Sir Walter Ralegh Part 19

Ralegh was liberated expressly that he might work out his Guiana plans.

He was not pardoned. A royal commission was granted him in August, 1616.

He had understood that he was to have a commission under the Great Seal, which would be addressed to him as 'trusty and well-beloved.' Actually, though he and others often seem to have forgotten the difference, it was under the Privy Seal, and he was described as plain 'Sir Walter Ralegh.'

The honorary epithets are known to have been inserted originally, and afterwards erased. Similarly, in a warrant for the payment to him in November, 1617, of the statutable bounty of 700 crowns for his construction of the Destiny, an erasure precedes his name. The s.p.a.ce it covers would suffice for the expression, 'our well-beloved subject,'

usual in such grants. The withholding at any rate of a pardon excited apprehensions. It was matter of common talk. Carew wrote to Roe on March 19, 1616, that Ralegh had left the Tower, and was to go to Guiana, but 'remains unpardoned until his return.' Merchants, it was stated, required security, 'Sir Walter Ralegh being under the peril of the law,'

that they should enjoy the benefits of the expedition. His kinsmen and friends, it was said, were willing to serve only 'if they might be commanded by none but himself.' Their scruples had to be pacified by the issue of an express licence to him to carry subjects of the King to the south of America, and elsewhere within America, possessed and inhabited by heathen and savage people, with shipping, weapons and ordnance. He was authorised to keep gold, silver, and other goods which he should bring back, the fifth part of the gold, silver, pearls, and precious stones, with all customs due for any other goods, being truly paid to the Crown. Further, his Majesty, of his most special grace, const.i.tuted Ralegh sole commander, 'to punish, pardon, and rule according to such orders as he shall establish in cases capital, criminal, and civil, and to exercise martial law in as ample a manner as our lieutenant-general by sea or land.' The commission did not contain the authority conferred by Ralegh's old Guiana commission to subdue foreign lands. It too is reported to have been originally inserted, and to have been struck out by James.

[Sidenote: _Unpardoned._]

[Sidenote: _Advice from, and avowal to, Bacon._]

Ralegh must, like his friends and creditors, have been conscious of the risk of sailing without a pardon. Carew Ralegh many years afterwards a.s.serted, that Sir William St. John agreed to procure one for him for 1500 beyond the sum paid for his liberty. According to the _Observations on Sanderson's History_, the benefit was offered by St.

John and Edward Villiers jointly, and for as little as 700. A right to abandon the voyage if he pleased was to have been added. Bacon's name is connected with the matter. Incidentally Bacon, who had been appointed Lord Keeper on March 7, 1617, is known to have met Ralegh after his release. He himself relates that he kept the Earl of Exeter waiting long in his upper room as he 'continued upon occasion still walking in Gray's Inn walks with Sir Walter Ralegh a good while.' On the authority of Carew Ralegh, as quoted in a letter to the latter from James Howell in the _Familiar Letters_, he is reported, possibly on this occasion, to have persuaded Ralegh to save his money, and trust to the implication of a pardon to be inferred from the royal commission. 'Money,' said the Lord Keeper, 'is the knee-timber of your voyage. Spare your money in this particular; for, upon my life, you have a sufficient pardon for all that is past already, the King having under his Great Seal made you Admiral, and given you power of martial law. Your commission is as good a pardon for all former offences as the law of England can afford you.'

That is the view of so sound a const.i.tutional lawyer as Hallam. His reason for the contention is that a man attainted of treason is incapable of exercising authority. But it can scarcely be argued as a point of law, and it is difficult to believe that a Lord Keeper should have volunteered a dogma of an absolute pardon by implication. Moreover, though, as will hereafter be seen, Sir Julius Caesar, who was Master of the Rolls, fell into the same mistake in 1618, the misdescription, imputed to Bacon, of the Commission as under the Great Seal, of itself casts doubt upon the anecdote. On the whole, there is no sufficient cause for disputing the statement in the _Declaration_ of 1618, that James deliberately, 'the better to contain Sir Walter Ralegh, and to hold him upon his good behaviour, denied, though much sued unto for the same, to grant him pardon for his former treasons.'

