All seemed so far going
well, when one morning Mr. Doughty's sloop was missing, and he along
with her. Drake, it seemed, had already reason to distrust Doughty, and
guessed the direction in which he had gone. The _Marigold_ was sent in
pursuit, and he was overtaken and brought back. To prevent a repetition
of such a performance, Drake took the sloop's stores out of her, burnt
her, distributed the crew through the other vessels, and took Mr.
Doughty under his own charge. On June 20 they reached Port St. Julian,
on the coast of Patagonia. They had been long on the way, and the
southern winter had come round, and they had to delay further to make
more particular inquiry into Doughty's desertion. An ominous and strange
spectacle met their eyes as they entered the harbour. In that utterly
desolate spot a skeleton was hanging on a gallows, the bones picked
clean by the vultures. It was one of Magellan's crew who had been
executed there for mutiny fifty years before. The same fate was to
befall the unhappy Englishman who had been guilty of the same fault.
Without the strictest discipline it was impossible for the enterprise to
succeed, and Doughty had been guilty of worse than disobedience.
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