Now what follows must I think be taken as direct proof that Providence concerns itself with extra diligence on behalf of great gentlemen who have the birth and parts of Prince Rupert.

No prospects could have been blacker than ours when we set sail again in the little brigantine from La Guayra. Of food we were well-nigh destitute; the little water remaining to us stank; the vessel herself had grown even still more leaky through straining at her anchor amongst the rough seas of the roadstead; and (as though out of sheer aggravation) one of the black slaves had died, leaving only three to carry on the necessary work.

Than bailing water out of a leaky vessel\'s bilges there is no labour more detestably menial; but a Prince of birth can be drowned by a ship swamping beneath him as glibly as a common sailor-man; and so as the remaining blacks showed clear signs of exhaustion, Rupert and his humble secretary had to take their turn at this occupation, and ply their utensils too with lusty vigour. It was extraordinary how fluent were the leaks. "They say that witches do sea-travelling in baskets," said Prince Rupert once. "I wish we had one aboard here to teach us the trick, if indeed this basket is not too large-meshed for a witch\'s skill."

His secretary looked at the dim line of the coast. "Anything would be better than staying here to be drowned like puppies under a bucket. It tears me to think that your Highness\'s dear life should be in this horrid danger."

"My dear life has been in worse case many a time when it was more pleasant to me, lad. And now that it is soured somewhat through thought of a certain lady, why, there you have all the more reason why it will not be cut short. I quite agree with you that there is a strong need that we should find soon a scheme to better our position; but at present I can think of none; and as for taking another turn on the shore yonder, why, that I flatly refuse to think about. I have no appetite for plunging about those pestiferous mangrove swamps till the Spaniards starve us out, and take us by sheer numbers and strength. In fact, I do not want to appear next before the Governor of Caraccas as a prisoner, Master Stephen. You will doubtless appreciate many of my reasons."

And there the poor secretary, being in truth a maid herself, and passionately enamoured of his Highness, turned away and faced the glaring sea, lest the jealousy that consumed her might be seen written upon her face. Though what Rupert could see in that creature puzzles her even to this day.

But neither Prince Rupert nor Master Laughan, his secretary, could afford to keep their thoughts entirely on this Donna Clotilde whom they had left behind them still in the safe keeping of her uncle the Governor of Caraccas. Their present discomforts went far to wean them from the memory of what had immediately passed. Their hunger and thirst grew upon them; their limbs ached with the incessant toil of keeping the crazy vessel afloat; an intolerable tropic sun scorched them from overhead; and, as though their case was obviously desperate even to the fish of the sea, three great sharks swam after the little brigantine in convoy. Moreover, one of the blacks began to show signs of delirium, and had to be confined with leg-irons so that he should not leap over-side, and lose them his services.

For three days this miserable voyage acquired to itself new miseries, and yet no plan came to the voyagers for lightening their case. In fine (and it is hard for the secretary to say such a thing about her revered patron), Prince Rupert lost his reckoning, and owned as much. He was at the best an inaccurate navigator, being brought up to nobler trades. And so there they were careering through a hot sun-scorched sea, with no land in sight, and the only hope remaining to them that if they kept at it long enough, they would, if they did not starve or drown first, fetch up somewhere in the long run.

"We are true buccaneers now, lad," said Rupert lightly, "for viler navigators and more desperate blades never sailed the Caribbean. My courage would be equal to attacking a caravel single-handed now—especially if my nose told me he had a meal preparing in his cook house."

As the sun lowered on that fourth day of their travel, a fog bank lifted out of the ocean ahead, a common enough sight in those unwholesome seas of the New World, and a breeding place for the calentura and other disorders. There is nothing in this you will say worthy of being commented upon in these memoirs; but when dark at last fell with all its tropical suddenness, this fog lit up with a glow, and as they drove nearer to it in their voyage, this glow seemed to collect and concentrate upon a centre.

At first they had taken the appearance for some trick of the sun which in these regions often leaves a reflection in the Eastern sky that lingers long after its setting; but this glow endured too long, and moreover it grew more concentrated, and increased in brightness; and so there came to the Secretary\'s lips a suggestion that some island lay ahead, and that its savannahs had been fired by buccaneers to drive the game into their snares. "There may be a wholesome meal close ahead of us," said the secretary, "and afterwards, your Highness\' charm will surely enlist some of these rude hunters into your service. It is my humble suggestion that Providence evidently intends us to find profit presently from some adventure ashore."

"That may be," said Rupert. "But my own idea is that shore\'s as far off as ever, and that just now we\'re staring at somebody\'s ship ablaze. Look now; if we bale a little harder, we may dare to give this basket of ours a few square yards more sail, and so come up with her all the quicker."

