CHAPTER XVI.
THE MOST CHIVALROUS ADVENTURE OF THE GOOD SHIP ROSE "He is brass within, and steel without, With beams on his topcastle strong; And eighteen pieces of ordinance He carries on either side along." Sir Andrew Barton.
Let us take boat, as Amyas did, at Whitehall-stairs, and slip down ahead of him under old London Bridge, and so to Deptford Creek, where remains, as it were embalmed, the famous ship Pelican, in which Drake had sailed round the world.

There she stands, drawn up high and dry upon the sedgy bank of Thames, like an old warrior resting after his toil.

Nailed upon her mainmast are epigrams and verses in honor of her and of her captain, three of which, by the Winchester scholar, Camden gives in his History; and Elizabeth's self consecrated her solemnly, and having banqueted on board, there and then honored Drake with the dignity of knighthood.

"At which time a bridge of planks, by which they came on board, broke under the press of people, and fell down with a hundred men upon it, who, notwithstanding, had none of them any harm.

So as that ship may seem to have been built under a lucky planet." There she has remained since as a show, and moreover as a sort of dining-hall for jovial parties from the city; one of which would seem to be on board this afternoon, to judge from the flags which bedizen the masts, the sounds of revelry and savory steams which issue from those windows which once were portholes, and the rushing to and fro along the river brink, and across that lucky bridge, of white-aproned waiters from the neighboring Pelican Inn.