Ten days more passed; but they were not so dull and tedious as those I had spent heretofore. Both Steele and myself were rapidly improving in health, under the cheering influence of our mutual companionship and conversation. We passed the days in recounting our mutual adventures; he telling of his experience in the Low Country; the many hairbreadth escapes that he had met with at the hands of the Spaniards; of the struggles that the people of Holland were passing through in their fight for freedom, and how many gallant Englishmen had drawn swords in their cause. He also asked me something of my Irish campaign with Sidney many years ago, when I was but a light-hearted lad, before I had ever gone to London and lost the sweetness and freshness of my youth in that great city of fashions and society. I would tell him of the gayeties of London of which he knew little; of the nobles and ladies of fashion, and their empty, care-free, butterfly existence. I told him of a great play which I had seen, when the little man, Shakespeare, had played a noble tragedy before the crown, and tried to give him some idea of the great lighted house with its audience of nobles and fair ladies. Steele's eyes flashed, as I tried to depict the play, and the enthusiasm of the people as they saw some noble scene. "It must have been grand!--grand! lad," he cried. "I would give five years of my existence to live such a life, be it only for a day." I also told him of my father's dismissal, for Steele's was a fine and generous nature, which invited confidence; and he agreed with me that Richard must have had a hand in it. We also talked of the golden Virginia, which Raleigh was determined to make into a great, vast empire; and discussed its wild, ferocious tribes, and its mines of gold and gems. So passed ten days. We had exhausted all plans for escaping; none seemed feasible. Were we to overpower our jailer, our condition would not be bettered; and so being surrounded by a shipload of pirates, and with no means of escape, we mutually agreed to wait until land was reached before making an attempt to free ourselves. On the eleventh morning, just as we finished our breakfast, Steele went to the grating to look out, and as he did so, uttered an exclamation. "Look!" he cried, pointing out upon the sea. I ran over to the window, and following his finger, saw far away on the horizon a dark speck, which Steele asserted was a ship. Even as we looked we heard a hoarse order in Spanish, a language I am familiar with. It was DeNortier's command to the pirates to put about in the direction of the distant vessel. All the morning long we followed that dark speck upon the water, gaining little by little, until about two of the evening we had gotten well in sight of her. She was a great galleon, bearing the yellow flag of Spain, her decks crowded with men, women, and children, who pointed and gesticulated at us.