"'To which end I am placing with you a vastness of treasure such as no
nation hath ever seen." Which was to be applied to only the advancement
of the True Faith, and which was in case of failure of the enterprise of
the Armada to be given to the custody of whatever King should, after the
death of Sixtus V, sit upon the throne. And again:
"'The Cave was a great one on the south side of the Bay with many
windings and blind offsets.... 'The black stone on one hand and the red
on the other giving back the blare of the lantern.'"
The memoranda which follow give the future history of the Trust:
"The narrative of my father, the great and good Don Bernardino de
Escoban, I have put in the present form for the preservation of the
secret. For inasmuch as the chart to which he has alluded is not to
be found, though other papers and charts there be, it may be
necessary that a branch of our house may live in this country in
obedience to the provision of the Trust and so must learn to speak
the English as though it were the mother tongue. As I was but a
youth when my father wrote, so many years have elapsed that death
has wrought many changes and the hand that should have carried the
message and given me the papers and the chart is no more, lying as
is thought beside my father amongst the surges of the Skyres. So
that only a brief note pointing to the contents of an oaken chest
wherein I found them, though incomplete, was all that I had to guide
me. The tongue that might have spoken some added words of import was
silent for ever
"FRANCISCO DE ESCOBAN."
"23, October, 1599."
"The narrative of my grandfather, together with my father's note
have I Englished faithfully and put in this secret form for the
guidance of those who may follow me, and whose life must be passed
in this rigorous clime untill the sacred Trust committed to us by
Pope Sixtus the Fifth be fullfilled. When on the death of my elder
brother, I being but the second son, I was sent to join my father
in Aberdeyne, I made grave preparation for bearing worthily the
burden laid upon us by the Trust and so schooled myself in the
English that it is now as my mother tongue. Then when my father,
having completed the building of his castle, set himself to the
finding of the cave whereof the secret was lost, in which emprise
he, like my grandfather lost his life amongst the waters of the
Skyres of Crudene. Ye that may follow me in the trust regard well
this secret writing, made for the confusion of the curious but to
the preservation of our secret. Bear ever in mind that not all that
is shows on the surface of even simple words. The cipher of my
Grandfather devised by Fr. Bacon now High Chancellor of England has
many mouths, all of which may speak if there be aught to say.
"BERNARDINO DE ESCOBAN."
"4, July, 1620."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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