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The Armada Galleon of Tobermory Bay: Florencia

That much treasure of gold and jewels and plate went down in these lost galleons was the opinion of Scotch and Irish tradition, but these stories gained the greatest credence in the case of the Florencia of Tobermory Bay. She was said to have contained the paymaster's chests of the Armada, and to have carried to the bottom thirty million ducats of money, and the church plate of fabulous richness. It is certain that the Florencia was one of the largest galleons of the Armada and that she never returned to Spain. Her armament comprised fifty-two guns, and her company numbered 400 soldiers and eighty-six sailors. It is probable that this was the Florencia belonging to the Duke of Tuscany, which was refitting at Santander in September, 1587, concerning which Lord Ashley wrote to Walsingham, after the destruction of the Armada, that she was commanded by a grandee of the first rank who was al-ways "served on silver." While even now the most painstaking investigation is unable to find definite information regarding the amount of treasure lost in the galleon of Tobermory Bay, that she contained a vast amount of riches was believed as early as a half century after her destruction. The papers of the great house of Argyll record the beginning of the search almost as 200 .THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE far away as 1640. Of these fascinating documents, the first is the grant to the Marquis of Argyll and his heirs by the Duke of Lennox and Richmond, Lord High Admiral, with consent of King Charles the First, of all rights and ownership in the wreck of the Florencia and her treasure. The deed of gift is dated from the Court of St. Theobold's, February 5th, 1641 and "proceeds upon the narrative that in the year 1588, when the great Spanish Armada was sent from Spain towards England and Scotland, and was dispersed by the mercie of God, there were divers ships and other vessels of the Armada, with ornaments, munition, goods, and gear, which were thought to be of great worth, cast away, and sunk to the sea ground on the coast of Mull, near Tobermory, in the Scots seas, where they lay, and still lie as lost; and that the Marquis of Argyll, near whose bounds the ships were lost, having taken notice thereof, and made inquiries therefor, and having heard some doukers 2 and other experts in such matters state that they consider it possible to recover some of the ships and their valuables, was moved to take and to cause pains to be taken thereupon at his own charges and hazard. "For this reason, the Great Admiral, with the King's consent, gives, grants, and disposes to the Marquis the said ships, ornaments, munition, etc. of the Spanish Armada, and the entire profit that might follow, or that he had already obtained therefrom, with full power to the Marquis, his doukers, seamen, and others to search for the ships, and intromit with them, providing the Marquis were accountable and made prompt payment to the Duke of Lennox and Richmond of a hundredth part of the ships, etc. with 2 Divers. deduction of the expenses incurred for their recovery, pro rata." In these words the Crown assigned the treasure of the Florencia to the house of Argyll as part of its admiralty rights along that coast where marched the family estates. In 1665, the ninth Earl of Argyll, son of him who had obtained ownership of the galleon, employed an expert diver and wrecker by the name of James Mauld to search for the treasure of ducats and plate. It was an attractive speculation for that notable "douker" who was promised four-fifths of all the "gold, silver, metal, goods, etc." re-covered and incidentally the Earl bound himself "that the same James Mauld shall not be molested in his work, and that his workmen shall have peace-able living in these parts during their stay, and traveling through the Highlands and Isles, and shall be free from all robberies, thefts, etc. so far as the said Earl can prevent the same. The said contract provides further lodging houses for the workmen at the usual rates, and is fixed to endure for three years after March 1, 1666." These divers easily found the hull of the galleon, and they made a chart showing its exact bearings by landmarks on two sides of the bay. This ancient chart of the "Spanish wrack" as it is labeled, is owned by the present Duke of Argyll, and has been used by the modern treasure seekers who are unable even with its aid to find the remains of the Florencia, so deeply have her timbers sunk in the tide-swept silt of the bay. The interest of the ninth Earl of Argyll in exploring the galleon