Dick had led a seafaring life during his earlier years, and Grey had picked him up in a shipwrecked, ragged, and starving condition on the coast of Spain some two years previously. In those days ship-wrecked sailors often had a hard time of it, even though the terrors of the galleys or the Inquisition did not loom quite so perilously before them as had been the case a century before. To find himself taken into the service of a young English gentleman of quality, and to be the companion of his travels, had been a piece of luck that Dick thanked Providence for every day of his life. He had been one of four servants at the outset; but as Grey’s resources diminished, or his roving life took him into perils for which some men had little stomach, he gradually lost his retinue, till, for the past year, Dick alone had followed him, and the two had become friends and comrades, as well as master and servant. Now at their first halting-place, where they paused to let the horses breathe after a steady half-hour’s gallop, Grey opened the wallet at his side, which he had filled with gold pieces from the casket (the rest he had sewn carefully into his clothes for safety), and counted out a certain number, which he shook in his fist as he spoke. "Dicon, I am going to London to try my luck there. But, as I have ofttimes heard, fortunes are as easily lost there as won, wherefore it may be that I shall become a beggar instead of growing in wealth and greatness." "Heaven forbid!" ejaculated Dick in passionate protest. "Well, Heaven watches over the undeserving as well as the virtuous, so there is e’en hope for me," answered Grey with his winning smile. "But look ye here, Dicon. You have been a faithful rogue, and have served me well, and I hope we may company together many a long day yet. But inasmuch as there are uncertainties in life, and we are going forth into a new world, where perchance I may sink rather than swim, I desire to give you six months’ wage in advance, whilst I have my pockets lined with gold, so that should any untoward chance befall me, as it has befallen better men than myself, I shall not have to turn you adrift unrewarded, nor will you, if you can be a wise varlet, and husband your resources, be thrown on the world without some means of support." Dick seemed about to protest, but either the look on his master’s face or some idea which had entered his own head held him silent. He took the coins without counting them, and producing a greasy leathern pouch, such as sailors often carry with them, he dropped the gold pieces into it one by one, tied it up, and fastened it safely in an inner pocket.