WHAT BEFELL US UPON THE SAND-SPIT.
Down I went, the water roaring about my ears and my body pulled this
way and that by the undertow which swept me fiercely up and down. I
opened my eyes, but the surf was full of foam and sand, so I closed
them. I felt that I was being borne out to sea, and scarce had the
mind to continue the struggle. Then came a sudden wrench. For a moment
I thought I must have been crushed among the timbers, and to this day
have often wondered that it was not so. But the strain was steady
and then relaxed and I remembered the rope which I had put about me
and knew it was the taughtening of the tackle about my shoulders. As
my body touched the sandy bottom, with a mighty effort and springing
upward I reached the surface, bewildered and all but exhausted. About,
in all directions, were tossing pieces of the wreckage. I reached a
spar with difficulty and to it clung, warding off meanwhile as best
possible the planks and gratings which were dashing all around. I saw
five or six men floating near and among them to my great joy marked the
figure of the Admiral, clinging to a spar. He saw me at the same moment
and feebly raised a hand in acknowledgment. Fearing he might lose his
hold, and watching my chance, I swam to him and set him astride the
yard. He seemed to have no will or power of his own and I thought he
must have been badly injured.
“Are you much hurt, monsieur?” I asked him while I struggled to raise
him. He made no great effort to aid me and would have toppled over
again had I not held him firmly.
“I do not know, my friend,” he replied, “and I care not.”
Then I discovered there was a cut upon the back of his head, which was
bleeding freely, dyeing his linen and doublet a sombre hue and marking
in greater contrast the pallor of his face.
“Be of good cheer,” I said as cheerfully as I might, “we will be ashore
in a moment, sir.” By the tackle about me, we were presently hauled
through the surf and reached the shallows, where a dozen arms plucked
us from our hazardous hold and landed us high upon the beach.
The perils of the last two days, ending in the position into which
we were thrown, had taken my thoughts from the desperate fear at my
heart. Until then--until we were surely wrecked and saw all destroyed
before our eyes, we had hoped at least to get back to Fort Caroline
before the Spaniards could attack. I made no doubt they would do that
at the earliest moment if indeed they had not done so already.
My God! For the first time the horrible chances came upon and
overwhelmed me. Wrecked and ruined upon an unknown and barren coast
with the Indians on one side and the Spaniards perhaps barring our way
to Fort Caroline and Mademoiselle! I was weak and could not bear to
think more. The horror of it overcame me! I rose to my feet and strode
up the beach like one distraught, breasting the flying sand and peering
fruitlessly through the mist, vainly searching for some familiar mark
to judge of our whereabouts. The motion of struggling against the
wind seemed to lessen the dreadful ferment of mind; and bare-handed
and worn as I was, no wish remained except only to press onward to
Mademoiselle, or learn that she was safe. Once above the roaring of
the storm I heard a sound like the cry of a woman and, with heart
a-leap started running with all my might. But it was only some shrill
creature which swirled near on the wind, uttering its storm-cry. On I
struggled, heat and fever making riot of thought, until I fell again
exhausted to the beach. I remember closing my eyes, but the eyeballs
swam in a red mist and burned so that I opened them again. Then I
seemed to sleep and dream. I saw dimly a woman seated at a table in
a room. Back of her and around her were many men in armor, and their
hands and faces were streaked with the red. It was Mademoiselle! By her
side, leaning forward toward her, was a man, his eyes swimming as he
gazed and his white teeth gleaming hatefully through his beard. He had
a mug upraised, from which the liquor was spilling about as he pledged
her, laughing coarsely the while. I could hear him too; for there was a
gruesome reality about it. The others watched amused. He reached toward
her, and I saw her shrink to a corner, away. He came again. She took
a dagger from her bosom. Then drew herself up cold, white, and set,
the weapon in both hands at her heart. No one moved. They stood, those
men in armor, their hands raised, like statues. There was silence,
deadly and oppressive; and I was dumb too and could make no sound. Then
everything grew red again and I saw no more. In my agony I dug my nails
deep into the sand and I cried aloud, calling to God. It was not so! It
could not be so! I was mad! Yes, yes,--I knew that I was mad, and that
comforted me.
