Page 60 - The Pirate Coast (By Sir Charles Belgrave)

as easily as you can hire a porter in England, the price to be paid,
being according to the danger of being discovered and the im­
portance of the person to suffer. The price which is placed on
one of the church is more than on any other member of the com­
munity, so it is not often that any of the clergy suffer. Yet one
was murdered while I was there. To secrete the deed, his head
had been cut off and cast into the bay, but it was driven ashore
not far from the house of Mr. Chamberlain.’
One evening, Loch watched the funeral procession of an old
lady who, he was told, had left large sums to the church. ‘First
came the clergy with large wax candles in their hands, accompany­
ing the Host, then the corpse, superbly and most gaudily dressed,
then more clergy singing a beautiful Requiem, followed by hun­
dreds of well-dressed people, mostly in cocked hats, all carrying
the same sort of candles in their right hands, these candles were
about five feet long, and one and a half inches in diameter. The
whole street was illuminated by them. All the people were on
foot, none being in carriages or on horseback.’
On another day, Loch met a gang of slaves from the interior,
bringing bales of sugar to Rio. They marched four abreast,
naked except for a white sash round the waist. A man led them,
singing a song as he marched, which the others joined in, keeping
in step to the tunc. In the markets they found fish, fruit and
vegetables of excellent quality, but very expensive. The beef and
mutton were not good, having been ‘improperly killed’. Among
the fruit, were oranges, each of which contained at the opposite
end to the stalk, under the same rind, little entire oranges, which
could be divided into sections like the parent orange.
By August 5th, having refitted the rigging and taken on food,
water and provisions, the Eden was ready to sail, but the date of
sailing was delayed for a day at the request of Mr. Chamberlain.
He asked Loch to allow the Eden to act as escort for a short dis­
tance to a Portuguese ship, bound for India, carrying a large
quantity of treasure belonging to English merchants. There were
a number of ships from Buenos Aires cruising off the coast, ‘who
were not very scrupulous as to what they could master’. At
6 p.m., the Eden weighed anchor, and made sail with a firm, light
breeze from the north. The Portuguese ship did the same. But
the wind died down so the Eden's boats were ordered to tow her
from the harbour. When she had cleared the harbour a breeze
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