WHEN the lifting-frame was complete, there was no reason why it should not at once be floated out and secured in place at the sunken hulk as soon as possible, and as the weather was very fine at that particular time, and the water clear, we concluded to do it immediately. We took both boats, Mr. Millward and Alice in his boat, and I alone in the “Mohawk.” With a line from the floating frame to each boat we towed it along so easily and rapidly that in a couple of hours we were over the wreck. We anchored the two boats one at the bow and one at the stern of the galleon, and pulling the floating frame between the two, fastened it safely by a line at each end to the boat anchors. The next task was to get some heavy rocks with which to sink it, and attach them to the frame in such manner that when the latter was down in position to engage the wreck bow and stern, the rocks could be released to permit the frame to rise by its own power of flotation. It would then, we thought, be secure against displacement, as there was evidently very little, if any, movement of the water at the depth the galleon lay. Leaving the frame attached to the anchor-lines we went to the north cape with the boats, and loaded on twelve stones of considerable weight, which we carried out and secured to the frame by slip-knots in such manner that by a pull from above on a rope each might be released.

When the stones were attached we found that ten of them were just enough to sink the frame slowly. By means of a couple of ropes, one at each end of the frame, paid out from the two boats by Mr. Millward and me, we guided the contrivance in its descent until it landed exactly in place. Alice Millward with the water-glass watched the frame, and indicated to us how to manipulate the ropes. Thus she would call out, “Slowly, Mr. Morgan, a little more forward; a little more aft, father; now you are going right,” until it was in proper position. We then pulled the ropes attached to the stones, releasing the slip-knots two at a time to keep the balance properly, and when relieved of this weight the frame floated up, enclosing and grasping the wreck at each end. This part of the work was therefore successfully and easily completed.

The frame was in position, and it now only remained to attach the calabashes, one cage of them at a time, and we hoped the galleon would be lifted. In preparation for this work,—which we would not be ready to undertake for some time, or until all the calabashes were caged and fitted with attaching ropes,—we had, before sinking the frame-work, passed over the spar that connected the two triangles the bight of an endless rope, for use as a down-haul with which the calabash cages might be pulled down. This endless down-haul line we proposed to hitch to a buoy when we left, so that it might be supported within reach until wanted.

Being very anxious to test the working of my plan for pulling down and attaching the calabashes, I had brought along a single cage of them for the purpose of trying the experiment of pulling it down and attaching it to the longitudinal spar. This scheme was a very simple one, and I sincerely hoped it would prove successful, as it had given me considerable study in its contrivance, and was, I thought, the best and easiest way to accomplish the result. The following description will make it clear. To the cage holding the calabashes was attached a rope four feet long. On the free end of this attaching rope was a hook made of a stout forked branch. Secured to the endless down-haul rope was a similar hook. By catching these hooks together, the cage could be pulled down until the two hooks passed under the spar and came up on the other side. Now by crossing the down-haul rope the hook on the attaching rope, I thought, could be made to hook over that part of its own rope which was on the other side of the spar. Then by reversing the pull on the down-haul its hook would be released and the calabash cage be left attached to the spar by the stout rope passing around the spar and hooked to itself.

The experiment, to our great delight, was entirely successful and satisfactory; and when we had fixed the down-haul rope securely to a buoy we set sail and returned feeling highly encouraged at the outlook for our labors.

As this business of pulling down and affixing the calabashes was likely to be a long and tedious job, to be successfully prosecuted only in good weather, we determined to begin it as soon as we could get a sufficient number of cages ready for a start; and thus we could work in suitable weather at the wreck attaching the cages, and in unsuitable weather at home in preparing them for attachment. It would be only at the very last that we need watch for the wreck to rise, and prepare for towing her in to shore. Until enough calabashes to float her had been sent down, such as were attached would of course be simply anchored to the wreck.

