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Title: The Monarchs of the Main; Or, Adventures of the Buccaneers. Volume 2 (of 3)

Author: Walter Thornbury

Release date: January 21, 2012 [eBook #38632]

Language: English

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THE MONARCHS OF THE MAIN;

Or,

Adventures of the Buccaneers.

by

GEORGE W. THORNBURY, ESQ.

"One foot on sea and one on shore,
To one thing constant never."
                MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

In Three Volumes.

VOL. II.







London:
Hurst and Blackett, Publishers,
Successors to Henry Colburn,
13, Great Marlborough Street.
1855.

London: Sercombe and Jack, 16 Great Windmill Street.




CONTENTS OF VOL. II.


CHAPTER I.--SIR HENRY MORGAN.

Son of a Welsh farmer--Runs to sea--Turns Buccaneer--Joins Mansvelt and
takes the Island of St. Catherine--Mansvelt dies--St. Catherine re-taken
by the Spaniards--Morgan takes Port au Prince--Quarrel of French and
English adventurers about a marrow-bone--Takes Porto Bello--Captures _Le
Cerf Volant_, a French vessel--It blows up--Takes Maracaibo---City
deserted--Tortures an Idiot beggar--Le Picard, his guide--Takes
Gibraltar--Also deserted--Tortures the citizens--With a Fire-ship
destroys the Spanish fleet and repasses the bar--Escapes the fort by a
stratagem--The Rancheria expedition--Sails for Panama--Captain Bradley
takes the Castle of Chagres--Anecdote of a wounded Buccaneer          1

CHAPTER II.--CONQUEST OF PANAMA.

March from Chagres over the Isthmus--Famine--Ambuscades of Indians--Wild
bulls driven down upon them--Victory in the Savannah--Battle of the
Forts--Takes the city--Burns part of it--Cruelties--Revels--Virtue of
the Spanish prisoner, and her sufferings--Retreats with
prisoners--Ransom--Divisions of booty--Treason of Morgan--Escapes by
night to Jamaica--Dispersion of his fleet--Morgan's subsequent fate 125

CHAPTER III.--THE COMPANIONS AND SUCCESSORS OF MORGAN.

Oexmelin's interview with the old Buccaneer--Adventure with
Indians--Esquemeling's escapes--D'Ogeron's escape from the
Spaniards--Buccaneers' fight in Tobago against the Dutch--Captain Cook
captures a Spanish vessel--Captains Coxen and Sharp begin their cruise
                                                                    189

CHAPTER IV.--THE CRUISES OF SAWKINS AND SHARP.

The South sea now visited--Buccaneers land at Darien--March
overland--Take Santa Maria--Sail to Panama--Ringrose is wrecked--Failure
of Expedition--Driven off by Spanish fleet--Partial victory--Coxen
accused of cowardice--Sharp elected commander, deposed--Plunder Hillo
and take La Serena--Take Arica--Sharp re-elected--Retreat with
difficulty--Conspiracy of the prisoners--Land at Antigua--Return to
England--Sharp's trial for piracy--Seizes a French ship in the
Downs--Returns to Jamaica                                           215

CHAPTER V.--DAMPIER'S VOYAGES.

Dampier leaves Captain Sharp--Land march over the Isthmus--Joins Captain
Wright--Wreck of D'Estrèes and the French fleet--Returns to
England--Second voyage--With Captain Cook--Guinea coast--Visits Juan
Fernandez--Takes Ampalla--Plunders Paita--Scheme for working the Spanish
mines--Attacks Manilla Galleon--Captain Swan--Dampier's death
unknown--Van Horn, a Dutch sailor--Entraps the Galleons--Takes Vera
Cruz--Killed in a duel with De Graff--His Dress                     277




MONARCHS OF THE MAIN.




CHAPTER I.

SIR HENRY MORGAN.

    Son of a farmer--Runs to sea--Turns Buccaneer--Joins Mansvelt, and
    takes the Island of St. Catherine--Mansvelt dies--St. Catherine
    retaken by the Spaniards--Takes Port-au-Prince--Quarrel of French
    and English Buccaneers about a marrow-bone--Takes Porto
    Bello--Captures _Le Cerf Volant_, a French vessel--It blows
    up--Takes Maracaibo--City deserted--Tortures an Idiot--Le
    Picard--Storms Gibraltar--Also deserted--Tortures the Citizens--With
    a Fire-ship destroys Spanish fleet, and repasses the Bar--Escapes by
    stratagem--Rancheria expedition--Sails for Panama--Captain Bradley
    takes the Castle of Chagres--Anecdote of wounded Buccaneer.


Morgan's campaigns furnish one of the amplest chapters of Buccaneer
history. Equally daring, but less cruel than Lolonnois, less fanatical
than Montbars, and less generous and honest than De Lussan or Sharp, he
appears to have been the only freebooting leader who obtained any formal
recognition from the English government. From an old pamphlet, we find,
that the expedition to Panama was undertaken under the commission and
with the full approbation of the English governor of Jamaica.

Sir Henry Morgan was the son of a Welsh farmer, of easy circumstances,
"as most who bear that name in Wales are known to be," says Esquemeling,
his Dutch historian. Taking an early dislike to the monotonous,
unadventurous life of his father's house, he ran away from home, and,
coming to the coast, turned sailor, and went to sea.

Embarking on board a vessel bound for Barbadoes, that lay with several
others in the port, he engaged himself in the usual way to a planter's
agent, who resold him for three years immediately on his arrival in the
West Indies. Having served his time and obtained his hard-earned
liberty, he repaired to Jamaica, a place of which wild stories were
told all over the Main. He resolved to seek his fortune at that El
Dorado, and arriving there, saw two Buccaneer vessels just fitting out
for an expedition. Being now in search of employment, and finding this
suit his daring and restless spirit, he determined to embrace the life
of a Flibustier. The gentlemen of fortune were successful, and had not
been long at sea before they took a valuable prize.

This early success was as fatal to Morgan as good luck is to a young
gambler on his first visit to a hell. It roused his ambition, heightened
his hope, and encouraged him to continue a career so auspiciously begun.
He followed the Buccaneer chiefs, and learnt their manners of living. In
the course of only three or four voyages, he signalized himself so much
as to acquire the reputation of a good soldier, remarkable for his
valour and success. He was a good shot, and renowned for his
intrepidity, coolness, and determination. He seemed to foresee all
contingencies, and set about his schemes with a firm confidence that
insured their success.

Having already laid by much money, and being fortunate both in his
voyages and in gambling, Morgan agreed with a few rich comerades to join
stock, and to buy a vessel, of which he was unanimously appointed
commander. Such was the usual beginning of an adventurer's career.
Setting out from Jamaica, he soon became remarkable for the number of
prizes which he took, his well known stations being round the coast of
Campeachy. With these prizes he returned triumphantly to Jamaica, his
name established as a terror to the Spaniard, and a war-cry to the
English. Finding Mansvelt, an old Buccaneer, lying in harbour, about to
start on a grand expedition to the mainland, he joined him, and was at
once elected as vice-admiral of a small fleet of fifteen vessels and 600
men, part English and part French.

They sailed first to the island of St. Catherine, near the continent of
Costa Rica, and distant about thirty-five degrees from the river of
Chagres. Here they made their first descent, and found the Spaniards
well entrenched in forts, strongly built of hewn stone, but landing most
of their men they soon forced the garrisons to surrender. Morgan
distinguished himself remarkably in this expedition, forcing even his
very enemies to laud his skill and valour. He now proceeded to demolish
all the castles but one, in which he placed 100 men, and the slaves and
prisoners, and proceeded to attack a small neighbouring island. In a few
days they threw over a bridge to join it to St. Catherine's, and
conveyed over it all the larger ordnance which they had taken, laying
waste their first conquest with fire and sword. They then set sail
again, having first set their prisoners ashore near Portobello,
intending to cruise along Costa Rica, as far as the river Colla, and
burn and pillage all the towns up to Nata. They had, in fact, only taken
the island in order to procure a guide who could lead them on their way
to Nata, knowing that the Spaniards used St. Catherine's as a depôt for
their prisoners of all nations. The first step towards a Buccaneer
expedition was to procure a guide. They found, to their delight, a
mulatto who knew Nata, and who undertook to lead them to the destruction
of a people whom he hated. It is probable, too, that Mansvelt had
already projected founding a colony at St. Catherine's, which might be
neither dependent on the French nor the English. But their schemes were
frustrated, for the governor of Panama, hearing of their approach, and
of their past success, advanced to meet them with a body of men, and
compelled them to retreat suddenly, for the whole country was now
alarmed and their plans all known.

Morgan, however, seeing St. Catherine's to be a well-fortified island,
easily defended, and important as to situation, because its harbour was
good and near the Spanish settlements, resolved to hold it, appointing
as governor Le Sieur Simon, a Frenchman, whom he left behind, with a
garrison of 100 men. St. Simon had behaved well in his absence, and put
the island in a good posture of defence, had strengthened the four large
forts, and turned the smaller island into a citadel, guarding carefully
the three accessible spots, planting vegetables and clearing plantations
in the smaller island, where abundance of fresh water could be procured,
providing victual enough for the fleet for two voyages.

The two commanders now determined to return to Jamaica, promising to
send recruits to Simon, for fear of an invasion, and themselves to bring
speedy succours, intending to make the island a sanctuary and refuge for
the brotherhood of both nations. The governor of Jamaica refused to
accede to Mansvelt's requests for soldiers, afraid to weaken the forces
of the island without permission from England. Mansvelt, worn out with
delay, hastened to Tortuga, and died while collecting volunteers, his
plans being still in embryo. Had his scheme succeeded, and been pushed
with energy, the Buccaneers might have founded a republic, and have
eventually driven the Spaniards out of the Indies.

While Simon was impatiently expecting succour from Jamaica, and
astonished at Mansvelt's really unavoidable silence, the Spaniards were
preparing to smoke out the wasps' nest that lay so dangerously near
their orchard. A new governor of Costa Rica threw unusual decision into
their plans. Fearing they should lose the Indies piecemeal, they
resolved to crush the evil ere it grew indestructible. Don Juan Perez de
Guzman equipped a fleet of four vessels with fifty or sixty men each,
commanded by Don Joseph Sancho Ximenes, major-general of the garrison of
Porto Bello. Don Juan, in a letter to Simon, promised him a reward if he
would surrender the island to his Catholic Majesty, and threatened him
with punishment if he resisted. Simon, seeing the impossibility and
uselessness of resistance, surrendered it after a few shots, on the same
condition with which Morgan had obtained it from the enemy.

The Spaniards made much of their victory, publishing "a true relation
and particular account of the victory obtained by the arms of his
Catholic Majesty, against the English pirates, by the direction and
valour of Don Juan Perez de Guzman, knight of the order of St. James,
governor and captain-general of Terra Firma, and the province of
Veraguas."

The account goes on to describe the arrival of fourteen English vessels
on the coast, 1665, their arrival at Puerto de Naos, and the capture of
St. Catherine's from the governor, Don Estevan del Campo, the enemy
landing unperceived. Upon this the valorous Don Juan called a council of
war, wherein he declared the great progress the said pirates had made in
the dominions of his Catholic Majesty, and propounded, "that it was
absolutely necessary to send some forces to the isle of St. Catherine,
sufficient to retake it from the pirates, the honour and interest of his
Majesty of Spain being very narrowly concerned herein, otherwise the
pirates, by such conquests, might _easily_, in course of time, possess
themselves of 'all the countries thereabout.'" The less vapouring, or
more pacific, ingeniously proposed to leave the pirates alone till they
perished for want of provisions, but Don Juan, overruling their
timidity, sent stores to the militia of Porto Bello, and conveyed
himself there, with no small danger of his life. At this port he found
the _St. Vincent_, a good ship, belonging to the Negro Company, which he
equipped with a crew of 270 soldiers, thirty-seven prisoners, thirty-two
of the Spanish garrison, twenty-nine mulattos of Panama, twelve Indian
archers, seven gunners, two lieutenants, two pilots, a surgeon, and a
Franciscan chaplain. Before they set sail, Don Juan (_who did not go
with them_) encouraged them to fight against the enemies of their
country and their religion, "those inhuman pirates who had committed so
many horrid cruelties upon the subjects of his Catholic Majesty,"
promising liberal rewards to all who behaved themselves well in the
service of their king and country. At Carthagena, they received a
reinforcement of one frigate, one galleon, a boat, and 127 men.

On arriving at the island, the pirates discharged three guns, refused to
surrender, and declared they preferred to lose their lives. The next day
three negro deserters, swimming to the admiral, told him there were only
seventy-two men on the island, and two days after the day of the
Assumption the Spaniards landed and commenced the affray. The _St.
Vincent_ attacked the Conception battery, the _St. Peter_ the St.
James's forts, the pirates driving off many of the enemy by loading
their guns with part of the pipes of a church organ, threescore pipes at
a time. The pirates lost six men before surrendering, the Spaniards one.
They found in the island 800 lbs. of powder, and 250 lbs. of bullets.
Two Spanish deserters, discovered amongst the prisoners, were "shot to
death" the next day. The prisoners were transported to Puerto Velo, all
but three, who, by order of the governor, were kept as a trophy, like
chained Samsons, to work in the castle of St. Jerome at Panama, a
fortress building by the governor at his own expense.

A day or two after this unavoidable surrender, a vessel arrived at St.
Catherine, bringing reinforcements and provisions from the governor of
Jamaica, who had repented of his rejection of Mansvelt's proposal, but
had not even yet the courage to be boldly dishonest. The Spaniards,
hoisting an English flag, persuaded Simon to welcome it, and betray it
into their hands. There were fourteen men on board and two women, all of
whom were made prisoners.

On the death of Mansvelt, Morgan became without opposition the leader of
all the adventurers of Jamaica. He at once published far and wide his
intention of setting out on a grand expedition, and named Cuba as a
rendezvous, St. Catherine's not being far distant. Morgan had been no
less anxious than Mansvelt to make this island a fortress and a
storehouse. He had written to the merchants of Virginia and New England,
to contract with them for ammunition and provisions; but this hope being
ended by the Spanish conquest, he felt himself free to embark on a wider
and more ambitious field. His plans were for a moment defeated, but his
courage and ambition were not a whit humbled.

Two months spent in the southern ports of Cuba sufficed him to collect a
fleet of twelve sail, with 700 fighting men, part English, part French,
resolved to follow him to the death. To prevent the disunion so frequent
between the two nations, Morgan had a clause inserted in the
charter-party, empowering him to condemn to instant death any adventurer
who killed or wounded another. A council was then called to decide on
what place they should first fall. Some proposed Santiago, which had
been before sacked, others a swoop on the tobacco of the Havannah, or
the dye-woods of Campeachy. Many voices were strong for a night assault
on the Havannah, which, they said, could be taken before the castle
could be ready to defend itself. The very ransom of the clergy they
might carry off, would be worth more than the pillage of a smaller town.
But some Buccaneers, who had been prisoners there, said nothing could be
done with less than 1500 men, and the proposal was abandoned, when they
proved that they must first go to the island de los Pinos, and land in
small boats at Matamana, fourteen leagues from the city.

At last some one proposed a visit to Port-au-Prince, a town of Cuba,
very rich from its traffic in hides, and which, being far inland and
built on a plain, could be very easily surprised. The speaker knew the
city well, and was sure that it never had been sacked. Despairing of
collecting forces enough to attempt the Havannah, they pursued the
Spaniard's plan. Morgan at once acceded to this scheme, and, giving the
captain the signal of weighing anchor, steered for Port St. Mary, the
nearest harbour to Port-au-Prince. The night of their arrival in the bay
a Spanish prisoner threw himself into the sea, and swimming on shore
went to inform the governor of the Buccaneers' plans, having, with a
scanty knowledge of English, gathered a full insight, deeper than
history tells us, of Morgan's intentions.