In the course of this or another conversation, Bacon, according to Sir Thomas Wilson's note of a statement made to him by Ralegh himself, inquired, 'What will you do, if, after all this expenditure, you miss of the gold mine?' The reply was: 'We will look after the Plate Fleet, to be sure.' 'But then,' remonstrated Bacon, 'You will be pirates!' 'Ah!'

Ralegh is alleged to have cried, 'who ever heard of men being pirates for millions!' The Mexican fleet for 1618 is in fact computed to have conveyed treasure to the amount of 2,545,454. It is scarcely credible that Ralegh, though never distinguished for cautious speech, should have been so intemperately rash. Such a confession to Bacon, known to be Winwood's antagonist, who would rejoice to have ground for thwarting the anti-Spanish party at Court, is particularly unlikely. Mr. Spedding himself, while he believes it, regards Ralegh's reply as 'a playful diversion of an inconvenient question.' As a serious statement the saying is not the more authentic that it emanates from Wilson. Naturally it has been accepted by writers for whom Ralegh is a mere buccaneer.

[Sidenote: _Count Gondomar._]

From the first it is evident that Spain and the Spanish faction at the English Court laboured to place upon the expedition the construction which Ralegh's apocryphal outburst to Bacon would warrant. Don Diego Sarmiento de Acuna, the Amba.s.sador of Spain, better known by the t.i.tle, not yet his, of Count Gondomar, was the mouthpiece of the view. He offered, as Ralegh in his _Apology_ virtually admits, to procure a safe-conduct for Ralegh to and from the mine, with liberty to bring home any gold he should find. The condition he imposed was that the expedition should be limited to one or two ships. The reason Ralegh gave in his paper for declining the arrangement, was that he did not trust sufficiently to the Amba.s.sador's promises to go unarmed. In view of the way Spaniards were in the habit of treating English visitors, he clearly could not with prudence. At all events, for its refusal, if the offer were ever made in a practicable shape, James and his Government are obviously as responsible as he. They might, if they chose, have withdrawn his commission if he rejected those terms. Gondomar was a good Spaniard. He had a patriotic hatred for 'the old pirate bred under the English virago, and by her fleshed in Spanish blood and ruin.' His influence with James was boundless. He could 'pipe James asleep,' it was said, 'with facetious words and gestures.' They were the more diverting from their contrast with his lank, austere aspect. James had supreme faith in his wisdom, to the extravagant extent, according to his own incredible letter in 1622 from Madrid to the King, of having appointed him a member '_non seulement de votre Conseil d'etat, mais du Cabinet interieur_.'

[Sidenote: _Disclosures to the Spanish Amba.s.sador._]

Above all, he held for or against England the key to a family pact with the Escurial. At first he hoped to stop Ralegh's enterprise altogether.

So late as the middle of March, 1617, Chamberlain wrote to Carleton that the Spanish Amba.s.sador had 'well nigh overthrown it.' If he could not nip the undertaking in the bud, he had means of stifling it by misinterpreting to James Ralegh's motives, and by informing the Spanish Court how to meet force with force. Ralegh was ordered to explain the details of his scheme, and to lay down his route on a chart. According to Carew Ralegh, whose information may be presumed to have been derived from Lady Ralegh, James promised upon the word of a King to keep secret these accounts of the programme. At any rate, Gondomar, by his familiar access to the King, was enabled to study the whole, whatever its value.

