CHAPTER LXVII
Everything being ready, we took our leave of our kind entertainers, and, going on board at Port Royal, set sail for England on the first day of June. We beat up to windward, with fine easy weather, and one night believing ourselves near Cape Tiberon, lay to, with an intention to wood and water next morning in the bay. While we remained in this situation, a sailor, having drunk more new rum than he could carry, staggered over board, and, notwithstanding all the means that could be used to preserve him, went to the bottom, and disappeared. About two hours after this melancholy accident happened, as I enjoyed the cool air on the quarter-deck, I heard a voice rising, as it were, out of the sea and calling, "Ho, the ship ahoy!" Upon which one of the men upon the forecastle cried, "I'll be d--n'd if that an't Jack Marlinspike, who went overboard!" Not a little surprised at this event, I jumped into the boat that lay alongside, with the second mate and four men, and rowing towards the place from whence the voice (which repeated the hail) seemed to proceed, we perceived something floating upon the water. When we had rowed a little further, we discerned it to be a man riding upon a hencoop, who, seeing us approach, pronounced with a hoarse voice, "D--n your bloods! why did you not answer when I hailed?" Our mate, who was a veritable seaman, hearing his salute, said, "By G--, my lads, this is none of our man. This is the devil--pull away for the ship." The fellows obeyed his command without question, and were already some fathoms on our return, when I when I insisted on their taking up the poor creature, and prevailed upon them to go back to the wreck, which when we came near the second time, and signified our intention, we received an answer of "Avast, avast--what ship, brother?" Being satisfied in this particular, he cried, "D--n the ship, I was in hopes it had been my own--where are you bound?" We satisfied his curiosity in this particular too; upon which he suffered himself to be taken on board, and, after having been comforted with a dram, told us, he belonged to the Vesuvio man-of-war, upon a cruise off the island of Hispaniola; that he had fallen overboard four-and-twenty hours ago, and the ship being under sail, they did not choose to bring to, but tossed a hencoop overboard for his convenience, upon which he was in good hopes of reaching the Cape next morning: howsomever, he was as well content to be aboard of us because he did not doubt that we should meet his ship, and if he had gone ashore in the bay, he might have been taken prisoner by the French. My uncle and father were very much diverted with the account of this fellow's unconcerned behaviour; and in two days, meeting with the Vesuvio, as he expected, sent him on board of her, according to his desire.
Having beat up successfully the windward passage, we stretched to the northward, and falling in with a westerly wind, in eight weeks arrived in the soundings, and in two days after made for the Lizard. It is impossible to express the joy I felt at the sight of English ground! Don Rodrigo was not unmoved, and Strap shed tears of gladness. The sailors profited by our satisfaction, the shoe that was nailed to the mast being quite filled with our liberality. My uncle resolved to run up into the Downs at once, but the wind shifting when we were abreast of the Isle of Wight, he was obliged to turn into St. Helen's, and come to Spithead, to the great mortification of the crew, thirty of whom were immediately pressed on board a man-of-war.