“Ah, that I can’t tell,” says he. “I can scarce believe now that the devil raised ’em up, for to punish us for our false news, but that was the thought in my mind, seeing ’em at first. Howsoever it be, they took back their captain, that, as I heard from the skipper of the Dutch ship, was prisoned only in a block-house by the river, and I don’t know whether they have the more reason to thank us, or we them, for their coming. Yet tis now my belief that those tales of the Indians concerning spies and suchlike were true, and that the Morattys was hid in the plantations (it being a feast-day, and no work done), with the intent to fall upon the city that night, but that our men’s coming and crying disturbed ’em and made ’em see they were as well make what they might from the tumult. But I tell you, Master Ned, when I found they was truly there, you might have knocked me down with a feather, so astonished was I to behold ’em.”
“ ’Twas a mighty strange escape,” says I.
“Ay,” says he, “and a doubly lucky one, since it gives me your company, sir, on my voyage. And this I may say, that you need not to grieve over the interruption to your sojourning in Goa, for I can speak the Portuguese as well as most men, and you should by rights have learned something on’t during these three years, so that we will speak it together, if you so desire it. And moreover, sir, in so far as I have any skill, whether in matters touching cargoes and merchandises, or in things pertaining to the sea and the winds and the sailing of a ship, ’tis all at your service, and I shall account it an honour to impart to you of the same. And so long as it shall please you to abide on board of my ship, so long shall it please me if you will mess with me and share the cabin, and there must be no word said of passage-money, for the favour of your company answers that.”
I could not make a fitting answer to an offer made with so much delicacy and kindness, but I grasped my good friend by the hand, assuring him that I counted myself only too highly favoured, that I should enjoy the happiness of a voyage with him, and begged of him to teach me whatsoever he knew. And this pleasing him, as I was well assured it should (for I never met a seaman yet that did not love to teach others out of his own skill and experience), we agreed that I should be considered as supercargo, and I was thus entered on the ship’s books, instead of in the name of Samuel Needham of Deptford. And ’twas thus that I embarked upon a voyage that bid fair to be one of the happiest times of my life, but yet led me into grievous sorrow and peril, by the will of God, and as I cannot but think, by the hard disposition of man as well. But that you may understand my meaning in saying this, I must needs explain myself.
For there was on board of the Boscobel a seaman named Darrell, an ancient person, and one that had travelled in many seas and was much looked up to by Captain Freeman and the rest. And this man I was wont to hear arguing and exhorting his fellows with great diligence, but what he said to ’em I never troubled myself to learn, thinking that he was but declaring to them the perils and dangers through which he had passed in his many voyages. But one day, coming near where Darrell was discoursing to the rest, I saw that he had a great Bible upon his knee, and listening, heard him as it were preaching. Now this in itself stirred my mind, but when I heard his words, I began to be very wrathful. For the fellow was speaking most boldly and naughtily against his majesty the king and all his court, and declaring that such a sink of iniquity had ought to be swept away from off the face of the earth, and that before God should destroy the whole nation by reason on’t. And this I could by no means stomach, that a mean person of this sort should set up himself as a judge over the king and the nobility, and stepping before him, I bade him speak to his fellows of their own sins, but to leave his majesty’s alone.
“Ay so,” saith he, regarding me sternly, “that is what you and your like are alway wont to say, Master Carlyon. Prophesy unto us smooth things, say naught, though vice sit in high places, and Popery go unrebuked, yea, encouraged. But shall we say naught? shall we hold our peace? Han’t this keeping silence brought upon us already two of the Lord’s sore judgments, namely, the sword of the Dutch and the pestilence? and shall the other two on ’em be long delayed? Nay, sir, for so long as life be in me will I be among those that sigh and that cry for the abominations that are done in the land, until the Lord come to our help and drive out from before us that evil family once more and for ever.”
“Do you dare speak thus of your king’s house?” asked I.
“I do, sir, even of that wicked and bloody house of Stewart,[80] that is drunk with the blood of the saints and of the martyrs of Jesus. ’Twas an evil day when it returned among us, and God send that it may soon leave us again.”
“Are you so bold as to desire another rebellion?” I cried.
“Is rebellion worse than all that passes in England now?” asked he.