“Ah! you stay with Iracana, and much love Iracana, and you have all these people. They will plant for you many fields of corn; you shall no more want; and we will dance when the evening comes, and we shall be so happy, Aphon and Iracana, to live together; Aphon the great Paracoussi, and Iracana to be Queen no more.”
It was not easy to resist these pleadings. But time pressed. Captain La Vasseur was growing impatient. The search after Louis Bourdon was abandoned, and the soldiers were again ordered on board. The anxieties of La Vasseur being now awakened, lest others of his people should be spirited away. Of this the danger was considerable. The Frenchman was a more flexible being than either the Englishman or Spaniard. It was much easier for him to assimilate with the simple Indian; and our Huguenot soldiers, who had very much forgotten their religion in their diseased thirst after gold, now, in the disappointment of the one appetite were not indifferent to the consolations afforded by a life of ease and sport, and the charms which addressed them in forms so persuasive as those of the damsels of Iracana. La Vasseur began to tremble for his command, as he beheld the reluctance of his soldiers to depart. He gave the signal hurriedly to Alphonso D’Erlach, and with another sweet single pressure of the hand, he left the lovely Queen to her own melancholy musings. She followed with her eyes the departing boats till they were clean gone from sight, then buried herself in the deepest thickets where she might weep in security.
Other eyes than hers pursued the retiring barks of the Frenchmen, with quite as much anxiety; and long after she had ceased to see them. On a little headland jutting out upon the river below, in the shade of innumerable vines and flowers, crouching in suspense, was the renegade, Louis Bourdon. By his side sat the dusky damsel who had beguiled him from his duties. While his comrades danced, he was flying through the thickets. The nation were, many of them, conscious of his flight; but they held his offence to be venial, and they encouraged him to proceed. They lent him help in crossing the river, at a point below; the father of the woman with whom he fled providing the canoe with which to transport him beyond the danger of pursuit. Little did our Frenchmen, as the boats descended, dream who watched them from the headland beneath which they passed. Many were the doubts, frequent the changes, in the feelings of the capricious renegade, as he saw his countrymen approaching him, and felt that he might soon be separated from them and home forever, by the ocean walls of the Atlantic. Whether it was that his Indian beauty detected in his face the fluctuations of his thoughts, and feared that, on the near approach of the boats, he would change his purpose and abandon her for his people, cannot be said; but just then she wound herself about within his arms, and looked up in his face, while her falling hair enmeshed his hands, and contributed, perhaps, still more firmly to ensnare his affections. His heart had been in his mouth; he could scarcely have kept from crying out to his comrades as the boats drew nigh to the cliff; but the dusky beauties beneath his gaze, the soft and delicate form within his embrace, silenced all the rising sympathies of brotherhood in more ravishing emotions. In a moment their boats had gone by; in a little while they had disappeared from sight, and the arms of the Indian woman, wrapped about her captive, declared her delight and rapture in the triumph which she now regarded as secure. Louis Bourdon little knew how much he had escaped, in thus becoming a dweller in the Floridian Eden.
[XXI.]
HISTORICAL SUMMARY.
The glowing accounts of the delights of the Floridian Eden which were brought by our returning voyagers, were not sufficient to persuade the garrison to forego their anxious desire to return to France. The home-sickness under which they labored had now reached such a height as to suffer no appeal or opposition. Nothing but the stern decree of authority could have silenced the discontents; and the authority lay neither in the will nor in the numbers under the control of Laudonniere. To such a degree of impatience had this passion for their European homes arisen, that, when it was found that the building of the vessel for their deportation would be delayed beyond the designated period, in consequence of the death, in battle with the savages, of two of the carpenters, the multitude rose in mutiny setting upon Jean de Hais, the master-carpenter,—who had innocently declared the impossibility of doing the work within the given time,—with such ferocity, as to make it scarcely possible to save his life. With this spirit prevailing among his garrison, Laudonniere was compelled to abandon the idea, altogether, of building the ship; and to address all his energies to the repair, for the desired purpose, of the old brigantine, which had been brought back to La Caroline, by the returning pirates. To work, with this object, all parties were now set with the utmost expedition. The houses which had been built without the fort were torn down, in order that the timber should be converted into coal for the uses of the forge; this being a labor much easier than that of using the axe upon the trees of the forest. The palisade which conducted from the fort to the river was torn down also by the soldiery, for the same purpose, in spite of the objections of Laudonniere. It was their policy to make their determination to depart inevitable, by rendering the place no longer habitable. The fort, itself, it was determined to destroy, when they were