Page 57 - The Pirate Coast (By Sir Charles Belgrave)

but this time without any misadventures, went up the mountain
again to visit the convent of Our Lady of the Mount. On the
day before they sailed, they sauntered through the town, admiring
the superb churches and convents, and buying dried fruits and
sweetmeats from the nuns. In the evening, on their way back
from the expedition, Loch and Dunkin lost their way. Seeing a
man in a garden, they went in to ask him where the road was.
He was a black slave, and when they spoke to him, lie began to
shout and holler, as though they were going to murder him: the
more they tried to pacify him, the louder he shouted. They were
close to the windows of a house in the garden, and they began to
think that they were in a rather dangerous situation, ‘as a stiletto
or a shot might have been their reception’. At last, by means of
a douceur and a few words of Portuguese mustered up by Dunkin,
the slave was made to understand that they had lost their way, and
all that they wanted was to find the road: this they did without
any further incident.
One of the people whom Loch met at Madeira was a young
Englishman, who had left England in a hurry, and was on his way
to America. He seems to have been a ‘confidence man’, for he
had cheated ‘the very Highest Society in England’ with his pre­
tensions of wealth and his claims to a peerage; he was now ‘cheat­
ing the good people of Madeira, as he had done in England’. He
carried documents, which lie had drawn up himself, proving his
wealth and his title. However, ‘the Young Adventurer’ was ex­
posed. He told Loch that he was shortly going to Madras to take
over a valuable estate which had been left to him by his grand­
mother. When closely questioned, he said that the estate was a
place outside Madras called the Mount. The Mount existed but
it did not belong to anybody’s grandmother, it was an artillery
barracks, the property of the Government. ‘Poor creature,’ says
Loch, ‘he was exceedingly annoyed at the discovery made of him.’
The Eden and the Tees sailed from Madeira on June 21st, two
days later, they parted company, when the Tees changed her
course for St. Helena which was an important anchorage for ships
of the East India Company and the chief victualling station for
ships going to India and the Far East. After sailing for a few days,
the Eden ran into shoals of flying fish, which were being hunted by
albacorcs (tunny fish), and banattas. The flying fish hit the sides
of the ship in the daytime and at night, many of them coming
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