The governor instantly sent to the neighbouring town for succour, and
collected, in a few hours, a force of 800 armed freemen and slaves,
occupying a pass which the Buccaneers must traverse. He cut down the
trees, barricaded the approaches, and planned eight ambuscades,
strengthened by cannon to play upon them on their march. He then marched
out into a savannah, where he might see the Buccaneers at a long
distance.

The townsmen, in the meanwhile, prepared for the worst with the usual
timidity of the rich, hiding their riches and carrying away their
movables. The adventurers, on entering the place, found the paths almost
impassable with trees, but, supposing themselves discovered, took to the
woods, and thus fortunately escaped the ambuscade.

The governor, seeing the enemy, to his astonishment, emerge from the
trees into the plain, instantly ordered his cavalry to surround them as
he would have done a troop of wolves, intending to disperse them first
with his horse and then pursue them with his main body. The Buccaneers,
nothing daunted by the flashing of the spears or the tramp of the
horsemen, advanced boldly, with drums beating and colours displayed.
They drew up in a semicircle to receive the charge, and advanced swiftly
towards the enemy, not waiting to be attacked. The Spaniards charged
them hotly for a while, but, finding their enemies dexterous at their
arms, moving their feet forward rather than backward; and seeing their
governor and many of their companions dead at their feet, fled headlong
to the town; those who escaped towards the wood were killed before they
could reach it. The Buccaneers with few men either killed or wounded,
advancing still in their phalanx, killed without mercy all they met, for
the space of the four hours that the fight lasted. The fugitives of the
town barred themselves in their houses and kept up a fire from the
windows and loopholes. The shots from the roofs and balconies still
continuing, though the town was taken, the Buccaneers threatened, if the
firing did not cease, to set the town in a flame, and cut the women and
children in pieces before the eyes of the survivors.

Having thus silenced all resistance, Morgan drove all his prisoners,
men, women, children, and slaves, into the cathedral, where he placed a
guard. He then gave the town over to pillage, for the benefit of his
joint-stock company, finding much that was valuable, but little money,
so skilful had the Spaniards grown in hiding. Parties were next sent
out, as usual, to plunder the suburbs, and bring in provisions and
prisoners for the torture.

The revelry then began, while the prisoners were allowed to starve in
the churches; old women and children were daily tortured to make them
disclose where their money was hidden.

The monks had been the first to fly from the English heretics, but bands
of them were frequently captured in the woods, and thrown, half dead
with fear, to confess the dying in the prisons. When pillage and
provisions grew scanty, and they themselves began to feel the privations
they had inflicted on others, the Buccaneers resolved to depart, after
fifteen days' residence, a favourite time with the brotherhood.

They now demanded a double ransom of their chief prisoners; first, for
themselves, under pain of being transported to Jamaica; and secondly,
for the town, or it would be burned to the ground. Four merchants were
chosen to collect the contributions, and some Spaniards were first
tortured in their presence, to increase the zeal of their applications.
After a few days, they returned empty-handed, and demanded a respite of
fifteen days, which Morgan granted. They had searched all the woods,
they said, and found none of their countrymen. Delay now grew
dangerous--a party of foragers had captured a negro, with letters from
the governor of Santiago, telling the citizens not to make too much
haste to pay the ransom, but to put off the pirates with excuses till he
could come to their aid. Enraged at what he deemed treachery, Morgan
swore he would have no more delay, and would burn the town the next day
if the ransom was not paid down, but not alluding to the detected
letter, and betraying no apprehension. Still unable to obtain money,
Morgan consented to take 500 oxen, which he insisted on the Spaniards
placing on board his ships at Port-au-Prince, together with salt enough
to "powder" them, needing the flesh to re-victual for a fresh and more
profitable expedition.

The same day Morgan left the city, taking with him six of the principal
citizens as hostages. The next day came the cattle, but he now required
the Spaniards to assist him in killing and salting them. This was done
in a great hurry, Morgan expecting every moment the Santiago vessels
would appear in sight. As soon as the butchering was completed he
released his hostages and set sail, unwilling to fight when nothing
could be gained by victory.

At this juncture, the smouldering jealousy of the two nations that
formed his crews broke into a flame. The grudges of the last voyage had
been perpetuated, and had grown into a deep and lasting feud, producing
ultimately a disunion fatal to all increase of the power of the
brotherhood of the coast.

While the prisoners were toiling at salting the beeves, the sailors
employed themselves in drinking and rejoicing at their success, cooking
the richest morsels while they were still fresh, and all hands intent on
securing the hot marrow bones, the favourite delicacy of the hunters of
Hispaniola. A Frenchman, employed as one of the butchers, had drawn out
the dainty and placed it by his side, as a _bonne bouche_ when his work
was over. An English Buccaneer, more hungry than polite, passing by,
and knowing no reservation of property in such a republic, snatched up
the reeking bone and carried it off. The Frenchman, pursuing him with
angry vociferations, challenged him to fight for it, but before they
could reach the place of combat, the aggressor stabbed his adversary in
the back, and laid him dead on the spot. The Frenchmen, rising in arms,
made it a national quarrel, and demanded redress. Morgan, just and
impartial by nature and from policy, arrested the murderer and condemned
him to be instantly shot, declaring that he had a right to challenge his
adversary, but not to stab him treacherously. Oexmelin says, the man was
sent in chains to Jamaica (and there tried and hung), Morgan promising
to see justice done upon him. The French, however, remained
discontented, lamented the fate of their comrade, and vowed revenge.

Morgan, not waiting for the governor of Jamaica to share his spoil,
sailed to a small island, at some distance, to make the dividend. To the
general grief and disgust, they found the whole amounted to only 60,000
crowns, not enough to pay their debts at Jamaica: this did not include
the silk stuffs and other merchandise, which gave a poor pittance of 80
crowns to each man, as the return for so much danger and privation.

Morgan, as unwilling as the rest to revisit Port Royal empty-handed,
proposed a new expedition, in search of a greater prize. But the French,
not able to agree with the English, left the fleet, in spite of all
their commander's persuasions, but still with every external mark of
friendship, entreating to the last to have justice done to the
"_infame_."

Morgan, who had always placed great reliance on the courage of the
French adventurers, was not going to relinquish his new expedition on
account of their desertion. He had inspired his men with courage and the
hope of acquiring riches, and they all resolved to follow him to the
attack of the place, whose name he would not yet disclose, exciting them
by a mystery, which prevented the possibility of treachery.

He put forth to sea with eight small vessels, but was soon joined by an
adventurer of Jamaica, just returning from Campeachy; with this new
ally, he had now a force of nine vessels and 470 men, many French being
still among them, and arrived at Costa Rica with all his fleet safe.

As soon as they sighted land, he disclosed his design to his captains,
and soon after to all his seamen. He intended to storm Porto Bello by
night, and to put the whole city to the sack: he was confident of
success, because no one knew of his secret; although some of his men
thought their force too small for such an enterprise. To these Morgan
replied, that if their number was small, their courage was great, and
the fewer they were the more booty for each, with the greater prospect
of union and secresy; and upon this, all agreed unanimously to the
design.

By good fortune, or by preconcerted arrangement, one of Morgan's crew
turned out to be an Englishman who, only a short time before, had been a
prisoner at Porto Bello, and his past sufferings now proved to have been
the foundation of his future good fortune. Having escaped from that
place, he knew every inch of the coast, which had been so painfully
impressed on his mind, and Morgan submitted, with perfect confidence, to
his guidance. By his advice, they steered straight for the bay of Santa
Maria, arriving there purposely about dusk, and reached a spot about
twelve leagues from the city, without meeting any vessel. They then
sailed up the river to Puerto Pontin, four leagues distant, taking
advantage of the land wind that sprang up, cool and fresh, at night.

They here anchored, and embarked in boats, leaving a few men to bring on
the ships. Rowing softly, they reached about midnight a place called
Estera de Longa lemos, where they all landed, and marched upon the
outposts of the city.

Michael Scott describes Porto Bello as built in a miserable, dirty, damp
hole, surrounded by high forest-clad hills, wreathed in mist, and
reeking with dirt and fever. Everlasting vapours obscure the sun, and
mingle with the exhalation of the steaming marshes of the
lead-coloured, land-locked cove that forms the harbour.

They were now within reach of the strongest city in the Spanish West
Indies, except Havannah and Carthagena, the port of Panama, and the
great mart for silver and negroes. Leaving as usual a party to guard the
boats, and preceded by their guide, they began halfway to the town to
prepare their arms. Upon approaching the first sentinel, Morgan sent
forward the guide and three or four others to surprise him. They did it
cunningly, before he could fire his musket, and brought him with his
hands bound to Morgan, who, threatening him with death, asked him how
things in the city went, and what forces they had, making a "thousand
menaces to kill him if he did not speak the truth." The terrified
Spaniard informed them that the town was well garrisoned, but that there
were very few inhabitants; the merchants only residing in the town while
the galleons are loading, and that he would be able to take the place in
spite of all the fortresses and the 300 soldiers. Morgan then pushed on
to the fort, carrying the man bound before them, and after a quarter of
a league reached the castle, where the man's company was stationed,
closely surrounding it, so that no one could get in or go out. The
prisoner had in vain attempted to avoid this redoubt, to which he had
served as picket, encouraged by Morgan's promises of reward, and avowal
that he would not give him up to his countrymen.

The Spaniards, finding the sentinel gone, had already spread the alarm
of the Buccaneers' approach. From beneath the walls Morgan commanded the
sentinel to summon the garrison to surrender at once to his discretion,
or they should be cut in pieces without quarter. Not regarding these
threats, the Spaniards began instantly to discharge their guns and
muskets to alarm the town and obtain succour. But though they made a
good resistance they were soon overpowered, and the Buccaneers, driving
them into one room, set fire to the powder which lay about on the floor,
and blew the tower and its defenders together into the air; all the
survivors they put to the sword, in order to strike terror in the city.

At daybreak they fell upon the city, and found the inhabitants, some
still asleep and others scared and alarmed; many had thought of nothing
but hiding their treasure, and only the professional soldier prepared
for resistance. The governor, unable to rally the citizens, fled into
the citadel, and fired upon the town as well as the enemy. The
frightened herd, stupid with fear, were throwing their money and jewels
into wells and cisterns, or burying their treasure in their courtyards,
cellars, gardens, and chapels. The adventurers, abstaining from pillage,
sent a chosen party to the convents to make prisoners of the religious,
male and female; while another division prepared ladders to escalade the
fort, not relaxing for a moment either in attack or defence. They
attempted in vain to burn down a castle-gate which proved to be of iron,
and baffled their efforts, and kept up a warm fire at the embrasures,
aiming with such dexterity at the mouths of the guns as to kill a
gunner or two every time the pieces were either run out or loaded.

The firing continued from daybreak till noon, and even then the result
seemed doubtful, for when the adventurers approached the walls with
their grenades to burn the doors the defenders threw down upon them
earthen pots full of powder, and lighted by a fusee, together with
showers of stones and other missiles. Morgan himself began to despair of
success, and did not know how to escape from that strait, when the
English flag arose above the smaller fort, and a troop of men ran forth
to proclaim victory with shouts of joy. The remaining castle, however,
was the _pièce de resistance_, being the storehouse of the church plate,
and the wealth of the richer citizens now with the garrison. A stratagem
was suggested, appealing strongly to Spanish superstition, and, as it
happened, successfully. Ten or twelve ladders were made so broad and
strong that three or four men might mount them abreast. To all threats
the governor replied he would never surrender alive, although the
religious should themselves plant the ladders. The monks and nuns were
then dragged to the heads of the companies, and forced to plant the
ladders, in spite of the hot rain of fire and shot; the governor "using
his utmost endeavours to destroy all who came near the walls, firing on
the servants of God, although his kinsmen, and prisoners, and forced to
the service. Delicate women and aged men were goaded at the sword's
point to this hateful labour, derided by the English, and unpitied by
their countrymen."

All this time the Buccaneers maintained an unceasing fire along the
whole line of grey battlements at every aperture where a pike head
glittered or a lighted match smouldered; suffering much in return,
unarmed as they were, guarded neither by steel-cap nor cuirass, and
unsheltered by palisade or earthwork. In spite of the cries of the
religious as they reared the ladders, their prayers to the saints, and
their entreaties to the garrison to remember their common blood and
nation, many of the priests were shot before the walls could be scaled.
The more superstitious of the Spaniards were unnerved at hearing the
dying curse of the consecrated servants of God, rising shrill above the
roar of the battle. The ladders were at last planted, amid a shower of
fire-pots that killed almost as many of the Spaniards as the English,
and the Buccaneers sprang up with all the agility of sailors and the
determination of Berserkers; their best marksmen shooting down the few
Spaniards who awaited their arrival at the summit. Their falling bodies
struck a few Buccaneers from their ladders. Every man that went up
carried hand grenades, pistols, and sabre, but the musket was now laid
aside, for it had done its work, and was a mere encumbrance in the
grapple of closer combat. The English swarmed up in great numbers, and
reaching the top kindled their fusees and threw down their fire-pots
upon the crowded ranks of the enemy, with destructive effect. Before
they could recover their dismay, sabre in hand, as if they were
boarding, they leaped down upon the garrison, who drove them off with
pikes and clubbed muskets, and, closing with them, hurled many from the
ramparts, or, stabbing them, fell clenched with the foe in their
despair. When their cannon was taken, the Spaniards threw down their
arms and begged for quarter, except the governor and a few officers, who
determined to die fighting against the robbers and heretics, the enemies
of God and Spain.

The Buccaneers, seeing the red flag flying from the first fort, which
was the strongest, and built on an eminence which commanded the towers
below, advanced with confidence to the attack of the remaining one,
hitherto thought impregnable, which defended the port, and prevented the
entrance of their vessels, which they wished to secure safe in the
harbour, as the number of their wounded would require their long stay in
the place they had captured. The governor, proud and brave, still
refused to surrender, and fired upon them with his cannon, which were
soon silenced by the superior fire of the newly-taken fort, which
flanked his position. Out of this last stronghold, the weary and
despairing defenders were quickly driven.

Major Castellon, the stout-hearted governor, disdaining to ask quarter
of a pack of heretic seamen, killed several of his own men who would not
stand to their arms and called on him to save their lives, and struck
down many of the hunters who tried to take him alive, not from a
generous compassion, for pity seldom entered a Buccaneer's heart, but in
order to obtain his ransom. A still more cruel trial of his courage, and
duty to his king, awaited him: his wife and children fell at his knees,
and, with cries and tears, begged him to lay down his arms and save both
their lives. But he obstinately and sternly refused, replying, "Better
this than a scaffold," preferring to die as a valiant soldier at his
post, than to be hanged as a coward for deserting it. He died the death
of a brave man, fighting desperately, and was found buried under the
bodies of his dead enemies. If unpitied by his ferocious foes, he has
left a name to be honoured by all brave men, as one worthy of a more
chivalrous age, and a better cause.

It now being nearly sunset, and the city their own, the adventurers
enclosed all their prisoners in the citadel, separating the wounded,
and, although heedless of their sufferings, employing the female slaves
to wait upon them. It now being nearly night, they gave way to all the
excesses of soldiers in a town taken by storm, exasperated by the
recollection of past danger, and the death of friends, and maddened by
both the certainty of present pleasure and the power of indulging in
every success. Oexmelin says, fifty brave Spaniards might have put all
the revellers to death, and recovered the place. We do not, however,
hear that a single Spanish Jael was found to revenge herself on these
modern Siseras.

