Page:Early English adventurers in the East (1917).djvu/63

Rh the monotony and keep up his character for freebooting, Michelborne chased whatever native craft came within easy distance of him. He got very little for his pains because the native crews of the threatened boats, with their intimate knowledge of the coasts, were able to elude their pursuers. At last the spell of inglorious marauding ended in a terrible tragedy which narrowly missed involving the whole expedition in absolute disaster.

For days the Tiger had been lying helplessly upon the water, "a painted ship upon a painted ocean." Hardly a breath of wind stirred to moderate the fierce intensity of the sun which beat with tropical strength upon the decks. The men were lying idly about in the shade of the high bulwarks or hanging listlessly over the sides watching with lack-lustre eyes the adjacent coast of the island of Bintang, which was shimmering in the blue haze of noonday. Suddenly a cry was raised of a sail. Immediately all was bustle and eager expectancy. The strange craft was too distant to determine her character, but she was evidently more than an ordinary junk.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the mysterious ship came on until she was near enough for those on board the Tiger to see that her deck was crowded with men. A boat, heavily armed, was put off from the Tiger and after a parley the Englishmen were admitted on board the stranger. She proved to be a Japanese vessel. Her crew, at all events, were of that nation—squat-figured determined-looking fellows, with the impassive calm of their race reflected in their features. There were some eighty or ninety of them, and they were manifestly not all seamen. The garb and bearing of many were indicative of the soldier rather than the sailor. Moreover, they made