By and by--it was a long while--for the clouds had broken and the light
of the sun had gone high in the heavens--I grew better and stronger
and got upon my feet. Cold and wet, the wind cut sharp as a knife,
but the fever had gone, and I laughed aloud to think of the fool I had
been. The situation was hopeless enough, but we were strong men, many
of us bearing weapons and armor, and much might be done. When the storm
abated the other ships would put in and take us aboard. All would yet
be well. Even if the ships did not come we would make a forced march
through the backwoods, persuading friendly Indians to guide and aid
us. We might not be far--perhaps only half a dozen leagues from Fort
Caroline.
I went back down the beach the wind at my back, warming with the new
impulse until I was soon running again. I found I had gone near a
league to the northward, and it was many minutes before I was back
among the company. They had moved behind the sand dunes the better to
find shelter from the wind. Fires had been kindled and around these
they huddled wretchedly, drying their clothing. There was nothing to
eat save a few biscuits which had been washed up in a cask, and these
were salt-soaked and unpleasing to the taste. Some of the men had gone
down the beach, where they found some ledges of moss and rock and
brought back a few shell-fish. These they ate raw from the shells; but
I was not hungry and they seemed unsightly to me, so I could find no
stomach for them.
When I came up La Caille, the sergeant-major, approached.
“Well, sir,” he asked, “what do you find? Is San Augustin to the north
or the south?”
“To the north, I should say. But there is nothing but sand and sea so
far as the eye can reach.” He turned to De Brésac gloomily and together
they walked in the direction from which I had come.
Admiral Ribault sat upon the sand, a rag binding his temples, his
head bent forward upon his breast, the very presentment of misery. I
went to him and tried to say a few words of good cheer. But a deep
melancholy had settled upon the man, and he looked down at the sand,
saying nothing. I could see that he was in no condition to speak upon
any subject. I felt, God knows, keen as he the desperate plight in
which we found ourselves. Yet, now that I had come to myself, I knew
that sighing would not mend the matter and so went among the officers
and cavaliers for counsel. These I found to be in as grievous a spirit
as their Admiral. Broken in spirit and sore in body, they felt horribly
the loneliness and the failure at the very beginning of a project into
which they had ventured all. By and by, Job Goddard and Salvation
Smith, who had gone down the beach on a voyage of discovery, returned
to the camp. They had come upon two Indians and learned that San
Augustin was fourteen leagues to the northward.
“I bade them stay with us for dinner to-day, Master Sydney,” said
Goddard, cheerfully, “but they had no stomach for truffles of
shell-fish and wet biscuit. The heathen scut! They fled to the woods as
though the fiend was after them. Salvation Smith fired at them with an
arquebus, but they vanished among the trees unscathed. Salvation has a
better knowledge of the pike than of the arquebus, sir.”
That apostle of the Martyrs stood by, looking ruefully at the weapon he
held in his hand.
“True, sir,” said he at last, “’tis a toy for women and lads. Give me a
pike or a shaft and a good yew-bow and I warrant our invitations will
not be so scorned another time.”
We were to the southward then! That was no pleasant information,
for Menendez lay between us and the River of May; and the Indians,
doubtless those of Outina, at war with the friendly Satouriona, would
lose no time in letting the Spaniards know of our whereabouts and
condition. Some of the gentlemen went into the forest, but came back
cut by the brambles, saying they saw no beasts nor food of any kind
and that they could not penetrate a rod into the thicket; we should
starve before receiving any aid from that quarter. Of one thing I was
soon convinced,--we could not lie long upon the beach our mouths agape
with hunger and thirst. And many more of us feeling the same cravings,
among them Bachasse, Arlac, De Brésac and La Caille,--late that night
we persuaded the Admiral to set out upon a march up the beach.
Many things save food had been brought upon the shore, among them two
trumpets, drums and two standards. And so at dawn of the next day
with waving banners and beating drums, with some show of gaiety and
a martial spirit--though famished--we set forth to the northward.
