The Spanish Galleon. A West Country romance

Front matter

THE SPANISH GALLEON PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO.. NEW-STREET SQUARE LONDON THE SPANISH GALLEON A WEST COUNTRY ROMANCE BY FREDERICK C. BADRICK AUTHOR OF ™" M»- 'STARWOOD HALL' ' CHRIS DERRICK' ETC Bardolph. Case ye, case ye ; on with your vizards ; there's money of the King's coming down the hill ; 'tis going to the King's exchequer. First Part of King Henry IV. LONDON WARD & DOWNEY 12 YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN 1889 [All rights reserved] CONTENTS PAGE

Prologue

:— THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE ... I THE STRANGE VOYAGE OF THE 'HAWK'

Chapter I. Hosey's Playfulness II II

DOROTHY FLOUTED ME 24 III. OLD MARTIN COVENTRY 43 IV. THE GREAT THREE-DECKER 69 V. THE HOME-COMING OF THE ' HAWK ' . . . .84 VI. VULTURES ON THE WING IOO VII. MY FRIEND DOMINICK II7 IN THE FURROWS I. ANDREW HOPGOOD'S EVIL FORTUNE . . . . 139 II. THE DWELLERS IN THE GREY TOWER . . -154 III. THE SHIP'S CAPTAIN AT THE 'ANGEL' INN . . . THE SPANISH GALLEON vi CHAPTER *"AGE IV. TREASURE GALORE "79 V. CAUGHT IN THE TOILS "93 VI. FOR DEAR LIFE • 20S THE LAST OF THE BONNETTS a. AUNT MARJORY 223 II. ' HIST ! MISTRESS ! ' 23°

Epilogue

:- ANDREW HOPGOOD MAKES HIS PEACE

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. THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE. INCE it was first suggested that it was my duty at some time or other to bring together a true and faithful account of certain events that happened in the west country in the year of grace one thousand seven hundred and forty, I have been much exercised in mind as to the most fitting and proper way in which I ought to put them forward. Because, on the one hand, if they be arranged according to the days and months when they fell out, not a little of the interest will be taken from them ; whereas, by the aid of some skill and cunning, the narrative might readily seem to be merely the busy design ing of man's mind. In this perplexity, I have taken the various papers and placed them in such straightforward order that they may easily be understood of men. First there is a bundle of letters that passed between Sir John Phillipps, Knight, of Cheapside in B

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2 the city of London, and his friend Thomas Park hurst, Esquire, of Shilford near Bristol, a justice of the peace for the county of Somerset. I make the following brief extracts from these letters as mark ing in a clear and just manner the chief incident among those already referred to, being careful also to pass over, as far as possible, all passages having no concern with the matter in hand : From Thomas Parkhurst to Sir John Pliillipps, Knight. ' February 2. ' . . . You will be mightily pleased to learn that His Most Gracious Majesty's ship "Adventure," under Captain King, and having no more than twelve guns and a crew of sixty-two men, has most gallantly captured a Spanish galleon, a three decked vessel of above forty guns and having on board well-nigh two hundred and fifty men together with much treasure of divers kinds.

It grieves me to say that the most part of the Spaniard's men have been killed or very dreadfully wounded, the captain himself and many of the officers positively refusing to surrender even when all chance of victory was gone, and fighting very valiantly until they were either cut down or shot. 'Tis said that the galleon's riches are something wondrous, though I know not what truth there be in the saying. Report even speaks of chests full of THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE 3 doubloons and pieces of eight worth full two hun dred thousand pounds, besides much other gold and silver and many bales of rare silks. The " Adven ture " and her prize have not yet come into the Channel, so more news you shall hear without fail anon. ... I send this letter by well-trusted mes sengers, one Edward Wilmot and one Henry Pye.' There is small room for doubt touching the reason that the justice was so anxious to communi cate the information as soon as possible to Sir John Phillipps.