was diverted by Monmouth's Rebellion in which luckless adventure he became an active leader. He was made prisoner and suffered the loss of his head which abruptly 202 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE snuffled out his romantic activities as a seeker after lost treasure. He left among his papers a memorandum concerning the galleon, under date of 1677, which states that "the Spanish wrackship was reputed to have been the Admiral of Florence, one of the Armada of 1588, a ship of fifty-six guns, with 30,000,000 of money on board. It was burned and so blown up that two men standing upon the cabin were cast safe on shore. It lay in a very good road, landlocked betwixt a little island and a bay in the Isle of Mull, a place where vessels ordinarily anchored free of any violent tide, with hardly any stream, a clean, hard channel, with a little sand on the top, and little or no mud in most places about, upon ten fathoms at high water and about eight at ground ebb. "The fore part of the ship above water was quite burned, so that from the mizzen mast to the fore-ship, no deck was left. The hull was full of sand and the Earl caused it to be searched a little without finding anything but a great deal of cannon ball about the main mast, and some kettles, and tankers of copper, and such like in other places. Over the hindship, where the cabin was, there was a heap of great timber which it would be difficult to remove, but under this is the main expectation. "The deck under the cabin was thought to be en-tire. The cannon lay generally at some yards distance from the ship, from two to twenty. The Earl's father had the gift of the ship, and attempted the recovery of it, but from want of skilled workmen he did not succeed. In 1666, the Laird of Melgum (James Mauld), who had learned the art of the (diving) bell in Sweden and had made a considerable fortune by it, entered into a contract with the Earl THE ARMADA GALLEON 203 for three years by which Melgum was to be at all the charge, and to give the Earl the fifth part of what was brought up. He wrought only three months, and most of the time was spent in mending his bells and sending for material he needed, so that he raised only two brass cannon of a large calibre, but very badly fortified, and a great iron gun. "After this, being invited to England, he wrought no more, thinking his trade a secret, and that the Spanish ship would wait for him. On the expiring of the contract, the Earl undertook the work alone and without the aid of any one who had ever seen diving, recovered six cannon, one of which weighed near six hundred weight. The Earl afterwards entered into a contract with a German who undertook great things, and talked of bringing a vessel of forty guns, but instead brought only a yacht and recovered only one anchor, going away soon after, taking his gold with him and leaving some debt behind. "The contract with the German has expired, and the Earl is provided with a vessel, bells, ropes, and tongs, and with men to work by direction, yet, al-though he is confident in his own understanding of the art of diving with the bell, he is willing to enter into a contract. He will dispone (grant) the vessel for three years, provided the contractor should keep four skilled men to work in seasonable weather from May 1 to October 1. The Earl will furnish a ship of 60 or 70 tons with twelve seamen, and give his partner a fifth part of the proceeds. If a Crown were found it was to be exempted from the division and presented to his Majesty. . . . "It is concluded that if the money expected be fallen upon, the fifth part will quickly pay all expenses, and reward the ingenious artist, and if 204 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE that fail, the cannon will certainly repay the charges." There are also preserved articles of agreement, dated December 18th, 1676, by which the Earl makes over a three-year concession to John Saint Clare, minister at Ormistoun in Scotland, "for himself and as taking burden for his father," to search the wreck on shares, the Earl reserving "one-third part of what should be recovered during the first year, and one-half of what should be recovered during the last two years." It is also provided that "if the Saint Clares were disturbed during the first year, so as not to be able to work or raise the wreck without damage to their persons (by reason of the unsettled state of the country), the contract should be regarded as not taking effect for a year. The Earl binds himself to produce before November 1, 1676, his right to the ship, under the Great Seal of Scot-land, at Edinburgh, and to deliver a copy of it to the Saint