Volume I Part 48 (1/2)
Take you the word of one who has occupied His business in great waters. There's no room, Meaning, or reason, office, or place, or name For courtiers on the sea. Does the sea flatter?
You cannot bribe it, torture it, or tame it!
Its laws are those of the Juggernaut universe, Remorseless--listen to that!”--a mighty wave Broke thundering down the coast; ”your hands are white, Your rapier jewelled, can you grapple that?
What part have you in all its flaming ways?
What share in its fierce gloom? Has your heart broken As those waves break out there? Can you lie down And sleep, as a lion-cub by the old lion, When it shakes its mane out over you to hide you, And leap out with the dawn as I have done?
These are big words; but, see, my hand is red: You cannot torture me, I have borne all that; And so I have some kins.h.i.+p with the sea, Some sort of wild alliance with its storms, Its exultations, ay, and its great wrath At last, and power upon them. 'Tis the worse For Spain, Be counselled well: come not between My sea and its rich vengeance.”
Silently, Bowing his head, Sidney withdrew. But Drake, So fiercely the old grief rankled in his heart, Summoned his swiftest horseman, bidding him ride, Ride like the wind through the night, straight to the Queen, Praying she would most instantly recall Her truant courtier. Nay, to make all sure, Drake sent a gang of seamen out to crouch Ambushed in woody hollows nigh the road, Under the sailing moon, there to waylay The Queen's reply, that she might never know It reached him, if it proved against his will.
And swiftly came that truant's stern recall; But Drake, in hourly dread of some new change In Gloriana's mood, slept not by night Or day, till out of roaring Plymouth Sound The pirate fleet swept to the wind-swept main, And took the wind and shook out all its sails.
Then with the unfettered sea he mixed his soul In great rejoicing union, while the s.h.i.+ps Cras.h.i.+ng and soaring o'er the heart-free waves Drave ever straight for Spain.
Water and food They lacked; but the fierce fever of his mind To sail from Plymouth ere the Queen's will changed Had left no time for these. Right on he drave, Determining, though the Queen's old officers Beneath him stood appalled, to take in stores Of all he needed, water, powder, food, By plunder of Spain herself. In Vigo bay, Close to Bayona town, under the cliffs Of Spain's world-wide and thunder-fraught prestige He anch.o.r.ed, with the old sea-touch that wakes Our England still. There, in the tingling ears Of the world he cried, _En garde_! to the King of Spain.
There, ordering out his pinnaces in force, While a great storm, as if he held indeed Heaven's batteries in reserve, growled o'er the sea, He landed. Ere one c.u.mbrous limb of all The monstrous armaments of Spain could move His s.h.i.+ps were stored; and ere the sword of Spain Stirred in its crusted sheath, Bayona town Beheld an empty sea; for like a dream The pirate fleet had vanished, none knew whither.
But, in its visible stead, invisible fear Filled the vast rondure of the sea and sky As with the omnipresent soul of Drake.
For when Spain saw the small black anch.o.r.ed fleet Ride in her bays, the sight set bounds to fear.
She knew at least the s.h.i.+ps were oak, the guns Of common range: nor did she dream e'en Drake Could sail two seas at once. Now all her coasts Heard him all night in every bursting wave, His topsails gleamed in every moonlit cloud; His battle-lanthorn glittered in the stars That hung the low horizon. He became A universal menace; yet there followed No sight or sound of him, unless the sea Were that grim soul incarnate. Did it not roar His great commands? The very spray that lashed The cheeks of Spanish seamen lashed their hearts To helpless hatred of him. The wind sang _El Draque_ across the rattling blocks and sheets When storms perplexed them; and when s.h.i.+ps went down, As under the fury of his onsetting battle, The drowning sailors cursed him while they sank.
Suddenly a rumour shook the Spanish Court, He has gone once more to the Indies. Santa Cruz, High Admiral of Spain, the most renowned Captain in Europe, clamoured for a fleet Of forty sail instantly to pursue.
For unto him whose little _Golden Hynde_ Was weapon enough, now leading such a squadron, The West Indies, the whole Pacific coast, And the whole Spanish Main, lay at his mercy.
And onward over the great grey gleaming sea Swept like a thunder-cloud the pirate fleet With vengeance in its heart. Five years agone, Young Hawkins, in the Cape Verde Islands, met-- At Santiago--with such treachery As Drake burned to requite, and from that hour Was Santiago doomed. His chance had come; Drake swooped upon it, plundered it, and was gone, Leaving the treacherous isle a desolate heap Of smoking ashes in the leaden sea, While onward all those pirate bowsprits plunged Into the golden West, across the broad Atlantic once again; ”For I will show,”
Said Drake, ”that Englishmen henceforth will sail Old ocean where they will.” Onward they surged, And the great glittering crested majestic waves Jubilantly rushed up to meet the keels, And there was nought around them but the grey Ruin and roar of the huge Atlantic seas, Grey mounded seas, pursuing and pursued, That fly, hounded and hounding on for ever, From empty marge to marge of the grey sky.
