Part 21 (1/2)
They settled down, causing a great wind, and put their great heads under their wings and went to sleep.
The boy was bright, and a plan of getting away from the tree came to him. He reasoned that if he could not fly the bird could, and what would be the weight of a little boy to a bird who could carry away an elephant?
So he marked the largest and most powerful bird with his eye, and crept up to it and got under his wing, and into his great feathers.
The bird was asleep and did not wake!
Morning came, and with the first red dawn, as we may fancy, the bird threw up his head and begun to stir. He lifted himself up and shook himself, but he did not shake off the boy, who was safely nestled among the little forest of its feathers.
The sun was brightening the islands, and the bird mounted up and flew away in search of food, carrying the little boy under his wing.
After traversing the sunrise air for a long time, the bird flew over a land of buffaloes.
He here descended to capture a buffalo, to bear him away to the mountainous tree for food. As he alighted on the back of the buffalo with a wild scream of delight, the little boy dropped out from under his wing, and so found his way to his own island.
It was the little boy that told this large story, quite like Sinbad's.
There were found mysterious fruits floating on the sea, which were supposed to have fallen from the tree.
”I have seen the bird myself,” said a third Moorish pilot, and with the testimony of the little boy, and the three pilots and the floating fruit, this story ought to be as trustworthy as the one of Sinbad the Sailor.
The voyage back to the Cape of Good Hope and thence to the Cape Verde Islands was one for strange reflections. Del Cano now was the leader of the returning mariners. The expedition had gone out from the port of Seville amid shouting quays and towers, with some two hundred and seventy men. Only one s.h.i.+p was returning and she was bringing home hardly as many men as composed her own crew.
We can imagine Del Cano on deck, with the lantern of Magellan still swinging above him, talking with his officers on a tropical night off the African coast.
”Magellan has found an unknown grave,” we may hear him say.
”But humanity will mourn for him, and honor him, and the grave matters not,” answers a padre.
”We shall never see Mesquita again,” continues Del Cano.
”We can not be sure,” replies the padre. ”We can know nothing that we do not see.”
”We surely shall never meet Carthagena again. I can see in my memory those last biscuits and bottles of wine. He needs none of them now.”
”He may have them all,” answers the padre.
”We are yet rich in spices. We shall surprise the world when we drop anchor at Seville.”
”And Seville may have surprises for us,” says the hopeful padre.
They drifted on under favoring airs. The soul of Del Cano was lost to common events in the wonderful revelations of the sea. Should he reach Seville, he would be the living hero of the most marvelous voyage ever made by any mariner.
Such were the scenes and tales that crowded upon the mind of Pigafetta, who wished ”to see the wonders of the world.” The story of the Emperor of China's palace is a.s.sociated with objects so marvelous that the meaning of their names is lost to-day.
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE LOST DAY.