r, was
false. I drink to a gentleman of known discretion, proved courage,
unstained honor--"

It needed not the glance of his eye to bring men to their feet. They
rose, courtiers and university wits, soldiers home from the Low
Countries, kinsmen and country friends, wealthy merchants who had staked
their gold in this and other voyages, adventurers who with Frobisher and
Gilbert had sailed the icy seas, or with Drake and Hawkins had gazed
upon the Southern Cross, Captain Baptist Manwood, of the _Marigold_,
Lieutenant Ambrose Wynch, Giles Arden, Anthony Paget, good men and tall,
who greatly prized the man who alone kept his seat, smiling upon them
from the head of the long table in the Triple Tun's best room. Baldry,
muttering in his beard that he had made a throw amiss and that the wine
was to blame, stumbled to his feet and stood with the rest. "Sir
Mortimer Ferne!" cried they all, and drank to the seated figure. The
name was loudly called, and thus it was no slight tide of sound which
bore it, that high noon in the year 158-, into the busy London street.
Bow Bells were ringing, and to the boy in blue and silver upon the bench
without the door they seemed to take the words and sound them again and
again, deeply, clearly, above the voices of the city.

Mortimer Ferne, his hand resting upon the table before him, waited until
there was quiet in the tavern of the Triple Tun, then, because he felt
deeply, spoke lightly.

"My lords and gentlemen," he said, "and you, John Nevil, whom I
reverence as my commander and love as my friend, I give you thanks. Did
we lose at Fayal? Then, this voyage, at some other golden island, we
shall win! Honor stayed with us that bloody day, and shall we not now
bring her home enthroned? Ay, and for her handmaidens fame and noble
service and wealth,--wealth with which to send forth other ships, hounds
of the sea which yet may pull down this Spanish stag of ten! By my
faith, I sorrow for you whom we leave behind!"

"Look that I overtake you not, Mortimer!" cried Sidney. "Walter Raleigh
and I have plans for next year. You and I may yet meet beneath a
palm-tree!"

"And I also, Sir Mortimer," exclaimed Captain Philip Amadas. "Sir Walter
hath promised me a ship--"

"When the old knight my father dies, and I come into my property," put
in, loudly, a fancy-fired youth from Devon, "I'll go out over bar in a
ship of my own! I'll have all my mariners dressed like Sir Hugh
Willoughby's men in the pi