The knight had warmly befriended him several years before, and, being anxious to secure a peerage at the hands of the King, was ever glad to court favour in an honourable way by bringing early tidings of victory or any other joyous matter to the ear of His Majesty. From the date of the succeeding letter, it is clear that Wilmot and Pye must have compassed the journey from Shilford to London, one hundred and twenty-two miles, in the space of three days or thereabouts. At the ale house hard by the Guildhall, where they rested, Sir John Phillipps regaled them as if they were country squires come up on a friendly visit to himself, paying for all their entertainment and other charges, so that the ease and merriment they found in London rewarded them fully for the dangers and hardships they had encountered on the road thither. B

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4 From Sir John Phillipps, Knight, to Thomas Parkhurst. ' February 6. ' . . . The King, to whom I conveyed the tidings of the capture through Pulteney, is delighted be yond measure, and yesterday must needs send for me and hear the story all over anew from my own lips, shewing his satisfaction at odd intervals by the nod that His Majesty is given to. His Majesty moreover asked several times after yourself and the Parkhurst family, and has graciously seen fit to issue letters under his own hand and signed with the royal seal, granting to you full power to arrange with Captain King for the safe conveyance of the prize to this city of London. These letters are sent herewith by the hands of William Chapman and three companions. Wilmot and Pye being so fatigued with their journey that they must rest awhile. . . .

Pray use every dispatch in this busi ness to the end that the treasure may come to port very shortly. ' P.S. — I should not much marvel if the King were to send for you and shew you some signal recognition of your good and loyal service.' Parkhurst had received the first intimation of the galleon from a schooner that had outsailed both the captured vessel and the ' Adventure,' and there fore was inwardly well satisfied when he learned THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE 5 that, his messengers having obtained a clear gain of nearly two days upon those from Captain King, his purpose had been effected. On February 10, the Captain (who was in ill mood that the matter had not been left entirely to himself and his own judgment), met Thomas Park hurst, and it was finally determined to make as though the treasures were to be carried up to Lon don by the high road, sending thither, to strengthen appearances, six waggons laden with big chests from out the Spaniard under a large and strong escort, while in reality the galleon, with all its richest cargo still on board, and manned by a stout crew, sailed round the coast, intending to come to the capital in that way.

Meanwhile Edward Wilmot and Henry Pye, each well rewarded by the knight with a purse of crowns, returned home, travelling, you may be sure, by easy stages and pleasuring themselves as they went, and reaching Shilford without any adventure worth recording. It was fully expected (the wind being pretty steady from the west-north-west), that the prize would be in the Downs by February 26, and off Sheerness on the following day ; and when that time came and no further news was brought, those who were acquainted with the affair began to marvel that nothing was heard. Three days later — that is to say, on February 29 — Pulteney sent an imperative message reproaching Sir John Phillipps with having made him the bearer of such idle information to

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His Majesty ; and the knight was so stung that he straightway dispatched two of his servants on horseback for Shilford by way of Bristol, to enquire of Parkhurst if the galleon had really sailed, and further if any good reason was known why its arrival should have been delayed. From Thomas Parkhurst to Sir John Phillipps, Knight. ' March 5. '. . . I am most grievously annoyed at the pesti lent hindrance in the galleon's voyage, and am still more pained in that it is not in my power to explain it. The ship, well armed and manned, weighed anchor here early in the morning of the twelfth day of February and should have been in port at the latest this two days ago. I do trust heartily that all will be well in the matter by the time this letter reaches your hands. May I beg of you that you will send further messengers immediately the vessel is in sight.' But nothing came to hand of the galleon and its great treasures, though at the end of another week or thereabouts the knight sent yet again to Thomas Parkhurst a letter that caused for long a breach in the friendship existing between them, and well-nigh leading to a demand for that reparation which was all that a gentleman of those days, feeling himself wantonly insulted, could seek.

THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE 7 From Sir John Phillipps, Knight, to Thomas Parkhurst. ' March 14. ' . . . The King is so angry and vexed, saying he has been befooled and made sport of, that I am much more likely to lose my knighthood than to gain the barony that I hoped for. As for myself, I am too deeply disgusted to speak, and I can no longer deny that I have been made a mock by a lewd fellow that I raised to his now position. I devoutly trust you will pester me no more. To you at least will I never be beholden again. ... It is not needful to add that none has heard aught of the galleon ; it has no doubt disappeared where it was first brought into being, that is to say, in your own addled pate. Well it is for you, sir, that Captain King is by this again on the South Ameri can coast or he might advertise how much you belied him. . . . ' P.S. — The Shilford messengers and all those who journeyed up here with the waggons were doubtless in your pay, who thought to get your reward before the trick was found out' The Spanish galleon had, indeed, vanished, and left no trace to shew that it had ever been.

Nor spar, nor mast, nor rope, nor boat was to be found, nor word had of any that had seen her on her journey. And the gold and the silver and the silks

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were as things of which men had fondly dreamed only to find them melting into thin air with the break of dawn. But the pages that follow (containing the narra tives, to wit, of Master Walter Chilton, of Andrew Hopgood, and of Mistress Dorothy Chilton [form erly Mercer]) will shew that there were some at least had seen the great ship with all its wondrous cargo, and knew of the strange happenings in its voyage that kept it from ever making joyous the hearts of those in London city that tarried for it so eagerly. THE STRANGE VOYAGE OF THE 'HAWK' As related by one Walter Chilton, of the village of Adderley, in the Shire of Somerset

CHAPTER I. HOSEY'S PLAYFULNESS.