So they set the blacks to loose and hoist the two topsails, and sheet them home, and then took it by turns to assist the tired creatures at their intolerable baling.

The Secretary will confess to have experienced a pang when the next half-hour\'s sailing proved His Highness to be right. On land once more, she could have shown a stout manner to whatever adventure or hardship lay before them. But land seemingly lay as far off as ever; indeed they did not even know its whereabouts; and here on this unstable sea poor Master Stephen was every minute forced violently to drag back her courage, lest it should slip from her shuddering breast and be overboard beyond reclaim. Indeed only the all-mastering love she bore for this adorable hero kept her from disgracing the livery of her borrowed manhood.

But Rupert\'s courage was in no way dulled; indeed matters that would have daunted all other men (let alone maids) always heartened that great soldier; and, besides, with his infinite strategy he saw here ahead of him an opportunity for earning monies for his master the King at the Hague, whom he was so diligently endeavouring to serve. From the moment of making sure that the glow came from a burning ship, he was all of a fidget to make the brigantine move faster; and indeed his haste was natural, for as they drew more near, and the wind slackened, it seemed likely that the ship would burn to the water\'s edge and sink before he could come up and drive his bargain with her.

They could see the vessel plainly now, a tidy-sized pink (or brig, to give her the newer name) with her bolt-sprit a mere flag of fire, her foremast already over the side, and the forepart of her hull little better than a bonfire of flames. The men upon her stood out black against the blaze which they fought so vehemently to subdue. They were massed for the most part in a mob on her aftercastle and as they drew nearer, Prince Rupert could see others standing on stages slung over the side, passing up water to quench the flames in every conceivable shape of pitcher, from ale-jacks to mess-kids.

It cannot be said that the reckless fellows showed any outward fear for the horrid death that was already beginning to scorch them. They were chanting a psalm when the brigantine first drove within earshot; but apparently thinking they had done enough for their souls with this exercise, they presently set up some ribald drinking song which had acquired a dirty popularity in the taverns of Tortuga, and bawled it out full-lunged to the accompaniment of water hisses and flame-roar.

With the glare of the fire dazzling their eyes, and the occupation of fighting it filling their minds, they did not see the brigantine till she sailed up through their smoke and rounded up head to wind just beyond pistol-shot; and when they did make the discovery, their behaviour was none too civil. Even had there been any doubt about their being French and English buccaneers, they proved it very plainly now. Spaniards would have shown panic and pleaded for their lives with threats and promises: these fellows were for taking what they wanted by sheer dash and impudence.

"Just the packet we want, lads," roared the great rude creature who commanded her. "She\'s only a Jack-Spaniard, and\'ll be taken as easy as skinning a bull. Strip and swim for her. We\'ll come back and salve our plunder afterwards."—Upon which they all began to doff their draggled finery with astonishing haste.

But Rupert stood up in the brigantine\'s rigging and called sharply for them to wait a moment and hear him. Upon which, catching the sound of his English words, they stopped their bawling and listened.

"I am willing to give you passage, gentlemen, upon reasonable conditions. But my conditions I must have: you will understand I am no common carrier."

The tall man who had spoken before gave voice. "You seem to talk very big, you in your small ship. I am Captain Wick. Who the devil are you?"

Prince Rupert louted low. "I fear you will not know my poor name sir, though at home in England and Europe it has been heard some few times. There they call me Rupert Palatine."

The tall man whistled. "You\'ll be the Captain that pawned his ships to old Skin-the-Pike in Tortuga?"

"Monsieur D\'Ogeron, the Governor, held some cavaliers who were my very dear friends, and no other way showed itself of ransoming them. Besides, I wanted their swords for my enterprises."

"Well, gratitude\'s no crime, though there\'s many in these pagan seas thinks it first cousin to foolishness. No, I can\'t say I think any the worse of you, Captain Rupert, for what you have done."

"Sir," said the Prince, "your approval overwhelms me."

"Don\'t mention it," said Captain Wick, "and don\'t let us waste any more time in speeches. This perch here is getting hot. Take us off, like a decent man, and you have my word for it you shall be no loser. We gutted a fat Spaniard yesterday—a Seville ship he was, new out of Maracaibo—and after the fight, all our hands got so drunk, he had the ingratitude to slip away; and as we found ourselves afire in the forehold, we\'d no time just then to set about rechasing him. I\'ll make free to own the fire was beginning to bother us when you came up."