The following morning Morgan summoned his vessels into the harbour, and
collecting all the loose wealth of the town, had it brought into the
fort. Directing the repairs of the ramparts, scorched and shattered, he
remounted the guns, in order to be ready to repel any attack from
Panama. He collected a few of the prisoners who had been persuaded to
say they were the richest merchants in Porto Bello, and put all who
would not confess to the torture. He maimed some and killed others, who
remained silent because they were in reality poor, and had concealed no
treasure. Having spent fifteen days in these alternate cruelties and
debaucheries, Morgan resolved to retreat. No Buccaneer general had ever
taken a city which could not be stripped clean in fourteen days. Famine
and disease began ungratefully to take the part of the Spaniard against
the nation that had fed them with so many victims. Wild waste compelled
them already to devour their mules and horses, rather than die of
hunger, or turn cannibals. Parties of hunters were sent into the suburbs
to hunt the cattle, whose flesh they then devoured, saving the mules for
the prisoners, who, between their wounds and their hunger, were reduced
to dreadful extremities.

A death more terrible than that of a blow in battle now appeared in
their midst. Many had already died victims of excess, and even the most
prudent perished. The bad food, the sudden transition from excess to
want, and the impurity of the tainted air, produced a pestilence. The
climate of Porto Bello, always unhealthy, as Hosier's squadron
afterwards experienced, was poisoned by the putrefaction of the dead
bodies, hastily buried, and scarcely covered by earth. The wounded
nearly all sickened, and the intemperate were the first to die.

The prisoners, crowded together, and already weakened mentally by
despondency, and physically by famine, soon caught the fever, and died
with dreadful rapidity. Rich merchants, accustomed to every luxury, and
to the most varied and seasoned food, pined under a diet of half-putrid
mule's flesh, and bad, unfiltered water. Everything warned Morgan that
it was time to weigh anchor, for the president of Panama was already on
his march towards the city at the head of 1500 men. Informed of their
approach from a slave captured by a hunting party, Morgan held a
council, at which it was agreed not to retreat until they had obtained a
ransom for the town greater than the spoil at present collected; and, in
order to prevent a surprise, he placed a body of 100 well-armed men in a
narrow defile, where but a few men could go abreast, and through which
the president must pass. They found that that general had fewer troops
with him than was reported, and these took flight at the first
encounter, and did not attempt again to force a passage, but waited for
reinforcements. The president, with the usual gasconade of a Spaniard,
sent word to Morgan, that if he did not at once leave Porto Bello he
should receive no quarter when he should take him and his companions, as
he hoped soon to do.

To this, Morgan, knowing he had a sure means of escape, said he should
not leave till he had received 180,000 pieces of eight as a ransom for
the city, and if he could not get this he should kill all his prisoners,
blow up the castle, and burn the town, and two men were sent by him to
the president to procure the money.

The president, seeing that nothing could either deceive or intimidate
Morgan, gave up Porto Bello to its fate, not caring to erect a silver
bridge for a flying enemy. In vain he sent to Carthagena for a fleet to
block up the ships in the river; in vain he kept the citizens in
suspense as to the money, in hopes of gaining time. He was deaf and
obdurate to all the entreaties of the citizens, who sent to inform him
that the pirates were not men but devils, and that they fought with such
fury that the Spanish officers had stabbed themselves, in very despair,
at seeing a supposed impregnable fortress taken by a handful of people,
when it should have held out against twice the number.

Don Juan Perez de Guzman, the president, a man of "great parts," and who
had attained high rank in the war in Flanders, expressed himself, with
candour, as astonished at the exploits of 400 men (not regular soldiers)
who, with no other arms but their muskets, had taken a city which any
general in Europe would have found necessary to have blockaded in due
form. He gave the people of Porto Bello, at the same time, leave to
compound for their safety, but offered them no aid to insure it.

To Morgan himself he could not refrain from expressing astonishment. He
admired his success, with no ordnance for batteries, and against the
citizens of a place who bore the reputation of being good soldiers,
never wanting courage in their own defence. He begged, at the same time,
that he would send him some small pattern of the arms wherewith he had,
with such vigour, taken so great a city. Morgan received the messenger
with great kindness and civility, flattered by the compliment from an
enemy, and glad of an opportunity of expressing contempt of any
assailants. He took a hunter's musket from one of his men, and sent it,
together with a handful of Buccaneer bullets, to the president, begging
him to accept it as a small pattern of the arms wherewith he had taken
Porto Bello, hoping he would keep it a twelvemonth or two, at which time
he hoped to visit Panama and fetch it away. The Spaniard, astonished at
the wit and civility of the captain, whom he had deemed a mere brutal
sea thief, sent a messenger to return the present, as he did not need
the loan of weapons, but thanking Morgan and praising his courage,
remarking at the same time that it was a pity that such a man should
not be employed in a just war, and in the service of a great and good
prince, and hoping, in conclusion, that he would not give himself the
trouble of coming to see him at Panama, as he would not fare there so
well as he had done at Porto Bello. Having delivered this message, so
chivalrous in its tone, the messenger presented Morgan with a beautiful
gold ring, set with a costly emerald, as a remembrance of his master Don
Guzman, who had already supplied the English chief with fresh
provisions.

Having now provided himself with all necessaries, and stripped the
unfortunate city of almost everything but its tiles and its paving
stones, carried off half of the castle guns and spiked the rest, he then
set sail, taking on board the ransom, which was punctually paid in the
shape of silver bars. Corn seldom grew where his foot had once been, and
he left behind him famine, pestilence, poverty, and death. Orphans and
widows, mutilated men and violated women leaped for joy as his fleet
melted into the distance.

Setting sail, with great speed, he arrived in eight days at Cuba, where
the spoil was divided.

They found that they had in gold and silver, whether in coin or bar, and
in jewels, which from haste and ignorance were seldom estimated at
one-fourth part of their value, to the value of 260,000 pieces of eight.
This did not include the silks and merchandise, of which they paid
little heed, only valuing coin or bullion, and regarding the richest
prize without coin as scarce worth the taking. This division
accomplished, to the general satisfaction of all but the people of Porto
Bello, who were now poor enough to defy all thieves, they returned at
once to Jamaica, where they were magnificently received, Oexmelin says,
"_surtout des cabaretiers_." Every door was open to them, and for a
whole week all loudly praised their generosity and their courage; at the
end of a month, every door was shut in their faces, all but one--the
prison for debts, and that closed behind their backs. "They spent in a
short time," says one of their historians, "with boundless prodigality,
what they had gained with boundless danger and unremitting toil." The
people of Tortuga considered them as mere slaves, who dived to get their
pearls, and cared not whether they perished by the wave or by the shark,
so the pearls which they had gathered could be first secured.

"Not long after their arrival in Jamaica," says Esquemeling, "being that
short time needed to lavish away all their riches, they concluded on
another enterprise to seek new fortunes:" a sailor spends his money
quickly, and so does a highwayman--in them both trades were combined.
Morgan remained at rest as long as most Buccaneers did, that is to say,
till he had drunk out half his money, strung the jewels of Spanish
matrons around the necks of the fairest courtesans in Jamaica, and
stripped himself at the gambling-table to-day in the hope of recovering
the losses of yesterday. As his purse grew thin his heart grew stout,
as his hunger grew greater his thirst for blood began also to increase.
At last he looked seaward, turned his back on the lotus-land and the
sirens, and prepared for sea.

His rendezvous this time was fixed in a small island on the south side
of Hispaniola, in order to invite both the French hunters and the
sailors of Tortuga. By this sign of confidence Morgan hoped to remove
all rankling prejudice between the French and English adventurers, and
to obtain recruits from both nations. He resolved this time upon an
expedition which would enable him and his men to retire from the sea
life for ever, or at least to hold a longer revel.

The Buccaneers of the coast seeing him always successful, and never
returning without booty, less cruel and less rash than Lolonnois, and
not only very brave but very fortunate, flocked to his flag almost
without a summons. Every one furbished up his musket, cast bullets,
bought powder, or fitted up a canoe. Parties were at once despatched to
hunt in the savannahs, and to prepare salted meat sufficient for the
voyage. Great numbers of French and English crowded to Cow Island.

A powerful ally appeared at this crisis, in the shape of a French
vessel, _Le Cerf Volant_, of St. Malo, which had come out to the Indies,
virtuously intending to trade with the Spaniards, but, finding this
difficult or unprofitable, had less virtuously determined to live by
plundering them, and was now manned by French adventurers from Tortuga,
no friends to Morgan, but anxious to share his booty. The vessel, which
had also a long-boat towing at its stern, had a short time before
attacked a Genoese ship, trading with negroes, but which, mounting
forty-eight cannon, had driven it off, and compelled the captain to
return home and refit. The crew seemed unwilling to trust the English,
and would not listen to any terms. Morgan, who had just been joined by a
ship from New England with thirty-six cannon, longed to add the
twenty-four iron guns and the twelve brass ones of _Le Cerf Volant_ to
his collection. In spite of his wish to unite the two nations, and
close the green and still rankling wound, the temptation was rather too
strong for him. His guardian angel slept for a moment, and when she
awoke the English flag floated at the Frenchman's peak.

The change happened thus: the French captain having refused to join
Morgan's expedition, unless he drew up a peculiar charter party opposed
to all Buccaneer law, and quarrelling about this, he swore _ventre St.
Gris_, he would return to Tortuga, reload his cargo, and return to
France.

The blow was to be struck now or never. The English part of the St. Malo
crew had already deserted to Morgan. Some of these men furnished him
with an opportunity of revenge. The merchant captain, unaccustomed to
the looseness of Buccaneer discipline, had treated them as sailors, and
not as _matelots_ and brothers. They told Morgan, that being short of
victual, he had lately stopped an English vessel, and taken provisions
by force, paying the commander only with bills of exchange, cashable at
Jamaica, and that he carried secretly a Spanish commission, empowering
him to plunder the English. These charges, though full of malice, had a
specious appearance of truth. The captain had indeed stopped an English
vessel, but had paid for all he had taken with honest bills. He did also
carry a Spanish commission, having been driven to anchor at the port of
Baracoa, on the north-east side of Cuba, where he had obtained letters
of marque from the governor, in order to conceal his real errand. Morgan
considered this a sufficient pretext, and sounded his crew to ascertain
how far they would help him at the moment of need. It was at this very
moment of indecision that the New England vessel joined the fleet, and
enabled him to bear down any opposition. This ship, which Oexmelin calls
the _Haktswort_ (Oxford?) carried a crew of 300 men. It was said to
belong to the king of England (Charles II.), and to have been lent by
him to the present captain.

[A strange, improbable story, unless the English government had really
determined to encourage the Buccaneer movement. The _Haktswort_ was
really sent by the governor of Jamaica to join the expedition.]

With this timely succour Morgan's mind was instantly made up. He asked
the St. Malo captain and all his officers to dinner, on board the
newly-arrived vessel, and there made them prisoners, without any
resistance, away from their crew, and with their ship exposed to an
overwhelming fire. He then affected the anger of indignant justice,
declared they were robbers, who plundered the English under a commission
from the enemy, and came there as mere spies and traitors. Fortunately
for him, the English vessel that had been stopped by the St. Malo crew
arrived at the very moment to repeat and exaggerate the charge. The ship
was now his own, and only God could take it from him. And "God did so,"
says Esquemeling, who sees a judgment in all misfortunes that befal an
enemy, but none in those that befal his friends.

Morgan, victorious and exulting, called a council of war, and summoned
all his captains to attend him on board his large prize. They praised
the vessel, laughed at the tricked Frenchmen, and discussed their plans.
They calculated what provisions they had in store, and of what their
force was capable. The island of Savona was agreed upon as a rendezvous,
as at that east corner of Hispaniola they might lurk and cut off
stragglers from the armed Spanish flota, now daily expected. Having
completed their arrangements they gave way to pleasure, the real
occupation and business of a Buccaneer's life, his toil being only
expended to procure the means for pleasure, and time to enjoy it. They
began to feast and drink healths, the officers below and the sailors on
deck. Prayers for a successful voyage were blended with drunken songs,
and unintelligible blasphemies. The captain and the cook were both
drunk, the very gunners who discharged a broadside when the toasts were
drained, fell senseless beside their smoking guns. Those who could not
move slept, those who could walk drank on. By some accident, a spark
from a smoking match caught the powder, and in an instant the vessel
blew up. In perfect equality all ranks were lifted up towards heaven,
in a column of flame, only to fall back again to perish, burnt and
helpless, in the sea. More than 350 of the 400 men that formed the crew
were drowned. By a singular coincidence, the officers nearly all
escaped. The English having their powder stored in the fore part of the
vessel, and not in the stern like the French, the sailors only perished;
the officers and the St. Malo prisoners who were drinking with them were
merely blown, much bruised, into the water. The English adventurers,
declaring that the French had set fire to the powder, would have killed
them on the spot, but Morgan, not apparently the least chapfallen by the
disappointment, sent them all as prisoners to Jamaica. The thirty men,
seated in the great cabin at some distance from the main force of the
powder, escaped, and many more would have been saved had they been
sober.

The French prisoners in vain endeavoured to obtain justice in Jamaica,
were long detained in confinement, and threatened with death when they
demanded a trial. Had Morgan returned unsuccessful they might have
perhaps been listened to.

Eight days after this loss Morgan commanded his men to collect the
floating bodies now putrifying, not to give them Christian burial, but
to save the clothes, and to remove the heavy gold rings which the
English Buccaneers wore upon their forefingers, abandoning their
unsaleable bodies to the birds and to the sharks.

Undaunted by this accident, Morgan found he had still a force of fifteen
vessels, and 860 men, but his gun ship, the largest of all, only carried
fourteen small guns. They now made way to Savona, where all were to
repair and careen, and the swift to wait for the slow. Letters were soon
placed in bottles, and buried at a spot indicated by a mark agreed on.
Coasting Hispaniola, they were detained by contrary winds, and attempted
for three weeks in vain to double Cape Lobos. Their provisions ran
short, but they were relieved by an English vessel, bound to Jamaica,
which had a superfluity for sale.

Always seeking for pleasure, though in emergencies capable of the
severest self-denials, six or seven of the fleet remained clustering
round this vessel to purchase brandy, as eager and thoughtless as
stragglers round a vivandière. The more thoughtful and earnest pressed
on with Morgan, and, reaching the bay of Ocoa, waited for them there,
the men spending their time usefully, as they had agreed before, in
hunting, and foraging for water and provisions, killing some oxen and a
few horses. Detained here by continued bad weather, Morgan maintained
strict discipline, compelling every captain to send, daily, on shore
eight men from each ship, making a total force of sixty-four. He also
instituted a convoy, or a body of armed men, who attended the hunters as
a guard, for they were now near St. Domingo, which was full of Greek
soldiers and Spanish matadors. The Spaniards, few in number, did not
attack them, but, adopting a Fabian policy, which suited their pride and
phlegm, sent for 300 or 400 men to kill all the cattle round the bay.
Another party drove all the herds far into the interior, wishing to
starve the foe out of the island, knowing that a Buccaneer, pressed by
hunger, did not care whether he ate horse, mule, or ass, falling back
upon monkeys and parrots, and resorting to sharks' flesh or his own
shoes as a last resource. But when the Buccaneers spread further inland,
a body of soldiers was despatched to the coast, to practise a stratagem,
and to form an ambuscade.

The following was their plan, which completely succeeded, but
nevertheless ended in the Spaniards' total rout. A band of fifty
Buccaneers having resolved to venture further than usual into the woods,
a party of Spanish muleteers were ordered to drive the bait, a small
herd of cattle, past the shore, where they had landed, pretending to fly
when they caught sight of their enemies. When they approached the
ambuscade two Spaniards were sent out, carrying a white flag of truce.
The Buccaneers, ceasing the pursuit, pushed forward two men to parley.

The treacherous Spaniards beseeched them plaintively not to kill their
cows, offering to sell them cattle, or furnish them with food. The
Buccaneers, with all the good faith of seamen, replied that they would
give a crown and a-half for each ox, and that the seller could make his
own profit besides on the hide and the tallow. During this time, which
was planned to give time for the operation, the Spanish troops were
turning the flank of the enemy, and had now surrounded the small band on
all sides. They interrupted the conversation by breaking out of the
wood, with shots and cries of "_Mata, mata_"--"kill, kill," imagining
they could cut to pieces so small a force without a struggle. The
Buccaneers, differing from them in opinion, faced about with good heart,
threw themselves into a square, and beat a slow retreat to the forest,
keeping up a rolling fire from all four sides of their brave phalanx.

