Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE NAVIGATORS We were Prince Henry's gentlemen,— His gentlemen were we, To dare the gods of Heathendom, Whoever they might be,— To do our master's sovereign will Upon a trackless sea. We were Prince Henry's gentlemen, And undismayed we went To right for Lusitania Wherever we were sent,— The stars had laid our course for us, And we were well content. We were Prince Henry's gentlemen, And though our flagship lie Where white the great-winged albatross Came wheeling down the sky, Or black abysses yawned for us, We could not fear to die. We were Prince Henry's gentlemen,— Around the Cape of Wrath We sailed our wooden cockleshells — Great pride the pilot hath To voyage to-day the Indian Sea — But we marked out his path! SEA OF DARKNESS THOSE things that you say cannot be true, Fer- nao! How do you know that the sea turns black and dreadful just behind those heavenly clouds? If there are hydras, and gorgons, and sea-snakes that can swallow a ship, and a great black hand reaching up out of a whirlpool to drag men down, why do we lever see them here? Look at that sea. can there be anything in the world more beautiful?" The vehement small speaker waved her slender hand with a gesture that seemed to take in half the horizon. The old Moorish garden, overrun with the brilliant blossoms that drink their hues from the sea, overlooked the harbor. Across the huddled many-colored houses the ten-year-old Beatriz and her playfellow Fernao could see the western ocean in a great half- circle, bounded by the mysterious line above which three tiny caravels had just risen. The sea to-day was exquisite, bluer than the heavens that arched above it. The wave-crests looked like a flock of sea-doves playing on the sunlit sparkling waters. Fernao fro...