Over the wandering wilderness of foam, Onward, through storm and death, Drake swept; for now Once more a fell plague gripped the tossing s.h.i.+ps, And not by twos and threes as heretofore His crews were minished; but in three black days Three hundred seamen in their shotted shrouds Were cast into the deep. Onward he swept, Implacably, having in mind to strike Spain in the throat at St. Domingo, port Of Hispaniola, a city of far renown, A jewel on the sh.o.r.es of old romance, Palm-shadowed, gated with immortal gold, Queen city of Spain's dominions over sea, And guarded by great guns. Out of the dawn The pirate s.h.i.+ps came leaping, grim and black, And ere the Spaniards were awake, the flag Of England floated from their topmost tower.
But since he had not troops enough to hold So great a city, Drake entrenched his men Within the Plaza and held the batteries.
Thence he demanded ransom, and sent out A boy with flag of truce. The boy's return Drake waited long. Under a sheltering palm He stood, watching the enemies' camp, and lo, Along the hot white purple-shadowed road Tow'rds him, a crawling shape writhed through the dust Up to his feet, a shape besmeared with blood, A shape that held the stumps up of its wrists And moaned, an eyeless thing, a naked rag Of flesh obscenely mangled, a small face Hideously puckered, shrivelled like a monkey's With lips drawn backward from its teeth.
”Speak, speak, In G.o.d's name, speak, what art thou?” whispered Drake, And a sharp cry came, answering his dread, A cry as of a sea-bird in the wind Desolately astray from all earth's sh.o.r.es, ”Captain, I am thy boy, only thy boy!
See, see, my captain, see what they have done!
Captain, I only bore the flag; I only----”
”O, lad, lad, lad,” moaned Drake, and, stooping, strove To pillow the mangled head upon his arm.
”What have they done to thee, what have they done?”
And at the touch the boy screamed, once, and died.
Then like a savage sea with arms uplift To heaven the wrath of Drake blazed thundering, ”Eternal G.o.d, be this the doom of Spain!
Henceforward have no pity. Send the strength Of Thy great seas into my soul that I May devastate this empire, this red h.e.l.l They make of Thy good earth.”
His men drew round, Staring in horror at the silent shape That daubed his feet. Like a cold wind His words went through their flesh: ”This is the lad That bore our flag of truce. This hath Spain done.
Look well upon it, draw the smoke of the blood Up into your nostrils, my companions, And down into your souls. This makes an end For Spain! Bring forth the Spanish prisoners And let me look on them.”
Forth they were brought, A swarthy gorgeous band of soldiers, priests, And sailors, hedged between two st.u.r.dy files Of British tars with naked cutla.s.ses.
Close up to Drake they halted, under the palm, Gay smiling prisoners, for they thought their friends Had ransomed them. Then they looked up and met A glance that swept athwart them like a sword, Making the blood strain back from their blanched faces Into their quivering hearts, with unknown dread, As that accuser pointed to the shape Before his feet.
”Dogs, will ye lap his blood Before ye die? Make haste; for it grows cold!
Ye will not, will not even dabble your hands In that red puddle of flesh, what? Are ye Spaniards?
Come, come, I'll look at you, perchance there's one That's but a demi-devil and holds you back.”
And with the word Drake stepped among their ranks And read each face among the swarthy crew-- The gorgeous soldiers, ringleted sailors, priests With rosary and cross, a slender page In scarlet with a cloud of golden hair, And two rope-girdled friars.
The slim page Drake drew before the throng. ”You are young,” he said, ”Go; take this message to the camp of Spain: Tell them I have a hunger in my soul To look upon the murderers of this boy, To see what eyes they have, what manner of mouths, To touch them and to take their hands in mine, And draw them close to me and smile upon them Until they know my soul as I know theirs, And they grovel in the dust and grope for mercy.
Say that, until I get them, every day I'll hang two Spaniards though I dispeople The Spanish Main. Tell them that, every day, I'll burn a portion of their city down, Then find another city and burn that, And then burn others till I burn away Their empire from the world, ay, till I reach The Imperial throne of Philip with my fires, And send it shrieking down to burn in h.e.l.l For ever. Go!”
Then Drake turned once again, To face the Spanish prisoners. With a voice Cold as the pa.s.sionless utterance of Fate His grim command went forth. ”Now, provost-marshal, Begin with yon two friars, in whose faces Chined like singed swine, and eyed with the spent coals Of filthy living, sweats the glory of Spain.
Strip off their leprous rags And twist their ropes around their throats and hang them High over the Spanish camp for all to see.
At dawn I'll choose two more.”