another kind of treasure laid up for him. James II needed
all his warships, and he promptly took the _Rose_ frigate from Captain
Phips and set him adrift to shift for himself. A man of less
inflexible resolution and courage might have been disheartened, but
Phips made a louder noise than ever with his treasure story, and would
not budge from London. He was put in jail, somehow got himself out,
and stood up to his enemies and silenced them, all the while seeking
noble patrons with money to venture on another voyage.

At length, and a year had been spent in this manner, Phips interested
the Duke of Albemarle, son of the famous General Monk who had been
active in restoring Charles II to the throne of the Stuarts. Several
other gentlemen of the Court took shares in the speculation, including
a naval man, Sir John Narborough. They put up L2,400 to outfit a ship,
and the King was persuaded to grant Phips letters of patent, or a
commission as a duly authorized treasure seeker, in return for which
favor His Majesty was to receive one-tenth of the booty. To Phips was
promised a sixteenth of what he should recover.

This enterprise was conceived in 1686, and was so singularly like the
partnership formed ten years later to finance the cruise of Captain
Kidd after pirates' plunder that the Earl of Bellomont, Lord Chancellor
Somers, the Earl of Shrewsbury, and William III may have been somewhat
inspired to undertake this unlucky venture by the dazzling success of
the Phips "syndicate."

In a small merchantman called the _James and Mary_, Captain Phips set
sail from England in 1686, having another vessel to serve as a tender.
Arriving at Port de la Plata, he hewed out a large canoe from a
cotton-wood tree, "so large as to carry eight or ten oars," says Cotton
Mather, "for the making of which perigua (as they call it), he did,
with the same industry that he did everything else, employ his own hand
and adze, and endure no little hardship, lying abroad in the woods many
nights together." The canoe was used by a gang of native divers
quartered on board the tender. For some time they worked along the
edge of a reef called the Boilers, guided by the story of that ancient
Spaniard, but found nothing to reward their exertions.

This crew was returning to report to Captain Phips when one of the men,
staring over the side into the wonderfully clear water, spied a "sea
feather" or marine plant of uncommon beauty growing from what app