"The gale deid awa, and the sails flapped against the masts and rattlins; the sea became like glass, and there was sae little wind that the _Peggie_ wouldna answer her helm; but it mattered little, for Sir Andrew and auld Gibbie o' Crail had been in these seas before, and we kent our whereabouts. We were within less than half a mile o' the shore, but in fifty fathoms water by the line. There was nae current, and the ship lay like a log, wi' her decks blistering in the sun. Sir Andrew thought it wad be a gude time to get fresh water, for our last pint was in the scuttlebutt; sae we hove up twelve casks, the crews o' the yawl and pinnace were piped awa, and cheerily we shipped our oars, and pulled for the shore, as I weel mind, singing merrily the auld ballad,-- "'Oh, who is he has dune this deed, And tauld the king o' me, And sent us oot at this time o' year, To sail upon the sea?' Every man o' us had a durk and gude braid Banffshire whinger in his belt, forbye ten that were armed wi' crossbows, for Sir Andrew kent of auld that the Guanchos o' the Fortunate Isles were unchancey chields to warsle wi'. Gibbie o' Crail, wha had served wi' the Spanish buccaneers under the Captain Bocca Roxa (he whom Barton slew off Cape Ortegal), tauld us that they had once landed there, and put a hail village to fire and sword, and that wi' his ain hand he had killed the prince o' the place by a slash _across the nose_ wi' his boarding-axe. "We landed at a sma' bit creek among black rocks, covered wi' ashes, dust, and pumice-stane; but among them grew the green sugar-cane, the olive, and the bonnie cotton-tree. The wee birds wi' their gouden wings flew aboot frae branch to branch, singing in the bright sunshine. A' the sweets o' summer were there, and they wiled mony o' our messmates awa frae the wark o' filling and bunging the water-casks to stray in the laurel woods that grow on the base o' that tremendous peak, which is five leagues nigh frae the water-line to the Deil's Cauldron on the tap, where the red brimstone burns day and night. Ay, Jamie Gair, ye think muckle o' the craigs o' Dunnotter; but I wish ye saw Adam's Peak, in the Fortunate Isles! "The fresh water was delightful as milk, and the grapes that hung owre the pumice-stane rocks were sweeter than heather honey; and sae, despite Sir Andrew's orders, twa or three o' us, including Sandie Mathieson, a Leith man, strayed a mile or mair into the island, flinging our braid bonnets after the gouden birds, eating grapes and wild honey in some places, tumbling knee-deep in soft sulphur and spongy pumice-stane, until we found the entrance o' a cave, for a' the warld like ane o' the weems in the Fife, and, sailor-like, we scrambled in to see what was there, and my faith, messmates, we saw a sicht to mind o'!