st English merchant to
dispatch a ship to the Spanish main. I love not the Spaniards and,
like all Englishmen who think as I do on matters of religion, have
viewed with much disfavor our alliance with men who are such cruel
persecutors of all who are not of their religion."

"I hate them," Reuben Hawkshaw said, energetically. "They swagger
as if they were the lords of the world, and hold all others as of
no account beside them. If you resolve on this enterprise I shall,
of course, do my utmost to avoid them; but should they try to lay
hand on us, I shall be right glad to show them that we Englishmen
hold ourselves fully a match for them."

"Well, well, we must not think of that," Diggory Beggs said,
hastily; "but, nevertheless, cousin, if the Swan sails for those
seas, I will see that she is well provided with ordnance and small
arms, so that she shall be able to hold her own with those who
would meddle with her."

"That is all I ask, Diggory. We shan't meddle with them, if they do
not meddle with us; but if they treat us as pirates, to be slain
without form of trial, they must not blame us if we act as pirates
when they come upon us. They hold that they are beyond the law,
when they are once beyond sight of land, going westward; and we
have only to take them at their word.

"As to piracy, if the things that are whispered as to their cruelty
to the natives be true, pirates are an innocent and kindly folk
compared to them. They openly proclaim that all found in these
seas, which they claim as their own, will be treated as enemies and
slain without mercy; and we shall be, therefore, fully justified in
treating as an enemy any Spanish ship that we may come across; and
holding her as a fair prize, if we are strong enough to take her."

"But you must not go out with that intent, Reuben. If I fit out the
Swan to go to the Indies, it is that she may trade honestly with
such natives as are ready to trade with her, and not that she may
wage war against the Spaniards."

"I quite understand that, Cousin Diggory," Reuben Hawkshaw said,
with a grim smile; "and that also is my intent, if the Spaniards
will but let me adhere to it; only if we are attacked, we must
defend ourselves. If they try to capture us, and we beat them, it
is but natural that we should capture them."

"Against that I have nothing to say, Reuben. I can find no
authority, in Scripture, for the Spaniards claiming a portion of
the seas as their right. The