He forwarded all particulars to Madrid. When the fleet had been surveyed by the Admiralty, he had a copy of the official report. He sent it by express to his Government, which despatched it with instructions to America. Cottington, the English Agent at the Spanish Court, was directed to promise that no harm should be done by Ralegh's voyage. The King in his _Declaration_ of 1618 said he had taken 'order that he and all those that went in his company should find good security to behave themselves peaceably,' though the intention, the King lamented, was frustrated by 'every one of the princ.i.p.als that were in the voyage putting in security one for another.' There even was a story that the Court had obliged Lords Arundel and Pembroke to engage solemnly for Ralegh's return, that he might be rendered personally liable for any wrong. The foundation for this report may have been that, late in March, as the Destiny was about to sail from the Thames, James, alarmed at Gondomar's prognostications of evil, retailed them to his Council.

Ralegh's supporters at the Board rea.s.sured him by affirmations of their willingness to give security that no harm should be done to lands of the King of Spain. James, several weeks earlier, at the end of January, had solemnly promised Gondomar, through Winwood, that, though he had determined to allow the voyage, if Ralegh acted in it in contravention of his instructions, he should pay for his disobedience with his head.

[Sidenote: _Ralegh's preparations against Violence._]

[Sidenote: _The Comte des Marets._]

Ralegh and his friends knew of the care taken to guard Spanish interests at his cost. He had told Carew, as Carew writes to Roe, that 'the alarm of his journey had flown into Spain, and sea forces were prepared to lie for him.' He was nothing appalled, since, as Carew was informed, he had a good fleet, and would be able to land five or as many as seven hundred men; 'which will be a competent army, the Spaniards, especially about Orinoque, being so poorly planted.' Carew evidently, it will be seen, a.s.sumed that Ralegh must expect violence, and might lawfully meet it in kind. James and his Councillors a.s.sumed it also, till Ralegh came back empty handed. He openly was arming to be a match in battle for the Spaniards; and his party in the Council with equal earnestness tried to balance the weight there of Spain by another influence. Mr. Secretary Winwood wished in all ways to break with Spain. He urged Ralegh to capture the Mexico fleet. In support of his policy he favoured an intimate alliance with the chief rival Power. He introduced Ralegh to the Comte des Marets, the French Amba.s.sador. Des Marets is supposed to have grown apprehensive of a sudden diversion of Ralegh's forces to an attack on St. Valery in the interest of the Huguenots against the Queen Mother. He was glad, therefore, of an opportunity of judging for himself of Ralegh's views. They may already have had communication by letter.

French influence had been, it is thought, employed on Ralegh's behalf while he was in the Tower. He had never ceased to maintain relations with the Huguenots, and the French Court appreciated the importance in certain circ.u.mstances of his services. The Spanish, Savoyard, and Venetian Envoys had inspected his squadron. On March 15, 1617, the Count too visited the Destiny. He reported the interview to Richelieu a few days later. He soon satisfied himself that St. Valery was not threatened. He told Ralegh that the French Court had sympathised with him in his long and unjust imprisonment, and the confiscation of his property. From another quarter he had heard, he wrote to Richelieu, that Ralegh especially resented the gift of Sherborne to Sir John Digby, who lately had returned from his Spanish mission. He gathered that Ralegh was discontented with James, and with the Court policy. Ralegh expressed his desire for more talk at a less inconvenient time and place.

Richelieu had recently described him to Marshal Concini as 'grand marinier et mauvais capitaine'; but he was far from discouraging his overtures. A subsequent interview was held, and described in a despatch several weeks after the meeting. If the Count's memory did not, as Sir Robert Schomburgk thinks, deceive him, Ralegh said: 'Seeing myself so badly and tyrannically treated by my own Sovereign, I have made up my mind, if G.o.d send me good success, to leave my country, and to make to the King your master the first offer of what shall fall under my power.'

Doubtless there was just so much truth in the Count's report that a profusion of compliments pa.s.sed. Des Marets would express his astonishment at the treatment Ralegh had experienced, and regret that France had not enjoyed the happiness of possessing such a hero, and the opportunity of rewarding him properly. Ralegh would respond in the same key, and a.s.sure his French sympathiser that, if an occasion presented itself, he was well inclined to serve the n.o.blest Court in Europe. He is not to be held responsible for the positive summary the Frenchman dressed up of the conversation weeks after it had pa.s.sed to show Ralegh's effusiveness and his own caution. Des Marets himself did not at the time treat the talk seriously. He said he replied that Ralegh could betake himself to no quarter in which he would receive more of courtesy or friendship. 'I thought it well,' wrote des Marets, 'to give him good words, although I do not antic.i.p.ate that his voyage will have much fruit.'