The Spaniards, considering the retreat a sure proof of despair and fear,
attacked them with great courage, but great loss. The Buccaneers losing
no men, while the Spaniards fell thick and fast, cried out, in imprudent
bravado, that they were only trying to frighten them, and put no balls
in their muskets. This jest cost them dear, for the Spaniards had been
only aiming high, wishing to kill them on the spot and to make no
prisoners. They now tried to maim as well as kill, and soon wounded so
many in the legs that the Buccaneers were obliged to retreat to a clump
of trees, where they stood at bay, and from whence the Spaniards did not
dare to beat them. They then began to prepare to carry off their dead
and wounded to the vessels, but seeing a small party of Spaniards
piercing one of the bodies with their swords, they fired upon them,
charged them, and drove them off, tracking their way by their dead, and
then retreated, killing the cattle and bearing them off in sorrowful
triumph to their vessels. The very next day, at the first light, Morgan,
furious to revenge this treachery of the Spaniards, landed himself at
the head of 200 men, and entered the woods, visiting the scene of the
last night's skirmish. But the Spaniards had long since fled,
discovering that in driving cattle towards the shore as a lure for the
Buccaneer, they only brought destruction upon themselves, and a
dangerous enemy nearer to their homes and treasures. Morgan, finding his
search useless, returned to his ship, having first burned down all the
deserted huts he could find: "Returning," says Esquemeling, "somewhat
more satisfied in his mind for having done considerable damage to the
enemy, which was always his ardent desire."

The day after, deciding not to venture an attack upon Bourg d'Asso,
Morgan, impatient at the delay of his vessels, resolved to sail without
them, and visit Savona, hoping there to meet his lingering companions.
Alarming the people of St. Domingo, he coasted round Hispaniola. He
determined to wait eight days at Savona, and, weary of rest, still
wanting provisions, he sent some boats and 150 men to plunder the towns
round St. Domingo, but they, finding the Spaniards vigilant and
desperate, gave up the enterprise as hopeless, and returned empty-handed
to endure the curses and sneers of their commander. Morgan now held a
council of war, for provisions were very scanty and time was going. The
eight ships did not arrive, and all agreed, with their seven small
vessels and their 300 men, some place of importance might still be
taken. Morgan had hitherto resolved to cruise about the Caraccas and
plunder the towns and villages, mere hen-roost robbing and footpad work,
compared with the enterprise proposed by one of his French captains amid
great applause.

This captain was Pierre le Picard, the _matelot_ of the famous Lolonnois
when he took Maracaibo: he it was who had steered the vessels over the
bar, and had served both as pilot at sea and guide on land; he reefed
and fought, and could handle a rope as well as a musket. He now proposed
a second attack upon the same place, and, with all the rude eloquence of
sincerity, proved the facility of the attempt, and the riches that lay
within their reach. As he spoke good English that could be understood by
all, and was, moreover, much esteemed by Morgan, the scheme for a new
campaign was at once rapturously approved. He disclosed in the council
all the entries, passages, forces, and means. A charter-party was drawn
up, containing a clause, that if the rest of the fleet joined them
before they had taken a fortress, they should be allowed to share like
the rest.

Having left a letter at Savona, buried in the usual way, the Buccaneers
set sail for Curaçoa, stopping after some days' sail at the island of
Omba, to take in water and provisions. This place was distant some
twelve leagues from Maracaibo. Here they stayed twenty-four hours,
buying goats of the natives for hanks of thread and linen. Sheep, lambs,
and kids were the only products of the island, which abounded with
spiders whose bite produced madness, unless the sufferer was tied hands
and feet, and left without food for a night and a day. The fleet set
sail in the night, to prevent the islanders discovering the object of
their voyage.

The next morning they sighted the small islands that lie at the entrance
of the lake of Maracaibo, anchoring out of sight of the Vigilia, in
hopes to escape notice, but were observed by the sentries, whose signal
gave the Spaniards ample time for defence. The fleet remained becalmed,
unable to reach the bar till four o'clock in the afternoon. The canoes
were instantly manned, in order to take the Bar Fort, rebuilt since
Picard's last visit. Its guns played upon the boats as they pulled to
land. Morgan exhorted his men to be brave and not to give way--for he
expected the Spaniards would defend themselves desperately, seeing their
fire was so rolling and incessant that the fort seemed like the crater
of a small volcano, and they could now see that the huts round the wall
had been burnt and removed, to leave them no protection or shelter. "The
dispute continued very hot, being managed with great courage from
morning till dark night."

That latterly the fighting died away to occasional shots is evident,
for, at six o'clock when it grew dusk, Morgan reconnoitred the fort, and
found it deserted. The cessation of the fire had already roused their
suspicions. Suspecting treachery, Morgan searched the place to see if
any lighted fuses had been placed near the powder, and a division was
employed to enter the place before the main body. There was no lack of
volunteers for this experimental and cat's-paw work. Morgan himself
clambered up first. As they expected, they found a lighted match, and a
dark train of powder communicating with the magazine. A little later and
the whole band had perished together. Morgan himself snatched up the
match. This fort was a redoubt of five toises high, six long, and three
round. In the magazine they found 3,000 pounds of gunpowder that would
have been wasted had the place been blown up; fourteen pieces of cannon,
of eight, twelve, and fourteen pounds calibre, and abundance of
fire-pots, hand-grenades, and carcases; twenty-four muskets and thirty
pikes and bandoliers had been left by the runaways. The fort was only
accessible by an iron ladder, which could be drawn up into the
guard-room. But courage requires no ladder, and, like love, can always
find out a way. When they had once examined the place, the Buccaneers
broke down the parapet, spiked the cannon, threw them over the walls,
and burnt the gun-carriages.

The Spaniards waited in vain for the roar of their bursting mine. Their
own city was rocking beneath their feet; a more dreadful visitation than
the earthquake or the hurricane was at their doors. At daybreak the
fleet sailed up the lake, the ruined fort smoking behind them. Making
great haste, they arrived at Maracaibo the next day, having first
divided among themselves the arms and ammunition of the fort. The water
being very low and the shoals numerous, they disembarked into their
boats, with a few small cannon. From some cavaliers whom they could see
on the walls they believed that the Spaniards were fortifying
themselves. The Buccaneers therefore landed at some distance from the
town, anchoring and disembarking amid discharges of their own cannon,
intending to clear the thickets on the shore. Their men they divided
into two divisions, in order to embarrass the enemy by a double attack.

But these precautions were useless. The timid people had already fled
into the woods; only the beggars, who feared no plunderers, and the
sick, who were praying for death, remained in Maracaibo. The brave fled
with the coward, the monk with the sinner, the thief from the thieves,
the soldiers from the seamen, the Catholic from the dreaded Protestant,
and the Spaniard from the enemies of his name and race. The sick were
expecting death, and cared not if it came by the hand of the doctor or
the Buccaneer; the beggar hoped to benefit by those who could not covet,
and might pity, their rags. "A few miserable folk, who had nothing to
lose," says Esquemeling, "alone remained." Crippled slaves, not worth
removing, lay in the streets; the dying groaned untended in the
hospital. Children fled from parents, and parents from children; rich
old age was left to die in spite of all the inducements of avarice. The
prostitute fled to escape dishonour, and the murderer to avoid
bloodshed.

The houses were empty, the doors open, the chambers stripped of every
movable, costly or precious. The first care of the invaders was to
search every corner for prisoners, the next to secure, each party as
they arrived, the richest palaces for their barracks. The palaces were
their dens, the churches their prisons; everything they defiled and
polluted, the loathsome things they made still more horrible, the holy
they in some degree contaminated. At sea they were brave, obedient,
self-denying, religious in formula (half the world goes no further),
determined, and irresistible; on land cruel, bloody, rebellious, and
ferocious. At sea they exceeded most men in the practice of the sterner
virtues, on land they were demons of wrath, devils of drunkenness and
lust, mercenaries and outlaws in their bearing and their actions. The
three former days of terror had sapped the courage of the bravest, and
alarm and fear had, by a common panic, induced the inhabitants to hide
the merchandise in the woods. The men who fled had had fathers and
children killed and tortured in the first expedition. Friends, still
maimed by the rack, increased their fears by their narrations. The
Buccaneers seemed a judgment from God, irresistible and unavertable. The
desire to defend riches seems to be a weaker principle in the human mind
than the desire to obtain them. Great conquerors have generally been
poorer than the nations they have conquered.

Scarcely any provisions remained in the town. There was no vessel or
boat in the port, all had been removed into the wide lake beyond. The
small demilune fort, with its four cannon, that was intended to guard
the harbour, was also deserted. The richer the man, the further he had
escaped inland; the needy were in the woods, the drunken beggars
revelled alone in the town, rejoicing in an event that at least made
them rich: "It is an ill wind that blows nobody good."

The very same day the Buccaneers despatched a body of 100 men to search
the woods for refugees, any attempt to secrete treasure being a heavy
offence in the eyes of Morgan. These men returned the next evening with
thirty prisoners, fifty mules, and several horses laden with baggage and
rich merchandise. Both the male and female prisoners seemed poor and
worthless. They were immediately tortured, in order to induce them to
disclose where their richer and more virtuous fellow citizens were
hidden. Morgan, finding none to resist him, quartered his men in the
richest houses, selecting the church as their central guard-house and
rallying point, their store-room for plunder, their court of justice
(blind and with false weights), and their torture-chamber.

Some of the prisoners offered to act as guides to places where they knew
money and jewels were hidden. As several places were named, two parties
went out the same night upon this exciting search. The one party
returned on the morrow with much booty, the other did not wander in for
two days, having been misled by a prisoner, who, in the hopes of finding
means to escape through his knowledge of the country, had led them into
such dangerous and uninhabited places that they had had a thousand
difficulties in avoiding. Furious at finding themselves mocked by their
guide, they hung him on a tree without any parley. In returning they
came, however, suddenly upon some slaves who were seeking for food by
night, having been hiding in the woods all day. Torture was at once
resorted to, to find out where the masters lay, for slaves could not be
there alone. The braver of the two suffered the most horrible pain
without disclosing a syllable, and was eventually cut to pieces without
confessing; the weaker, and perhaps younger negro, endured his
sufferings at first with equal fortitude, although he was offered
liberty and reward if he would speak. But when the seamen drew their
sabres, still red with the blood of his companion, and began to hew and
gash his brother's limbs that still lay palpitating on the ground, his
courage fell, and he offered to lead them to his master. The Spaniard
was soon taken with 30,000 crowns' worth of plate.

For eight days the men practised unheard-of cruelties upon the wretched
townsmen, already starved and beggared, wretches whose only crime had
been their yielding to the natural impulse of self-preservation. They
hung them up by their beards and by the hair of their heads, by an arm
or a leg; they stretched their limbs tight with cords, and then beat
with rattans upon the rigid flesh; they placed burning matches between
their fingers; they twisted cords about their heads, tightening the
strain by the leverage of their pistol stocks, till the eyes sprang from
the sockets. The deathblow was never given from pity, but as the climax
and consummation of suffering, and when the executioners were weary of
their cruelty. In vain the tortured Spaniards screamed that the treasure
was all removed to Gibraltar, and that they were not the rich citizens
but very poor men, monks and servants of Jesus, God help them! Many died
before the rack could be loosened.

Captain Picard, exulting in the success of his expedition, was now very
urgent in pressing Morgan to advance on Gibraltar before succours could
arrive there from Merida, believing that it would surrender as it had
done to Lolonnois. Morgan having in his custody about 100 of the chief
families of Maracaibo, and all the accessible booty, embarked eight
days after his landing, and proceeded to Gibraltar, hoping to rival
Lolonnois in every virtue. His prisoners and plunder went with him, and
he determined to hazard a battle. Expecting an obstinate defence, every
Buccaneer made his will, consoling himself by the thought of revelry at
Jamaica if he was one of those lucky enough to escape. "Death," says
Oexmelin, "was never much mixed up in their thoughts, especially when
there was booty in view, for if there were only some hopes of plunder
they would fight like lions." Before the fleet started, two prisoners
had been sent to Gibraltar to warn the governor that Captain Morgan
would give him no quarter if he did not surrender.

Picard, who remembered the former dangerous spots, made his men land
about a quarter of a league from the town, and march through the woods
in hopes of taking the Spaniards in the rear, in case they should be
again entrenched. The enemy received them with quick discharges of
cannon, but the men cheered each other, saying, "We must make a
breakfast of these bitter things ere we sup on the sweetmeats of
Gibraltar." They landed early in the morning, and found no more
difficulty than at Maracaibo. The Spaniards, deceived by a stratagem,
had expected their approach by the road, and not by the woods. They had
no time to throw up entrenchments, and only a few barricades, planted
with cannon, protected their flight. They remembered Lolonnois; their
hearts became as water, and they fled as the Buccaneers took peaceable
possession of the town. The Spaniards took with them their riches, and
all their ammunition, to use at some more convenient period. Morgan,
rejoicing in the easy victory, posted his men at the strong points of
the town, while 100 men, under Picard, went out to pursue and bring in
prisoners. They found the guns spiked, and every house sacked by its
owner, much spoiled, much carried off, and the heavy and the worthless
alone left.

The only inhabitant remaining in the town was a poor half-witted
Spaniard, who had not clearly ascertained what he ought to do. He was
so well dressed that they at first took him, much to his delight, for a
man of rank, and asked him what had become of all the people of
Gibraltar. He replied, "they had been gone a day, but he did not know
where; he had not asked, but he dare say they would soon be back, and
for his part he, Pepé, did not care." When they inquired where the
sugar-mills were, he replied that he had never seen any in his life. The
church money, he knew, was hid in the sacristy of the great church.
Taking them there he showed them a large coffer, where he pretended to
have seen it hid. They opened it and found it empty. To all other
inquiries he now answered, "I know nothing, I know nothing." Some of the
Buccaneers, angry at the disappointment, and vexed at the subtlety of
the Spaniards, declared the fellow was more knave than fool, and dragged
him to torture. They gave him first the strapado, till he began to wish
the people were returned; they then hung him up for two hours with heavy
stones tied to his feet, till his arms were dislocated. At last he cried
out, "Do not plague me any more, but come with me and I will show you
my goods and my riches." He then led them to a miserable hovel,
containing only a few earthen pots and three pieces of eight, wrapped in
faded finery, buried under the hearth. He then said his name was Don
Sebastian Sanchez, brother of the governor of Maracaibo, that he was
worth more than 50,000 crowns, and that he would write for it and give
it up if they would cease to hang and plague him so. They then tortured
him again, thinking he was a grandee in disguise, till he offered, if he
was released, to show them a refinery. They had not got a musket-shot
from the hut before he fell on his knees and gave himself up as a
criminal. "Jesu Maria!" he cried, "what will you do with me, Englishmen?
I am a poor man who live on alms, and sleep in the hospital." They then
lit palm-leaves and scorched him, and would have burnt off all his
clothes had he not been released by one of the Buccaneers who now saw he
was an idiot. The poor fellow died in great torment in about
half-an-hour, and before he grew cold was dragged into the woods and
buried.

The following day Picard brought in an old peasant and his two
daughters; the old man, his crippled limbs having been tortured, offered
to serve as guide, and lead them to some houses in the suburbs. Half
blind and frightened, he mistook his way, and the Buccaneers, thinking
the error intentional, made a slave, who declared he had intentionally
misled them, hang him on a tree by the road side.