A knock-down argument : 'tis but a word and a blow. Dryden. I, there ! you lazy loon, give a hand with this boat instead o' standing star ing there like a clown ! ' It was not a very polite or taking form of introduction, but Martin Coventry knew no other, and as there was nothing better to be done just then, I leaped down on the shingle, and laying a firm grip on one side of the boat, while he held the other, together we ran it down the shelving bank and thrust its nose out into the river. I had been standing on the quay there, when his voice roused me, thinking and wondering and watching the boats going to and fro and the men at work on the vessels at anchor, my hands stuck deep in my pockets and a wrapper close wound about my neck to keep off the cold east wind that was blowing. When he had tossed the rudder and the ropes into the stern and given the boat a final push, he sprang lightly on its edge on one knee just as it felt the lift of the water, and dropping on to a seat in the fore part dipped his oars and started.

There was an aspect of premature greyness about Coventry that made him look old though he was scarcely fifty : his hair and beard were thick and coarse and wiry, and grew by turns in patches of iron and slate colour, and his thick eyebrows and weather beaten face lent weight to a suspicion that he had passed much of his time in the wind and salt sea spray. And this indeed was true. Now just before the spot where I stood there was a big vessel made fast, behind which the boat had disappeared, though only to come into view again a moment later. The old man was pulling the oars lightly, just enough to keep the boat from drifting down stream, for the ebb tide had only an hour to run, when he sang out again : ' You mightn't want to go down the river a bit ? Ifyou do, you can keep me comp'ny.' Down the river or up the river was alike to me, so I accepted the offer, and, while he backed the boat slowly to wards the beach, seized a favourable opportunity, and by great good fortune stumbled somehow into the stern, whereupon he straightway pulled her head round and off we went.

It must have been four o'clock or thereabouts as we passed the end of the Red Causeway and came off the low banks of the great Avon marsh ; the water had well-nigh run out, though you might just hear it lip-lipping under the bows and fore chains of the ships and on the stones of the beach. ' A stranger to these parts ? ' said old Coventry presently, keeping one of his little ferret eyes on me and the other, as it seemed, down stream, his head working on a kind of free swivel. I nodded. ' Might be stayin' at the Old Harbour inn or some such place,' he added, after a pause and some reflection, ' a-waitin' for a ship or something o' that sort ? ' He was right again. A ship was the very thing I wanted, though, I was loth to tell, I had never been on board in my life. ' None the worse for that,' he rejoined ; ' but things want learnin'.

Plenty of strength and a heap o' pluck, tho', a man must have to get on ; then he's only got to fight his way and not stand at trifles. There's them about here as won't, if you do,' he added in a jolly tone, as though it was the best joke possible, and leaning forward towards me. By the time we had got as far as Leigh Down, the sun had dropped like a coppery shield behind the hill-top and the shadows were purpling all along both banks. Here and there a few lights were already flickering in the deepening twilight, and a faint white mist was rising from the river and spreading away over the shores on our right in low and rounded clouds. Presently the old man spoke again. He had been pulling his oars leisurely and regularly through the water, puffing at a pipe of black tobacco the while, and keeping his eyes pretty intently on me. ' You don't know my boy Roger,' he said — ' Roger Coventry,' he added, as though to explain matters more clearly. ' Ah ! he's the boy.

You must see Roger when the ship comes home.' A slight touch of pain passed over his bronzed face. ' I can't for the life of me think what's got with him. At the very latest he was to be back by Christmas, and here's January well in and no Roger. For a month past never a tide have I missed but what I've been down to look for him. It's a-beginnin' to play on me. If they was to say that Roger was dead, any of the cursed brood of them, I'll tell you what I'd do ' — he took his pipe from his mouth and put it in the bottom of the boat, resting one hand on both oars and thrusting the other out, a terrible glare of anger rushing into his eyes as he did so — ' I'd kill them ! ' His features relaxed as suddenly as they had been clenched tight, and he said with a hard laugh, ' But Roger isn't dead. They can't settle accounts with him so easily as they think ! ' By this the last of the daylight was fading out of the sky and over the low eastern shores of the river darkness had silently crept.