[Sidenote: _Understanding with France._]

Before Ralegh left English waters he had further negotiations with France. A Frenchman, Captain Faige, was his companion on the voyage, which commenced March 28, 1617, from the Thames to Plymouth. By this man he sent in May a letter to a M. de Bisseaux, a French Councillor of State. He wrote that he had commissioned Faige to take ships to points in the Indies agreed on between them. The intention was to meet Ralegh at the mine which he counted upon working. Faige, he said, could explain his plan. He asked for a patent, promised, he said, by Admiral de Montmorency, which would empower him to enter a French port, 'avec tous les ports, navires, equipages, et biens, par lui traites ou conquis.'

One Belle reported himself to Montmorency as Faige's a.s.sociate. In that character he obtained Ralegh's letter, and carried it with other papers, and a map of Guiana, to Madrid. There he told the story in the May of the following year. Ralegh's letter to Bisseaux in his handwriting has been seen and copied at Simancas. If he ever received, as is inferred from his admissions to the Royal Commissioners next year, and to Sir Thomas Wilson, the warrant he asked, it was a permit from the French Admiralty. It was not a commission from the French Crown, and, whatever it was, James and his Ministers were parties to its grant.

[Sidenote: _Mystifications._]

The whole secret history of the preliminaries to the Guiana expedition forms a tangled skein. The negotiations of Ralegh with France were certainly known to Winwood, and, there can be little doubt, to James also. Ralegh taxed the King by letter in October, 1618, with privity and a.s.sent to the arrangement, through Faige, for the co-operation of French ships against the Spaniards at the mouth of the Orinoko. He was not contradicted. Winwood and his section of the Council in good faith preferred a French to a Spanish compact. They did not shudder at the contingency of war. James and the pro-Spanish party concurred for the moment in the playing off of France against Spain, in order to push Spain into the English alliance which they coveted. From the double motive the Government in general encouraged Ralegh to treat with France.

That Spain might be frightened he was instigated to an intimacy with French Ministers and plotters. Though he never received a regular French commission, it was allowed to be supposed that one had been issued to him. No French ships were fitted out to aid him, or despatched to the coast of Guiana. Nothing, it may confidently be a.s.serted, was ever farther from his thoughts than the surrender of territory he might appropriate to any foreign Crown. All simply was a game of mystification devised for one purpose by Winwood, and, for a different purpose, joined in by James and the rest. The Spanish faction wished to give Spain cause to fancy its foe was being unchained to do his worst against it at his own discretion, and by any agency he chose, unless it should come to terms speedily. A condition of the game, which Ralegh but imperfectly understood, was that it should be played at his especial peril. He was suffered to concert measures with one foreign ally of England against another, at the direct instance of a leading Minister, and with the connivance of the King himself. The King was informed of the intrigue, and knew as much as his indolence permitted of its various steps. He was never obliged to know so much, or to betray such signs of knowing anything, as not to be in a position on an exigency to disavow the whole. This was his idea of state-craft.

The negotiation with the French Government was but one of the threads in the skein. James and his advisers were in a frame of mind in which any foreign adventure had a chance of securing their support. Ralegh, and the popular excitement which had wafted him from a prison to an Admiral's command, were p.a.w.ns moved by the political speculators of the Court for their own purposes. Wild rumours circulated of objects to which the expedition was about really to be directed. The circ.u.mstances of the expedition, the character of its chief, his sudden liberation, and the trust reposed in him, were so extraordinary that all Europe was disturbed. Though Continental thought may, as the greatest of modern historians has said, have visited the memory of Ralegh since with an indifference more bitter than censure or reproach, it was very far from indifferent in 1617. At home cynics disbelieved the sincerity of Ralegh.