"It has a solid look about it just now," said Rupert, and he had to shout, for the roar of the devouring flames overtopped all quieter voice. "And so as a business man yourself you will be ready to pay all the higher for your conveyance elsewhere. It is well we should get these ungenteel matters of commerce settled first. It would put an unpleasant finish on our voyaging together if bad blood rose between us when the hour came for settling the bill for passages."

Whereupon Captain Wick broke out into some very fierce and wrathful language.

But Prince Rupert preserved an admirable temper. "Sir," he said, "I am new to this trade of passenger-carrying, and I trust I have too much niceness to make a commencement with a bevy of unwilling guests. Let me call to your mind that I am offering no compulsion. If you do not like my terms, I will draw off and continue my proper voyage, and as for you—why, you, sir, and your merry gentlemen can continue to tend your fire."

It was clear that Captain Wick had fine appetite for another outburst of words and temper; but the growing heat of the flames behind was every moment worse to be borne, and so with a hard effort he kept his tongue civil. "Well," he said, "what are your terms?"

"I do not want, sir, to drive too hard a bargain. I will not take more than you can offer."

"Meaning all we have? That\'s gluttonous enough, anyway."

"I did not come out to these amusing seas merely to study philosophy and refinement."

"That I\'ll be sworn you didn\'t. You might be a common buccaneer like me, with a matelot ashore to provide for, from the keenness you show."

"Why there, sir," said Rupert, "you have hit off my condition in a phrase. I was formally and solemnly adopted into your desirable Brotherhood after strict examination and full trial of my poor abilities, and I have a good camerade now meat-hunting ashore in Hispaniola. Even if I were disposed to forego my own advantage, I could not remain loyal to him and let this chance of earning moneys slip by me. It is a vital condition of our partnership that we share and share alike, and that each should do his best for his matelot."

"You need not remind an old buccaneer of the first principle of the Brotherhood. How do they name your matelot?"

"Simpson. He\'s a finely accurate shot."

"A man well freckled with pock-markings?"

"He is so distinguished."

"Simpson and I have been shipmates. Well, I\'ll have no hand in defrauding Simpson—especially as I\'ve small choice in the matter. But if the chance comes my way for driving another hard bargain, just you look to yourself, Captain Rupert."

"Sir," said the Prince, "I\'ve done very little else these some years. Do you answer for your crew standing honourably by the conditions?"

"You shall swear each fellow for yourself when they come aboard. Man, make haste and bring that cockle-shell of yours athwart our stern. The bacon is beginning to frizzle on us already, and presently some of us will be cooked alive. I must say you make a rather poor show of your hospitality."

"You will not blame me presently, sir. As it is you will enjoy the fare here. Had you come from anything short of desperation, I fear you would have turned up your honoured noses at its roughness."

The brigantine\'s head was canted with the sprit-sail till she gathered way again, and she was so manoeuvred that Master Stephen Laughan, who was standing on the forward castle, caught a rope which was hove to him, and made it fast to one of the knightheads. Singly the buccaneers made their way down this from the high poop which towered above, each carrying a bag filled with the more valuable of the Spaniard\'s plunder to pay his passage, and each, as he dropped foot on the deck, was made to swear a most comprehensive obedience. A Bible, a crucifix and a naked blade were set ready, and the oath was taken on all three, so that whether the man was of the Reformed Religion, or Papist, or confessed no creed at all, one or other of the oaths was bound to pledge him, and so there would be no wriggling out through this very common bye-way.

"By the Lord!" said Captain Wick, who was the last to come on board. "By the Lord, if formalities can make sound business, you should be in a fair way towards storing a fortune. By your leave I\'ll cast off this rope from the knighthead here and we\'ll get your cock-boat under way. My old ship is pretty well a-fire just now, and it\'s on the cards my drunken rascals were not very thorough when they set to drown the powder. The kegs were not all easy to get at in the magazine."

"After your handsome behaviour," said Prince Rupert with a bow, "the least I can do is to put my poor ship entirely at your present disposal. You may set your crew to work her (for I will own ingenuously that mine are somewhat unskilled), and you may navigate her where you choose. But if I might venture to suggest, I should say that the sooner you could bring up with some land, or with some desirable ship of the Spaniards, the pleasanter it would be for all of us."

Captain Wick stared. "You have a rum way of putting things," he said. "But let\'s go to your cabin, and talk it out over a cup of wine. I\'ve a throat that\'s full of sand."

"Why," said Rupert smiling, "I\'m afraid the cabin floor will be a-slop with water, as when we pressed her with sail so as to come down to you the quicker, the leaks rather gained on us."

"By the Lord!" cried Wick, fairly startled, "she feels sodden enough under the feet now you call attention to it. Why, your lower deck ports are well-nigh awash."