Clares. John Saint Clare, younger, hinds himself to repair with all skill for its recovery, and for the recovery of the valuables, during the space of three years, and to make true account and payment of the shares above reserved to the Earl and his heirs, etc. Lastly, both parties oblige themselves faithfully to observe all the articles of agreement under the liquidated penalty of 2,000 marks, Scots." The Saint Glares, or Sinclairs, as the name is spelled in other documents of the same tenor, as-signed their rights and contract to one Hans Albricht von Treibelen, who was probably that German referred to by the Earl as taking his gold with him and leaving his debts behind. This document contains a fascinating mention of "all that might be found in the water and about the ship, as gold, silver, bullion, jewels, etc." and sets forth a new scheme of division of the spoils. Now there appears Captain Adolpho E. Smith as a partner of Hans Albricht von Treibelen, and one finds another parchment executed by the Earl who appears to have thought that these "doukers" would bear watching, for they are enjoined "immediately on the recovery of the wreck to deliver on the spot to the Earl's factors or servants who are daily to attend the work and to be witnesses of what is recovered. . . . Should the work be impeded by the violence of the country people, it is provided that the term of the contract might be lengthened." The repeated references to molestation by the in-habitants round about were aimed at the Clan Mac-Lean. The great Lachlan M'or had long since closed his stormy career,, and, wrapped in his plaid, his bones were smouldering in a grave by Duart Castle. His kinsmen had good memories, however, and there was that debt for provisions which had been left owing by Captain Pareira of the Florencia some eighty years before. It might seem that young Donald Glas had squared the account when he blew the galleon and her crew to kingdom come, but the MacLeans were men to nurse the embers of a feud and set the sparks to flying at the next opportunity. They held it that theirs was the first right to the wreck, and cared not a rap for any documentary rights that might have been granted to the Camp-bells (the clan of the Earls of Argyll), by the Great Admiral of Scotland. Hector MacLean, brother of Lachlan MacLean of Castle Torloisk, near Tobermory, rallied a force and drove the divers from the wreck. Then, in order that there might be no doubt about the views 206 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE of the MacLeans, they built a small fort overlooking the bay and the scene of the wreck, the ruins of which still survive. There a detachment was posted with orders to make it hot for any interlopers who might try to find the sunken treasure without first consulting the MacLeans. This interference found its way into the Courts at Edinburgh in the form of a petition of grievances suffered by Captain Adolpho E. Smith. He swore before a notary that John MacLean, of Kinlochalan, and John MacLean, a servitor to Lachlan MacLean of Torloisk, "had convocated six or seven score of armed men, and he had exhibited to them a royal warrant bearing his Majesty's protection and free liberty to Captain Smith and his servants to work at the wreck-ship at Tobermory, and prohibiting any of his Majesty's subjects from interrupting them. Captain Smith then required the MacLeans to dissipate the armed men, part of whom were in a fort or trench at Tobermory, newly built by them for interrupting the work, and the rest in the place or houses adjacent,as John MacLean of Kinlochalan acknowledged,and in his Majesty's name required them to give him and his men liberty to prosecute their work at the wreck. "Upon this Kinlochalan answered that the men in arms were not commanded by him but by Hector MacLean, brother of Lachlan MacLean of Torloisk, and others; and he declared that not only would Captain Smith and his men be hindered, but that the men in arms would shoot guns, muskets and pistols at them, should any of them offer to duck or work at the wreck. Whereupon Captain Smith took this instrument, protesting against the aforesaid Mac-Leans and their accomplices, at Tobermory in Mull, 7 September, 1678." The militant and tenacious MacLeans struck terror to the heart of Captain Adolpho Smith, according to another official document called a "notorial instrument at the instance of William Campbell, skipper to the Earl of Argyll's frigate, called Anna of Argyll. This worthy sea dog, it appears, as procurator for the Earl," had compeared, desired, and required Captain Adolpho E. Smith and his men to duck and work at the wreck-ship and to conform to