to take the town if it is any hindrance to the digging of the mine.' 1

At last, however, he decided against this plan, and gave directions that when the expedition drew near the mine, Keymis should take with him six or seven men to explore the ground, leaving the rest of his companions some little distance lower down. Scarcely, however, had the flotilla started, when Raleigh, changed his mind, and sent a letter after Keymis. Some Indian might be lurking on the bank, and seeing a boatload of Englishmen land, might carry the news to the Spaniards. Before they could return from the mine, the enemy would have time to cut them off from the river. It would therefore be more prudent to take the whole number to the landing-place. From that point the mine was only three miles distant. It would be easy to post the soldiers in advance, so as to guard the road. If the mine proved not so rich as was expected, Keymis was to bring away a basket or two of ore, as proof of its actual existence. But if, as was hoped, gold were discovered in abundance, the troops were to remain at their post to guard the working party from aggression. If they were attacked by the Spaniards, 'then,' he wrote, 'let the Sergeant-Major repel them, if it be in his power, and drive them as far as he can.'

One contingency remained to be provided for. A rumour had reached him in the Cayenne, that a large Spanish force had already made its way up the river. For this case his instructions to Keymis were clear. "If," he continued, "without manifest peril of my son, yourself, and other captains, you cannot pass toward the mine, then be well advised how you land. For I know "--and we can fancy how the fire flashed from his eyes as he wrote the words "I know, a few gentlemen excepted, what a scum of men you have, and I would not for all the world receive a blow from the Spaniard to the dishonour of our nation. I, myself, for my weakness, cannot be present, neither will the company land except I stay with the ships, the galleons of Spain being daily expected. Pigott, the sergeant-major, is dead; Sir Warham, my lieutenant, without hope of life; and my nephew,

This stands on the authority of the Declaration, upon which I am quite ready to accept it.

1617

THE BOATS ON THE ORINOCO.

121

1

your serjeant-major now, but a young man. It is, therefore, on your judgment that I rely, whom I trust God will direct for the best. Let me hear from you as soon as you can. You shall find me at Punto Gallo, dead or alive; and if you and not my ships there, yet you shall find their ashes. For 1 will fire with the galleons, if it come to extremity; but run away I will never." Braver words it was impossible to utter. Wiser instructions than these last it was impossible to frame, unless he had been prepared to think his promise to the King was worth keeping at the risk of the overthrow of the enterprise. One thing alone was wanting. He could not put his own head upon Keymis's shoulders. The crisis of his fortunes had come, and he had to stand aside whilst the stake upon which his life and his honour were set was being played for by rough sailors and beardless boys.

1618.

tion up the

For three weeks Keymis and his followers struggled against the current of the Orinoco. Two out of his five vessels ran aground upon a shoal. But on the morning of The expedi- January 2, the remaining three had passed the head Orinoco. of the delta. The wind was favourable, and the weary crews might hope that either that evening, or the following morning, they would reach the place from whence a walk of a few miles would bring them to the golden mine, for the sake of which they had risked their lives.

The new

It was mid-day when a sight met their eyes by which they must have been entirely disconcerted; for there, upon the riverbank in front of them, a cluster of huts San Thome appeared. A new San Thomè, as they afterwards learned, had risen to break the stillness of the forest. All hope of reaching the mine unobserved was at an end.

seen,

It was at such a moment that the want of Raleigh's presence was sure to be felt most deeply. It was still possible to carry out his instructions in the spirit if not in the letter. The object of the expedition was the mine, not the town. Common sense should have warned Keymis to pass the town

1 Raleigh to Keymis. Coyley, Life of Raleigh, ii. 125.

on the further side of the river, and to take up a defensive position near the mine.

attacked

Instead of this, he came to an anchor about a league below the town, and immediately proceeded to land his men. If he intended to attack the place-and he can hardly and burnt. have taken these measures with any other purpose— he was singularly slack in his movements. At nightfall the three vessels weighed anchor, and steered towards San Thome, whilst, at the same time, the land troops put themselves in motion in the same direction. Meanwhile the Spanish governor had taken his measures with skill. He had but forty-two men to dispose of, but he had in his favour their thorough knowledge of the locality, and the thickness of the woods through which the English had to force their way. It was about nine o'clock when the first shot was fired upon the vessels. Not long afterwards ten Spaniards sprang out from amongst the trees upon the advancing column.' The English

