Many ships in those days were named, as we name chrysanthemums, in honor of some prominent man or fair dame. These good folk must have followed the coming and going of their namesakes with curious interest. The sight of a sail on the horizon never lost its excitement, for every ship brought some wild tale of adventure. The story of shipwreck "on the still vexed Bermoothes," and the wonderful escape of Gates and Somers, with their crew, has been made famous forever by the tradition that it suggested to Shakespeare the plot of _The Tempest_; but every "frygat" that touched at Jamestown or Annapolis brought accounts almost as thrilling, of storm and stress, of fighting tempests with a crew reduced by scurvy to three or four active seamen, of running for days from a Spanish caravel or a French pickaroune. The _Margaret and John_ set sail for America early in the seventeenth century, carrying eighty passengers, besides sailors, and armed with "eight Iron peeces and a Falcon." When she reached the "Ile of Domenica," the captain entered a harbor, that the men might stretch their limbs on dry land, "having been eleven weeks pestered in this vnwholesome ship." Here, to their misfortune, they found two large ships flying Hollander colors, but proving to be Spaniards. These enemies sent a volley of shot which split the oars and made holes in the boats, yet failed to strike a man on the _Margaret and John_. "Perceiving what they were," writes one of the English crew, "we fitted ourselves the best we could to prevent a mischief: seeing them warp themselves to windward, we thought it not good to be boarded on both sides at an anchor; we intended to set saile, but the Vice-Admiral battered so hard at our starboard side, that we fell to our businesse, and answered their vnkindnesse with such faire shot from a demiculvering, that shot her betweene wind and water, whereby she was glad to leave us and her Admirall together." The Admiral then bespoke them, and demanded a surrender; to which the sturdy English replied that they had no quarrel with the King of Spain, and asked only to go their way unmolested, but as they would do no wrong, assuredly they would take none. The Spaniards answered these bold words with another volley of shot, returned with energy by the English guns.