"Hearken," said Borthwick, with deliberation. "On the very day you sailed for Sluice, three months ago, the Provosts of Aberdeen and Dundee appeared before the Parliament at Stirling (where the king was biding) making doleful complaints anent the great loss their burghs had suffered from the pirates of Portugal, who had seized many of their ships and barbarously murdered the crews. In five hours thereafter, Sir Andrew Barton put to sea with the _Great Lion_, the _Unicorn_ and _Little Jenny_. He sailed towards the Tagus, and by a herald's mouth demanded immediate justice from the Portuguese. Alfonso V. delayed; then stout old Barton lost his temper, and after firing a few shot at the castle of Lisbon, put to sea. Falling in with the identical ships which had committed the outrages complained of by the two Provosts, he captured and sunk them, sending the heads of their crews, daintily salted in beef barrels, to the King, at Stirling. Being somewhat soft-hearted, James, as you may believe, was no way delighted by the present; but, Sir Andrew, after cannonading every town on the coast of Portugal, as he passed it, and after destroying every ship of that nation which he met on the high seas, bore away for Scotland. Alfonso complained to his good ally the King of England; the latter made inquiries as to the most likely route to be chosen by Sir Andrew Burton on his homeward voyage, and despatched his high-admiral, the Lord Thomas Howard, and his brother Edmund, with a strong fleet of the best ships London could produce, to the Downs, as these Southerns call that part of the north sea----" "I know, I know, off the south-east coast of England, on the Kentish shore," said the admiral, stamping a foot impatiently; "go on, man--go on!" "After sweeping all the shores of Portugal, and after escaping a frightful tempest, on Saint Swithin's day, he was descried by the English fleet, breasting gallantly up the channel, with all sail possible on the _Lion_, and the _Jenny_, too, which bowled on alongside, like a little gadfly, all legs and arms, with sweeps out, and every stitch of canvas set." "Ay," said Robert Barton, "she was a noble little sloop, built under my father's own eye, poor man!--Well."