Her skipper, the Captain José Estremera was very unwilling to add to the number of his crew, lest provisions should run short, and flatly refused at first to haul up for the island, and take me off.
For two days he resisted all the entreaties of Hislop and others, till the former found one ally in a Portuguese friar, who was returning from his mission in Java, and another in a wealthy Dutch passenger.
Fra Anselmo held the terrors of Pandemonium before the capitano, and the Dutch planter held a handful of guilders, so the yards were trimmed anew, the charts were consulted carefully, and in two days more the look-out man in the fore-cross-trees of the San Ildefonso sighted the great mountain of the island.
Hislop had many doubts whether he would find me alive, fearing that I might perish of hunger, of despair, or by the hand of the Cubano.
Just as he concluded his narrative, I found myself under the towering side of the Spanish merchant-ship.
She had a long flush deck: was pierced for and carried twelve brass nine-pounders, and had top-gallant bulwarks aft. Over these and along her side was a row of faces, surveying us in the moonlight with expressions of wonder and interest.
I sprang up the rope-ladder, and on reaching the deck my hands were caught and shaken by Ned Carlton, old Probart, Burnet the cook, Boy Bill, and others of our crew, who all expressed in various fashions, but chiefly by swearing at themselves, their contrition for having so selfishly abandoned me; but that was all over now, and I desired them to forget it.
Antonio was next hoisted on board. His appearance and his wounds excited great astonishment; and now, surrounded by a crowd of dark and grim-looking Spanish seamen, and darker leathery-visaged Lascars, we were conducted aft to the quarter-deck, where Captain José Estremera awaited us, together with a number of passengers, whose curiosity was excited by the whole affair.