1 I have, not without some hesitation, taken my narrative thus far from Fray Simon (Noticias Historiales, 636). It is a story in minute detail, and is evidently founded upon the report of an eye-witness. Its most striking difference from Raleigh's account consists in this, that whilst the Spaniard represents the English as landing below the town, and deliberately marching to attack it, Raleigh describes them as landing between the mine and the town, and therefore above the town, merely for the purpose of taking a night's rest, and as being ignorant that the town was so near them as it was. In the first place, it must be remembered that Raleigh had every motive to falsify the narrative, so as to make it appear that his men were not the aggressors. In the second place, his story is improbable in itself. It is most unlikely that Keymis should not have discovered where the town was. We are, however, not left to probabilities, as there exists an independent account of the affair. In a letter written not long afterwards (Discovery of Guiana, ed. Schomburgk), Captain Parker says: "At last we landed within a league of San Thomè, and about one of the clock at night we made the assault, where we lost Captain Raleigh and Captain Cosmor, but Captain Raleigh lost himself with his unadvised daringness, as you shall hear, for I will acquaint you how we were ordered. Captain Cosmor led the forlorn hope with some fifty men; after him I brought up the first division of shot; next brought up Captain Raleigh a division of pikes, who no sooner heard us charged, but indiscreetly came from his command to us," &c. The whole tenor of this presupposes that the English were formed for the attack when they

1618

BURNING OF SAN THOMÈ.

123

were taken by surprise, and, by their own confession, were almost driven into the river. Order, however, was soon restored. Numbers began to tell, and the Spaniards, repulsed at every point, were forced back towards the town. Young Walter Raleigh dashed into the thick of the fight, shouting, in words which were one day to be remembered against his father, "Come on, my men; this is the only mine you will ever find." The next minute he was struck down, and his followers were crying wildly over his corpse for vengeance. As the English pushed their way into the street, a galling fire was opened upon them from the houses on either side. At last, in sheer selfdefence, they were driven to set fire to the buildings in which the enemy was sheltered. The wooden huts were soon in a blaze, and by one o'clock, the defenders of San Thomè were driven from their homes, to find what refuge they could in the surrounding woods.

Difficulties of the captors.

When the morning dawned the English discovered that they had not improved their position by their victory. In a thickly wooded country, the advantage is

were charged by the Spaniards. Of any surprise whilst resting on the river-bank the writer knows nothing. Nor is there any reference to any such surprise in Keymis's letter of January 8. Keymis says of young Raleigh, that had not his extraordinary valour and forwardness

led them all on, when some began to pause and recoil shamefully, this action had neither been attempted as it was, nor performed as it is, with this surviving honour.' This is hardly the language of a man to whom 'this action was a mere accident. In his letter to Carew, Raleigh

himself says, “Upon the return I examined the sergeant-major and Keymis why they followed not my last directions for the trial of the mine before the taking of the town; and they answered me that although they durst hardly go to the mine, having a garrison of Spaniards between them and their boats, yet they said they followed those latter directions and did land between the town and the mine, and that the Spaniards, without any manner of parley, set upon them unawares and charged them, calling them perros Ingleses, and by skirmishing with them drew them on to the very entrance of the town, before they knew where they were." (Edwards, ii. 379.) Now, though Raleigh here states that the Spaniards attacked first, there is nothing really contradictory with Fray Simon's story. The charge against the Spaniards of having rushed upon the English when quietly resting on the bank was, no doubt, an afterthought. The English were preparing to attack, but the Spaniards actually struck the first blow.

always on the side of the defence, and it was that advantage which, by their attack upon San Thome, they had recklessly thrown away. Instead of being able, according to Raleigh's instructions, to await in a well-chosen position the assault of the enemy, they were now compelled, if the mine was to be reached at all, to make their way through dense woods, in which every tree would afford a shelter to a Spanish marksınan. Keymis did his best to execute his orders. At one time he tried to force a passage through the forest. At another time he placed his men in boats, and rowed up the stream to seek for a safer path. Everywhere he met with the same reception. Volleys of musketry, fired by men whom it was impossible to reach, told him, in unmistakable tones, that the great enterprise had failed.

The retreat

Thomè.

For some days Keymis still lingered at San Thome. It was hard to be the bearer of such tidings as his to the bereaved father, whose son was lying in his bloody grave. But from San the inevitable retreat could not much longer be delayed. His men were raving like madmen, and cursing him for having led them into such a snare. The mine, they told him, was a pure invention of his own. As he listened to their angry reproaches, he began, unconsciously perhaps, to look about for excuses by which he might shield himself from blame. A new light suddenly broke upon him. After all, what would be the use of reaching the mine? If the gold were found, it would only fall into the hands of the Spaniards. Even if he could preserve it from them, and could bring it safe to England, would it not be immediately confiscated by the King? He was told that the King had granted it to Raleigh under the great seal. His answer was that Raleigh was an attainted man, and that no grant to him was of any force.

Keymis's determination was probably hastened by some papers which he found at San Thomè, from which he learned that Spanish troops were on their way to the Orinoco. The survivors of the band which, less than three weeks before, had come up the river full of hope, hurried on board the vessels, with failure written on their foreheads. From that moment