Slavery here brought its own retribution, for this same slave, burning
to avenge some ill treatment he had received, offered, on being made
free, to lead them to many of the Spanish places of refuge. Before
evening ten or twelve families, with all their wealth, were brought into
Gibraltar. It had now become difficult to track the fugitives, as
fathers refused even to trust their children; no one slept twice in the
same spot, for fear that some one who knew of the retreat would be
captured, and then, under torture, betray the spot, generally huts in
the darkest recesses of the woods, where their goods were stored from
the weather. These exiles were, however, obliged to steal at night to
their country houses to obtain food, and then they were intercepted.
From some of these merchants Morgan heard that a vessel of 100 tons, and
three barges laden with silver and merchandise belonging to Maracaibo,
now lay in the river; about six leagues distant, and 100 men were
despatched to secure the prize.

In scouring the woods again with a body of 200 human bloodhounds, Morgan
surprised a large body of Spaniards. Some of these he forced the negro
guide to kill before the eyes of the others, in order to implicate him
in the eyes of the survivors. After eight days' search the band returned
with 250 prisoners, and a long train of baggage mules, bound for Merida.
The prisoners were each separately examined as to where the treasure was
hid. Those who would not confess, and even those who had nothing to
confess, were tortured to death--burnt, maimed, or had their life slowly
crushed out of them.

Amongst the greatest sufferers in this purgatory on earth was an old
Portuguese of venerable appearance, perhaps either a miser or purposely
disguised. This man the blood-thirsty negro, now high in favour with the
Buccaneers, and trying to rival them in cruelty, declared was very rich.
The poor old man, tearing his thin grey hair, swore by the Virgin and
all the saints that he had but 100 pieces of eight in the whole world,
and these had been stolen from him a few days before, during the general
chaos, by a runaway slave. This he vowed on his knees with tears and
prayers, doubly vehement when coming from one already on the grave's
brink. The cruel slave still looked sneeringly on, and swore he was
known to be the richest merchant in all Gibraltar. The Buccaneers then
stretched the Portuguese with cords till both his arms broke at the
shoulder, and then bound him by the hands and feet to the four corners
of a room, placing upon his loins a stone, weighing five cwt., while
four men, laughing at his cries, kept the cords that tied him in
perpetual motion. This inhuman punishment they called "swimming on
land." As he still refused to speak, they held fire under him as he
swung groaning, burnt off his beard and moustaches, and then left him
hanging while they strapadoed another. The next man they threw into a
ditch, after having pierced him with many sword thrusts, for they seem
to have been as insatiable for variety of cruelty as they were for
cruelty itself. They left him for dead, but he crawled home, and
eventually recovered, although several sword blades had passed
completely through his body.

As for the old Portuguese, his sufferings were far from ended; putting
him on a mule they brought him into Gibraltar, and imprisoned him in the
church, binding him to a pillar apart from the rest, supplying him with
food barely sufficient to enable him to endure his tortures. Four or
five days having passed, he entreated that a certain fellow prisoner,
whom he named, might be brought to him. This request being complied
with, as the first step to obtaining a ransom while he still remained
alive, he offered them, through this agent, a sum of 500 pieces of
eight. But the Buccaneers laughed at so small a sum, and fell upon him
with clubs, crying "500,000, old hunx, and not 500, or you shall not
live." After several more days of continued suffering, during which he
incessantly protested that he was a poor man and kept a small tavern,
the miser confessed that he had a store of 2000 pieces of eight, buried
in an earthen jar, and all these, bruised and mutilated as he was and
much as he loved money, he gave for his liberty, and a few days more of
life.

Upon the other prisoners, without regard to age, sex, or rank, they
inflicted tortures too disgusting and shocking to mention. Fear, hatred,
and avarice generated crimes, till the prisoners grew as vile as their
persecutors.

A slave, who had been cruelly treated by his master, persuaded the
Buccaneers to torture him on the plea that he was very rich, although he
was in reality a man of no wealth. The other prisoners, roused from the
selfishness of self-preservation by a thrill of involuntary compassion,
told Morgan that the Spaniard was a poor man, and that the slave had
perjured himself to obtain revenge. Morgan released the Spaniard
directly, but he had been already tortured. The slave was given up to
his master to be punished by any sort of death he chose to inflict.
Handed over to the Buccaneers, he was chopped to pieces in his master's
presence, still exulting in his revenge. "This," says Oexmelin, with a
cold _naïveté_, "satisfait l'Espagnol, quoyqu'il fust fort mal traité,
et en danger d'estre estropié" (this satisfied the Spaniard, though he
had been very badly treated, and almost lamed for life). Some of the
prisoners were crucified, others were burnt with matches tied between
their toes or fingers, many had their feet forced into the fires till
they dropped from the leg black and charred. All that the Indians had
suffered was now retaliated on the Spaniards. The Buccaneers themselves
considered the punishment a vengeance of Providence. The only mercy ever
shown to a Spaniard was to end his sufferings by death. The _coup de
grace_ was a kindness when it ended the misery of a groaning wretch,
bruised and burnt, lying in the hot sun, half mortified, or with his
body already paralyzed four or five days since. The masters being all
tortured, the slaves next received the strapado. These men, weaker in
their moral nature and with no motive for concealment but fear, told
everything. Many of the hiding-places were, however, not known to them.
One of them, during the fever of his wound, declared he knew where the
governor of the town was secreted, with many of the ladies of Gibraltar,
and a large portion of the treasure. Threats of death revealed the rest,
and he confessed that a ship and four boats, laden with Maracaibo
wealth, lay in a river of the lake. The Buccaneers were instantly on
their feet. Morgan, with 200 men and the slave guide, set out to capture
the governor; and 100 others, in two large _settees_ (boats), sallied
out to capture the treasure and the ships. The governor was not easily
caught, for it needed a battalion of balloons to surprise him. His first
retreat was a fort thrown up in the centre of a small island in the
river, two days' march distant. Hearing that Morgan was coming in
force, he retreated to the top of an adjoining mountain, into which
there was but one ascent, so straight, narrow, and perilous, that it
could only be mounted in single file.

The expedition altogether broke down, the rock proved inaccessible to
any but eagles; a "huge rain" wetted their baggage and ammunition; in
fording a river swollen by this "huge rain," many of their female
prisoners were lost, and, what they valued more, several mules laden
with plate were whirled down the torrents. Many of the women and
children sank under the fatigue, and some escaped. Involved in a marshy
country, up to their middles in water, the Buccaneers had to toil on for
miles. A few lost their lives, others their arms (the means of
preserving them). A body of fifty determined men, the Buccaneer
historian himself says, could have destroyed the whole body. But the
Spaniards were already so paralyzed by fear that they fled at the very
rustle of a leaf. Twelve days were spent in this dangerous and useless
expedition. Two days after them arrived their comrades, who had been
somewhat more successful. The Spaniards had unloaded the vessels, and
were beginning to burn them when they arrived, but many bales were left
in the haste of flight, and the boats, full of plunder, were brought
away in tow.

Morgan had now been lord in Gibraltar for five whole weeks, practising
all insolences that a conqueror ever inflicts on the conquered;
revenging on them the sufferings of the conquest, and trampling them
under foot for the very pleasure of destruction. Provisions now failing,
he resolved to depart; the provisions of Gibraltar, except the fruits,
coming entirely from Maracaibo, were delayed and intercepted. He first
sent some prisoners into the woods to collect a ransom from the
fugitives, under pain of again burning down their newly rebuilt city. He
demanded 5,000 pieces of eight. They promised to pay it in eight days,
and gave four of their richest citizens as hostages. The governor, safe
from all danger himself, had, however, forbidden them to pay any
ransom, and they prayed Morgan to have patience.

Setting sail with his hostages he arrived in three days at Maracaibo,
afraid that, during his long absence, the Spaniards had fortified
themselves, and he should have to fight his way through the passes.
Before his departure he released all his prisoners who had paid ransom,
but detained the slaves. He refused particularly to give up the
treacherous negro, because he knew they would burn him alive.

The only inmate of all the rich palaces and wide squares of Maracaibo,
was a poor sick man, who informed him (Morgan), to his astonishment,
that three Spanish men-of-war had arrived at the bar, and had repaired
and garrisoned the fort. Their commander was Don Alonso del Campo
d'Espinosa, the vice-admiral of the Indian fleet, who had been
despatched to those seas to protect the Spanish colonists, and put to
the sword every adventurer he could meet. This news did not alarm those
who every day "set their lives upon the hazard of a die," but it enraged
men who thought themselves secure of their plunder, and which they now
might have to throw off to lighten them in their retreat. Morgan
instantly despatched his swiftest vessel to reconnoitre the bar. The men
returned next day, assuring him that the story was too true, and they
were in very imminent danger. They had approached so near as to be in
peril of the shot, the biggest ship mounted forty guns, the next thirty,
and the smallest twenty, while Morgan's flag-ship had only fourteen.
They had seen the flag of Castile waving on the redoubt. There was no
means of escape by sea or land, and all were in despair at such enemies
so placed.

Morgan, undaunted and roused to new courage by the extremity, grew more
full of audacity than ever. He at once sent a flag of truce to the
_Magdalene_, the Spanish admiral's vessel, demanding 20,000 pieces of
eight, or he should set Maracaibo in flames. The admiral, amused and
astonished at such temerity, wrote back to say, that hearing that they
had committed hostilities in the dominions of his Catholic Majesty, his
sovereign lord and master, he had come to dispute their passage out of
the lake, from that castle, which they had taken out of the hands of a
parcel of cowards, and he intended to follow and pursue them everywhere,
as was his duty. The letter continued: "Notwithstanding if you be
contented to surrender with humility all you have taken, together with
the slaves and other prisoners, I will let you pass freely without
trouble or molestation, on condition that you retire home presently to
your own country. But if you make any resistance or opposition to what I
offer you, I assure you I will command boats to come from the Caraccas,
wherein I will put my troops, and, coming to Maracaibo, will put you
every man to the sword. This is my last and absolute resolution; be
prudent, therefore, and do not abuse my bounty with ingratitude. I have
with me very good soldiers, who desire nothing more ardently than to
revenge on you and your people all the cruelties and base infamous
actions you have committed upon the Spanish nation in America."

This vapouring letter Morgan read aloud to his men in the broad
market-place at Maracaibo, first in French and then in English, begging
their advice on the whole matter--asking them whether they would
surrender everything for liberty, or fight for both liberty and hard-won
treasure. They all answered unanimously, they did not care for the
Spanish brag, and they would rather fight to the last drop of their
blood than surrender booty got with such peril. One of the men, stepping
forward, cried, "You take care of the rest, I'll build a _brûlot_, and
with twelve men will burn the biggest of the three Spaniards."

The scheme was adopted, but resolved once more to try negotiation, now
that he was prepared for the worst, Morgan wrote again to Don Alonso,
offering to leave Maracaibo uninjured, surrender all the prisoners, half
the slaves, and to give up the hostages. The Don, trusting in his
superior strength, and believing Morgan fairly intimidated or at least
entirely in his mercy, refused to listen to any terms but those he had
proposed, adding, that in two days he should come and force him to
yield. Morgan resolved upon this to fight his way out and surrender
nothing, his men, though discouraged, being still brave and desperate.
All things were put in order to fight. The Englishman of Morgan's crew
proceeded as fast as possible with his _brûlot_, or fire-ship. He took
the small vessel captured in the Rivière des Espines, and filled it full
of palm-leaves dipped in tar, and a mixture of brimstone and gunpowder.
He put several pounds of powder under each of the ten sham guns, which
were formed of negro drums. The partitions of the cabins were then
broken down, so that the flame might spread unimpeded. The crew were
wooden posts, dressed up with swords, muskets, bandoliers, and hats or
montero caps. This fire-ship bore the English colours, so that it might
pass for Morgan's vessel; and in eight days, by all hands working upon
it, it was ready. During the preparation an extra guard was kept upon
the prisoners, for one escaping would have destroyed all their hopes of
safety. The male prisoners were kept in one boat, and the females,
slaves, plate, and jewels in another. In others, guarded by twelve men
each, came the merchandise. The _brûlot_ was to go first and grapple
with the admiral's ship.

All things being now completed, Morgan, with a heart as gay as if he
fought for God and the right, made his men take the usual Buccaneer
oath, employed on all occasions of pressing danger, when mutual
confidence was peculiarly necessary. They vowed to fight till death, and
neither to give nor take quarter. He promised a reward to all who
distinguished themselves, exciting all the strongest feelings of their
nature--revenge, avarice, and self-preservation.

With these desperate resolves, full of hope, for they were accustomed to
consider his promises of victory as certain prophecies, they set sail on
the 30th day of April, 1669, to seek the Spaniards.

They found the Spanish fleet riding at anchor in the middle of the entry
of the lake, like gaolers of their spacious prison. It being late and
almost dark, Morgan gave orders to anchor within range of the enemy,
determined to resist if attacked, but to wait for light. They kept a
strict watch, and at daybreak lifted anchor and set sail, bearing down
straight upon the Spaniards, who, seeing them move, advanced to meet
them.

Poor fishing boats the Buccaneers' barks seemed beneath those proud
floating castles; "but the race is not always to the swift, nor the
battle to the strong." The _brûlot_ sailed first, pushing on to the
admiral's vessel, which lay stately between its two companions, and was
suffered to approach within cannon shot. The Spaniards believing that it
was Morgan's vessel, and intended to board them, waited till it came
closer to crush it with a broadside. They little thought that they were
fighting with the elements. The fire-ship fell upon the Spaniard and
clung to its sides, like a wild cat on an elephant. Too late the
Spaniard attempted to push her off, but the flames had already leaped
from their lurking places; first the sails were swathed in fire, then
the tackling shrivelled up, and soon the solid timbers burst into a
blaze. The stern was first consumed, and the fore part sank hissing
into the sea. The wretched crew, flying from one element to the other,
perished, some by fire, some by water; the half-drowning clung to the
burning planks and withered in the glare; the burning sailors were
sucked down by the vortex of the sinking wreck. Don Alonso, seeing the
danger, called out to them in vain to cut down the masts, and, throwing
himself with difficulty into his sloop, escaped to land. The sailors,
refusing quarter, were allowed to perish by the Buccaneers' boats'
crews, who at first offered to save them. Perhaps the recollection of
their oath lessened their exertions.

The boats were pulling round the burning vessel in hopes of saving
plunder, and not of saving lives. The second vessel was boarded by the
Buccaneers and taken, in the confusion, almost without resistance. The
third ship, cutting its cables, drifted towards the fort, and there ran
ashore, the crew setting fire to her to prevent capture. The Buccaneers,
proud of their victory, determined to push it to extremities by landing
and attempting to storm the fort at the bar, without ladders, and
relying only on their hand grenades, but their artillery was too small
to make any practicable breach. The fort they found well supplied with
men, cannon, and ammunition. The garrison had not suffered personally by
the loss of a fleet manned by strangers, and they repulsed all attacks.
Unwilling to retire, Morgan spent the whole of the day till dusk in
firing muskets at any defenders who showed themselves above the walls,
and at dusk lit them up with a shower of fireballs, but the Spaniards
desperately resisted, and shot so furiously at them as to drive them
back to the ships, with the loss of thirty killed and as many
wounded--more loss than they had suffered in the capture of Maracaibo
and Gibraltar, while the fleet had been destroyed without the loss of a
single man. The garrison, expecting a fresh attack at daybreak, laboured
all night to strengthen their works, levelling the ground towards the
sea, and throwing up entrenchments from spots that commanded the
castle.

The next day Morgan, not intending to renew the attack, employed himself
in saving the Spanish sailors who were still floating on charred pieces
of the wreck; not rescuing them from mercy, but in order to make them
help in recovering part of the sunk treasure. They acknowledged that Don
Alonso had compelled them before the engagement, after they had
confessed to the chaplain, to come and take an oath to give the enemy no
quarter, which was the reason many had refused to be saved. The
admiral's vessel, the _Magdalene_, had carried thirty-eight guns and
twelve small brass pieces, and was manned by 350 sailors; the second,
the _St. Louis_, had thirty-four guns and 200 men; and the third, the
_Marquise_, twenty-two guns and 150 men. The _Marquise_ derived its name
from the Marquis de Coquin, who had fitted it out as a privateer. The
_Concepcion_ and _Nostra Signora de la Soledad_, two larger vessels, had
been sent back to Spain from Carthagena; a fourth, _Nostra Signora del
Carmen_ (for the Spaniards generally drew the names of their war vessels
from the lady of love and peace), had sunk near Campeachy.