They ridiculed the notion that, after the iniquitous treatment he had experienced, he would have the folly to come back. Friends apparently were not entirely free from the suspicion that he might be induced, if he failed, to shake the dust of an ungrateful kingdom off his feet. Lord Arundel at parting earnestly dissuaded him from yielding to any temptation to a self-banishment, which a.s.suredly he never contemplated.

A solicitation of authority to carry Spanish prizes in certain circ.u.mstances into French ports is no evidence that he contemplated a change of allegiance. Reports that he had asked the licence may explain why it occurred to Arundel or Pembroke to pledge him against such an use of it.

[Sidenote: _Plot against Genoa._]

If acquaintances who felt how ill he had been treated feared he might be beguiled into abjuring his ungrateful country, others deemed the ostensible gold digging aim of the expedition too simple and bounded for his subtle and lofty ambition. Leonello, the Secretary to the Venetian Emba.s.sy, writing to the Council of Ten on January 19 and 26, and February 3, 1617, described communications between Ralegh, Winwood, and Count Scarnafissi, the Amba.s.sador of Savoy. The Duke of Savoy was waging a war with Spain, which ended in the following September. He would have liked Ralegh to pounce upon Genoa, which was become almost a Spanish port. The project was discussed by Scarnafissi with Winwood and Ralegh, whom Winwood had introduced to him. It is said by Leonello to have been divulged by Winwood to James. James at first was inclined to adopt it.

After a few days he recalled his a.s.sent. Probably he had given it partly out of pique against the Spanish Court; and now Spain was resuming negotiations for the marriage of the Infanta to Prince Charles. He was, moreover, said Leonello, suspicious that Ralegh might not give him his just share of the antic.i.p.ated twenty millions of booty. The entire business is not very intelligible. Leonello's three secret despatches disinterred by Mr. Rawdon Brown are the main evidence of the project, and of the degree of Ralegh's partic.i.p.ation in it. An examination of the Piedmontese Archives might shed clearer light on the scope and reality of the obscure intrigue. Leonello himself offers no testimony but admissions alleged to have been extorted by him from Scarnafissi. At any rate if credence is to be given to the somewhat suspicious account, the worst guilt for the contemplated piratical perfidy attaches to the crowned accomplice. Sir Thomas Wilson wrote to James on October 4, 1618: 'Sir Walter Ralegh tells me Sir Ralph Winwood brought him acquainted with the Amba.s.sador of Savoy, with whom they consulted for the surprise of Genoa, and that your Majesty was acquainted with the business, and liked it well.' The King never denied the truth of the imputation. From first to last the negotiations, the plots for and against, were, on the side of the English, French, Spanish, and Savoyard Governments, a mere shuffle of diplomatic cards. The one thing in real earnest was the universal propensity to intrigue at Ralegh's expense. Everybody's hands were to be left loose but his.

[Sidenote: _Strength of the Armament._]

The preparations for the expedition on the original basis were little affected by the speculative projects for turning it to strange purposes.

The Destiny, Jason, Encounter, Thunder, Southampton, and the pinnace Page had sailed from the Thames at the end of March, 1617. Fears of a countermand were said to have hastened their departure. They carried ninety gentlemen, a few soldiers, and 318 seamen, beside captains and masters. There were also servants and a.s.sayers. The _Declaration_ of 1618 contends, truly or untruly, that no miners were embarked. If it were so, it is strange that the omission should not have been remarked in the West, of all regions. Four ships had been fitted for sea at Plymouth by Sir John Ferne, Laurence Keymis, Wollaston, and Chudleigh.