the minutes of contract betwixt the Earl and him, otherwise to give the bells, sinks, and other instruments necessary for ducking to William Campbell, and the men on board the Earl's frigate, who would duck them without any regard to the threatenings of the MacLeans. "Notwithstanding this, Captain Smith and his men refused to duck and work, or to give over the bells, etc., necessary for the work to William Camp-bell who thereupon, as procurator for the Earl of Argyll asked and took instruments and protested against Captain Smith for cost, skaith, and damage conform to the contract. The instrument was taken by Donald McKellar, notary public, at and aboard the yacht belonging to Captain Adolpho E. Smith, lying in the Bay of Tobermory in Mull, 7 September, 1678." The wreck of the galleon was fought over about this time, not only by the mettlesome MacLeans but also by the Duke of York as Lord High Admiral of Scotland and the Isles, succeeding in that office the Duke of Lennox. He challenged the rights of the house of Argyll to the Florencia and her treasure and instituted legal proceedings in due form which were decided in favor of the defendant, thereby con-firming for all time the possession of the wreck, 208 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE which belongs to the present Duke of Argyll. The verdict read in part as follows: "The rights, reasons, and allegations of the par-ties, and the gifts and ratifications therein referred to, produced by Archibald, Earl of Argyll, being at length heard and seen, the Lords of Council and Session assoilized the said Archibald Earl of Argyll from the hail points and articles of the summons libelled or precept intended and pursued against him at the instance of said William Aikman, Procurator-Fiscal of the Admiralty, before said Lord High Admiral and his deputies, and decreed and declared him quit and free thereof in all time coming. Dated 27th, July, 1677." There comes into the story, during the lifetime of the ninth Earl, the figure of Sir William Sacheverall, Governor of the Isle of Man, who was interested as a partner in one of the several concessions granted. He had left an account of his voyage to Mull in the year 1672, printed shortly after the event, in which he not only records sundry efforts to fish up the treasure but gives also a lively and vivid picture of the primitive Highlander on his native heather. "About twelve o'clock," he wrote, "we made the Sound of Mull. We saluted the Castle of Duart with five guns, and they returned three. I sent in my pinnace for the boats, and things you had left there ; and in the evening we cast anchor in the Bay of Tauber Murry, which for its bigness, is one of the finest and fastest in the world. The mouth of it is almost shut up with a little woody island call'd the Calve, the opening to the South not passable for small boats at low-water, and that to the North barely Musquet-shot over. To the Landward, it is surrounded with high Mountains cover 'd with woods, pleasantly intermix'd with rocks, and three or four Cascades of water which throw themselves from the top of the Mountain with a pleasure that is astonishing, all of which together make one of the oddest and most charming Prospects I ever saw. "Italy itself, with all the assistance of Art, can hardly afford anything more beautiful and diverting; especially when the weather was clear and serene, to see the Divers sinking three-score foot under water and stay sometimes above an hour, and at last returning with the spoils of the Ocean; whether it were Plate, or Money, it convinced us of the Riches and Splendor of the once thought Invincible Armada. This rais'd a variety of Ideas, in a Soul as fond of Novelty as mine. Sometimes I reflected with horror on the danger of the British Nation, sometimes with Pleasure on that generous Courage and Conduct that sav'd a sinking State; and sometimes of so great an Enterprize baffled and lost, by accidents unthought of and unforseen. . . . "The first week the weather was pleasant, but spent in fitting our Engines, which prov'd very well, and every way suited to the design; and our Divers outdid all examples of this nature. But with the Dog-Days the autumnal rains usually begin in these parts, and for six weeks we had scarce a good day. The whole frame of Nature seem'd inhospitable, bleak, stormy, rainy, windy, so that our Divers could not bear the cold, and despairing to see any amendment of weather I resolved on a journey across the Isle of Mull, to the so much celebrated II-Columb-Kill,3 in English St. Columb's Church. . . 