The wind had nearly died away, though every now and then you might hear it among the bare trees on the hill-top, and overhead there were straggling patches of blue here and there from which the stars shone brightly The night was sharp and frosty, and it was fortu nate for me that I was so well wrapped up. ' Let me see,' said the old man reflectively as he tugged harder at the oars, the tide having turned and begun to run in again, ' what did you say your name was ? Come, you've no call to be ashamed on't, I s'pose ' — as he saw that I hesitated — ' and I'm not the man to act dishonourable by any. There's none in Bristol town can ever say they were treated falsely by Martin Coventry ! ' I hastened to assure him that I entertained no mistrust of him save what prudence dictates to the solitary and friendless in strange places, and with out further ado satisfied his curiosity. ' So : Walter Chilton, is it ? ' said he. ' Then Walter Chilton and Martin Coventry are friends.' With that he gave me such a grip of the hand that I verily thought he would have wrenched it off, afterwards proceeding to help himself to a liberal allowance from a flask of rum, which he then handed to me, saying that it was ' Roger's own bringing from the Indies.' The incoming tide had carried us up the stream a matter of forty or fifty yards, and the old man, wiping his sleeve across his mouth and half turning to take his bearings, something in the darken ing distance arrested his attention. ' As I'm alive and the son of a gun,' he cried with a thick laugh, ' if it ain't Blackburne's schooner come in !

Now I shall hear something about my boy. Move ! you thundering idle vaga bond ' — this last remark was addressed to the boat in which we sat — ' I'll let you know there's life and devil in the old skipper yet ! ' The vigorous strokes sent us along at a good pace, despite the opposing tide, for the old man hugged the shore, knowing its every turn and twist, and where the water eddied and whirled and where it was smooth as a mill-pond. I could now make out the lines of the vessel which my com panion's more practised eyes had seen so long before. It was a small three-master with a running bowsprit, and lay close to the shore, anchored fore and aft and all its sails furled. There were lanterns hung over the bows with another on the fore-stay, and as we ran under her side a voice sang out : ' Boat ahoy, there !

Who are you ? ' ' Martin Coventry, to be sure ! Who else 'ud be down the river a night like this, 'cept old Martin for to look for his own boy Roger ? ' The old man swung himself up on board, saying he should not be many minutes ; and passing along the side of the schooner with the boat's rope in his hand, threw it to me over the taffrail, bidding me be quick and make it fast to the anchor chain. This, with some difficulty, I contrived to do, and then sat down in the stern beneath the flickering of the ship's lanterns and the great black hull that glowered down on me. Now there occurred an accident, slight enough in itself, yet which made me an enemy for some while to come. At intervals I could hear the confused murmur of voices from the cabin, the sturdy roar of old Coventry being alone distinguishable above the others, and sometimes the man on watch pacing to and fro the deck.

The chill in the air and the strangeness of the situation, one would have thought, had kept me awake ; but I must have dozed, for, when I recovered with a start, the painter was hanging loose in the water and the boat was drifting quickly up the river. For a moment I was dazed, not because of the thought of danger so greatly as from the sudden shock at finding myself in an unforeseen situation. Should I shout ? Who would hear ? And who can help if they do hear ? Nay, be a man, Walter Chilton, said I, be up and doing — God helps those that help them selves. I laid hold of the oars and tried to retrace the journey, but a pretty, wide space had already come between me and the schooner, and, instead of making up any of the lost ground, all unskilled as I was in seamanship, the tide carried me up the river still further.

At last, with a desperate effort to imitate old Coventry's trick and get nearer in to the bank, one of the oars missed the water, caught me a violent blow across the chest, and sent me sprawling in the bottom of the boat. At the same moment something gave her a heavy shock that c made her shiver in every beam, and a man's gruff voice said in a low but resolute tone : ' If you move an inch, I'll drive this knife through you ! ' A light shone down and an ugly face showed beside it. As I have said, I was lying on my back and was not disposed to resist, still less to afford the stranger any justification for carrying out his threat. Besides, he had at least one companion, for there were oars still dipping in the water which kept runnelling along under my head. ' Keep your eyes well on him,' said the second fellow, ' while I pull across to Penny's. It's guineas in our pockets, Hosey !

Eh, mate ? ' He laughed very quietly and whistled a snatch of song. ' But, matey, we'd oughter clean the ship afore we dock her ! ' Whereupon, his companion grunting assent, he addressed himself again to me : ' P'r'aps we'd better have the swag before we introduces you to the cap'en ; so out with it and no words ! If it's gold, so much the better ! ' Protest of any kind was of course useless, but it was impossible for me to reach the inside pocket of my coat without sitting up, and this the villain would not permit. ' Why, man,' I cried in great scorn, ' you must be a fool as well as a scoundrel. Help yourself as best you can.' Hard words break no bones, mate,' he retorted. With that he laid forcible hold of my coat and was just wrenching it open, when the other fellow, whose face I had not seen, said, ' Hosey, there's some one a-comin' up the river from the schooner.

