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Updated: June 16, 2025
"No," said Carera, after a long look in the direction indicated, "I don't see anything of him; where is " "There he is; I see him!" exclaimed one of the men. "Ah! now he is gone again, settled into the trough. Look a bit further out in that direction, captain there he is again; Madre de Dios, what a monster! don't you see him?"
He will waste no more powder and shot upon us," exclaimed Courtenay; and sure enough on looking astern I saw two boats just dropping into the water. "We must give up we must give up," cried our crew as they saw this; and leaving their sweeps they came aft in a body with the request that Carera would hoist the Spanish ensign and haul it down again in token of our surrender.
Carera, the honest and faithful, therefore proposes to become virtuous. He has, doubtless, of late experienced certain qualms of conscience respecting the trade he is at present engaged in, and he has made up his mind to abandon it.
Being, moreover, a stranger, you are a marked man. It is not everybody who, like the commandant of La Guayra, will believe that you are travelling for your own pleasure. What man in his senses would choose a time like this for a scientific ramble in Venezuela?" And then Señor Carera explained that he could arrange for me to leave Caracas almost immediately, under excellent guidance.
The four men constituting the watch stepped as quietly as possible into the boat, and, followed by Carera, took their places at the oar; Carera standing up in the stern-sheets to look out for the quarry and to direct his men how to pull.
Courtenay and I were in our berths and asleep at the moment; but the cry of "Land ho!" at once aroused us, and, slipping on our clothes, we hurried on deck to see what it looked like. We found Carera there, staring in the utmost perplexity at the small grey shape only discernible when the felucca rose on the crest of a sea and audibly wondering what on earth it could be.
These cays lie so thickly scattered along the coast, and are so close to each other, that they afford innumerable places of shelter with snug anchorage for small craft; whilst, from the fact that they are all situated well within the outer limit of the shoal, they are unapproachable except by vessels of exceedingly light draught; I was therefore not at all surprised to learn from Carera that they were infested by a perfect nest of pirates, who, in feluccas and schooners of great speed and shallow draught of water, were wont to sally forth for a few days' cruise in the Gulf of Florida, or among the Bahamas, to prey upon the shipping bound into and out of the Gulf of Mexico; returning to their depots after every successful raid, and landing their booty there, so that, in the event of their encountering a man-of-war, nothing of an incriminating character might be found on board them.
You will find provisions in the tub and fresh water in the keg, which we have dropped overboard. And now, adieu! we wish you a pleasant passage." Carera and his comrades seemed to take in my meaning even before I had finished speaking, for, with a whole torrent of sonorous Spanish maledictions, they once more dashed their oars into the water and made for the felucca.
Carera, in his perplexity, went aloft as far as our stumpy mast-head a thing we had never known him do before to get a clearer view of the land, the bearings of which were then taken, after which our skipper, accompanied by Courtenay and me, descended to the cabin to consult the chart.
To this arrangement we had no objection whatever to make, as Carera assured us there was nothing in the least likely to interest us on shore nothing whatever, in fact, that we could not just as well see from the felucca's deck with the aid of a telescope.
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