ready to sail, “lest some new-come guest should have enjoyed and possessed it.” Our Frenchmen were very jealous of the designs of the English queen. They well knew that the haughty and courageous Elizabeth was meditating a British settlement in the New World; and though, after their own voluntary abandonment of the country, they had no right to complain that another should occupy the waste places, yet their jealousy was too greatly that of the dog in the manger, to behold, with pleased eye, the possession by another of the things which they themselves had been unable to enjoy. “In the meanwhile,” says Laudonniere—seeking to excuse his own unwise management and feeble policy—“In the meanwhile, there was none of us to whome it was not an extreme griefe to leave a country wherein wee had endured so greate travailes and necessities, to discover that which wee must forsake through our owne countrymen’s default. For if wee had beene succoured in time and place, and according to the promise that was made unto us, the war which was between us and Utina had not fallen out, neither should wee have had occasion to offend the Indians, which, with all paines in the world, I entertained in good amitie, as well with merchandize and apparel, as with promise of greater matters; and with whome I so behaved myself, that although sometimes I was constrained to take victuals in some few villages, yet I lost not the alliance of eight kings and lords, my neighbours, which continually succoured and ayded me with whatever they were able to afford. Yea, this was the principal scope of all my purposes, to winne and entertaine them, knowing how greatly their amitie might advance our enterprise, and principally while I discovered the commodities of the country, and sought to strengthen myself therein. I leave it to your cogitation to think how neare it went to our hearts to leave a place abounding in riches (as we were thoroughly enformed thereof) in coming whereunto, and doing service unto our prince, we lefte our owne countrey, wives, children, parents and friends, and passed the perils of the sea, and were therein arrived as in a plentiful treasure of all our heart’s desire.”
It was while distressing himself with these cogitations that Laudonniere, on the 3d of August, 1565, took a walk, “as was his custom of an afternoon,” to the top of a little eminence, in the neighborhood of the fort, which afforded a distant prospect of the sea. Here, looking forth with yearning to that watery waste which he was preparing to traverse, he was suddenly excited, as he beheld four sail of approaching vessels. At first, the tidings made the soldiers of the garrison to leap for joy. The vessels were naturally supposed to be those of their own countrymen; and such was the gladness inspired by this supposition, that “one would have thought them to be out of their wittes, to see them laugh and leap.” But, something in the behavior of the strange ships, after a while, rendered our Frenchmen a little doubtful of their character. Instead of boldly approaching, they were seen to cast anchor and to send out one of their boats. A prudent fear of the Spaniards made Laudonniere get his soldiers in readiness; while Captain La Vasseur, with a select party, advanced to the river side to meet the visitors. They proved to be Englishmen—a fleet under the command of the celebrated John Hawkins; and had on board one Martin Atinas, of Dieppe; a Frenchman, who had been one of the colonists of Fort Charles,—one of those who, returning to France, had been taken up at sea and carried into England. He had guided the English admiral along the coast, and his information had contributed to prompt the voyage of exploration which Hawkins had in hand. But the object of the British admiral was quite pacific, and his conduct exceedingly generous and noble. His ostensible purpose in putting into May River was to procure fresh water. Laudonniere permitted him to do so. Hawkins, perceiving the distressed condition of the Frenchmen, relieved them with liberal supplies of bread, wine and provisions. Apprised of their desire to return to France, he, with greater liberality and a wiser policy, offered to transport the whole colony. But Laudonniere was still jealous of the Englishman, and was apprehensive that, while he carried off the one colony, he would instantly plant another in its place. He declined the generous offer, but bargained with him for one of his vessels, for which Laudonniere chiefly paid by the furniture of the fortress,—the cannon, &c.,—viz.: “two bastards, two mynions, one thousand of iron (balls), and one thousand (pounds) of powder.” These items included only a portion of the purchase consideration, in earnest of the treaty. Moved with pity at the wretched condition of the Frenchmen, the generous Englishman offered supplies for which he accepted Laudonniere’s bills. These the subsequent misfortunes of the latter never permitted him to satisfy. In this way our colonists procured “twenty barrels of meale, six pipes of beanes, one hogshead of salt, and a hundred (cwt.?) of waxe to make candles. Moreover, forasmuch as hee saw my souldiers goe barefoote, hee offered me besides fifty paires of shoes, which I accepted.” “He did more than this,” says Laudonniere. “He bestowed upon myselfe a great jarre of oyle, a jarre of vinegar, a barell of olives, a great quantitie of rice, and a barell of white biscuit. Besides, he gave divers presents to the principal officers of my company according to their qualities: so that, I may say, that we received as many courtesies of the Generall as was possible to receive of any man living.”
