There were ten on board the little Biscayan felucca—­three men in crew, and seven passengers, of whom two were women.  In the light of the open sea (which broadens twilight into day) all the figures on board were clearly visible.  Besides they were not hiding now—­they were all at ease; each one reassumed his freedom of manner, spoke in his own note, showed his face; departure was to them a deliverance.

The motley nature of the group shone out.  The women were of no age.  A wandering life produces premature old age, and indigence is made up of wrinkles.  One of them was a Basque of the Dry-ports.  The other, with the large rosary, was an Irishwoman.  They wore that air of indifference common to the wretched.  They had squatted down close to each other when they got on board, on chests at the foot of the mast.  They talked to each other.  Irish and Basque are, as we have said, kindred languages.  The Basque woman’s hair was scented with onions and basil.  The skipper of the hooker was a Basque of Guipuzcoa.  One sailor was a Basque of the northern slope of the Pyrenees, the other was of the southern slope—­that is to say, they were of the same nation, although the first was French and the latter Spanish.  The Basques recognize no official country. Mi madre se llama Montana, my mother is called the mountain, as Zalareus, the muleteer, used to say.  Of the five men who were with the two women, one was a Frenchman of Languedoc, one a Frenchman of Provence, one a Genoese; one, an old man, he who wore the sombrero without a hole for a pipe, appeared to be a German.  The fifth, the chief, was a Basque of the Landes from Biscarrosse.  It was he who, just as the child was going on board the hooker, had, with a kick of his heel, cast the plank into the sea.  This man, robust, agile, sudden in movement, covered, as may be remembered, with trimmings, slashings, and glistening tinsel, could not keep in his place; he stooped down, rose up, and continually passed to and fro from one end of the vessel to the other, as if debating uneasily on what had been done and what was going to happen.

This chief of the band, the captain and the two men of the crew, all four Basques, spoke sometimes Basque, sometimes Spanish, sometimes French—­these three languages being common on both slopes of the Pyrenees.  But generally speaking, excepting the women, all talked something like French, which was the foundation of their slang.  The French language about this period began to be chosen by the peoples as something intermediate between the excess of consonants in the north and the excess of vowels in the south.  In Europe, French was the language of commerce, and also of felony.  It will be remembered that Gibby, a London thief, understood Cartouche.

The hooker, a fine sailer, was making quick way; still, ten persons, besides their baggage, were a heavy cargo for one of such light draught.

The fact of the vessel’s aiding the escape of a band did not necessarily imply that the crew were accomplices.  It was sufficient that the captain of the vessel was a Vascongado, and that the chief of the band was another.  Among that race mutual assistance is a duty which admits of no exception.  A Basque, as we have said, is neither Spanish nor French; he is Basque, and always and everywhere he must succour a Basque.  Such is Pyrenean fraternity.