It was oppressively warm that evening after we had returned home, and we all brought our chairs down to the shed to better enjoy the slight breeze which breathed in from the sea. We sat thus, watching the breakers roll in through the dim light, and crash on the sand with a long, running sound that passed from left to right along the beach, slow but regular as heart-beats in their constant reiteration. Mr. Millward was seated at a little distance from Alice and me enjoying his pipe, the fire in the bowl of which shone at intervals with a red glow, as though in rhythmic sympathy with the sound of the surf. The stars were bright and sprinkled all over the clear, dark sky, which was lit now and then by the long, fiery thread of a meteor ruled rapidly across the azure dome, and lingering as an impression on the retina long enough so that by turning the eye away the line of fire was transported to another quarter,—fading out, however, too fast for us to locate it distinctly.

It was a peaceful, quiet summer night, and we sat silent, enjoying together the restfulness of it. I looked at the dim outlines of Alice as she sat by my side leaning her cheek upon one hand, and my heart was filled with conscious depths of love and tenderness; then past her at the shadowy figure of the old man and the intermittent glow of his pipe. A great peace seemed to possess my soul, a wonderful content of spirit, and I said to myself, “This is the peace of pure content and happiness.” Often since have I recalled that night, and felt that man, born to trouble and sorrow on this earth,—beautiful though it be,—can hope for no greater bliss than such hours afford him. Happy hours come not at call, nor often, nor long remain. Satisfied ambition brings them not, nor gratified pride, nor gathered wealth; but they come only when there is united this trinity of conditions: rest from labor done, the healthy body, the presence of those we love. When these three things are united, the peaceful, happy hour will come. And when this sweet angel of peace shall hover over you, drive it not away, my friend, by taking troubled thought of the morrow, nor by grieving over the past, nor regretting opportunities missed. Enjoy it in contented silence while you may, and with little thought of past or future.

An unusually brilliant meteor shot in a long diagonal line from the zenith nearly to the horizon, and there burst in a ball of fire like a rocket. Alice laid her hand on my arm as though to call my attention, but without a word. The touch was light; the little hand remained but a moment on my arm, and was then as gently withdrawn. But, light and momentary, it thrilled me through and through; the angel of peace took instant flight, and thought came back with a rush. The restless fear that we might be parted; that she could never love me; the instinctive wish to know with certainty her heart; a thousand contending emotions stirred me. With all my will I strove to calm myself and still the wild beating of my heart. What strange power was this which the girl had acquired over me, that a mere touch of her hand sufficed to banish quiet, fill my brain with teeming fancies and my breast with longing and unrest? The quiet stars still shone as before, the surf still fell in measured cadence, the gentle, rustling breeze still fanned my cheek with its soft, cool breath; but peace and quiet and rest had departed. My soul was fevered, and anxiety preyed once more upon my heart.

The night-blooming cereus had unfolded its waxen, white flowers, and the warm air was laden with its strange, sweet perfume mingling with the fragrance of the dew-moistened foliage. Now there stole up out of the verge of the sea the thin, pale crescent of the young moon, a mere rounded line of silver tilted back as though reclining in its new feebleness, and giving but little more light than the brilliant lamp of Venus that hung, a point of corruscating splendor, near it.

Again, as the silver horn emerged from the dim horizon line, I felt the soft touch of her hand upon my arm, and in low tones she said, “Is it not beautiful?”

For answer I took the hand in mine. Cool and soft it felt to my fevered grasp. She withdrew it not, but, passive, let it lie for a few minutes. Some say that souls while still embodied do and can communicate with each other in some occult and mysterious way. If that be true, then surely my soul must then and there have greeted Alice Millward’s.

Mr. Millward, who had once or twice nodded over his pipe, now rose and knocking out the ashes reminded us that it was time to go to bed; and he and Alice retired to the house. As I had no fancy to be shut up in-doors on such a night, I brought my hammock down to the shed and swung it there where the sound of the sea would lull me to sleep, while the breeze fanned by with its cool breath.