Here, we are fortunately in possession of the narrative of Hawkins himself, and his report of the encounter with our Frenchmen. It affords a good commentary upon the bad management of Laudonniere, and the worthless character of his followers; the sturdy Englishmen seeing, at a glance, where all the evils of the colony lay. He describes their first settlement as gathered from their own lips; their numbers, the period they had remained in the country, their frequent want, and the modes resorted to for escaping famine. His details comprise all the facts of our history, as already given. Of their discontents and rebels, he speaks as of a class, “who would not take the paines so much as to fishe in the river before their doores, but would have all thinges put in their mouthes. They did rebell against the Captaine, taking away first his armour, and afterwards imprisoning him, &c.” The narrative of Hawkins gives the subsequent history of the rebels, their piracy, capture and fate. He mentions one particular, which we do not gather from Laudonniere, showing the sagacity of the Floridian warriors. Finding that the Frenchmen, in battle, were protected by their coats of mail, or escaupil, and the bucklers in familiar use at the time, they directed their arrows at the faces and the legs of their enemies, which were the parts in which they were mostly wounded. At the close of this war, according to our Englishmen, Laudonniere had not forty soldiers left unhurt. After detailing the supplies accorded to the colonists from his stores, he adds, “notwithstanding the great want that the Frenchmen had, the ground doth yield victuals sufficient, if they would have taken paines to get the same; but they being souldiers, desired to live by the sweat of other men’s browes.” Here speaks the jealous scorn of the sailor. “The ground yieldeth naturally great store of grapes, for in the time the Frenchmen were there they made twenty hogsheads of wine.” Our poor Huguenots could seek gold and manufacture wine, but could not raise provisions. They were of too haughty a stomach to toil for any but the luxuries of life. “Also,” says Hawkins, “it (the earth) yieldeth roots passing good, deere marvellous store, with divers other beastes and fowle serviceable to man. These be things wherewith a man may live, having corne or maize wherewith to make bread, for maize maketh good savory bread, and cakes as fine as flowre; also, it maketh good meale, beaten and sodden with water, and nourishable, which the Frenchmen did use to drink of in the morning, and it assuageth their thirst, so that they have no need to drink all the day after. And this maize was the greatest lack they had, because they had no labourers to sowe the same; and therefore, to them that should inhabit the land, it were requisite to have labourers to till and sowe the ground; for they, having victuals of their owne, whereby they neither spoil nor rob the inhabitants, may live not only quietly with them, who naturally are more desirous of peace than of warre, but also shall have abundance of victuals proffered them for nothing, &c.” The testimony of Hawkins is as conclusive in behalf of the Floridians as it is unfavorable to our Frenchmen. He speaks in the highest terms of the qualities and resources of the country, as abounding in commodities unknown to men, and equal to those of any region in the world. He tells us of the gold procured by the Huguenot colonists, one mass of two pounds weight being taken by them from the Indians, without equivalent. The latter he describes as having some estimation of the precious metals; “for it is wrought flat and graven, which they wear about their necks, &c.” The Frenchmen eat snakes in the sight of our Englishmen, to their “no little admiration;” and affirm the same to be a delicate meat. Laudonniere tells Hawkins some curious snake stories, which could not well be improved upon, even in the “Hunter’s Camp,” on a “Lying Saturday.” “I heard a miracle of one of these adders,”—snakes a yard and a half long,—“upon the which a faulcon (hawk) seizing, the sayd adder did claspe her taile about her; which, the French captaine seeing, came to the rescue of the faulcon, and took her,—slaying the adder.” There is no improbability in this story; but we shall be slow to give our testimony in behalf of that which follows: “And the Captaine of the Frenchmen saw also a serpent with three heads and foure feet, of the bignesse of a great spaniel, which, for want of a harquebuse, he durst not attempt to slay.” Laudonniere had evidently some appreciation of the marvellous; but only four feet to three heads was a monstrous disproportion. The account which Hawkins gives of the abundance of fish in the neighborhood of the garrison, is no exaggeration, and only adds to the surprise that we feel at the wretched indolence and imbecility of the colonists, who, with this resource “at their doores,” depended for their supply upon the Floridians.
