
majority of the inhabitants were of the
protestant faith, and it will be seen that the conspirators
had no very strong reason to apprehend any fatal
miscarriage of their scheme.

It was late before Cocklescraft made his appearance
in this assembly. He had gone into the inn,
where he remained in solitude until after nightfall;
and when the retiring day had left every thing in
shade, he sallied forth and indulged his moody and
fevered temper in lonely musing, as he rambled
through the town and along the margin of the river.
Callous as he was to the ordinary sensibilities of humanity,
it cost him a struggle to pursue his vindictive
purpose to the extent of making war against that
faith, the devotion to which, in his bosom, was superstition—a
superstition that clung to his mind through
all the iniquities of his life amongst the Brothers of
the Coast, and which he now trembled to renounce.
His self-communing on this subject had wrought him
up to a state of mind that bordered upon insanity,
exhibiting itself, at times, in bursts of apparently jocular
recklessness, and driving him to the stimulus of
strong drink.

His absence from Chiseldine's began to be remarked.
Master Yeo had already let fall—when Coode
spoke of his interview with the Skipper—some expressions
of distrust in the sincerity of such a conversion
as the tale implied; and more than one of the
company hinted at a trick contrived by the Papists
to entrap them. Private mutterings of dissatisfaction
and threats of retribution were growled in whispered

tones. Corporal Abbot was remarkably fierce and
denunciatory. “By my sword, neighbours!” he said,
with a scowling eye-brow, “an' I find it should turn
out that we have been paltered with by that briny
ruffler, it shall go hard with him but he shall find that
I wear cold iron,—if he learn as much from never a
man in the town beside. And as we are all here together,
where we may speak our minds,” he added
in a stage-whisper, with a significant solemnity of
manner, “I would have you know I do not put too
much faith in the honesty of these absolution and purgatory
men: they are fishy—fishy, masters,” he said,
laying his finger against his nose, and looking portentously
mysterious. “To my seeming, this Richard
Cocklescraft ever had a hang-dog—”

“Ay, that's true—a hang-dog devil in his looks,”
said Cocklescraft himself, taking the parole from the
speaker, as he strode into the room immediately behind
the Corporal, who stood near the door. His
brow was flushed, his air hurried and disturbed, and
he had entered the outer door without knocking or
ceremony of announcement, and thus came into the
apartment where the meeting was assembled, at unawares,
and at the moment that his name was upon
the Corporal's lips. His cap was drawn conceitedly
over one side of his forehead, and his scabbarded
sword, detached from the belt, was borne in his hand.
A constrained smile gave a disagreeable and unusual
expression to his features, and there was an air of
affected jovialty in his carriage when he interrupted
the boasting martialist and accosted the company.
“Nay, Master Corporal, thou need'st not shrink, for

thy brave speaking: 'tis a license of a man of the
wars to rail at such as leave their colours; and as I
have left mine, I stand under your reproof.—God
save you, my masters, for a set of merry contrivers
of mischief! By St. Iago, but you make a snug
house of it here together! Master Chiseldine, Captain
Coode would have me come here to-night to
speak before witnesses. Presto, change! is the word.
I have done with the cowls and the cassocks, and
with all who bow to the honourable Council: I have
done with my lords gentlemen of taffeta and buckram;—yea,
and have a reckoning to make which
shall be remembered in Maryland. Santo Rosario!
but I will make it,” he added, as he spoke through
his clenched teeth, “when the foremost man amongst
you all shall cry shame for pity!—We shall forswear
water-drinking, comrades! I have renounced it to-day:
for an hour past I have fed upon the milk of
Scheidam—most wholesome usquebaugh, without
taint of Papistry in it: I fetched it myself from Holland
to the Crow and Archer. Ha! it has baptized
me in the faith of our new quarrel. I will swear by
it as your only holy water!”

“Master Cocklescraft, I would you had brought us
a cooler head—though you are not the less welcome,”
said Chiseldine. “Think you, sir, you can
strike, if there be need for it, at those you have lately
consorted with?”

“Strike!” exclaimed Cocklescraft, “Ay, by Saint
Anthony, can I strike! on the broad sea, or green
land,—in pell-mell or orderly fight,—amongst pikes

and musquets, or grenades and culverins. I can
strike with sword or dagger,—at waking man, or
sleeping babe—grey head or green:—strike, Master
Chiseldine, to drum and trumpet, or to the music of
shrieking wives and sobbing maidens. I have been
nursed to the craft. What else should have brought
me here to-night?”

“A most monstrous and horrid papistical schooling
the wolf has had!” piously ejaculated Master
Yeo, in the ear of a neighbour. “This fellow would
have been a Guido Fawkes in time.”

“We must use him, nevertheless, reverend Master
Yeo,” said Coode; “we shall teach him gentleness,
when we have got over the rough work of our plot.”

The Parson assented by a nod of the head; and
then approaching the Skipper, inquired, “What argument,
worthy Master Cocklescraft, hath persuaded
you to renounce your old associates? There may be
much edification in the experience of a man so thoroughly
converted.”

“That concerns no man here,” replied the seaman
bluntly. “Enough for you, sir, that I have changed
my colours. I come to you not alone, neither: I
have men to back me, and follow where I lead, and
a trim bark which may serve a turn when you are
put in straits. If you will have service out of me,
I ask no return for it, but that you set quickly
about the work. Do you want motive for present
quarrel? I can give it to you. I know it for a truth,
that the King hath sent orders hither to dislodge
every Papist from his office in this province; and I
know, further, that the Council do, upon deliberation,

refuse to obey the King's bidding. There is a handle
for rebellion which may serve you for a throat-cutting!
But what is a royal order to Charles Calvert
if the wind of his humour set contrary against it? A
feather.—Who are they that counsel my Lord Baltimore?
The men that feed their own idleness on the
substance of the honest folk who toil;—the men who
flatter his Lordship with crafty courtesies. First
amongst them is that old grout-head, Anthony Warden:
I would have you note him, masters, for a chief
leech; a most topping blood-sucker. To whom should
the offices of this province belong? To such as the
good pleasure of the Burgesses may appoint—”

“Surely,” grunted Coode.

“To such as the King would have—”

“Without question,” breathed the reverend Parson
Yeo.

“Then, there are reasons for rebellion as thick as
you could wish, masters,” continued Cocklescraft, by
way of close to an harangue which showed him
qualified to take a rank amongst the demagogues of
the time not inferior to that of the most successful
masters of the art of agitation at the present day.
“So, fall to, and make yourselves worshipful dignitaries,—men
of consideration amongst your neighbours:
I am here to help.”

“Bravely spoken!” shouted Coode, as the Skipper
concluded this successful essay in political oratory,
whilst several voices re-echoed the commendation;
“that is the true aspect of our plot, and Master
Cocklescraft shows himself a worthy and apt scholar.
The sooner we come to buffets the better. We have

force enough to match the pikes and musquets of his
Lordship, and make ourselves masters of the Fort.
By a placard set against the mulberry at the Town
House this afternoon, it seems we are to have a prize
play between Stark Whittle and Sergeant Travers,
come next Wednesday week. This will not fail to
bring our friends of the country swarming to the
sport, and the occasion will be apt for us to manage
the appointments of a general revolt.”

This suggestion receiving the countenance of the
conclave, was adopted, and the execution of the particulars
committed to Coode himself. For the present,
it was thought adviseable that no immediate
step be taken in reference to the rescue of the Fendalls,
as it was very obvious, from various intelligence
which had been brought to the conspirators,
that a crisis was near at hand which must be decisive
of the question of strength between the two
parties.

After this the company gradually dispersed.