That night the laird [lord of the manor] being advertised, came; and, on the morn, with a good number of the gentlemen of the countrey round about, gave the said general and the captains presence, [audience] and after the same speeches in effect as before, received them in his house, and suffered the souldiers to come a land and ly altogether to the number of thirteen score, for the most part young beardless men, silly, [weak] travelled, and hungered; to the which, one day or two kail pottage[353] and fish was given; for my advice was conform to the prophet Elizeus [Elisha] his to the king of Israel in Samaria, Give them bread and water, &c.

[Footnote 353:  A mess formerly much used in Scotland among the commons, being a kind of soup maigre, composed of kail, a species of greens or coleworts, boiled in water, and thickened with oat-meal, grits, or shelled barley.—­E.]

The names of the commanders were Jan [Juan] Gomes de Medina, general of twenty hulks, captain Patricio, captain de Lagaretto, captain de Luffera, captain Mauretio, and Seingour Serrano.  But verily all the while, my heart melted within me for desire of thankfulness to God, when I remembered the prideful and cruel natural temper of the people, and how they would have used us, in case they had landed with their forces among us, and the wonderful work of Gods mercy and justice in making us see them, the chief commanders of them, to make such due-gard [submission] and courtesie to poor seamen, and their souldiers, so abjectly, to beg alms at our doors and in our streets.

In the mean time, they knew not of the wrack of the rest, but supposed that the rest of the army was safely returned [to Spain,] till one day I got in St Andrews, in print, the wrack of the gallies in particular, with the names of the principal men, and how they were used, in Ireland and our Highlands, in Wales and other parts of England.  The which, when I recorded to Jan Gomes, by particular and special names, he cried out for grief, bursted and grat [burst into tears.] This Jan Gomes shewed great kindness to a ship of our town, which he found arriested at Calais[354] at home coming, rode[355] to court for her, and made great russe [praise] of Scotland to his king, took the honest men to his house, and inquired for the laird of Anstruther, for the minister, and his host, and sent home many commendations:  But we thanked God in our hearts, that we had seen them in that form.

[Footnote 354:  This must signify Cadiz, as mentioned before.—­E.]

[Footnote 355:  Perhaps ought to have been wrote.—­E.]

SECTION VII.

A cruising Voyage to the Azores in 1589, by the Earl of Cumberland[356].

We learn from Hakluyt, II. 647, that this narrative was written by Mr Edward Wright, an eminent mathematician and engineer, who was the real author of that admirable invention for charts, commonly called Mercators projection, but unjustly, as Mr Wright complains in his work entitled Vulgar Errors, where he charges Mercator with plagiarism.  From the narrative, Mr Wright appears to have been engaged in the expedition and on board the Victory[357].