"Oh, I gave the brigantine no certificate for seaworthiness, when I asked you to honour us with your presence."

"Well, you\'re a cool one, anyway," said Wick, and gave sharp orders to his men to take a spell at the baling.—"But sink or swim, that doesn\'t alter my thirst, and if we can\'t wash our necks politely seated in the cabin, why, bid one of your blacks bring aft the wine on to the poop, and we\'ll drink to our better acquaintance there."

"I fear, sir," said Prince Rupert, still with his best manner, "that you will think me most cursedly remiss, but our provisioning has been plaguely ill done, and there\'s not a drop of wine on board."

Captain Wick stared still more, and then, as a thought struck him, he went to the scuttle-butt and took a sample from the dipper. "And your water stinks!" he spluttered. "Faugh! do you keep ducks in your casks? Man, tell me squarely, what entertainment is it that you have asked us to?"

"Lean enough, I fear, but I have no wish that it should endure longer than is absolutely needful. As a buccaneer, sir, you are my senior, and I bow to your experience, but as a mere soldier, I should say that the strategy indicated is to go to the nearest place where provisions are stored whether it is afloat or ashore, and procure them in the handiest way which occurs to us."

Captain Wick slapped his thigh. "Well," he said, "this is the maddest turn-out! You\'ve neither meat, wood, nor water; you\'ve a little old ship that leaks like a fishing net; you\'ve no force——"

"Ah, pardon me there, sir. You see before you two very good swords, who would be quite pleased to parade themselves against any other two you can put against them."

"Give it if you like, you\'ve an army of two, yourself and this slim youngster here. You must have left a very ugly place behind you to have sailed out so blithely into this fix."

"In honest truth we did. But being here, sir, and having you and your excellent friends as companions, I repeat that the shrewdest thing at present seems to me that we should sail with as much canvas as we can carry towards the nearest meal. Come, Captain Wick, I\'m still but raw in these seas, and you are likely to know far more where the good things are stowed. What do you say? Are we to get ashore and hunt bullocks? Or is there some convenient town to sack, or some castle to ransom? Or can you guarantee that we shall find a Spaniard on the sea, and get our next dinner from him before we are absolutely starving?"

Captain Wick leaned up against the bulwarks and laughed. "This is like the old hard, wicked times once more, when buccaneers sailed cheerfully against an armada in a canoe—and sometimes took it. It gives me a thrill to be desperate again. I oughtn\'t to be merry, I know, but spit me if I can help it. I\'ve lost my ship, I\'ve been robbed of my lawful plundery, I\'m out of the frying-pan into the fishing-net, but by the Lord, there\'s something too humorous about the whole adventure to let one work up a proper pitch of anger."—His face sobered with a sudden pucker of recollection.—"Rupert," he repeated, "Captain Rupert. Isn\'t it Prince Rupert I should have said?"

"So I am more usually known."

Captain Wick changed his manner. He lugged off his feathered hat and made a great bow. "My lord," he said, "you must excuse these manners I\'ve been showing you. At first I thought you were a rogue, and then I thought you were a madman, and then I judged you were a fool, but I never guessed you were a born prince and there\'s the truth of it. I was only a common seaman before the mast before I drifted out to these seas of the New World, and earned distinction, and so at home I was not in a position to meet Princes, and here there are none to come across. But believe me, my lord, it gives me great pleasure now to make your acquaintance, and devil take the expense. Indeed I don\'t grudge the expense: Princes out here will want to make their bit like other men."

The secretary, who stood near, looked for an explosion of his Highness\' anger, for there were times when Prince Rupert could defend his dignity with great niceness and punctilio. For it was in Master Laughan\'s mind that this Wick was merely mocking her patron, since of all these rude buccaneers they had come across so far in the New World, they had not met one who showed a particle of reverence for a great name and exalted birth for their own sakes. But Prince Rupert, with his usual fine discernment, saw otherwise; indeed he understood in a flash that the man was dazzled at finding himself the guest of one who carried so illustrious a name: and he showed him some very pretty and graceful condescensions.

The secretary, being by this time so thoroughly wearied out that her eyes would keep open no longer, heard dully the rumble of their talk for awhile, and then dropped off to sleep where she was on the bare deck, but not before a new course had been set, and sharp orders given for the re-trimming of tacks and sheets. The buccaneers, it appears, would have waked her to take a spell at the baling, being rude brutal fellows with but little sympathy for gentility and a slim figure; but the Prince so pleasantly asked them to desist, at the same time speaking so handsomely of the secretary\'s youth and previous labours, that of their uncouth condescension Stephen was permitted to further enjoy plank bed undisturbed.