3 Iona. 210 THE BOOK OF BURIED ,TREASURE "The first four miles we saw but few houses, but cross'd a wild desert country, with a pleasant mixture of Woods and Mountains. Every man and thing I met seem'd a Novelty. I thought myself entering upon a new Scene of Nature, but Nature rough and unpolish'd, in her undress. I observed the men to be large bodied, stout, subtile, active, patient of cold and hunger. There appeared in all their actions a certain generous air of freedom, and contempt of those trifles, Luxury and Ambition, which we so servilely creep after. They bound their appetites by their necessities and their happiness consists not in having much, but in coveting little. "The Women seem to have the same sentiments as the men; tho' their Habits were mean, and they had not our sort of breeding, yet in many of them there was a natural Beauty, and a graceful Modesty which never fails of attracting. The usual outward habit of both sexes is the Plaid; the women's much finer, the colours more lively, and the squares larger than the men's, and put me in mind of the ancient Picts. This serves them for a Veil and covers both head and body. The men wear theirs after another manner; when design'd for ornament it is loose and flowing, like the mantles our painters give their Heroes. "Their thighs are. bare, with brawny Muscles ; a thin brogue on the foot, a short buskin of various colours on the leg, tied above the calf with a strip'd pair of garters. On each side of a large Shot-pouch hangs a Pistol and a Dagger; a round Target on their backs, a blue Bonnet on their heads, in one hand a broadsword, and a musquet in the other. Perhaps no nation goes better arm'd, and I assure you they will handle them with bravery and dexterity, especially the Sword and Target, as our veteran Regiments found to their cost at Killie Crankie." Although Sir William Sacheverall, he of the facile pen and the romantic temper, brought no Spanish treasure to light, he helped us to see those fighting MacLeans and MacDonalds as they were in their glory, and his description was written almost two and a half centuries ago. The "Spanish wrack" was handed down from one chief of the Campbell clan to another, as part of the estate, until in 1740, John, the second Duke of Argyll, decided to try his luck, and employed a diving bell, by which means a magnificent bronze cannon was recovered. It has since been kept at Inverary Castle, the seat of the Dukes of Argyll, as an heir-loom greatly esteemed. This elaborately wrought piece of ordnance, almost eleven feet in length, bears the arms of Francis I of France (for whom it was cast at Fontainebleau) and the fleur-de-lis. It was probably captured from Francis at the battle of Pavia during his invasion of Italy, and the Spanish records state that several of such cannon were put on a vessel contributed to the Armada by the state of Tuscany. At the same time a large number of gold and silver coins were found by the divers, and the treasure seeking was thereby freshly encouraged. Modern experts in wrecking and salvage have agreed that the crude apparatus of those earlier centuries was inadequate to combat the difficulties of exploring a wreck of the type of the Florencia galleon, built as she was of great timbers of the iron-like African oak which to-day is found to be staunch and unrotted after a submersion of more than three hundred years. 212 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE The diving bells of those times were dangerous and clumsy, and easily capsized. The men worked from inside them by thrusting out hooks and tong-like appliances, and dared venture no deeper than eight fathoms, or less than fifty feet. In other words, the treasure might be in the galleon, but it was impossible to find and bring it up. For an-other century and more, the Florencia was left undisturbed until about forty years ago, the present Duke of Argyll, then Marquis of Lorne, considered it his family duty to investigate the bottom of Tobermory Bay, his curiosity being pricked at finding the ancient chart, and other documents already quoted, among the archives stored in Inverary Castle. More for sport than for profit, he sent down a diver who found a few coins, pieces of oak, and a brass stanchion, after which the owner bothered his head no more about these phantom riches for some time. In 1903, or three hundred and fifteen years after the Florencia found her grave in Tobermory Bay, a number of gentlemen of Glasgow, rashly speculative for Scots, formed a company and subscribed a good many thousand dollars to equip and maintain a treasure-seeking expedition by modern methods. The Duke of Argyll, like his ancestors before him, was ready to grant permission to search the wreck of the galleon for a term of