Ribault, who walked with the rear-guard, turned at the last to where
the timbers of the _Trinity_ were scattered down the shore as far as
the eye could reach. He had grown ten years older in the night and
walked with Bourdelais and the Sieur de la Notte, the mere shadow of
the man he had been at the Fort and upon the ship. By and by some of
the Huguenots set up a martial hymn, which all the gentlemen sang with
a fine good will and rhythm, keeping the cadence of the march. That
seemed to put new life into them. They were like children and, drawing
their swords, began looking to their weapons and jesting at the chances
of the good fight which might soon be. They manfully tightened their
girths to stay their hunger and each vied with the other in good humor
and courage. But in the afternoon one man, a great burly calker, threw
up his hands and then fell down dead. They said his heart had rotted.
It was a desperate expedition, and the reflection of the Admiral’s
melancholy, in spite of some flashes of good cheer, was seen in the
eyes of all who knew the obstacles before us. Any man with half a
seaman’s eye could tell that any storm that had wrecked the _Trinity_
could not fail to beach the other vessels; and few of us believed
that we would be saved by them. If we could but find a break in the
impenetrable forest and strike inland we might prey upon the Indians
and so by an easy detour at last reach the Fort. Perhaps Menendez had
put to sea again in the hope of finding us storm-beaten and unprepared
for battle. If he had done this we might come quickly upon his fort
at the lodge of Seloy, and by audacity and rapidity compass what mere
strength or force of numbers might not effect.
This was my hope, and the Admiral took great heart when it was
spoken to him. We would know upon the morrow. In the afternoon the
storm-clouds blew away and the wind went down. The ocean still lashed
the beach sullenly, but the horizon clouds to the eastward were tinged
with pink, and with the prospect of fair weather there was much
happiness. More shell-fish were found, the moisture of which cooled
the palate, though the taste was unpleasing, and the saltiness made
one long the more for fresh water and food. At about sunset we passed
around a point of land and abruptly came upon the timbers of a vessel.
The beams were split and the yellow of the splinters showed most
plainly that she had been recently wrecked. A bit of the stern piece of
a pinnace was found, which bore the name of the _Gloire_ and then we
knew that others of the French fleet shared our fate. In a little while
we made an abrupt turn and came upon more wreckage and a large party of
our shipwrecked comrades.
The worst that we had expected had happened. The French fleet was no
more! I glanced at Jean Ribault. His face was pale as death, and when
he saw these men before him his under-lip dropped and his mouth fell
open, his eyes expressing the bitterness of soul he could not contain.
He stopped short and let his head fall forward. His muscles loosened
and I thought he would have fallen. But at the touch of the Sieur de
la Notte at his elbow, he straightened again and casting his eyes
heavenward, said tremblingly, “The will of God be done!”
But all of Ribault’s officers were not discouraged. Indeed upon the
sight of so large a company many of the men and soldiers took great
heart again and cried joyously to one another. The men we had found
were sailors of the _Gloire_, who had elected to remain together upon
the beach, until sighted by some French ship while the main body of
their company had gone northward. Others were of the _Petit-Jean_
and of the _Jesus_, which had gone ashore leagues below. We numbered
now three hundred and fifty persons, and but for our hunger and the
smallness of the supply of powder and ball would have been a formidable
little army indeed. Captain Cosette of the _Gloire_, who was there,
embraced the Admiral with great joy, and Bourdelais commanded a halt,
for the men of the _Trinity_ were tired out. Many of them dropped
to the ground, and, forgetting their hunger and their thirst fell
mercifully into a deep sleep in which they were left to rest.
