United States or Egypt ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The Mexican captain glanced, with some surprise, at the formidable array of men upon the deck of the Zanthe, and then, after a few words in Spanish to his boat's crew, followed the captain and mate into the cabin. Captain Morena was a very fine looking man of thirty, with magnificent hair and mustaches, and wore a very showy uniform.
A smoke by day and a fire by night, upon the shore, was the signal for the brig to approach and come to anchor. The Zanthe, as we before said, slowly worked her way to her anchorage. One by one, her white sails, on which the last flush of the sunset fires had just faded, were all furled, and, her anchors dropped, she swung round with the tide, and rode in safety.
One broadside from our starboard battery would settle him, and save all future trouble, and make every thing pleasant and comfortable on all sides." But Captain Morris would not listen to reason, and so the guns were secured, and the ports closed, and the little Zanthe went bounding on her course to Santa Rosara.
And Ranier answered, "No!" "Then," said Dyvorer, "it is a pity that you do not love the Princess Isauré." "Why?" inquired Ranier. "Because," replied Dyvorer, "the princess not only favors you, but, I think, from what my sister Zanthe has said, that the king has taken this mode of giving her to you at her instance."
Not to keep the reader any longer in suspense with regard to her character and purpose, we will inform him that the Zanthe was a smuggler, and for some years had been engaged in the illegal game of defrauding the revenue of the Mexican republic.
The Zanthe, for that was the name inscribed in gilt letters on her stern and sideboards, might have been a dangerous customer in a brush, for her armament consisted of ten brass eighteens, and her crew of sixty picked seamen an abundance of men to work the brig, and serve her batteries with satisfaction and credit.
The Zanthe spread her wings, and some days afterwards was crossing the equator. She was never known again as a free trader. The captain and mate had both "made their piles," and after arriving at the Atlantic states retired from sea.
Ranier knew that the Lady Zanthe was the favorite maiden of the princess, and, as we are easily persuaded in the way our inclinations run, he took heart and determined to act upon Dyvorer's counsel. About a week afterward, as the king was walking in the court-yard of his palace, as he did at times, he met with Ranier.
Suddenly rounding the headland on the north, a cutter, with the Mexican flag flying at her mizzen peak, and the muzzles of her guns gleaming through the port holes, came in view of the astonished mate. She stood into the bay, till within rifle shot of the bow of the Zanthe, when she dropped her sails and came to anchor.
Leaving only a boatkeeper in the barge, the Mexican officer, followed by his crew, sprang up the ladder, and bounding on deck, struck his drawn sword on the capstan, and announced the Zanthe as his prize. "To whom shall I have the honor of surrendering?" asked Captain Morris, touching his hat.
Word Of The Day