years, conditioned upon a fair division of the spoils. He let them have the chart, without which no treasure hunt deserves the name, and all the family papers dealing with the Florencia. In charge of the operations was placed Captain William Burns of Glasgow, a hard-headed and vastly experienced wrecker who had handled many important salvage enterprises for the marine underwriters in seas near and far. The contrast between this twentieth century syndicate with its steam dredges and electric lights, and that primitive age when the MacLeans were harassing Captain Adolpho Smith from their fort beside the bay, is fairly astonishing. The gentlemen of Glasgow were not moved by sentiment, however, and soon Captain Burns was spending their money in a preliminary survey of the waters and the sands where the galleon was supposed to be. Although the ancient chart was explicit in its bearings, and these were made when men were living who had seen a part of the wreck above tide, locating the Florencia proved to be a baffling puzzle. During the first season, 1903, divers and lighters were employed in this work of searching, but the salvage consisted of no more than another bronze cannon loaded with a stone ball, several swords, scabbards, and blunderbusses, a gold ring, and some fifty doubloons bearing the names of Ferdinand and Isabella, and Don Carlos. Two years later, in 1905, the work was fairly be-gun with a costly equipment. The bottom of the bay was photographed and a mound of sand revealed, which, it was concluded, covered the surviving part of the galleon. Digging into this bank, the divers found many curious trophies, among them more arms and munition, bottles or canteens, boarding pikes, copper powder pans, and other small furniture, much corroded and encrusted. It was surmised that the vessel lay with her stern cocked up, and that in this end, indicated by the swelling of the sand bank, the treasure was hidden. Powerful suction pumps worked by steam were set going to clear away this bank, and they bored into it steadily for three weeks while the divers dug 214 THE BOO$ OF BURIED TREASURE shafts to clear away obstructions. At length, a massive silver candlestick was fetched up, and the sand pumps clanked more industriously than ever. At the end of the summer, about one hundred square feet of the bank had been removed, but the whereabouts of the galleon was by no means certain. As soon as the weather became favorable in the following spring, Captain Burns and his crew re-turned to the quest with more men and machinery than before. It was really impossible that such a business as this could be carried on without some touch of the fantastic and the picturesque. There now intrudes a Mr. Cossar, employed as "the famous expert, who, by means of delicate apparatus can indicate where metal or wood is buried in any quantity underground," and he spent the summer taking observations and buoying the bay with floats or markers. At these places boring was carried on by means of steel rods to a depth of one hundred and forty feet, while the dredges were busy exploring the vicinity of the sand bank. The area thoroughly explored was increased to eight acres in 1906, in water from seven to fourteen fathoms deep. That famous expert, Mr. Cossar, and his delicate apparatus were reinforced by Mr. John Stears of Yorkshire, one of the most notable diviners of England. He operated with no more apparatus than a hawthorn twig and professed to be able to locate precious metals no matter how many fathoms deep, and more than this, mirabile dictu, to tell you whether it was gold, or silver, or copper, that made his inspired twig twist and bend in his fingers. Mr. Stears was taken as seriously as Mr. Cossar had been, and the findings of one confirmed the verdicts of the other. The powerful salvage steamer Breamer with a large crew searched where the diviner told them to go, and several pieces of silver plate were recovered amid the excitement of all hands. The Breamer continued work in 1907, but during the next year the waters of Tobermory Bay were unvexed by the treasure-seekers. Then the syndicate went into its pockets for more cash, got its second wind, so to speak, and wrapped its operations in a cloud of secrecy, quite the proper dodge for a venture of this kind. A new and taciturn crew was hired for the Breamer, and whatever was found under water was hidden from prying eyes. The additional funds raised amounted to $15,000, and Captain Burns was told to obtain the best equipment possible. It was reported in the autumn of that year that "Mr. Cossar, the mineral expert, by whose skill the scope of the operations was more or less controlled, had