the sick Laudonnière, the men, bedrenched and disheartened, labored as
they might to strengthen their defences. Their muster-roll shows but a
beggarly array. "Now," says Laudonnière, "let them which have bene bold
to say that I had men ynongh left me, so that I had meanes to defend my
selfe, give care a little now vnto mee, and if they have eyes in their
heads, let them see what men I had." Of Ribaut's followers left at the
fort, only nine or ten had weapons, while only two or three knew how to
use them. Four of them were boys, who kept Ribaut's dogs, and another
was his cook. Besides these, he had left a brewer, an old
crossbow-maker, two shoemakers, a player on the spinet, four valets, a
carpenter of threescore--Challeux, no doubt, who has left us the story
of his woes,--and a crowd of women, children, and eighty-six
camp-followers. To these were added the remnant of Laudonnière's men, of
whom seventeen could bear arms, the rest being sick or disabled by
wounds received in the fight with Outina.

Laudonnière divided his force, such as it was, into two watches, over
which he placed two officers, St. Cler and La Vigne, gave them lanterns
to go the rounds, and an hour-glass to set the time; while he himself,
giddy with weakness and fever, was every night at the guard-room.

It was the night of the nineteenth of September; floods of rain
bedrenched the sentries on the rampart, and as day dawned on the
dripping barracks and deluged parade, the storm increased in violence.
What enemy could have ventured forth on such a night? La Vigne, who had
the watch, took pity on the sentries and on himself, dismissed them, and
went to his quarters. He little knew what mortal energies, urged by
ambition, avarice, bigotry, desperation, will dare and do.

To return to the Spaniards at St. Augustine. On the morning of the