‘Young man, I know not your soul, whether it loveth the gauds and the pomps of the world which are but vanity, or whether it would walk in the paths which are narrow and thorny, but which lead upwards. Yet I do believe you to be in spirit true and leal; and wherefore then should I dissemble, that if I am an outcast, it is in a holy and a just cause—ay, and a cause which will triumph, when the blood of the saints which crieth aloud is justified and avenged! Leonard Lindsay, I am one of those who by voice and hand did to death the man Charles Stuart.’ This, then, was one of the regicides whom I had often heard were wandering about the world, being driven from their land by this great and justifiable deed, for so my parents taught me to esteem it, of the putting to death of the king. I would have told my friend somewhat to this effect, but he stopped me, saying, applause or disapprobation were alike to him; that he would help and comfort all his fellow-men, but that he cared not for their opinion on what he had done, always looking for judgment inwards to his own soul, and thence upwards to his God. Shortly after this we went on deck, and my first glance was astern, where the skiff was still towing, although the waves raised by the sea-breeze ran so gaily, that sometimes as they chased us, the boat, rising on the crest of the following sea, would seem as though she would be hove bodily on deck. The land was now quite close, not more than a mile under the lee, so that we could see a great succession of bays and little headlands with bushes of many sorts, and rich tangled underwood, creeping among and clothing the knolls and banks even to the water’s edge. Over these, high palms bended and waved in the sea-breeze, these seeming to issue from every crevice in the rocks; and sometimes, where a rivulet came down into the sea, the banks thereof being flat and soft, grew great thickets of the mangrove bush, a shrub which rises on bare grey stems out of the water, supporting whole beds of tangled and intertwisting foliage above, thus raising, as it were, a sort of canopy above the water. Between such places and the rocky headlands were often little bays, with narrow strips of white glittering beach, running like crescents from cliff to cliff, the sea breaking in flashing surf upon the shingle, and often sending its spray pelting among the bushes. Never, indeed, had I seen a more glorious coast, one so teeming with beauty and the riches of an overflowing nature. Involuntarily after every long and ardent gaze I turned my eyes upon my skiff, praying within my heart that nought might come to make my adventure miscarry.