broken down in health owing to the severe strain, and had gone home to recruit," but John Stears of Yorkshire with his hawthorn twig was still finding treasure which refused to be found by divers. The five-year concession from the Duke of Argyll had expired and was renewed by a syndicate organized in London, the manager a Col. K. M. Foss, an American, who appeared in Tobermory and conveyed an impression of cock-sure Yankee hustle. He announced that his agents were making historical researches in the libraries and museums of Europe and had already convinced him that the lost galleon was crammed with treasure ; that the chart relied on in past searches was all wrong, and expressed his surprise that the extensive salvage operations of recent years should have failed to locate the exact 216 THE BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE position of the wreck. In a word, Scotchmen might know a thing or two, but your up-to-date Yankee was the man to crack the nut of the lost Florencia and deftly extract the kernel. The appearance of this Colonel Foss in this storied landscape of Tobermory Bay has a certain humorous aspect. He hardly seems to belong in the ensemble of the search for the treasure galleon which has been carried on for centuries. This entertaining American may perhaps have unearthed information hitherto unknown, but the fact is worth some stress that all previous investigations had failed to prove beyond doubt that the Florencia bore from Spain the thirty millions of money reputed to have been stowed in her lazarette. An ancient document known as "The Confession of Gregorie de Sotomeya of Melgaco in Portugal" contains a list of the treasure ships of the Armada. He was with the fleet in the galleon Neustra Senora del Rosario, commanded by Dom Pedro de Valdes, and he goes on to say: "To the sixth question concerning what treasure there was in the fleet, I say there was great stories of money and plate which came in the galleon wherein the Duke of Medina was (The San Martin), and in the ship of Dom Pedro de Valdez which was taken, and in the Admiral of the galleons (The San Lorenzo), and in the Galley Royal (The Capitana Royale), and in the Vice Admiral wherein was Juan Martinez de Ricalde (The Santa Alma), and in the Vice Admiral whereof was General Diego (The San Christobel), and in the Vice Admiral of the pinnaces (N. S. de Pilar de Targoza), and in the Vice-Admiral of the hulks (The Gran Grifon), and in a Venitian ship in which came General Don Alonzo de Leyna. The report goeth that this ship brought great stores of treasure, for that there came in her the Prince of Ascoli, and many other noblemen. This is all I know touching the treasure." The name of the Florencia does not appear herein, yet the report of her vast riches was current in the Western Highlands no more than one lifetime after the year of the Armada. That men of solid business station and considerable capital can be found to-day to charter wrecking steamers, divers, dredges, and what not to continue this enterprise proves that romance is not wholly dead. In the town of Tobermory, the busy, mysterious parties of treasure seekers, as they come year after year with their impressive flotilla of apparatus, furnish endless diversion and conjecture. The people will tell you, in the broad English of the Highlander, and in the Gaelic, even more musical, as it survives among the Western Islands, the legend of the beautiful Spanish princess who came in the Florencia, and was wooed and won by a bold MacLean, and they will show you the old mill whose timbers, still staunchly standing, were taken from the wreck of the galleon. In Mull, and oftener among the islands further seaward and toward the Irish coast, are to be found black-eyed and black-haired men and women, not of the pure Celtic race, in whose blood is the distant strain bequeathed by those ancestors who married shipwrecked Spanish sailors of the Armada, and perhaps among them are descendants of these two or three seamen who were hurled ashore alive when the Florencia was destroyed by the hand of young Donald Glas MacLean. In quaint Tobermory whose main street nestles along the edge of the bay, the ancient foemen, Mac- 218 THE, BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE Leans and MacDonalds, tend their shops side by side, and it seems as if almost every other sign-board bore one of these clan names. If you would hear the best talk of the galleon and her treasure, it is wise to seek the tiny grocery and ship chandlery of Captain Coll MacDonald, a gentle white-bearded man, so slight of stature and mild of mien and speech that you are surprised to learn that for