ust_ have been the
_Pinta_--my lady-love was painfully anxious as to our fate; for it
appeared that the _Pinta_ and her crew bore a somewhat evil reputation
among those who professed to know her best at La Guayra; and the only
hope or consolation which Dona Inez could find lay in her somewhat too
favourable estimate of our ability to take care of ourselves. She most
earnestly entreated that I would not lose a moment, after the receipt of
her letter, in writing to set her mind at rest. She added that her
father had returned home in excellent health; and that, though he had at
first betrayed some vexation at the loss of our services, he had soon
cooled down, and had then acknowledged that he was glad, for our sakes,
that we had succeeded in effecting our escape.

Having read and re-read this most cherished epistle some half a dozen
times over, I refolded and put it carefully into my pocket, next turning
to the letters from my father, which I arranged and opened according to
the dates of the postmarks.

The first of these letters--being the third written by my father since
the date of my leaving England (I had received the other two on the
occasion of our former visit to Port Royal, in the _Hermione_)--was very
similar to all others which had ever reached me from the same writer;
brief, cold, and evidently strained and artificial as to the one or two
expressions of affection contained therein--altogether a painful and
unsatisfactory letter to receive, in fact. The second was somewhat
similar, except that therein my father condescended to inform me that he
was by no means well; that he thought he had perhaps been overworking
himself, and that unless his health speedily mended he feared he should
be obliged to call in medical advice. This was sufficiently alarming;
but the third letter was even more so, for in it he informed me that he
had suffered a complete break-down in health and spirits; that he had
placed himself under the care of Doctor Wise, one of the most eminent
physicians of the day, and that he had not only been strictly enjoined
to entirely lay aside his brush for at least six months, but that he had
also been ordered to travel. This, however, was evidently not the worst
of it; for the letter, a long, rambling, and somewhat incoherent epistle
this time, went on to hint mysteriously at the causes which had brought
this lamentable state of affairs about; but so obscurely was the letter
worded that, on its f