The next morning we went diligently to work caging the calabashes in sets of four, rigging each cage with its short attaching rope and hook. The hooks I cut with axe and knife from the bushes of the nearest jungle. The work was congenial and light. Under the shed we arranged some tussocks of dried grass so that we could be seated low down; and thus ranged in a sociable triangle we worked, chatted, laughed, and joked; the old gentleman revived his experiences of former years; and altogether it was a very pleasant time. Whenever the weather was favorable we would load the completed cages of calabashes on board Mr. Millward’s boat, and all three of us would sail to the galleon and sink and attach them one at a time, in the manner already indicated.

Little by little the great pile of calabashes near the shed diminished until it was nearly gone. We had attached literally thousands of the gourds to the framework which grasped the wreck, until now when we looked through the water-glass the hull was no longer visible, by reason of the mass of caged gourds sunk far under water, each one of course pulling upwards to the full extent of its buoyancy. Still we kept on. I began to think that I should have to make another trip to the calabash trees. But it was not to be so.

One morning we arrived at the galleon with a huge load in both boats which we had got ready during the two preceding days. We had not pulled half of them down when I felt the hauling-line slacken in my hand. Now I had fully expected this very thing sometime to take place; but when it did occur I thought for the moment that the line had frayed and parted, and did not realize that the hull was rising. Then as suddenly I understood, and shouted to Mr. Millward to cast off his boat from the buoy, as the wreck was rising, and suiting the action to the word did the same for my boat. We had no sooner cast loose than slowly the gourds lifted their heads in a confused mass to the surface, rattling and knocking together in the swell. The water all about became dark with ooze and sand and fragments of weed stirred up from the ocean’s bed. I felt sure that the old hull was floating beneath in the frame, because, though I could not see it on account of the condition of the water, I knew that had the framework let go, its beams would have floated up and would now be in view among the floating gourds.

At the sight Mr. Millward jumped upon the gunwale of his little schooner and waving his hat began a cheer, in which we all joined. The old hulk floated at last! Its long rest was broken and a new voyage begun.

By a piece of sheer good-luck it so happened that the tide was coming in and nearly at the flood, the swell was setting to the land, and moreover the little breeze there was came from the right quarter to drift the wreck in to the point of rocks. Everything was favorable to success in beaching the galleon there.

In the greatest imaginable excitement we hastened to get the hauling-line on board the schooner, and securing both boats to it made all sail and endeavored thus to help the old hulk along by towing. It was sluggish business. The boats would rise and fall with the swell and lean down to the breeze, then come up, the sails empty, and then down again, and so on. But we moved, and in the right direction, though slowly, very slowly at first, and then a little faster as the rattling mass of gourds and the heavy load beneath it got fairly under way.

I never saw Mr. Millward so wrought up with excitement as at this time. And indeed we were all in something of the same condition. For here was the result of long labor culminating before our eyes. Small wonder, then, that there should be much hilarity. The galleon was afloat, and our ship was coming in! Halfway to the beach Mr. Millward, in a sweet and powerful voice, rolled out that good old hymn, “We are going home,” and back from the rocks came the echo of the last word, “to-morrow.” We all joined heartily in the chorus, with the best of good-will.

In about an hour, and as near as could be at high tide the Spanish galleon grounded between two rocks on a sandy bottom just at the north cape of the island, and we beached my boat near by in a sheltered place to the southwest of the cape. The other boat we sailed down to the creek, got something to eat, put the axe and some other things on board, and came back to the cape, where we anchored to await the falling of the tide.

As we sat in the boat lifted by the swell, and watched each wave wash through between the rocks where lay the galleon, I began to realize that Mr. Millward’s spirited song about “going home to-morrow” was not very likely to come true for a good many to-morrows. There was a regular tide-way through this passage, and I began to doubt whether the sea had not played us a sad trick in bringing the galleon to such a port.

