he should yet be Captain of a
King's Ship; that he should come to have the command of better men than
he was now accounted himself, and that he would be the owner of a fair
brick house in the Green Lane of North Boston."[1]

Inasmuch as William Phips would have been a very sorry scoundrel
indeed, to run away, for the sake of a cargo of lumber, and leave his
old friends and neighbors to be scalped, it seems as Cotton Mather was
sounding the timbrel of praise somewhat over-loud, but the parson was a
fulsome eulogist, and for reasons of his own he proclaimed this
roaring, blustering seafarer and hot-headed royal governor as little
lower than the angels. Here and there Mather drew with firm stroke the
character of the man, so that we catch glimpses of him as a live and
moving figure. "He was of an inclination cutting rather like a hatchet
than a razor; he would propose very considerable matters and then so
cut through them that no difficulties could put by the edge of his
resolution. Being thus of the true temper for doing of great things,
he betakes himself to the sea, the right scene for such things."

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[Illustration: Sir William Phips, first royal governor of
Massachusetts.]

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Phips had no notion of being a beggarly New England trading skipper,
carrying codfish and pine boards to the West Indies and threshing
homeward with molasses and niggers in the hold, or coasting to Virginia
for tobacco. A man of mettle won prizes by bold strokes and large
hazards, and treasure seeking was the game for William. Among the
taverns of the Boston water-front he picked up tidings and rumors of
many a silver-laden galleon of Spain that had shivered her timbers on
this or that low-lying reef of the Bahama Passage where there was
neither buoy nor lighthouse. Here was a chance to win that "fair brick
house in the Green Lane of North Boston" and Phips busied himself with
picking up information until he was primed to make a voyage of
discovery. Keeping his errand to himself, he steered for the West
Indies, probably in a small chartered sloop or brig, and prowled from
one key and island to another.

This was in the year 1681, and the waters in which Phips dared to
venture were swarming with pirates and buccaneers who would have cut
his throat for a doubloon. Morgan had sacked Panama only ele