"
The Gascon sprang to his feet muttering something between his teeth. "I
crave your pardon, my lord," he added with a courteous bow. "I am but a
plain rough soldier unused to the ways of courts, but it seems to me
that things being as they are, my duty is quite simple." He bowed
himself out and left Coligny wondering.
During the following months it was noted that in choosing the men for
his coming expedition Gourgues appeared to be unusually select. He sold
his inheritance, borrowed some money of his brother, and fitted out
three small ships carrying both sails and oars. He enlisted, one by one,
about a hundred arquebusiers and eighty sailors who could fight either
by land or sea if necessary. He secured a commission from the King to
go slave-raiding in Benin, on the coast of Africa. On August 22, 1567,
he set sail from the mouth of the Charente.
"I should like to know," said one of the trumpeters, Lucas Moreau,
"whether we are really going slave-catching, or not."
"Why do you think we are not?" asked the pilot, to whom he spoke.
"Because I have seen nothing on board that looks like it. Moreover, he
was very particular to ask me if I had been in the Spanish Indies, and
when he heard that I had been in Florida he took me on at once. I was
out there, you know, when you were, two years ago.
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