Page images
PDF
EPUB

presently knew that it was the river, crimson from the sunset. A minute more and I stood upon the shore of the mighty stream, between the two brightnesses of flood and heavens. There was a silver crescent in the sky 5 with one white star above it, and fair in sight, down the James, with lights springing up through the twilight, was the town, the English town that we had built and named for our King, and had held in the teeth of Spain, in the teeth of the wilderness and its terrors. It was not 10 a mile away, a little longer and I could rest with my tidings told.

[ocr errors]

The torches were lighted, and the folk were indoors, for the night was cold. One or two figures that I met or passed would have accosted me, not knowing who I was, 15 but I brushed by them and hastened on.

The Governor's door was open, and in the hall serving men were moving to and fro. I passed them without a word and went on to the Governor's great room. The door was ajar, and I pushed it open and stood for a min20 ute upon the threshold, unobserved by the occupants of the room.

After the darkness outside the lights dazzled me; the room, too, seemed crowded with men, though when I counted them there were not so many, after all. Supper 25 had been put upon the table, but they were not eating. Before the fire, his head thoughtfully bent, and his fingers

e

f

tapping against the arm of his chair, sat the Governor. And Rolfe was there, walking up and down with hasty steps, and a flushed and haggard face. His suit of buff was torn and stained, and his great-boots were spattered with mud.

The Governor let his fingers rest upon the arm of his chair, and raised his head.

5

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

no other conclusion. We mourn with you, sir."

I came forward to the table, and leaned my weight 10 upon it, for all the waves of the sea were roaring in my ears, and the lights were going up and down.

"Are you man or spirit?" cried Rolfe through white lips. "Are you Ralph Percy?"

"Yes, I am Percy," I said. "I have not well understood what quest you would go upon, Rolfe, but you cannot go to-night. And those parties that Your Honor talked of, that have gone with Indians to guide them to 5 look for some lost person, I think that you will never see them again."

With an effort I drew myself erect, and standing so told my tidings, quietly and with circumstance, so as to leave no room for doubt as to their verity or as to the 10 sanity of him who brought them. They listened, as the warder had listened, with shaking limbs and gasping breath; for this was the fall and wiping out of a people of which I brought warning.

When all was told, and they stood there before me, 15 white and shaken, seeking in their minds the thing to do or say first, I thought to ask a question myself; but before my tongue could frame it, the roaring of the sea became so loud that I could hear naught else, and the lights all ran together in a wheel of fire. Then in a moment all 20 sounds ceased, and to the lights succeeded the blackness of outer darkness.

Abridged.

detour': a roundabout way. - ab'atis: a defense formed by felled trees. -Pocahon'tas: an Indian girl who was of great assistance to the early settlers in Virginia. — Nautau'quas: a chief of the Powhatans and brother of Pocahontas. - Rolfe: an English gentleman who married Pocahontas. She died in England previous to the opening of this story.-buff: yellow

leather.

WALTER RALEIGH

DONALD G. MITCHELL

There are only too many at the king's elbow who are jealous of the grave and courtly gentleman, now just turned of fifty, who has packed into those years so much of high adventure; who has written brave poems; who has fought gallantly and on many fields; who has voyaged widely in 5 southern and western seas; who was a favorite of the great queen; and whose fine speech, and lordly bearing, and princely dress made him envied everywhere and hated by less successful courtiers. Possibly, too, Raleigh had made unsafe speeches about the chances of other succession 10 to the throne. Surely he who wore his heart upon his sleeve, and loved brave deeds, could have no admiration for the poltroon of a king who had gone a-hunting when the stains upon the scaffold on which his mother suffered were hardly dry.

15

So it happened that Sir Walter Raleigh was accused of conspiring for the dethronement of the new king and was brought to trial. The street people jeered at him as he passed, for he was not popular; he had borne himself so proudly with his exploits, and gold, and his eagle eye. But 20 he made so noble a defense, so full, so clear, so eloquent, so impassioned, that the same street people cheered him as he passed out of court-but not to freedom. The

[ocr errors]

sentence was death; the king, however, feared to put it to immediate execution. Raleigh went to the Tower, where for thirteen years he lay a prisoner.

At the end of that time, the king's exchequer being low 5 (as it nearly always was), and there being rumors afloat of possible gold findings in Guiana, the old knight, now in his sixty-seventh year, felt the spirit of adventure stirred in him by the west wind that crept through the gratings of his prison, bringing tropical odors; and he volunteered 10 to equip a fleet in company with friends, and with the

king's permission to go in quest of mines, to which he believed, or professed to believe, he had the clew. The permission was reluctantly granted; and poor Lady Raleigh sold her estate as well as their beloved country home, to 15 vest in the new enterprise.

But the fates were against it: winds blew the ships astray; tempests beat upon them; mutinies threatened; and in Guiana, at last, there came disastrous fights with the Spaniards. Raleigh's own son is sacrificed, and the 20 crippled squadron sets out homeward, with no gold, and shattered ships, and maddened crews. Storm overtakes them; there is mutiny; there is wreck; only a few forlorn and battered hulks bring back this disheartened knight.

He lands in his old home of Devon, is warned to flee 25 the wrath that will fall upon him in London; but as of old he lifts his gray head proudly and pushes for the capital to meet his accusers. He is seized, imprisoned, and

« PreviousContinue »