“Indeed, ’twould be to my disadvantage just now, noble Sir, that he should know I am thy poor friend,” said Hildebrand. “It might, it might!” observed Sir Walter. “Have no doubt of my secresy. Farewell, and God keep thee, my friend!” “Farewell! farewell!” said Hildebrand. They shook hands again, and, this done, Sir Walter and his friends, without further observation, descended to their boat. All the other strangers had departed before, and none but her proper crew remained on board the “Eliza.” Once parted from his friends, Hildebrand stepped quickly across the deck, and mounted to the poop. Glancing forward, he perceived that the white sails were all loosened, and were beginning to expand to the wind: the men were scattered in groups, in different parts of the ship; and every eye, from Master Halyard’s downwards, was turned wistfully on him. As he observed the general attention, Hildebrand doffed his plumed hat, and raised it gaily in the air. “One cheer for merry England!” he exclaimed. There was a dead pause for a moment: then the welkin rang with a hearty hurrah! CHAPTER VI. Six weeks elapsed before the good ship “Eliza” again made the land. Then the heights of Maryland rose to the view, and on the following morning, at an early hour, she made Cape Fear. Passing Virginia, she sailed slowly along the coast of Carolina, and at last, after a very fair passage, came to an anchor at Roanoke. Roanoke island, a little to the south of Albemarle Sound, and somewhat further south of Dismal Swamp, was Sir Walter Raleigh’s plantation, and the first of the British settlements in North America. It had been established several years, but was, nevertheless, yet in its infancy, and the arrival of a ship from dear old England naturally excited in the colony the liveliest sensation. Long and long before she came to an anchor, and while she was yet far in the offing, every human creature in Roanoke had made her the subject of their every thought, and conjecture had deemed no point in her appearance too small for the exercise of its powers. Boats put off to meet her miles out, and, as she neared the island, a whole fleet of this craft, comprising every class of galley and canoe, hovered round her, and, though no one was allowed to come on board, all the news from England was known in every boat before the ship anchored.