"'LISBON, 10th March, 1808.
"'DEAR CAPTAIN BRAND,—I am about to quit this place for the East in a few days, and shall probably never see you again. Pray accept the accompanying case of jewels as a small token of the love and esteem in which you are held by a heart-broken father. I feel assured that if it had been in the power of man to have saved my drowning child your gallant efforts would have been successful. It was ordained otherwise; and I now pray that I may be enabled to say "God's will be done". But I cannot bear the sight of these ornaments. I have no relatives—none at least who deserve them half so well as yourself. Do not pain me by refusing them. They may be of use to you if you are ever in want of money, being worth, I believe, between three and four hundred pounds. Of course, you cannot misunderstand my motive in mentioning this. No amount of money could in any measure represent the gratitude I owe to the man who risked his life to save my child. May God bless you, sir."
The letter ended thus, without signature; and the captain ceased to read aloud. But there was an addition to the letter written in pencil, in the hand of the late Captain Brand, which neither he nor Minnie had yet found courage to read to the poor widow. It ran thus:—
"Our doom is sealed. My schooner is on the Bell Rock. It is blowing a gale from N.E., and she is going to pieces fast. We are all standing under the lee of a ledge of rock—six of us. In half an hour the tide will be roaring over the spot. God in Christ help us! It is an awful end. If this letter and box is ever found, I ask the finder to send it, with my blessing, to Mrs. Brand, my beloved wife, in Arbroath."
The writing was tremulous, and the paper bore the marks of having been soiled with seaweed. It was unsigned. The writer had evidently been obliged to close it hastily.
After reading this in silence the captain refolded the letter.
"No wonder, Minnie, that Swankie did not dare to offer such things for sale. He would certainly have been found out. Wasn't it lucky that we heard him tell Spink the spot under his floor where he had hidden them?"
At that moment there came a low knock to the door. Minnie opened it, and admitted Davy Spink, who stood in the middle of the room twitching his cap nervously, and glancing uneasily from one to another of the party.
"Hallo, Spink!" cried the captain, pushing his spectacles up on his forehead, and gazing at the fisherman in surprise, "you don't seem to be quite easy in your mind. Hope your fortunes have not sprung a leak!"
"Weel, Captain Ogilvy, they just have; gone to the bottom, I might a'most say. I've come to tell ye—that—the fact is, that the press-gang have catched us at last, and ta'en awa' my mate, Jock Swankie, better kenn'd as Big Swankie."