Quick, mate, or we shall be done and not get even Penny's guineas ! ' Hosey, still leaning over me lying prostrate in the boat, threw the light of the lantern towards the stern, and a scowl passed across his long-jawed face. ' By the Spaniard's head ! ' he cried, ' this is Martin Coventry's boat. Pull for your life, Jock Flinders, for it's the old man himself a-comin'.' He made a vicious dig at my breast as he spoke, but I contrived to catch the knife blade in the sleeve of my coat, which it fortunately ripped through without so much as giving me a scratch. When the schooner's boat came alongside and I told old Coventry what had taken place, he cursed and swore roundly at me who could not contrive to fasten a rope but what it must needs unloose itself; then laughed, as it were, a gruff sort of gurgling in his throat at my little adventure. ' But it comes to this,' he said : ' some folks are always a-makin' ropes'-ends for their own backs, and them as make 'em 'as to 'ave the strokes.

Here what does Martin Coventry do but he takes a young fellow, friendly like, in tow down the river, and this mate is fool big enough to let Hosey Budd and some of his gang get hold of him. O' course, old Martin — which he'd stand by a matey if he c could — can't get right away back to the Old Har bour and down again to his bunk again' such a tide as is a-runnin', so what must he do but put his mate ashore as best he can.' He looked at me with a comical appeal, and I made no demur to his pro posal, only asking him to set me on the way back for Bristol. This he did, parting from me halfway up a long steep hill-side on the road leading from the ferry at Wolf's Tower to Billeswick. ' It'll be no long time afore ye'll see Martin Coventry again,' he said as I left him, ' and it may be you'll not be getting a ship before then, though you weren't far off this very night as is.' The same chuckle crept over his face again, and his keen little eyes were kindling with fun.

Before he had gone many yards he called out : ' Matey, it'll p'r'aps be as well to take this with you. Hosey Budd's that playful, there's no knowing where he'll be got to by this.' So saying, he put a heavy pistol in my hands ; and I, thrusting it into the breast of my great coat, and keeping one hand on it, left him and strode up the hill as he had directed me. The road was rough and steep, the frozen snow that had lain there for a week past being ironbound and as slippery as glass. Above, there was now a bright shining of the stars, but no moon, and there was scarcely a sound besides the crunching and grinding of my boots in the top snow and the occasional bark of a dog in the far distance. Now, a mile or so onward, the road thus far having followed the course of the river, comes into it steeply up from the water side the path from the Rownham Ferry and the Abbot's Manor of Leigh ; and the road itself, sweeping away to the left in a great curve, mounts higher still and runs right along the eastern crest of the ridge of hills.

On the left, and nearly at the summit, were the wild and broken ruins of St. Brendan's Hermitage showing black against the dark blue of the sky, while on the other side the ground fell away in ugly slopes and pitches right on to the flat of the Canon's Marsh. Be sure that I lost no time in getting over the ground, and was congratulating myself that in a few minutes more I should be in Frog Lane and consequently within three hundred yards or so of the inn, when I heard a low whistle somewhere away on my right. This was answered almost imme diately from the opposite side of the road, whence a man sprang out before me and made a grab at my throat. I grasped the pistol with my right hand and at the same moment let drive my left full in his face : and he went backwards like a log. This had scarcely come to pass when a couple more villainous-looking fellows darted from where they had been lying in hiding, and the sound of quick steps behind told me that I had to settle with at least four or five assailants of one kind or another.

I was not nervous, but rather fiercely indignant and angry to think that men could be so cowardly. There was safety only in front ; behind and on both sides all was dark and strange. With a run I made for those before me. ' Stand clear ! ' I cried, ' or I'll fire ! ' ' No nonsense, mate,' said one, ' it's no good. There's a dozen of us, I tell you ; ' then, as he saw me making straight at him, ' Shoot, Jack ! Bowl him over ! ' dropping on his knee as I pulled the trigger right in his face. Bang ! And then another bang from behind, and something whistled through the air close to my head. The road before me was now clear, but I was rather afraid of keeping too long on the highway, and so, running at top speed, I darted down the hillside at the first turning towards the river and came upon the Abbey Back in less time than it takes in the telling.