The pilot of the smaller vessel being saved, and promised his life,
disclosed all Don Alonso's plans. He had been sent, upon the tidings of
the loss of Porto Bello, by direction of the supreme council of state,
with orders to root out the English pirates in those parts, and to
destroy as many as he could, for dismal lamentations had been made to
the court of Spain, to the Catholic king, to whom belonged the care and
preservation of the New World, of the damages and hostilities committed
by the English, and he had resolved to punish these proceedings and
avenge his subjects. The king of England being complained to, constantly
replied that he never gave any letters-patent to such men or such ships.
Sending home his more cumbrous ships, the Don had heard at St. Domingo
of the fleet sailing from Jamaica, and a prisoner, taken at Alta Grecia,
disclosed Morgan's plan on the Caraccas. On arriving there the wild fire
had already broken out at Maracaibo a second time, and hither he came to
extinguish it. A negro slave had indeed informed the admiral of the
fire-ship, but with short-sighted pride he derided the idea, saying that
the English had had neither wit, tools, nor time to build it.

The pilot who made these disclosures was rewarded by Morgan, and,
yielding to his promises, entered into his service. He informed him,
with the usual zeal of a deserter, that there was plate to the value of
40,000 pieces of eight in the sunken ship, for he had seen it brought on
board in boats. The divers eventually recovered 2000 pounds' worth of
it, some "in plate" and others in piastres, that had melted into large
lumps, together with many silver hilts of swords and other valuables.

Leaving a vessel to superintend this profitable fishery, Morgan hurried
back to Maracaibo, and, fitting up his largest prize for himself, gave
his own ship to a companion. He also sent to the governor, now somewhat
crest-fallen, to re-demand the ransom, threatening more violently than
before to burn down the city in eight days if it was not brought in. He
also demanded, in addition, 500 cows as victual for his fleet. These
were brought in in the short space of two days, with part of the money,
and eleven more days were spent in salting the meat and preparing for
sea. Then returning to the mouth of the lake, he sent to Don Alonso to
demand a free passage, offering to send all the prisoners on shore as
soon as he had once passed out, but otherwise to tie the prisoners to
the rigging, exposing them to the shot of the fort, and then to kill and
throw overboard those who were not struck. The prisoners also sent a
petition, praying the governor to spare their lives. But the Don, quite
undaunted, sternly answered to the hostages, who besought him on their
knees to save them from the sword and rope, "If you had been as loyal to
your king in hindering the entry of these pirates as I shall be in
hindering their going out, you had never caused these troubles, either
to yourselves or to our whole nation, which hath suffered so much
through your pusillanimity. I shall not grant your request, but shall
endeavour to maintain that respect which is due to my king, according to
my duty."

When the terrified messengers returned and told Morgan, he replied, "If
Alonso will not let me pass, I will find out a way without him,"
resolving to use either force or stratagem, and perhaps both.

Fearing that a storm might separate his fleet, or that some might not
succeed in escaping, Morgan divided the booty before he attempted to
pass the bar. Having all taken the usual oath, he found they had
collected 250,000 pieces of eight, including money and jewels, and in
addition a vast bulk of merchandise and many slaves. Eight days were
spent in this division, which took place within sight of the exasperated
garrison in the fort.

The following stratagem was then resorted to. Knowing that the Spaniards
were expecting a final and desperate attack on the day before their
departure, the Buccaneers made great show of preparing to land and
attack the fort. Part of each ship's crew embarked with their colours
in their canoes, which were instantly rowed to shore. Here the men,
concealed by the boughs on the banks, lay down flat in their boats, and
were rowed back again to their vessels by only two or three sailors.
This feigned landing they repeated several times in the day. The
Spaniards, certain of an escalade, at night brought down the great
eighteen pound ship guns of the fort to the side of the island looking
towards the land, and left the sea-shore almost defenceless. When night
came Morgan weighed anchor, and, by moonlight setting sail, at the
commencement of the ebb tide, dropped gently down the river, till the
vessels were almost alongside of the castle. Then spreading sails, quick
as magic, he drove past, firmly but warily. Every precaution was taken.
The crew were couched flat on the poop, and some placed below to plug
the shot-holes as they came. The Spaniards, astonished at their daring,
and enraged at their escape, ran with all speed and shifted their
battery, firing hastily, furiously, and with little certainty; but by
this time, a favourable wind springing up, the Buccaneers were almost
out of reach, few men were killed, and little damage done.

In this manner escaped Morgan from the clutches of Don Alonso, who had
thought himself sure of his prey. The baffled rage of the Spaniards and
the wild joy of the Buccaneers, their clamorous approval of Morgan's
skill, the exultation of their triumph, and the prisoners' dismay, may
be easily imagined. Generous in success, Morgan, once out of range of
the guns that thundered in pursuit, sent a canoe on shore with his
prisoners from Maracaibo, but those of Gibraltar he carried off, as they
had not yet paid their ransom. The joy of one and the grief of the
other, their parting and the tears, were painful to witness. As he set
sail, and the fort was still looming to the right, Morgan discharged a
farewell salute of eight guns, to which the chapfallen Spaniards had not
the heart to return even a single musket shot.

But out of Scylla into Charybdis was a Buccaneer's fate: one danger was
succeeded by another, hope by hope, despair by despair. The very day of
their escape the judgment of Heaven seemed to overtake the sea rovers,
as if to warn them that no stratagems could defeat God. The fleet was
surprised by such a tempest that they were compelled to anchor in five
or six fathom water. The storm increased, they were obliged to weigh
again, and at any risk keep off the land. Their only choice seemed to be
death by the Spaniard, the Indian, or the wave--all equally hostile and
deaf to mercy.

Oexmelin says he was on board the least seaworthy vessel of the whole
fleet, that, having lost anchors and mainsail, they had great difficulty
in keeping afloat, and were obliged to bale as well as work night and
day at the pumps, amid deafening thunder and mountainous seas that
threatened to drown them even while the vessel still floated. The ship,
but for the ropes that held it together, would have instantly sunk. The
lightning and the wave disputed for their prey, but the rude arbiter,
the wind, came in and snatched them from these destroyers. "Indeed,"
says Oexmelin, "though worn out with fatigue and toil, we could not make
up our minds to close our eyes on that blessed light which we might so
soon lose sight of for ever, for no hope of safety now remained. The
storm had lasted four days, and there was no probability of its
termination. On one side we saw rocks on which our vessel threatened
every instant to drive, on the other were Indians who would no more have
spared us than the Spaniards who were behind us; and by some evil
fortune the wind drove us ceaselessly towards the rocks and the Indians,
and away from the place whither we desired to go."

In the midst of these distresses, six armed vessels gave them chase
through the storm when they were near the bay of Venezuela. They turned
out to be vessels of the Count d'Estreés, the French admiral, who
generously rendered them aid, and the wind abating enabled them to reach
the shore. Morgan and some others made for Jamaica, and the French for
St. Domingo,--the Spaniards at the fort probably believing they had
perished in the gale.

The laggers of Morgan's fleet, who had never joined him, were less
fortunate than the admiral they deserted. 400 in number, they landed at
Savona, but could not find the buried letter. They determined to attack
the town of Comana, on the Caraccas, choosing Captain Hansel, who had
distinguished himself at Porto Bello, as their commander. This town was
distant sixty leagues from Trinidad. On landing they killed a few
Indians who awaited them on the beach, but the Spaniards, disputing
briskly the entry of the town, drove them back at last to their ships
with great loss and confusion. On returning to Jamaica they were jeered
at by Morgan's men, who used to say, "Let us see what sort of money you
brought from Comana, and if it be as good as that which we won at
Maracaibo."

Morgan, encouraged by success, soon determined on fresh enterprises. On
arriving at Jamaica, "he found many of his officers and soldiers already
reduced to their former indigency by their vices and debaucheries. Hence
they perpetually importuned him for new exploits, thereby to get
something to expend still in wine and strumpets, as they had already
done what they got before. Captain Morgan, willing to follow fortune's
call, stopped the mouths of many inhabitants of Jamaica who were
creditors to his men for large sums, with the hopes and promises of
greater achievements than ever in a new expedition. This done, he could
easily levy men for any enterprise, his name being so famous through all
these islands, as that alone would readily bring him in more men than he
could well employ."

Affecting a mystery, attractive in itself, and necessary where Spanish
spies might be present, Morgan appointed a rendezvous at Port Couillon,
on the south side of Hispaniola, and made known his intentions to the
English and French adventurers, whether in Tortuga or St. Domingo. He
wrote letters to all the planters and old Buccaneers in Hispaniola, and
desired their attendance at a common council. At many a hunting fire
this announcement was read, and many an _engagé's_ heart beat high at
the news, for Morgan was now the champion and hero of the Buccaneers of
America. Great numbers flocked to the port in ships and canoes, others
traversed the woods and arrived there by land, through a thousand
dangers. Such crowds came that it soon became difficult to obtain a
place in the crews. Vessels and provisions were now all that was wanted.
Plunder was certain, and they had but to choose on what rich coast they
should land. The French adventurers, ever gay and ready, were first in
the field. Morgan himself, punctual and prompt, followed in the _Flying
Stag_, the St. Malo vessel we have before mentioned, carrying forty-two
guns. The vessel had been lately confiscated and sold by the governor of
Jamaica, the unfortunate captain escaping with his life, happy in being
free although penniless.

At the rendezvous on the 24th day of October, 1670, 1600 men were
present, and twenty-four vessels assembled at the muster, amid shouting,
gun firing, flag waving, and great joy and hope. Morgan's proposition
was to attack some rich place which was well defended--the more danger
the more booty, for it was only rich places that the Spaniards cared to
defend. Several previous expeditions had failed from want of provisions,
and the necessity of attacking small places to obtain food gave the
alarm to the Spaniards and frustrated their plans. They therefore
resolved to visit La Rancheria, a small place on the banks of the River
de la Hache, on the mainland, with four vessels and 400 men. This was a
place where corn and maize were brought by the farmers for the supply of
the neighbouring city of Carthagena, and they hoped to capture in the
port some pearl vessels from that place.

In the meanwhile, Morgan, not caring for lesser prey, employed his men
in careening, cleaning, rigging, and pitching their vessels ready for
sea, that all might be ready to weigh anchor the moment the expedition
of foragers returned. It augured terribly to the Spaniard that it was
necessary to sack a town or two before the Buccaneer fleet could even
set sail.

Part of the men were in the woods boar-hunting, and others salting the
flesh for the voyage. Each crew had a certain part of the woods allotted
it for its own district, so perfect was Morgan's discipline. Each party
prepared the salt pork for its own use, while the cauldrons of pitch
were smoking on the beach, and the clank of the shipwrights' hammers
could be heard all night by the hunters. The English, who were not so
expert in hunting as their Gallic brethren (so says a French writer),
generally took a French hunter with them, to whom they gave 150 or 200
piastres. Some of these men had trained packs of dogs that would kill
enough boars in a day to load twenty or thirty men.

The Rancheria expedition arrived in six days within sight of the river,
and was unfortunately becalmed for some time within a gunshot of land.
This gave the Spaniards time to prepare for their defence, and either to
bury their goods or throw up entrenchments, for these repeated visits of
the Buccaneers had rendered them quick on such occasions. A land-wind at
last springing up, gave a corn vessel from Carthagena, lying in the
river, an opportunity to sally out and attempt its escape, but being a
bad sailer it was soon captured, much to the Englishmen's delight, for
corn was the object of their visit. By a singular coincidence, it turned
out to be that very cocoa vessel which Lolonnois sold to the governor of
Tortuga, who, on its return from France, had sold it to Captain
Champaigne, a French adventurer, who in his turn sold it to the same
merchant captain who then commanded it. He told the Buccaneers that it
made the twelfth vessel taken from him by the brotherhood of the coast
in five years only, and yet that with all these losses he had contrived
to make a fortune of 500,000 crowns. "On peut juger par là," says
Oexmelin, with a shrug, "s'il y a des gens riches dans l'Amérique."

Landing at daybreak, in spite of the mowing fire from a battery, and
under protection of their own cannon, they drove the Spaniards back to
their strongly fortified village, which they at once attacked. Here the
enemy rallied and fought desperately, hand-to-hand, sword blow and push
of pike, from ten in the morning till night, when they fled, having
suffered great loss, into secret places in the woods. The Buccaneers,
who had suffered scarcely less loss, pushed on at once headlong to the
town, which they found deserted; and next day pursuing the Spaniards
took many prisoners, and proceeded to torture them, inflicting on fear
and innocence all the horrors of the Madrid inquisition. In fifteen days
they captured many prisoners and much booty, and with the usual threats
of destroying the town, they obtained 4000 hanegs, or bushels of maize,
sufficient for the whole of the fleet. They preferred this to money, and
in three days, the whole quantity being brought in by the people, eager
for their departure, they at once sailed.

Morgan, alarmed at their five weeks' absence, had begun to despair of
their return, thinking Rancheria must have been relieved from Carthagena
or Santa Maria. He also thought that they might have had good fortune,
and deserted him to return to Jamaica. His joy was great to see them
arrive laden with corn, and more in number than when they departed. A
council of war was actually holding to plan a new expedition, when
Captain Bradley and his six vessels hove in sight. The maize was divided
among the fleet, but the plunder was awarded to the captain who had
risked his life for the general good.

The captured ship arrived very opportunely, and it was instantly awarded
by general consent to Le Gascon, a French adventurer who had lately lost
his vessel. Morgan having divided the meat and corn, and personally
inspected every bark, set sail for Cape Tiburon, at the west end of
Hispaniola, a spot convenient for laying in stores of wood and water.
Here he was joined by several ships from New England, refitted at
Jamaica. Morgan now found himself suzerain of a fleet of thirty-seven
vessels, large and small, carrying sixteen, fourteen, twelve, ten, even
down to four pound guns. To man these there were 2200 sailors, well
armed and ready for flight and plunder. The fleet was divided into two
squadrons, under his vice-admiral and subordinate officers. To the
captains he gave letters-patent, guaranteeing them from all the effects
of Spanish hostility, from "the open and declared enemies of the King
his master," (Charles II.)

The charter-party which we give elsewhere was then signed, the
rewards were higher than usual, and many modifications introduced.
In the private council three places were proposed as rich and
accessible--Panama, Carthagena, and Vera Cruz. In these consultations
the only thing considered was whether a town was rich or poor, not
whether it was well or ill defended.

"The lot fell" on Panama, as the richest of the three, though the least
known to them, being further from the North Pacific than any Buccaneer
had yet gone. Panama was the galleon-port and the El Dorado of the
adventurer's yarns. Being so unknown a place they determined to first
recapture St. Catherine's, where in the prisons they might obtain many
guides, who had seen both the North and South Pacifics, for outlaws
made, they found, the best guides for outlaws; and they agreed before
sailing that, if they took a Spanish vessel, the first captain who
boarded it should have for his reward a tenth part of her cargo.

They had begun by sacking a town to victual their fleet, they now
proposed to storm a fort to obtain a guide--St. Catherine's batteries,
if resolutely manned, being able to beat off three such fleets.

The admiral, it was agreed, should have a share for every hundred men,
and every captain eight shares if the vessel they took was large. The
crews then one by one took the oath of fidelity. On the 18th December,
1670, the fleet set sail for St. Catherine's, whose prisoners would
rejoice at their arrival.

The one squadron carried the royal English and the other a white flag.
The admiral's division bore a red banner with a white cross, "le
pavillon du parlement," and at the bow-sprit one of three colours, blue,
white, and red. Those of the other divisions carried a white and red
flag. Morgan also appointed peculiar signals for all emergencies.