Hawkins’s account of the coast and characteristics of Florida is copious and full of interest, but belongs not to this narrative. He left the Huguenots, on the 28th July, 1565, making all preparations to follow in his wake; and on the fifteenth of August Laudonniere was prepared to depart also. The biscuit was made for the voyage, the goods and chattels of the soldiers were taken on board, and most of the water;—nothing delayed their sailing but head-winds;—when the whole proceeding was arrested by the sudden appearance of Ribault, with the long-promised supplies from France. The approach of Ribault was exceedingly cautious; so circumspect, indeed, that fears were entertained by the garrison that his ships were those of the Spaniards. The guns of the fortress were already trained to bear upon them when the strangers discovered themselves. The reasons for their mysterious deportment, as subsequently given, arose from certain false reports which had reached France, of the conduct of Laudonniere. He had been described, by letters from some of his malcontents in the colony, as affecting a sort of regal state—as preparing to shake off his dependence upon the mother-country—and setting up for himself, as the sovereign lord of the Floridas. Poor Laudonniere! living on vipers, crude berries and bitter roots, mocked by the savages on one hand, fettered and flouted by his own runagates and rebels on the other,—defied in his authority, and starving in all his state, was in no mood to affect royalty upon the River May. He was, no doubt, a vain and ostentatious person; but, whatever may have been his absurdities and vanities, at first, they had been sufficiently schooled by his necessities, we should think, to cure him of any such idle affectations. He had been subdued and humbled by defeat,—the failure of his plans, and the evident contempt into which he had sunk among his people. Yet of all this, the King of France and Monsieur de Coligny could have known nothing; and when we recollect that the colony was made up of Huguenots only, a people of whose fidelity the former might reasonably doubt, the suspicions of the Catholic monarch may not be supposed entirely unreasonable. At all events, Ribault was sent to supersede the usurping commander, and bore imperative orders for his recall. The armament confided to Ribault consisted of seven vessels, and a military force corresponding with such a fleet. We are also made aware that, on this occasion, the force which he commanded was no longer made up of Huguenots exclusively, as in the previous armament. A large sprinkling of Catholic soldiers accompanied the expedition, and the temporary peace throughout the realm enabled a great number of gentlemen and officers to employ themselves in the search after adventure in the New World. They accordingly swelled the forces of Ribault, and showed conclusively that the colonial establishment in Florida had grown into some importance at home. That Laudonniere should become a prince there, was calculated to exaggerate the greatness of the principality; and the jealousy of the French monarch, in all probability, for the first time, awakened his sympathy for the settlement. The same accounts which had borne the tidings of Laudonniere’s ambition, may have exaggerated the resources and discoveries of the country; and possibly some specimens of gold—the mass of two pounds described by Hawkins—had dazzled the eyes and excited the avarice of court and people. Enough that Laudonniere was to be sent home for trial, and that Ribault was to succeed him in the government.
The approach of Ribault with his fleet was exceedingly slow. Head-winds and storms baffled his progress, and as he reached the coast of Florida he loitered along its bays and rivers, seeking to obtain from the Indians all possible tidings of the colony, before venturing upon an encounter with the supposed usurper of the sovereignty of the country. When, at length, he drew nigh to La Caroline, so suspiciously did he approach, that he drew upon him the fire of Laudonniere’s men; and, but for the distance, and the seasonable outcry which was made by his followers, announcing who they were, a conflict might have ensued between the parties. To the great relief of Ribault, Laudonniere received him with submission. The former apprised him frankly of the reports in France to his discredit, and delivered him the letters of Coligny to the same effect. Laudonniere soon succeeded in convincing his successor that he had been greatly slandered—that he was entirely innocent of royalty, and almost of state, of any kind—that, however unfortunate he may have been—however incompetent to the duties he had undertaken, he was certainly not guilty of the extreme follies, the presumption, or the cruelty, which constituted the several points in the indictment urged against him. Ribault strove to persuade him to remain in the colony, and to leave his justification to himself. But this Laudonniere declined to do, resolving to return to France;—a resolution which, as we shall see hereafter, was only delayed too long,—to the further increase of the misfortunes of our captain. Meanwhile he fell sick of a fever, and the authority passed into the hands of Jean Ribault, whose return was welcomed by crowds of Indian chiefs, who came to the fortress to inquire after the newly-arrived strangers. They soon recognised the chief by whose hands the stone pillar had been reared, which stood conspicuous at the entrance of the river. He was easily distinguished, by many of them, by reason of the massy beard which he wore. They embraced him with signs of a greater cordiality than they were disposed to show to his immediate predecessor. The Kings Homoloa, Seravahi, Alimacani, Malica, and Casti, were among the first to recall the ties of their former friendship, and to brighten the ancient chain of union, by fresh pledges. They brought to Ribault, among other gifts, large pieces of gold, which, in their language, is called “sieroa pira,” literally “red metal,”—which, upon being assayed by the refiner, proved to be “perfect golde.” They renewed their offers to conduct him to the Mountains of Apalachia, where this precious metal was to be had for the gathering. Ribault was not more inaccessible to this attractive showing than Laudonniere had been; but before he could project the desired enterprise, in search of the mountains which held such glorious possessions, new events were in progress, involving such dangers as superseded the hopes of gain among the adventurers, by necessities which made them doubtful of their safety. The Spaniards, of whom they had long been apprehensive, were at length discovered upon the coast.