But, near as that ridge looked from their mid-day camping-place, it was not reached until the evening of the fifth day of their march; and then, after toiling up a steep slope for half an hour, the party topped it, and a sudden shout of exultation burst from their throats as, standing in a little glade, they looked out over the tree-tops of the intervening forest and saw first another but much lower ridge, with a mountain valley between it and them, and beyond that ridge, and only some ten miles distant, the white towers and buildings of Panama nestling beside a river which discharged into its harbour, the harbour itself dotted with a few ships, and beyond it again the great, boundless, mystic Southern Sea, at the sight of which George and his crew, like the pious Christian mariners that they were, incontinently fell upon their knees and gave God thanks, vowing at the same time that by His grace they would sail those waters until they had recovered the lost ones of whom they were in search—or had fearfully avenged their death.
And now it became necessary to exercise the most extreme caution, for, so far as was known, there were no Indians within twenty miles of Panama, save a few “tame” ones who had been permitted to establish themselves within some four miles of the city, and who made a living by growing vegetables and fruit and rearing poultry for the Panama market; the country all round about within a radius of a dozen miles or so had therefore come to be regarded as practically as safe as the streets of the city itself, and hawking parties were of frequent occurrence among the magnates of Panama. And to encounter one of these parties would be to inevitably give the alarm to the citizens, which, strong as the English felt themselves to be, was a consummation to be carefully avoided; wherefore, having gazed their fill upon the glorious prospect before them, the party retired along the way by which they had come, until they reached a spot where they had already decided to camp; and there they spent the night. The journey down into the plain was accomplished on the following day with the utmost circumspection, not only because every step which they now took led to the danger of detection by some party of sportsmen, or solitary fowler, but also because the “tame” Indians had to be reckoned with; and it was known that these were in the habit of wandering far up the slopes of the Cordilleras in search of game and of the fruit that grew wild in rich abundance in certain of the woods. Moreover, the time had now arrived when a definite plan of action of some sort must be determined upon, since this would largely influence the manner of their approach to the city and their subsequent actions. Therefore as soon as the party had once more topped the ridge upon which they had stood entranced for half an hour during the previous evening young Saint Leger called a halt and, flinging himself down upon the grass, produced his perspective glass—or telescope, as we now call the much improved instrument—and with its assistance subjected the town and roadstead to a prolonged and careful examination. The result of this examination, and of a conference with his officers which was simultaneously conducted, was that the resolution was made to capture a certain caravel which was seen to be riding at anchor in the roadstead and which appeared to be the best suited to their requirements of any of the ships then in sight; and, having secured possession of her, to threaten the town with destruction by her guns until all the information required from the Governor had been abstracted from him; after which the only thing remaining to be done would be to sail in search of the galleys containing the English prisoners, and capture them when found. It was an audacious scheme, for Panama was the biggest and most important city on the continent at that time, and, apart from the question of soldiers, the citizens alone if they chose to arm themselves and fight were sufficiently numerous to overwhelm the English; but George had by that time learned to gauge the courage of the American Spaniard pretty accurately, and he felt that the undertaking which he had planned, although difficult, was by no means beyond his power to accomplish.
Chapter Sixteen.
How they took the great galleon.
In order to obtain possession of the caravel which George had marked down as his prey, boats were necessary, since the vessel lay at anchor in the roadstead, instead of alongside the wharf; and to obtain boats it would be necessary to enter the city. But Panama, like Nombre and San Juan, and indeed all the Spanish settlements in America, was fortified on the landward side as a protection against the incursions of the savages who, gentle enough when the white man first came among them, soon had their most ferocious and bloodthirsty instincts fully aroused by the heartless cruelty and treachery with which the Spaniards quickly began to treat them; to enter the city from its landward side was therefore impossible for the English without at once betraying themselves and something of their purpose. The only alternative, therefore, was to gain an entrance from the water; and the problem was how to do this without betraying themselves and putting the inhabitants on their guard.
At first the difficulty seemed to be insurmountable, but George Saint Leger was one of those who refuse to acknowledge anything as impossible; and at length, when the party had halted at mid-day behind the very last screen of timber between them and the city, he believed he had discovered the answer to his problem.
It has been said that Panama stood not only on the shore of the ocean but also on the left bank of a small stream which, taking its rise somewhere among the adjacent mountains, discharged itself into the waters of the harbour, and when once it had come to be recognised that the approach of the party must be made by water, it was upon this stream that George concentrated his attention. It was but an insignificant affair as to width, and to all appearance shallow, but just before it reached the city it widened out to about sixty yards across; and while the young captain was studying it through his perspective glass, during the mid-day halt, he perceived a few boats and canoes plying hither and thither upon that portion of it which flowed past the town. Also, while he was watching, his attention was attracted to two figures in the plain below; and by bringing his glass to bear upon them he was able to distinguish that the leading figure was a Spaniard carrying what appeared to be a hawk upon his wrist, while the individual who followed him was either an Indian or a negro, he could not distinguish which, but he saw that this person was carrying something suspended from a pole over his shoulder, which looked like and doubtless was a bunch of dead birds. The pair walked straight to the margin of the stream, about three-quarters of a mile above the city, the stream being at that point about twenty yards wide, and when the Spaniard reached the margin he halted, turned and said something to his follower, at the same time pointing to the ground, whereupon the black carefully deposited the pole and its burden upon the ground, then stooped low, and allowed the Spaniard to seat himself astride upon his shoulders. Then, rising to his feet with his burden, the black stepped into the stream, waded across, deposited the Spaniard upon the bank, and, as the latter strode off towards the town, returned, picked up his load, waded across again, and followed the footsteps of his master. Now, there was nothing very remarkable about this, but there were two points connected with it which attracted George’s notice, one of them being that when the black stepped into the stream with his master upon his shoulders, a single stride sufficed to carry him into water deep enough to submerge him to his waist, and that depth was maintained all the way across until within about two yards of the bank. The other point which George considered worthy of note was that about a hundred yards below the point where those two persons had crossed the stream, there grew a clump of bamboos sufficiently large to screen the entire party from observation, if they could reach it undetected by people in the town. He called Lukabela to him, told him what he had seen, explained the scheme that had developed in his mind while watching the passage of the two men across the stream, and finally indicated the clump of bamboo, asking whether there was any possibility of reaching it after dark without being detected. The Cimarrone thereupon studied the features of the country below and around him long and intently, and at length answered in the affirmative, pointing out the route which it would be necessary to follow, and then, after a little further pregnant conversation, the two rose and returned to where the rest of the party lay perdu.
In conversation with Lukabela, George had already learned from the Cimarrone that, from information derived by the latter from certain runaway slaves, the citizens of Panama were somewhat addicted to the keeping of late hours, as late hours were counted in those days, that is to say, the more gay and pleasure-loving of the Panamans rarely thought of seeking their couches before midnight; Saint Leger, therefore, determined to remain where he was until that hour in order that his arrival in the city might be deferred until its roysterers were all safely in bed and asleep; also, there was in all probability a somewhat strenuous time before the Englishmen, and some unlikelihood as to when they might reckon upon another night’s undisturbed rest; upon his return to camp, therefore, George issued an order that every man was to compose himself to rest and get as much sleep as possible, the only breaks in these periods of rest being at the appointed meal times. But the young captain had by this time become wise in the art of warfare, consequently he took the precaution to protect his camp from surprise by throwing out strong pickets of Cimarrones in every direction from which surprise could possibly come; and, this done, the expedition composed itself to rest.