Old St Augustine; a story of three centuries . of a hurricane. Such a tempest, the Indianssaid, had never been known on the coast before. Therain beat down in blinding floods. The sea was lashedto fury. The French ships struggled and labored in thestorm, striving in vain to gain an offing; the wavesrising to the maintopmasts threatened to engulf the Spaniards saw them driving helplessly to thesouthward. Then they disappeared in the gloom of thestorm. In such a sea, on the Florida co^st, the hereticsmust perish. The Spaniards were saved. Thus hadProvidence interposed once agan to a
Old St Augustine; a story of three centuries . of a hurricane. Such a tempest, the Indianssaid, had never been known on the coast before. Therain beat down in blinding floods. The sea was lashedto fury. The French ships struggled and labored in thestorm, striving in vain to gain an offing; the wavesrising to the maintopmasts threatened to engulf the Spaniards saw them driving helplessly to thesouthward. Then they disappeared in the gloom of thestorm. In such a sea, on the Florida co^st, the hereticsmust perish. The Spaniards were saved. Thus hadProvidence interposed once agan to avert their destruc-tion; so,writes the pious Mendoza, God and the HolyVirgin have performed another great miracle in ourbehalf; and soldiers and priests joined in a service ofthanksjiving. Heaven had destroyed the ships. Now to fall uponthe rest of the French at Fort Caroline. A mass wassaid. Menendez selected 500 arquebusiers and pikemen,gave the command to march, and himself led the four days, led by Indian guides, they threaded the. Foi^t Caroline. 31 niaze3 of the pines, waded the swamps and hewed theirway through scrub and hamak. Day after day, nightafter night, the never-ceasing floocs of rain poured downupon them. At 10 oclock of the fourth night, drenched,bruised, exhausted with fatigue and privation, theyreached the River of May, and on a bluff overlooking FortCaroline threw themselves down to await the dawn. How was it within the fort? Ribault had left nodefenders. Laudonniere lay in bed sick with a garrison was a beggarly assemblage of were Challeux the carpenter, old and helpless; LeMoyne the artist, who could wield a pencil but not a pike;the boys who kept Ribaults dogs; and lackeys, womenand children. The pitiful few who could bear arms at allwere worn out by their protracted guard duty during thefour days and nights of continuous tempest. Throughthe weary hours of this night, as before, the tired sentinelspaced the ramparts in t
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Keywords: ., bookauthorreynoldscharlesbcharl, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880