many years he was master of a great white-winged clipper ship of the famous City Line of Glasgow, in the days when this distinction meant something. Now he has come back to spend his latter days in this tranquil harbor and to spin yarns of many seas. "The scour of the tide has settled the wreck of the galleon many feet in the sand," he told me. "I can show you on a chart what the old bearings were, as they were handed down from one generation to the next, but Captain Burns is not sure that he has yet found her. The money is there, I have no doubt. There was a bark in the bay not long ago, and when she pulled up anchor a Spanish doubloon was sticking to one fluke. Mr. Stears, the Yorkshireman with the divining rod, did some wonderful things, but the treasure was not found. To test him, bags of silver and gold and copper money were buoyed under water in the bay, with no marks to show. It was done by night and he was kept away. He went out in a boat next morning and was rowed around a bit, and wherever the metal was hid under water, his twig told him, without a mistake. More than that, he knew what kind of metal it was under the water." "And how was that?" I asked of Captain Coll MacDonald. "He would hold a piece of gold money in each hand when the twig began to twist and dip. If the gold was under the water, the twig would pull with a very strong pull, so that he knew. If it was undecided like, he would hold silver money, and the twig told him the proper message. I watched him working many a time, and it was very wonderful." "But he did not find the treasure," I ventured to observe. "Ah, lad, it was no fault of his," returned the old gentleman. "The Spanish gold is scattered far and wide over the bottom of the bay, I have no doubt. Donald Glas MacLean did a very thorough job when he blew the galleon to hell." The present Duke of Argyll, brother-in-law of the late King Edward, bears among the many and noble and resonant titles that are his by inheritance, several which recall the earlier pages of the history of the Clan Campbell, the brave days of the feudal Highlands, and the ancient rights in the Armada Galleon of Tobermory Bay. He is Baron Inverary, Mull, Morvern, and Tiry; twenty-ninth Baron of Lochow, with the Celtic title of the Cailean Mo'r, chief of the Clan Campbell, from Sir Colin Camp-bell, knighted in 1286; Admiral of the Western Coast and Islands, Marquis of Lorne and Kintye ; Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland and of the Castles of Dunstaffnage, Dunoon and Carvick, Hereditary High Sheriff of the County of Argyll. He once explained how the ownership of the Florencia galleon came to his family by means of the ancient grant already quoted. The Campbells held the admiralty rights of the coast of Mull at the time of the Armada, and any wreck was lawfully theirs for this reason. The document was simply a formal confirmation of these rights. The Florencia 220 THE. BOOK OF BURIED TREASURE was flotsam and jetsam to be taken by whatever chiefs held the rights of admiralty. A case involving the salmon fishing rights of a Scottish river was recently decided by virtue of a charter of admiralty rights granted by Robert the Bruce, who ruled and fought six hundred years ago. In order to complete the documentary links of this true story of the Armada galleon, it may be of interest to quote from a letter recently received by the author from the present Duke of Argyll, in which he says : The galleon was the ship furnished by Tuscany as her contribution to the Armada. She was called the Florencia, or City of Florence, and was commanded by Captain Pereira, a Portugese, and had a crew largely Portugese on board. We have found specimens of his plate with the Pereira arms engraved on the plate border. She carried breech loading guns on her upper deck, and you will see one of them at the Blue Coat School now removed from London to the suburbs. On the lower deck were some guns got from Francis I at the Battle of Pavia. I have a very fine one at Inverary Castle, got from the wreck in 1740. Diving with a diving bell was commenced in 1670 and discontinued on account of civil troubles. Pereira foolishly took part in local clan disputes, helping the MacLeans of Mull against the Mac-Donalds. One of the MacDonalds, when a prisoner on board, is said to have blown up the vessel as she was warping out of harbor. I found an old plan and located the "Spanish wrack" from the plan, but only sent a man down once from a yacht. There was little obtained during the last divings, cannon balls, timber, a few pieces of plate, small articlesabout 70 dollars, etc. Yours faithfully, Kensington Palace, ARGYLL. April 25,1910."