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Great was the astonishment of the mariners when they found that the true day, with those who had remained on shore, was Monday the 26th, they not being aware that they had lost a day by the course they had steered, following the sun, and thereby gaining on him.
But before the departure the travellers had offered sacrifices to the foam-born Cyprian Aphrodite and the Dioscuri, the protectors of mariners, and the conversation took the gayest turn. In the harbour of the neighbouring seaport Tanis they went aboard of the commandant's state galley, one of the largest and finest in the royal fleet, where a banquet awaited them.
But a ship protected by a few weather-worn and stranded mariners, and a ship defended by a strong and an armed party, like that headed by Captain Truck, presented very different objects to the cupidity of these barbarians. They knew the great advantage they possessed by being on their own ground, and were content to await events, in preference to risking a doubtful contest.
Strong intuitions of the man assure the mariners he can be no innocent. In their gamesome but still serious way, one whispers to the other "Jack, he's robbed a widow;" or, "Joe, do you mark him; he's a bigamist;" or, "Harry lad, I guess he's the adulterer that broke jail in old Gomorrah, or belike, one of the missing murderers from Sodom."
What happiness there is in a dish of polenta, or of a few fried fish, in a cup of coffee, and in one of those apologies for cigars which the government furnishes, dear at a cent the cigar with a straw in it, as if it were a julep, which it needs five minutes to ignite, and then will furnish occupation for a whole evening! Is it a hard lot, that of the fishermen and the mariners of the Adriatic?
Before leaving the islands Gates caused a cross to be made of the wood saved from the wreck of his ship, which he secured to a large cedar; a silver coin with the king's head was placed in the middle of it, together with an inscription on a copper plate describing what had happened That the cross was the remains of a ship of three hundred tons, called the Sea Venture, bound with eight more to Virginia; that she contained two knights, Sir Thomas Gates, governor of the colony, and Sir George Summers, admiral of the seas, who, together with her captain, Christopher Newport, and one hundred and fifty mariners and passengers besides, had got safe ashore, when she was lost, July 28, 1609.
What man can say who gets into the cabin, when an unknown name stands first in the shipping list of a vessel?" "The stranger is shut in by a cloud!" exclaimed one of the mariners, who, while he listened to the philosophy of his officer, still kept an eye riveted on the mysterious object to leeward. "Ay, ay; it would occasion no surprise to see that craft steering into the moon!
The Burling light is not a very big one not so big, some mariners think, as it should be. It is visible twenty-five miles away; but Luke's knowledge told him that in thick and misty weather, such as hovers over this coast in a westerly wind, the glare of the revolving lamp could not be distinguished at a greater distance than ten or twelve miles.
It was a small peripatetic republic of merchants and mariners, evolved out of the mother republic which had at last established its position among the powers of Christendom and it was to begin its career full grown and in full armour. The States-General were to furnish the company at starting with one million of florins and with twenty ships of war. The company was to add twenty other ships.
Then there appeared a stir among the foretop-men and on the forecastle, where a rope was rove at the fore-yard-arm, and a grating was rigged for a platform unerring signs of the approaching execution. Accustomed as these hardy mariners were to brave dangers of all sorts, and to witness human suffering of nearly every degree, a feeling of singular humanity had come over the whole crew.
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