re in their gundeloe that evening, to fight about a mistress, adding
that about two hours before, a pinnace had gone past under sail, with
her oars out, and the men rowing furiously. Her men had hailed his
vessel as they passed, asking whether any French or English men had been
there. Upon answer that there had been none they bade him look to
himself, and rowed on up the coast. Within an hour of their going past
the harbour the city batteries had fired many cannon, as though some
danger were toward. One of the old man's mates had then gone aloft "to
descry what might be the cause." He had looked over the narrow neck of
land which shuts the harbour from the sea, and had espied "divers
frigates and small shipping bringing themselves within the Castle." This
report showed Drake that he had been discovered, but the information did
not greatly move him. He gathered from the old mariner that a great ship
of Seville lay moored just round the next point, with her yards across,
"being bound the next morning for St Domingo," or Hispaniola. Drake
"took this old man into his pinnace to verify that which he had
informed, and rowed towards this ship." As he drew near, the Spanish
mariners hailed them, asking "whence the shallops came." Drake answered:
"From Nombre de Dios." His answer set the Spaniards cursing and damning
him for a heretic English buccaneer. "We gave no heed to their words,"
says the narrative, but hooked on to the chains and ports, on the
starboard bow, starboard quarter, and port beam, and laid her aboard
without further talk. It was something of a task to get on board, for
the ship stood high in the water, being of 240 tons, (and as far as we
can judge) in ballast. Having gained the ship's waist they tossed the
gratings and hatch covers down into the lower decks. The Spaniards gave
up the ship without fighting, and retired, with their weapons, to the
hold. Two or three of their younger seamen went forward, and hid in the
manger, where they were found as soon as the dark decks were lit by a
lantern from the pinnaces. The raiders then cut the ship's cables, and
towed her "without the island into the sound right afore the town," just
beyond the shot of the citizens' great guns. As they towed her out, the
town took the alarm, the bells were rung, thirty great cannon were
fired, and the garrison, both horse and foot, well armed with calivers,
marched down "to the very point of the wood," to impeach them "if they
might" i