Others arrived later. Want of money caused delay. Captain Pennington of the Star was detained off the Isle of Wight for provisions. He had to ride to London to redeem, with Lady Ralegh's help, his ship's bread. To eke out Captain Whitney's resources, Ralegh sold much of his plate. He raised 300 for Sir John Ferne. No checks, temptations, or expenses daunted him. While he knew, as he wrote to Boyle, 'there was no middle course but perish or prosper,' his idea steeled him against forebodings.

He felt inspired to accomplish a national enterprise. 'What fancy,' he exclaimed later, 'could possess him thus to dispose of his whole substance, and undertake such a toilsome and perilous voyage, now that his const.i.tution was impaired by such a long confinement, beside age itself, sickness, and affliction, were not he a.s.sured thereby of doing his prince service, bettering his country by commerce, and restoring his family to its estates, all from the mines of Guiana!' The spectacle of his confidence is among the most pathetic tragedies in history.

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE EXPEDITION (May, 1617-June, 1618).

[Sidenote: _Orders to the Fleet._]

On May 3 he published his orders to the fleet. They were a model of G.o.dly, severe, and martial government, as testified a gentleman of his company. Divine service was to be solemnised every morning and evening.

The pillage of ships of friendly Powers was rigorously prohibited.

Courtesy towards the Indians was strictly injoined. All firearms were to be kept clean. Rules were laid down in the event of an encounter with 'the enemy' at sea. Cards, dice, and swearing were forbidden. The people of the West, and especially Plymouth, had remained faithful in their admiration of Ralegh though an imprisoned convict. They rejoiced at seeing him once more in command of a powerful fleet. On the eve of his departure the Mayor of Plymouth, a Trelawny, 'by a general consent,' at the town's expense entertained the Admiral and his followers. The town also 'paid the drummer for calling Sir Walter Ralegh's company aboard.'

On June 12, seven ships of war and three pinnaces sailed from the port.

At sea they were joined by loiterers, which brought the total up to thirteen ships, manned by a thousand men. Contrary winds forced them back, first into Plymouth, and next into Falmouth. Again, eight leagues west of Scilly, a gale rose which sank a pinnace, and drove the rest into Kinsale.

[Sidenote: _Boyle's Bargain with Ralegh._]

At Cork he was cordially welcomed alike by old enemies and old friends.

With his inexhaustible vivacity he flew his hawks at Cloyne; he took shares in an Irish copper mining adventure; he provisioned his fleet; he was feasted and admired; he reviewed the past, and antic.i.p.ated the future. Among those who sought his company were Lords Barry and Roche.

Boyle, now Lord Boyle, came from Lismore, and entertained him. He rode to Lismore and Mogelly. His estate had turned in Boyle's more patient hands into a n.o.ble domain with a revenue estimated by Pym in 1616 at 12,000. Boyle gave his own account of his transactions with Ralegh in a letter of 1631 to Carew Ralegh, who wished to have them reviewed.

According to this he behaved, and was recognised by Ralegh as having behaved, generously and honourably. Clearly he had no doubt of his own magnanimity. At the time of the attainder the conveyance under the agreement of 1602 was not legally completed. Apparently not all the purchase-money had been paid. Inquisitions were being taken of Ralegh's Irish lands by the Government. Sir John Ramsay, Boyle said, had offered to use his Scotch influence to obtain from the Crown an absolute release of all claims against him, by Ralegh as well as by the Crown, for 500 marks. He preferred to follow the advice of George Carew, who predicted to him after the Winchester conviction that the King would remit Ralegh's forfeiture. He went on dealing with him, though legally incompetent, and had paid him a supplementary sum of 1000 to close the matter. In addition he had to beg or buy a royal confirmation of his t.i.tle to the lands, when they had been 'found by offices' upon the attainder. Now, in Cork he supplied the expedition with oxen, biscuit, beer, and iron, to the value of 600 marks or more. He gave Ralegh 350 in cash, and a thirty-two gallon cask of whiskey. For three weeks he kept open house for him at Cork. Ralegh, he a.s.serted, reciprocated his hospitalities by a full abandonment of any possible claims he might have made upon the Lismore property. He also contributed evidence towards Boyle's defence against some demands founded by Ralegh's old partner Pyne upon a lease alleged by him to have been granted him by Ralegh many years before, in extension of a shorter term. Ralegh, though on good terms at the time with Pyne, seems to have a.s.sured Boyle of his belief that the second demise was a counterfeit fabricated by Meere. His dealings, however, were very complicated, and his remembrance of them necessarily not always clear. In 1618 he became dubious if he had not been too positive against Pyne's t.i.tle. He requested, on the eve of his death, that he should not be considered a witness either for or against it.