On their way to St. Catherine's they chased two Dutch vessels from
Cuba, which escaped by aid of contrary winds that baffled their
pursuers. In four days the fleet arrived at St. Catherine's, and Morgan
despatched two small vessels to guard the port.

This island was renowned for its vast flocks of migratory pigeons, and
is watered by four streams, two of which are dry in summer. The land,
though fertile, was not cultivated.

The next day, before sunrise, they anchored in the bay of Aguada Grande,
where the Spaniards had erected a four-gun battery. Morgan, at the head
of 100 men, landed and made his way through the woods, having no guides
but some old Buccaneers who had been there before with Mansvelt. On
arriving that night at the governor's house and the Platform Battery
they found the Spaniards had retreated by a bridge into the smaller and
almost impregnable island, which they had made strong enough to beat off
10,000 men. Being driven back at first by a tremendous fire, Morgan was
obliged to encamp that night in the woods or open country--no hardship
to hunters or sailors in fine weather. There still remained a whole
league of dense brush between them and their enemies, at once their
protection and destruction. A chilling torrent of rain began to beat
upon them, and instead of ceasing, as they had hoped, lasted till noon
of the next day. They pulled down two or three thatched huts, and made
small damp fires, that scorched a few but warmed none. They could not
shelter themselves, and, what was worse, could not keep their arms and
powder dry. But more than this, they suffered from hunger, having had no
food for a whole day. The men for the greater part being dressed with no
clothes but a seaman's shirt and trowsers, and without shoes or
stockings, suffered dreadfully after the burning of a tropic noon from
this freezing cold and rain. One hundred men, says Esquemeling, even
indifferently well armed, might have cut them all to pieces. At daybreak
they were roused from their shivering sleep by the Spanish drums beating
the _Diane_, or _reveillé_. The rain had now ceased, and their courage
rose as high as ever. But they could not answer this challenge, for
their own drums were loose and soaked with wet, and they had now to
employ themselves in quickly drying their arms. Scarcely had they done
this, when it began to cloud over and rain with increased fury, as if
the "sky were melting into waters," which blinded them and prevented
them again from advancing to the attack. Many of them grew
faint-hearted, and talked of returning. The men were now feeble for want
of sleep, and faint with cold and hunger. The eager foragers found in a
field "an old horse, lean, and full of scabs and blotches, with galled
back and sides." This was instantly killed and flayed, and divided in
small pieces among as many as could get any, and eagerly eaten without
salt or bread by the few lucky epicures--"eaten," says the historian,
"more like ravenous wolves eat than men."

The rain still gushing down, and the men, worn out in mind and body,
growing angry, discontented, and clamorous, it became necessary for
Morgan to act with promptitude. About noon, to his great joy, the rain
ceased and the sun broke out. Taking advantage of this lull--for the
rain had barred even their retreat--Morgan ordered a canoe to be rigged
out in great haste, and dispatched four men with a white flag to the
Spanish governor, declaring that if they did not all surrender he would
put them to the sword without quarter. His audacity was luckily crowned
with success. Opposed armies are often men mutually afraid, trying to
frighten each other. The governor was intimidated. He demanded two hours
to confer with his officers. At the end of this time, on Morgan giving
hostages, two soldiers with white flags were sent to arrange terms. The
governor had decided in full conference that he could not defend the
island against such an armada, but he proposed a certain (Dalgetty-like)
stratagem of war to save his own head, and preserve the reputation of
his officers at home and abroad.

Morgan was to come at night and assault the fort of St. Jerome, which
stood near the bridge that joined the two islands, and at the same
moment his fleet was to attack the castle of Santa Teresa by sea, and
land troops near the battery of St. Matthew. These men were to
intercept and take prisoner the governor as he made his way to the St.
Jerome batteries. He would then at once lead them to the castle, as if
they were his own men. On both sides there was to be continual firing,
but only with powder, and no bullets. The forts thus taken, the island
would of course surrender.

This well-arranged performance took place with great _éclat_. Morgan, in
acceding to the terms, had insisted on their strict performance of every
item, and gave notice, for fear of ambush, that every straggling
Spaniard would be shot. Afraid of a stratagem, some Buccaneers loaded
their muskets with ball, and held themselves ready for any danger. With
much smoke and great consumption of powder, the unsuspecting Spaniards
were driven like sheep into the church, the island surrendered, and by
this bloodless artifice Spanish pride remained unhurt.

But a cruel massacre now commenced. The Buccaneers had eaten nothing for
nearly two days. They made war upon all the poultry and cattle--the
oldest cow was slain, the toughest rooster strangled. For several days
the island was lit up with huge fires, round which the men roasted their
meat, and revelled and caroused. When wood grew scarce they pulled down
cottages to light their fires, and having no wine very wisely made use
of water.

The day after the surrender they numbered their prisoners, and found
they had collected 450 souls--seventy of the garrison, forty-three
children, and thirty-one slaves. The men were all carefully disarmed,
and sent to the plantations to bring in provisions; the women were left
in the church to pray and weep. They next inspected all the ten
batteries, wondering in their strength and exulting in their victory.
The fort St. Jerome contained eight great guns and sixty muskets; the
St. Matthew three guns; the Santa Teresa twenty guns and 120 muskets.
The castle was very strong, and moated; impregnable on the sea side, and
on the land side ascended by a narrow mountain path, while the guns on
its summit commanded the port. The St. Augustine fort mounted three
guns; the Platform two; the St. Salvador and another also two; the Santa
Cruz three; and the St. Joseph six and twelve muskets. In the magazine
they found 30,000 pounds of powder, which they at once shipped, with all
the other ammunition. In the St. Jerome battery Morgan left a guard, but
in all the other forts the guns were spiked and the gun-carriages burnt.

The object of his visit was still to seek. Examining the prisoners, who
were now crowded in with merchants and grandees, he inquired for
banditti from Panama, and three slaves stepped forward who knew every
path and avenue to the city. These men he chose as guides, promising
them a full Buccaneer's share of the spoil if they brought him by a
secure way to the city, and, in addition, their liberty when they
reached Jamaica. These volunteers consisted of two Indians and a
mulatto. The former denied all knowledge of the place; the latter--a
"rogue, thief, and assassin, who had deserved breaking on the wheel
rather than mere garrison service"--readily accepted Morgan's
propositions, and promised to serve him faithfully. He had a great
ascendancy over the two Indians, and domineered over them as he pleased,
without their daring to disobey a half-blood already on the point of
preferment.

The next step to Panama was to capture Chagres and its castle, and
Morgan at once dispatched five vessels, well equipped, with 400 men on
board, to undertake this expedition, remaining himself at St.
Catherine's, lest the people of Panama should be alarmed. He was to
follow his van-guard in eight days, guided by the Indians, who knew
Chagres. This time he and his men prudently spent in pulling manioc
roots for cassava, and digging potatoes for the voyage.

The Chagres expedition was led by the same Captain Bradley who commanded
at Rancheria. He had been with Mansvelt formerly, and had rendered
himself famous by his exploits both among the Buccaneers and the
Spaniards. He arrived in three days at Chagres, opposite Fort St.
Lawrence, which was built on a mountain commanding the entrance of the
river. As soon as the Spaniards saw the red flag spreading from his
vessels, they displayed the royal colours of Spain, and saluted him with
a volley too hasty and angry to be very destructive. The Buccaneers,
according to their usual stratagem, landed at Narangui, a place a
quarter of a league distant from the castle, their guide leading them
through thick woods, through which they had to cut a path with their
sabres. It was early morning when they landed, and requiring half a day
to perform the short distance, they did not reach a hill commanding the
castle till two o'clock. The mire and dirt of the road combined, with
the darkness of the way, to lengthen their march. The guides served them
well, but brought them at one spot so near to the castle, and in so open
and bare a place, that they lost many men by the shot. In other parts
the wood was so thick that they could only tell that they were near the
castle by the discharge of the cannon. The hill they had now reached was
not within musket range, and they were thus deprived of the use of
their favourite weapon. Could they have dragged cannon so far they might
have taken the place without losing a man.

The castle of Chagres was built on a high mountain at the entry of a
river, and surrounded by strong wooden palisadoes banked with earth. The
top of the mountain was divided into two parts, between which ran a
ditch thirty feet deep; the tower had but one entrance by a drawbridge,
towards the land it had four bastions, and towards the sea two more. The
south wall was inaccessible crag, the north was moated by the broad
river. At the foot of the hill lay a strong fort with eight guns, which
commanded the river's mouth; a little lower down were two other
batteries, each of six guns, all pointing the same way. At another side
were two great store-houses, full of goods, brought from the inland, and
near these a flight of steps, cut in the rock, led to the castle of the
summit. On the west side was a small port not more than seven or eight
fathoms deep, with good anchorage for small vessels, and before the
hill a great rock rose from the waves, which almost covered it at low
water.

The place appeared such a perfect volcano of fire, and so threatening
and dangerous, that the Buccaneers, but for fear of Morgan's rage and
contempt, would have at once turned back. After many disputes and much
doubt and perplexity, they resolved to hazard the assault and risk their
lives. When they descended from their hill into the plain, they had to
throw themselves on their faces to escape the desolating shower of
balls; but their marksmen, quite uncovered and without defence, shot at
the Spanish gunners through the loops of the palisading, and killed all
who showed themselves. This skirmishing continued till the evening, when
the Buccaneers, who had lost many men, their commander having his leg
broken with a cannon shot, began to waver and to think of retiring,
having in vain tried to burn down the place with their fireballs, and
charged up to the very walls, which they tried in vain to climb, sword
in hand. When the Spaniards saw them drawing back through the dusk, in
some disorder, carrying their wounded men and gnashing their teeth in
rage at the dark lines of defence, they shouted out "Come on, you dogs
of heretics; come on, you English devils: you shan't get to Panama this
bout, for we'll serve your comerades as we have served you." The
Buccaneers, astonished at their cries, now for the first time learnt
that Morgan's expedition had been heard of at Panama.

Night had already begun, and the rain of bullets, shot, and Indian
arrows (more deadly almost than the bullets), harassing and well-aimed,
continued as grievous as by day. Taking advantage of the gloom, another
party advanced to the palisadoes; the light of their burning fuses
directed the aim of the Spaniards.

A singular accident of war gave the place, so briskly defended, into the
hands of the assailants. A party of the French musketeers were talking
together, devising a plan of advance, when a swift Indian arrow fell
among them and pierced one of the speakers in the shoulder (Esquemeling
says in the back and right through the body, another writer says in the
eye). A thought struck the wounded man, for the wound had spurred his
imagination: coolly drawing the point from his shoulder, he said to
those near him, "Attendez, mes frères, je m'en vais faire périr tous les
Espagnols--tous--avec cette sacré flèche" (wait a bit, my mates, I'll
kill all the Spaniards--all--with this d---- arrow); so saying he drew
from his pocket a handful of wild cotton, which the Buccaneers kept as
lint to staunch their wounds, and wound it round the dart; then putting
it in his loaded musket, from which he extracted the ball, he fired it
back at the castle roof. It alighted on some dry thatch, which in a
moment began to smoke, and in another second broke into a bright flame,
more visible for the darkness. The Buccaneers shouted and pushed on to
the attack, and the wounded men forgot their wounds. Some of the men,
seeing the result of the experiment, gathered up the Indian arrows that
lay thick around them, and fired them at the roofs. Many houses were
soon in flames. The Spaniards, busy with the defence, did not see the
fire until it had gained some head, and reaching a parcel of powder
blown it up and caused ruin and consternation within the fort. If they
left the walls the Buccaneers gained ground, if they left the fire the
flames spread more terribly than before; the want of sufficient water
increased the confusion, and while they tried to quench the
conflagration, the Buccaneers set fire to the palisadoes.

Oexmelin, who was present as a surgeon at this attack of Chagres, relates
an anecdote of courage which he himself witnessed, to show the
indomitable fury of the assailants. One of his own friends was pierced
in the eye by an Indian arrow, and came to him to beg him to pull it
out, the pain was so intense and unbearable. Although a surgeon, Oexmelin
had not the nerve to inflict such torture, however momentary, on a
friend, and turned away in pity, upon which the hardy seaman tore out
the arrow with a curse, and, binding up the wound, rushed forward to the
wall. The few Buccaneers who had retreated, seeing the flames, now
hurried back to the attack. The Spaniards could no longer see the enemy
at whom they fired, the night was so dark and starless, while the
Buccaneers shot down with the unerring aim of hunters the Spaniards,
whose bodies stood out dark and well-defined against the bright
background of flame. All this time, before the fire of the roofs could
be extinguished, the Buccaneers had swarmed through the fosse, and,
mounting upon each other's shoulders, burnt down part of the palisadoes,
as we have before described, in spite of the hand grenades that were
thrown from above, and which burst among them. The fire ran along the
wall, leaping like a winged thing, and devoured wherever it clung,
spreading with dreadful rapidity.

The fight continued all night, and when the calm daylight broke on the
worn soldiers, the Buccaneers saw with sparkling eyes that the gabions
had smouldered through, and that the earth had fallen down in large
heaps into the fosse. The breaches in many places were practicable. The
armour had fallen piece-meal from their giant adversary, and he now
stood before them bare, wounded, and defenceless. The Buccaneers,
creeping within musket shot of the walls, shot down the gunners in the
breaches to which the cannon had been dragged by the governor's orders
during the night. Divided into two bands, one party kept up a constant
fire on the guns, and the other watched the motions of the enemy. About
noon they advanced to a spot which the governor himself defended, belted
round with twenty-five brave Spaniards, armed with pikes, halberds,
swords, and muskets. They advanced under a dreadful hail of fire and
lead, the defenders casting down flaming pots full of combustible matter
and "_odious smells_," which destroyed many of the English. But we do
not know how smells could drive back men who would have marched through
hell if it had been the shortest way to Panama.

Nothing could equal the unflinching courage of the Spaniards--they
disputed every inch of ground--they yielded slowly like wounded lions
when the hunters narrow their circles. They showered stones and all
available missiles on their assailants, only wishing to kill a
Buccaneer, but feeling that resistance was hopeless; some, rather than
yield, threw themselves from the cliffs into the sea, and few survived
the fall. As the Buccaneers won their way to the castle the Spaniards
retreated to the _garde du corps_, where they entrenched themselves with
two cannon; to the last the governor refused quarter, and at last fell
shot through the brain. The few who remained surrendered when the guns
were taken and would have been turned against them.

Only fourteen men were found unhurt in the fort and about nine or ten
wounded, who had hid themselves among the dead. They told Morgan that
they were all that were left of a garrison of 314 soldiers. The
governor, seeing that he was lost, had despatched the survivors to
Panama to alarm the city, and remained behind to die. No officer was
left alive; they had been the first to set their men the example of a
glorious death. It appeared that a Buccaneer deserter, an Irishman,
whom Morgan had not even informed of his design, had come to the port,
and assured them of the attack on La Rancheria, and the contemplated
movement on Panama. The governor of that place had instantly sent to
Chagres a reinforcement of 164 men, with ammunition and provisions, and
had placed ambuscades along the river. He was at that very moment, they
said, awaiting them in the savannah with 3600 men: of these 2000 were
infantry, 400 cavalry, and 600 Indians. He had also employed 200
muleteers and hunters to collect a drove of 1000 wild cattle to drive
down upon the invaders.

"The taking of this castle," says Esquemeling, "cost the pirates
excessively dear, in comparison to what they were wont to lose, and
their toil and labour was greater than at the conquest of the Isle of
St. Catherine." On numbering their thinned ranks, many voices were
silent at the roll call. More than 100 men were found to be dead, and
more than seventy grievously wounded. There were sixty who could not
rise, and many in the ranks wore on their arms strips of the Spanish
colours, or had their heads bound round with bloody cloths. The
prisoners they compelled to drag their own dead to the edge of the
cliffs and cast them among the shattered bodies on the beach, and then
to bury them where the sea could not wash them out of their graves, or
the birds devour them. The castle chapel they turned into an hospital
for the wounded, and the female slaves were employed to tend them, for
the surgeons in the heat of battle had only had time to amputate a limb
or bind an artery.