I seemed to have no further sensation--even of weariness. Quiet was
more irksome to me than aught else. I could not remain seated like the
others but must walk up and down upon the sand. And yet I was not in
a fever as before. It was easier for me to think thus upon my feet. I
felt myself most calm in mind and could not understand how it should
be so when every new discovery went to confirm the premonition of the
doom that had hung over us like a pall since that day--years ago it
seemed--when I had bade farewell to Mademoiselle upon the bastion at
Fort Caroline. It all came back upon me as some dream, the stifling
atmosphere, the ominous elements, the listlessness of all things human
and animate upon the earth, and the misery which took the joy from
those last words with my love. Then I thought of those red sunsets
upon the ocean, when we had sat upon the fore-castle laughing at our
ill omens and watched the great ball of fire drop down into the purple
mists of the hot western sea. Such a sun there was this night--I
mounted a sand hill that I might see it the better. A yellow mist rose
from a swamp somewhere inland and the disk grew to a greater size than
I had ever seen. Yet one could look at it squarely ere it had come to
the horizon, for it was not bright and seemed not to be shining at all;
only a great ball of blood poised in the air, which one might almost
reach out and pluck from the sky. Then it fell down behind a line of
barren pine trees at the horizon, which cut across it cold and clear as
prison bars,--and in a moment was gone.
When I went back the officers of the _Trinity_ and some of the other
gentlemen had lit a fire and sat in a circle upon the sand. A council
of war was held. The wilder blades were for pushing on at once.
Bourdelais stood up and on behalf of the Admiral, said he, “We must be
patient. To-morrow we will know something.”
“Bah!” said Arlac, angrily, “you speak of patience as though it were
water or sand or anything that is easy to have. What will you know
to-morrow? Sacré! Speak to us of food, if you please. Bigre! We’re
hungry I tell you.”
“Yes,” growled others, “we starve. Let us die fighting at any rate.”
Some of the more moderate wished to wait until the dawn, that the
men could sleep and so be fresh against any new adversity on the
morrow. Others were for a rest until midnight and then a quick march
to the mainland; for we did not doubt that we were on one of the many
promontories which in these parts jut up and down the coast for long
distances. For my part I asked nothing better than to move quickly, to
the northward, or westward or which ever way would bring us soonest
to our journey’s ending. So, at midnight we set forth again, the men
moving uncomplaining.
By four of the morning, it being still dark, those of the company who
were in advance came to a sudden halt. In a moment we were all at a
standstill, peering out into the darkness over a body of water. It
was a channel or sluice, through which the tide was running strongly
into the sea. The line of the beach took a turn sharply to the left
and follow it as we might there was no chance to gain our way to the
mainland.
Across the channel from time to time we fancied we could make out
the twinkling of lights, small like stars; but whether they were
glow-flies or lights of lanthorns or fires upon a distant beach we
could not discover. Men were at once set to work building large rafts
out of small trees, upon which when day dawned we might make our way
across this channel. Slowly the dawn came up out of the sea, and a
faint glow spread over the sky overhead, turning it to a color deep
and fathomless. One by one the lines of foam on the bar came out of
the darkness until the sea was dark against the lightening sky and
the stars grew fainter in the glow of coming day. It was cool and
frosty--the freshness of something new begun, and the dry grasses
behind us were trembling together in the morning breeze. Never did
the spur of new-born day find such ready response. For the blithe
Frenchmen, hungry as they were, answering readily to the crisp call
of the dawn, set about putting their weapons to rights and gathered
together in their companies in fine fettle.
By and by we could plainly see the low-lying beach of a shore not far
distant across the channel. We seemed on a kind of cape or sand-spit,
for the bay lay far around to the left and was lost in the angle of
the sand dunes. There were sand dunes there, across this channel, in
plenty too and bushes and hills higher than those we had passed. The
sergeant-major, La Caille, the Chevalier de Brésac, and Bachasse came
and stood by me, waiting until we could clearly make out the line of
the coast.
Presently, upon a hill, outlined clear against the sky, his arquebus
upon his shoulder and his breastpieces and helmet catching the first
glint of the morning light, a soldier appeared. I fancied that my mind
had played my eyes some trick. But the sergeant-major saw him at the
same time; and in a moment there followed two, three, five figures who
stood besides the first one pointing at us and waving their arms.
Were they friends or enemies--Protestants or Catholics? I strained my
eyes to find in their garb or manner some familiar sign.
We had not long to wait, for in a moment other soldiers appeared from
behind the hills and out on the air there floated the ominous standard
of Spain.