Sanders then began speaking again, and told me how that the Pope had blessed the expedition, and had given both men and money, and would send more ere long. Next he took me to see a splendid banner, all blue and gold, with the figure of our Lord upon it, which he had received from Rome.
“This will march with our hosts,” cried he, “and lead us on to victory!”
Now, with the priests and the mysteries of religion I have never had much to do, and while the spirit of the man was in itself a beautiful thing, and the banner, too, a thing beautiful to behold, yet I could not forbear from thinking that fighting men were what we most stood in need of, and that four hundred soldiers, however brave they were, even added to our own, were far from being sufficient to drive the English out of Ireland. For I knew the English by this time, and that they were no mean foes.
And when I said what was in my mind to Fitzmaurice, who I was sure would agree with me, he replied that I must remember that the force he had with him was but the advance guard of a great army, which, even at that very instant, might be already on its way to our coasts. So I took fresh courage, and hoped for the best.
After we had had a long conversation I said that my present business was to see his ships safe into the harbour of Dingle, or into any other haven which might be selected in Kerry, and as de Ricaldo’s vessel was not at Dingle, I purposed, if it was agreeable to him, to go on ahead in my galley and show him the way, as it were, to the place. To this he assented, and I went back to The Cross of Blood. We made Dingle soon thereafter, and I could see that Fitzmaurice and Sanders immediately got ready to land.
There had already gathered upon the shore a crowd of the Irish belonging to that part of Kerry. Partly, I imagine, to impress them, and partly because of the nature of the occasion itself, Fitzmaurice and Sanders had deemed that their landing afforded a fit opportunity for no little display. They had therefore arranged a sort of procession, and I watched it, as it moved along, with keen interest; nor was I cold and stolid myself at the sight of the joy of the country people, who received it on shore with loud shoutings and a tumult of cheers.
Two friars, chanting a psalm, stepped first on shore; behind them came a bishop, clad in the robes of his sacred office, with a mitre on his head and a pastoral staff in his left hand. His right hand was raised solemnly invoking a blessing on the land, and his lips moved as if in prayer, while the Irish knelt upon the shore as his feet touched the ground.
Then came Father Sanders, the banner which the Pope had consecrated waving above him, and, immediately after him, Fitzmaurice and those of knightly rank—gallant, mailed, long-sworded gentlemen every one! And now the foot-soldiers, each in a company under its own captain, streamed from the ships—making altogether a brave show.
As soon as a camping place for the night had been chosen, Fitzmaurice appeared at the side of my galley, and, having come on board, said that the harbour of Dingle from its shape—the mouth of the bay being narrow—was one from which it would be difficult to escape in an extremity, and asked me to suggest another.
Whereupon I replied that the haven of Smerwick, four miles to the north across the tongue of land where we now were, would be more to his mind. And thither the next day Fitzmaurice marched his troops; the ships were brought round, and, all his stores having been fetched ashore, he at once set his men to work, making a trench and fortifying the place.