Page:MacGrath--The luck of the Irish.djvu/107

 was like finding it; and eternally the poor never save anything they find. William had mapped out a plan for spending only five dollars in each port or town he visited; spending-money, you understand; five in Gibraltar, five in Naples, and so on until he landed in San Francisco. He had written down this budget in detail and had sworn to keep within it. By this method of economy he would arrive in America with something over a thousand dollars. But to-morrow he would spend thirty dollars in Gibraltar.

As he was leaving the purser's office the next morning, after having wisely deposited his letter of credit, he heard some one exclaim, "Spain!"

He ran out to the port rail. Blue sky and blue sea, and a thin ribbon of salmon-tinted rock in between; that was all he could see. But there was some peculiar magic in the sight; it stirred a thousand little cells in his head. Yonder was the Spain of the Armada, of the golden galleons and black-browed pirates, of mighty conquest and quick decay; and here was William Grogan, news-boy, messenger, apprentice, plumber, seeing it through his very own eyes. One was a great historical fact; the other was a plain, downright miracle.

Not until after lunch would they raise Gibraltar. Spain was all right, but its coast suggested spooks, vanished splendors, things which trembled nebulously on the far horizon of memory, therefore unsatisfactorily. What he wanted to see was something which had not only been great, but still