but now he was missing everything.

That night a terrible storm arose and continued for days. The marshes
became a boundless sea; the forests were whipped like weeds in the wind.
Where had the fleet found refuge? or had it been hurled to destruction
by the rage of wind and sea? Laudonniere, in the driving rain, came from
his sick-bed to direct the work on the defenses, which were broken down
in three or four places. Besides the four dog-boys, the cook, the
brewer, an old cross-bow maker, and the old carpenter, there were two
shoemakers, a musician, four valets, fourscore camp-followers who did
not know the use of arms, and the crowd of women and children. The sole
consolation that could be found in their plight was that in such a storm
no enemy would be likely to attack them by sea or land. Nevertheless
Laudonniere divided his force into two watches with an officer for each,
gave them lanterns and an hour glass for going the rounds, and himself,
weak with fever, spent each night in the guard-room.

On the night of the nineteenth the tempest became a deluge. The officer
of the night took pity on the drenched and gasping sentries and
dismissed them. But on that night five hundred Spaniards were coming
from San Augustin through almost impassable swamps, their provisions
spoiled and their powder soaked, under the leadership of the pitiless
Menendez. The storm had caught Ribault's fleet just as it was about to
attack on the eleventh, and Menendez had determined to take a force of
Spaniards overland and attack the fort while its defenders were away.
With twenty Vizcayan axemen to clear the way and two Indians and a
renegade Frenchman, Francois Jean, for a guide, he had bullied,
threatened and exhorted them through eight days of wading through mud
waist-deep, creeping around quagmires and pushing by main force through
palmetto jungles, until two hours before daylight the panting,
shivering, sullen men stood cursing the country and their commander,
under their breath, in a pine wood less than a mile from Fort Caroline.
It was all that Menendez could do to get them to go a rod further. All
night, he said, he had prayed for help; their provisions and ammunition
were gone; there was nothing to do but to go on and take the fort. They
went on.

In the faint light of early morning a trumpeter saw them racing down the
slope toward the fort and blew the alarm. "Santiago! Santiago!" sounded
in the ears of the half-awakened French as t