That the situation of affairs may be better understood, it will be necessary to describe precisely the lay of the land. The two rocks were separated from each other by a narrow passage about thirty feet in width at the end where the galleon entered, and narrowed to perhaps ten feet at the other end in a length of a hundred and fifty feet. Through this passage the swell washed with great force. Indeed, the galleon and its supporting mass of gourds had been carried in on the heave of the swell and the hull dropped there with a crash on the bottom. The frame-work and cages had been at once torn loose, and the spars and gourds lay jammed in the narrow exit beyond, the water churned to foam by the obstruction they offered, dashing continually against them and tearing them one by one loose from one another until the sea all beyond was littered with the fragments.

Even as we watched, this dÉbris little by little washed out and away. The hull of the galleon, it is true, lying on the bottom and well under water where at high tide it was full five and twenty feet in depth, would suffer no such damage probably in the present state of the weather. But on the other hand the fall of the tide would most likely not be great enough to leave her above water, and there was no telling what might happen if a gale of wind should come along, especially with a low tide. Indeed I speedily made up my mind that there was not only going to be great danger of the wreck breaking up and getting away from us entirely by washing piecemeal out through the exit into the sea, but also, if this dire misfortune should be long delayed, that we should not be able to get at the cargo for the racing of the water, even when at its lowest. I must confess that when this fully dawned on me I felt greatly discouraged.

At last after a weary wait the tide reached its lowest, and as I feared, we found that we dared not go into the race-way with the boat. Each swell swept through it with a great rush, breaking into foam in the narrower part, so that a boat would have been dashed to pieces unless fortunate enough to swim fairly out through the exit, and would then be extremely liable to be overwhelmed. We drew up to the rock which lay adjoining the beach and landed, so that we might look down on the galleon from above. There she lay with the deck just awash at the water’s surface, except when a green sea came whelming through, and then she was buried to the depth of several feet. The old hulk was a most venerable and curious sight; shells of various kinds grown fast all over her ancient deck and sides; long streamers of sea-weed floating from her like hair; coral branches, sand, ooze, mud,—a thousand reminiscences of her long sleep on the bottom were now plainly observable in the light of day.

We all three stood looking down upon this curious sight in silence, which was finally broken by Mr. Millward, saying,—

“I am afraid we are as far away from the treasure that lies in that old ship as we were before we raised her.”

I did not feel like talking about it, and therefore said nothing, but stood with hands in pockets looking at this exhibition of what I regarded as the perversity of inanimate matter. That the bewitched old galleon should have run her nose exactly into this place of all others, when there were miles of fair sloping beach on which she might have stranded, seemed like a deadly stab in the back by a treacherous adverse fate. It was enough to make a man swear, if that would have done any good. And possibly it might have eased my feelings temporarily if I had possessed talent enough in that direction to have done full justice to the subject.

This would have been a good time to give up the whole project,—to wash my hands of all Spanish galleons in general and this perverse one in particular. But I must say that no such thought entered my mind. I was disgusted, and very much disappointed, and not a little angry; but as for giving up, that was simply impossible. The situation stunned me, and there seemed no way out of it; but I could not entertain the thought that the recovery of the treasure was impossible.

Alice Millward came up and drew me away by the arm. “Do not look so downcast,” said she. “Surely we need not grieve over this failure. If we cannot get the treasure we are no worse off than we were yesterday.”

“But you do not know,” said I, fiercely, “what it means to me. I have been working to save my birthplace.”

“Never mind, never mind, Mr. Morgan,” replied she, gently, “let us go home to the house now and think it all over there, where the hateful thing will be out of sight.”

“We can do no more here and we might as well be starting,” added the old man. Between them they led me to the boat, the old man saying various things about not putting your trust in things of this earth; that riches are not enduring; and other like remarks, all of which fell on my ear without at all penetrating to my understanding. To tell the truth, I was utterly dazed and unable to give the thing any sort of consecutive thought.

We made the run quickly to Home Creek, and all went early to bed, a most disheartened lot of mortals. Contrary to my expectation, I soon fell asleep and slept soundly all night long.