Homepage
Login
Profile
BookClubs
dmBox
Read Ebook: Hey Ma Where's Willie? by Bukstein I M
Font size:
Background color:
Text color:
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page
Ebook has 19 lines and 2347 words, and 1 pages
Illustrator: John Williamson
The Cruise of the "Nonsuch" Buccaneer
A friendly shipbuilder has a new vessel, the Nonsuch, almost ready to sail, and he agrees with George that he will finance a voyage in search of the brother, in return for half of the proceedings of the voyage, for the Nonsuch has been designed as a fast-sailing buccaneer.
The crew are all local Devon men, so much of the dialogue in the book is in a strong Devonian accent, still to be heard in the outlying districts of that beautiful county.
They set off as soon as possible, knowing that the Government might well requisition the Nonsuch. There are plenty of adventures and battles, but eventually the brother is found, but in very dire straits, for he might have died if found only a few minutes later.
There is an interesting and very revealing episode where we are shown how the Spanish Inquisition worked.
BY HARRY COLLINGWOOD
HOW GEORGE SAINT LEGER RETURNED FROM FOREIGN PARTS.
The time was mid-afternoon, the date was January the 9th, in the year of our Lord 1569; and the good town of Plymouth was basking in the hazy sunlight and mild temperature of one of those delightful days that occasionally visit the metropolis of the West Country, even in mid- winter, under the beneficent influence of the Gulf Stream combined with a soft but enduring breeze from the south-south-east charged with warm air from the Saharan desert and the Mediterranean.
So mild and genial was the weather that certain lads, imbued with that spirit of lawlessness and adventure which seems inherent in the nature of the young Briton, had conspired together to defy the authority of their schoolmaster by playing truant from afternoon school and going to bathe in Firestone Bay. And it was while these lads were dressing, after revelling in their stolen enjoyment, that their attention was attracted by the appearance of a tall ship gliding up the Sound before the soft breathing of the languid breeze.
That she was a foreign-going ship was evident at a glance, first from her size, and, secondly, from the whiteness of her canvas, bleached by long exposure to a southern sun; and as she drew nearer, the display of flags and pennons which she made, and the sounds of trumpet, fife, hautboy, and drum which floated down the wind from her seemed to indicate that her captain regarded his safe arrival in English waters as something in the nature of a triumph.
At length one of the party who had been intently regarding the craft for several minutes, suddenly flung his cap into the air, caught it as it fell, and exclaimed excitedly as he replaced it on his head:
And the exultant lad dashed away toward Stonehouse, accompanied by his companions, each of whom was instantly ready to help with suggestions as to the spending of the prospective noble.
To the impatient watchers it seemed an age before the ship hove in sight at the mouth of the Pool. At length, however, as the sun dipped behind the wooded slopes across the water toward Millbrook, a ship's spritsail and sprit topsail, with a long pennon streaming from the head of the mast which supported the latter, crept slowly into view beyond Devil's Point, to the accompaniment of a general shout of "There a be!" from the waiting crowd, and a minute later the entire ship stood revealed, heading up the Pool under all sail, to the impulse of the dying breeze which was by this time so faint that the white canvas of the approaching craft scarcely strained at all upon its sheets and yards.
Then, when the ship had been securely moored, fore and aft, her gangway was thrown open, a gang-plank was run out from the deck to the wharf, and Mr Richard Marshall, her owner, stepped on board and advanced with outstretched hand toward a short, stout, grey-haired man who had hitherto occupied a conspicuous position on the poop, but who now descended the poop ladder with some difficulty and hobbled towards the gangway.
"Welcome home again, Cap'n John," exclaimed Marshall, grasping the hand of the sailor and wringing it so heartily that poor Burroughs winced at the pain of his rheumatism-racked wrist and shoulder. "I am glad to see you safely back, for I was beginning to feel a bit uneasy lest the King of Spain had caught you in his embargo."
"And a very smart piece of work, too, apparently," said Mr Marshall. "I must not forget to thank George Saint Leger for his share in it. Has your voyage been a success, Captain?"
"So, so; I don't think you'll find much to complain about when we comes to go into the figures," answered Burroughs. "We had a bit of a brush wi' the rovers, who comed out against us in three ships, during our outward voyage, but we beat 'em off wi' the loss of only one man--poor Matthews, as I mentioned just now--since when we've had no call to fire a single shot."
"Excellent, excellent!" commented the merchant, rubbing his hands. "Of course I am very so
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page