[Sidenote: _Fray at Lancerota._]

The fleet stayed at Cork from June 25 to August 19. Then it made a fresh start. Off Cape St. Vincent, Captain Bayley, of the ship Southampton, boarded four French vessels, and took from them a fishing net, a pinnace, and some oil. A report of the capture reached Madrid, where it was denounced as piracy. In truth Ralegh had been scrupulous. He insisted on buying the goods of the owners at the price of sixty-one crowns, to the high indignation of Bayley. The captor's argument was that he found the Frenchmen had procured their cargo by piracy in the West Indies, and he, therefore, had lawfully confiscated it. Ralegh did not admit that the charge would, if true, justify him in refusing compensation. Frenchmen and Englishmen alike, he held, could plunder Spaniards 'beyond the line.' Lancerota, one of the Great Canaries, was reached on September 6. The islanders happened to be under the influence of a special panic. Barbary corsairs had been ravaging a neighbouring island. Next year they laid Lancerota itself waste. When Ralegh's fleet appeared it was supposed to be the Barbary squadron. Some sailors having landed, three were murdered. Ralegh showed remarkable forbearance. He would suffer no vengeance to be taken. An English merchantman, belonging to one Reeks of Ratcliff, lay in the harbour. Ralegh knew it would have to bear the penalty of retaliation by him. Bayley, however, seized upon the pretext of the broil. He affected to see in that, onesided as it was, evidence of Ralegh's piratical temper. In a fit of virtuous horror at his Admiral who had docked his prize money of sixty-one crowns, he deserted, and sailed home.

[Sidenote: _Sickness in the Fleet._]

At Gomera, one of the Lesser Canaries, the fleet found more hospitality.

The Governor permitted the crews to draw water, and buy provisions.

Ralegh reciprocated by keeping his men in perfect order. He sent a present of gloves to the Governor's wife, a lady of the Stafford family.

She returned fruit, sugar, and rusks. Not to be outdone he rejoined with ambergris, rosewater, a cut-work ruff, and a picture of the Magdalen. He was in the habit of taking pictures with him on his voyages. This interchange of courtesies was the one gleam of human kindness which lighted up for Ralegh his dismal journey. He dwells upon it gratefully in the journal he kept. The ma.n.u.script, in twenty large pages, is in the British Museum. It covers the period from August 19 to February 13. Off the Isle of Bravo, sickness attacked the fleet. It was aggravated through the protraction of the voyage by contrary winds from the customary fortnight or three weeks to six. Forty-two men in the flagship died. Among them were Fowler, the princ.i.p.al refiner, Ralegh's cook Francis, his servant Crab, the master surgeon, the provost martial, Captain Piggot, his best land-general, and Mr. John Talbot, 'who,'

records Ralegh, 'had lived with me eleven years in the Tower, an excellent general scholar, and a faithful true man as lived.' The ship left Bravo on October 4. On the 12th they were becalmed. At one time a thick and fearful darkness enveloped them. Then the horizon became over-shot with gloomy discolorations. Off Trinidad fifteen rainbows in a day were seen. Ralegh caught a cold, which turned to a burning fever.

For twenty-eight days he lay unable to take solid food. He could not have survived but for the Gomera fruit. His ordinary servants were all ill; but he had also pages who attended him. Apparently his illness did not prevent him from keeping a general supervision of the fleet. His journal proves him to have been a thorough and practical seaman.