I am free to confess that the meeting with Captain Wick and his men, let alone from the sums earned as their passage money, was indeed fortunate from another respect. That Prince Rupert had high military genius, no one who reads these memoirs, and the other histories specially written upon his person, will for a moment deny. But the fact cannot be got over that if the brigantine had stuck to her original course, his Highness and the others on her would have starved, if indeed they had not drowned first. For the nearest land (if indeed they did not miss it) was distant a week\'s sail that way, and the seas in between practically desert. But this Captain Wick, if rude, had at least local knowledge and no particular appetite for starvation, and so by his hint the brigantine was headed for Curassou, which island it appeared was conveniently close at hand.

Let no reader think that in owning this, Master Stephen Laughan wavers for one instant in loyalty to Prince Rupert, and profound admiration for his wonderful powers. But the fact is the island was out of sight below an horizon, and guessing at an island\'s position, when indeed you have never before heard of its existence, is but dangerous seamanship.

As Wick himself owned the place had small enough fame. It had neither mines nor pearl-fisheries; the Spaniards did naught but gather salt there; and as this commodity would not attract buccaneers, who liked more profitable valuables for their purses, there were no fortifications to protect the works or the labourers.

"But, your worship," said Captain Wick, "at present we need comestibles more than cash, and I take it that these fellows on Curassou, humble though they may be, must have some sort of food on hand to stow in their bellies. And besides, salt-making should be one of the thirstiest trades imaginable, and there you see that drink, and much drink, is clearly indicated." And in fine this prophecy came very near to the truth. In the harbour of the island they found two vessels of the salt gatherers and a well-stored village ashore all practically undefended, and these they took without opposition.

At this point though the very nasty customs of the buccaneers nearly caused a breach—and indeed would have brought about complete severance of the parties if the secretary had had the choice. For the rude fellows, after their usual habit, when the materials for debauch were ready to their hands, had not the smallest mood to go abroad for further earning, and in this Captain Wick (that was none too sober himself) to all practical purposes gave them his countenance.

"Master Prince," he hiccoughed solemnly. "I am your most obedient servant to command, but you mustn\'t ask me to make water run up hill, or to cause handy liquor to cease from running down a thirsty buccaneer\'s gullet. They are common fellows, common as dirt every one of them, and they haven\'t the gentility and niceness that is natural to you and me. And moreover, as a buccaneer\'s life is often a short one, he strives to make it as merry as may be. Besides as you are one of the brotherhood yourself, you ought to fall in with the custom. I\'m sure Simpson, your matelot, would not be pleased to see you deny yourself. Come, my lord, what do you say, if you and me, that are their superiors, condescend a little and go and take a turn down yonder ourselves?"

The Prince very civilly declined, but still this Wick must needs persuade him further.

"Of course it\'s not what me and your lordship are accustomed to, but there\'s entertainment in it. A buccaneer when he\'s ashore is a rarely humorous fellow. The Spaniards were asked to provide a fiddle, or some pipes, or at least a drum for harmony; but it seems they are leanly enough furnished with both talent and instruments; and so the beggars have been stood in a row, and bidden to whistle jigs as dance music. The boatswain\'s been appointed bandmaster, with a rope\'s end for baton, and I can tell you he\'s making a dandy orchestra."—Captain Wick fidgetted with his feet—"Oh Lord," he said, "watch \'em dancing. I just must have a turn myself. Here, Master Laughan, you\'re slim, and should make a most ladylike partner. Come along."

And with that he clapped an arm round the poor secretary\'s waist (that was like to have died with mortification) and set off into absurd capers, keeping time to the whistling, till the pair of them were brought to a stop through sheer breathlessness.

Prince Rupert (it is painful to relate) was in one of his whimsical humours, and, far from interfering, only laughed and shook with merriment. "Keep it up, Stephen, lad," cried he. "You fling a fine leg. By my faith, you dance the best maid\'s steps of all of them. Ho! you other blushing, bearded, lady buccaneers, mince your steps like Master Laughan."—And when the secretary came back flushed and angry to his side, and would have reproached him with a look, "Pooh! lad," said he, "you\'re none the worse. There\'s a bit too much of the pedant about you at times"—At which the poor creature tried to smile, though in truth she was but an ace off tears.

Of the two vessels of the Spaniards which they met in the harbour, one was fired, as they had no service for her, and the other careened, breamed, refitted and loaded with the brigantine\'s treasure and puny armament. The brigantine herself, being left unbaled for a dozen hours, quickly sank out of further mischief\'s ways. The orgie of the buccaneers, when one came to measure it up afterwards in the cool blood of the historian, was in reality short, for these disgusting creatures consider lavishness the highest gentility, and was............