CHAPTER II.

CONQUEST OF PANAMA.

   March from Chagres--Famine--Ambuscade of Indians--Wild bulls driven
   down upon them--Victory--Battle of the Forts--Takes the City--Burns
   part of it--Cruelties--Debauchery--Retreat with prisoners--Virtue of
   the Spanish prisoner, and her sufferings--Ransom--Division of
   booty--Treason of Morgan--Escapes by night to Jamaica--Dispersion of
   the Fleet--Morgan's subsequent fate.


The bodies of their comerades, who had died that they who survived might
conquer, were buried, not without some tears even from these rude men,
in large (plague pit) graves, dug by the prisoners. The women were
violated in the first fury of the sack. During their plunder they found
a great quantity of provisions and ammunitions stored up for the use of
the fleet. Their next act was to repair the fort and render it tenable.

Morgan, instantly informed of the fall of Chagres, did not remain long
behind. Having first collected all the Indian wheat and cassava he could
carry, he embarked his prisoners and provisions, taking with him Don
Joseph Ramirez de Leiba, the governor, and the chief officers. The
cannon he spiked or threw into the sea, in places where he might recover
them, intending to return and fortify the place, as a stronghold if his
design on Panama failed. The forts, and church, and house he fired, with
the exception of the castle of Santa Teresa.

In sailing to Chagres a storm arose and dispersed his vessels, keeping
them many days at sea. The admiral, always watchful in danger, suffered
himself for a moment to sleep in the hour of prosperity. When he
approached the river mouth and saw the English flag floating from the
blackened walls, he could not restrain the heedless joy of his crew--not
waiting for the pilot canoe that was putting out to warn them of their
danger, he drove on the sunken rock at the foot of the castle hill. His
own and three other vessels sank, yet the crews and cargoes were all
saved, and but for a strong "norther" the ships themselves would have
been preserved.

Brought into the castle with acclamations and hearty congratulations at
his escape, Morgan employed the Spanish prisoners from St. Catherine's
in repairing the palisading of the fort, carefully destroying all
thatched sheds for fear of fire. He then chose a garrison by lot, and
divided the stores. He heard with delight the details of the victory,
and lamented the absent dead and the many brave men that had shared so
often his own hopes and fears. His next movement was to seize some
_chatten_, or small Spanish vessels that were still in the river. They
were small craft that went to and fro between Chagres and Porto Bello,
or Nicaragua, or plied with merchandise up and down the river. They
mounted six guns, two iron, and four small brass, and were navigated by
six men. He also took four small frigates of fourteen and eight guns,
and all the canoes he could lay hands on, requiring them for the
expedition. He left behind him 100 men, under command of Captain Le
Maurice, and 150 men to guard the ships.

For Panama, Morgan took with him 1300 of the best armed and the most
robust of his band, five boats with artillery, and thirty-two canoes. He
imprudently carried little provisions, expecting to obtain plenty from
the Spaniards they should kill in the ambuscades. In spite of the recent
victory, and of Morgan's certainty of conquest, many of the Buccaneers
were less sanguine than on former expeditions. The Spanish prisoners had
succeeded in alarming them by rumours of the dangers and intricacy of
the road, and the ambuscades that had been two months in preparation.
Some, more superstitious than the rest, thought the wreck of Morgan's
ship, and the severe loss at Chagres, bad omens for their success at
Panama. But these were mocked at by the rest, as white-livered, and
Morgan having divided the provisions between the garrison and the St.
Catherine prisoners, reviewed his men, and examined himself their arms
and ammunition. He quieted their fears and spoke of victory as already
obtained. He exhorted them to show more than usual courage, in order to
return as soon as possible rich and glorious to Jamaica. With a shout of
"Long live the King of England, and long live Henry Morgan," they began
their march towards the doomed city on the 18th of January, 1670.

The first day they advanced only six leagues to Rio de los Braços, where
they got out of their canoes to sleep on shore, being crippled with
overcrowding in the boats. They could have brought no provisions, for
few had any food that day, but a pipe of tobacco "to stop the orifice of
the stomach." They could find nothing in the deserted plantations, where
even the unripe fruits had been plucked and the roots pulled up before
their arrival. The men longed to fight, in order that they might eat. By
noon of the next day they reached Cruz de Juan Gallego, where they were
obliged to leave their canoes; the river was very dry and shallow from
want of rain, and much impeded with fallen trees, but their hopes were
excited by the guide's intelligence, that about two leagues further the
roads grew better. Here they left their boats with 160 men to guard
them, as a resource in case of defeat, giving them strict injunctions
not to land for fear of ambuscades in the neighbouring woods, which were
so thick as to seem impenetrable. Finding the forest almost impassable,
Morgan ordered a few of the canoes to be rowed, though with immense
labour, to a place called Cedro Bueno, further up the river, taking half
the men at a time and returning for the rest, so by nightfall all the
men were once more united. From discovering no ambuscades, in spite of
all the wishes of these hungry soldiers, it was supposed that the
Spanish spies, willing to avoid a fight, had frightened their officers
by exaggerating the number of the adventurers. On the third day Morgan
sent forward some guides, who could find no road, the country being
flat, inundated, and marshy. The men, who had scarcely eaten anything
since their departure, grew faint and hungry, and a few of them
gathered the leaves from the forest trees. It being night before they
could pass the river, they slept on the bank, exposed, half-clothed as
they were, to the tropical damps and cold.

The fourth day's march they advanced in divisions; the largest went by
land, the smaller in canoes. The guides were always kept two musket
shots in advance, to give notice of ambuscades, and in hopes of
capturing stragglers who might furnish intelligence. But the Spaniards
had also scouts, very wary, and very "dexterous" in giving notice of all
accidents, frequently bringing the Panama men intelligence of the
Buccaneers' approach six hours before the enemy arrived. About noon the
army reached a post named Torna Cavallos, so called probably from the
roughness of the road, and at this spot the guide of the canoes cried
out that he saw an ambuscade. With infinite joy, the hungry men,
thirsting for blood, flew to arms, knowing that the Spaniards always
went luxuriously provided with food, and knowing that a dead Spaniard
could want no more provender. As soon as they came within sight of the
entrenchment, which was shaped like a half-moon, and the palisading
formed of entire trees, they uttered a dreadful shout, and, driven on by
rage and hunger, began to race like starved wolves, seeing which could
first cross swords with the enemy, whom they believed to be about 400
strong. But their hearts fell within them when they found the place a
mere deserted rampart, and all the provisions, but a few crumbs which
lay scattered about, either burnt or carried off. Some leather bags lay
here and there, as if left in a hasty retreat. Enraged at this, they at
once pulled down the Spanish huts, and cutting the leather bags, tore
them up for food. Quarrels then arose for the largest messes, but before
they could well finish this unsavoury banquet, the drum sounded for the
march. About 500 Spaniards seem to have held these entrenchments, and
many of the men threatened to devour the first fugitive they could meet
with. About night they reached another deserted ambuscade, called Torna
Munni, equally bare of food, and the remainder of the bags were now
devoured. Those fortunate enough to obtain a strip first soaked slices
of it in water, next beat it between two stones, then scraped off the
hair with their hunters' knives, and, roasting it in the fire, ate it
leisurely in small pieces. "I can assure the reader," says Oexmelin,
"that a man can live on this fare, but he can hardly get _very fat_."
Frequent draughts of water (which, by good fortune, they had at hand)
seasoned this not very palatable food of men accustomed to revel on
venison and brandy. "Some who were never out of their mothers'
kitchens," says Esquemeling, "may ask how these pirates could eat and
digest those pieces of leather, so hard and dry, whom I answer, that
could they once experience what hunger, or rather famine, is, they would
find the way as the pirates did."

The fifth day at noon they arrived at a place called Barbacoa, where
there were more deserted barricades, and the adjacent plantations were
equally bare of either man, animal, or plant. Searching with all the
zeal and perseverance of hungry men, they found at last, buried in the
floor of a cave lately hewn out of the rock, two sacks of flour, two
jars of wine, and some plantains, and Morgan generously divided these
among the most exhausted of his troops, some being now nearly dead with
famine. The flour they mixed with water, and, wrapping the dough in
banana leaves, baked it in the fire. Somewhat refreshed, they renewed
their march with increased skill and vigour. The lagging men they placed
in the canoes, till they reached at night some deserted plantations
known as the Tabernillas, where they slept.

On the sixth day they marched slowly, after resting a time from real
weakness, some of the strongest being sent into the woods to pluck
berries and pull roots, many even eating leaves and grass. The same day
at noon they arrived at a plantation. Eagerly foraging here, but not
expecting to find anything, they turned a little from the road, and came
upon a barn full of maize in the husk. Beating down the door, they fell
upon it and devoured it as rapaciously as a herd of swine, till they
fell off satiated. A distribution was then made of it to each man, for
hunger does not care for cooking. Loaded with this grain they continued
their march in high spirits for about two hours, when they came suddenly
on about 200 Indians, and soon after passed a deserted ambuscade. Those
who had maize still left threw it away, thinking that the Spaniards and
better food were at hand. These archers were on the opposite side of the
river. The Buccaneers, firing, killed a few, and pursued the others as
far as Santa Cruz. The nimblest escaped by swimming, and two or three
adventurers, who waded after them, were pierced with arrows at the ford.
The Indians, as they fled, hooted--"Ah perros Ingleses, à la savanah, à
la savanah:" "_English dogs, English dogs, come to the savannah._"
Passing the river they were now compelled to begin their march on the
opposite side. There was little sleep that night, but great dejection,
and murmurs arose against Captain Morgan and his conduct. He was blamed
for not having brought provisions, and for not having yet met the
Spaniards; condemned for irreconcilable errors, and reviled for even his
past successes. Some declared they would return home, others would
willingly have done so, yet were afraid to retreat; but a large party
declared they would rather die than go back a step. One of the guides,
perhaps bribed by Morgan, promised that it should not be long before
they met with people from whom they should derive no small advantage,
and this comforted them. A tinge of superstition would have soon
converted this into one of those prophecies by which Cromwell and Cortes
both consoled their desponding troopers.

On the seventh morning, expecting enemies, the men all cleaned their
arms, and every one discharged his musket and pistols without ball to
let the Spaniards hear they were coming, and that their ammunition was
not damaged. Leaving Santa Cruz, where they had rested, they crossed the
river in their canoes, and arrived at the town of Cruz.

At some distance from Cruz they had beheld to their great joy a great
smoke rising above the roofs, which they thought arose from kitchen
chimneys, and quickening their pace they began to laugh, and shout, and
leap,--joking at the Spanish waste of fuel, and saying, "the Spanish
cooks are roasting meat for our dinner when we have mastered their
masters;" but as the smoke grew thicker, they began to think that the
enemy were burning some houses that interfered with the fire of the
entrenchments.

Two hours after, on arriving panting and hot at Cruz, they found the
place deserted and stripped, and no meat, but many fires, for every
Spaniard had burnt his own house, and only the royal store-house and
stables were left standing. A few crackling ruins were all that remained
of the great halfway house between Chagres and Panama, for here the
Chagres merchandise was always landed and transported to Panama on the
backs of mules, being distant only twenty-six Spanish leagues from the
river of Chagres, and eight from Panama. The disappointed Buccaneers
spent the remainder of the day at Cruz in seeking food and resting.
Every cat and dog was soon killed and eaten, for the cattle had been all
driven off. Morgan, growing now more strict in discipline, gave orders
that no party of less than 100 men should leave the town. Five or six
Englishmen who disobeyed the order were killed by the Indians. In the
king's stables fifteen or sixteen jars of Peruvian wine were found, and
a leather sack full of biscuit. Morgan, afraid that his men would fall
into excesses, spread a report that the Spaniards had poisoned the
wine--a report confirmed by the violent sickness of all who drank of it;
although half-starved men, fed for a week on vegetable refuse, would
have been injured by any excess. It was, however, eagerly drunk, and
would have been had there been death in every cup. This sickness
detained them a day at Cruz. The canoes, being now useless, were sent
back, guarded by sixty men, to join the other boats, one alone being hid
in a thicket for fear of any emergency or any necessity arising, and to
transmit intelligence to the vessels. He feared that, if left at Cruz,
they might be captured, and would at least require an extra guard.

On the eighth day at morning Morgan reviewed his troop, and found he had
1100 able and resolute men still at his back. He persuaded them that
their comerade who was carried off by the Indians had returned, having
only lost his way in the woods, fearing they might be discouraged at his
disappearance. He then chose a band of the best marksmen as a forlorn
hope, and a "hundred of these men," says Oexmelin, "are worth six hundred
of any other nation." He divided the remainder into a van and wings,
knowing that he should have to pass many places where not more than two
men could pass abreast.

After ten hours' march they arrived at a place called _Quebrada
Obscura_, a dark wooded gorge where the sunlight rarely entered. Here,
on a sudden, a shower of 300 or 400 arrows poured down upon them,
killing eight or nine men, and wounding ten. These arrows came from an
Indian ambuscade hid on a wooded and rocky mountain, perforated by a
natural arch, through which only one laden beast could pass. The
Buccaneers, though they could see nothing but rocks and trees, instantly
returned the fire, and two Indians rolled down into the path. One of
these, who appeared to be a chief, for he wore a coronet of variegated
feathers, attempted to stab an English adventurer with his javelin, but
a companion, parrying the thrust with his sabre, slew the Indian. This
brave man was, it is supposed, the leader of the ambuscade, for the
savages seeing him fall took at once to flight, and never discharged
another shaft. As they entered a wood the rest of the Indians fled to
seize the next height, from whence they might observe them and harass
their march. The Buccaneers found them too swift to capture, and pursued
them in vain: but two or three of the wounded fugitives were found dead
in the road. A few armed and disciplined men could have made this pass
good against a hundred, but these Indians were now scattered and without
a leader, and they had only fired at random, and in haste, through
trees and thickets that intercepted their arrows. On leaving this defile
the Buccaneers entered a broad prairie, where they rested while the
wounded were tended. At a long distance before them they could see the
Indians on a rocky eminence, commanding the road where they must pass.
Fifty active men were dispatched to take them in the rear in the hopes
of obtaining some prisoners, but all in vain, for the Indians were not
only more agile but knew all the passes. Two hours after they were seen
at about two gunshots' distance, on the same eminence from which they
had been just driven, while the Buccaneers were now on an opposite
height, and between them lay a wood. The Buccaneers supposed that a
Spanish ambuscade was hid here, for whenever they came near enough the
Indians cried out "À la savanah, à la savanah, cornudos perros
Ingleses:" "To the savannah, to the savannah, you cuckold English dogs."
Morgan sent 100 men to search this wood, and upon this the Spaniards and
Indians came down from the mountain as if to attack them, but appeared
no more.

About night, a great rain falling, the Buccaneers marched faster, in
order to prevent their arms getting wet, but they could find no houses
to barrack in, for the Indians had burnt them all and driven away the
cattle, hoping to starve out the men whom they could not drive out. They
left the main road after diligent search, and found a few shepherds'
huts, but too few to shelter all their company; they therefore piled
their arms, and chose a small number from each company to guard them.
Those who slept in the open air endured much hardship, the rain not
ceasing all night. They made temporary sheds, which they covered with
boughs, in order to sleep under a shelter, however imperfect; and
sentinels were placed, Morgan being afraid of the Indians, who chose wet
nights for their onslaughts, when fire-arms were often useless.

Next morning very early, being the ninth of their tedious journey, they
recommenced their march, Morgan bidding them all discharge their guns
and then reload them, for fear of the wet having damped the powder. The
fresh air of the morning, clear after the storm, was still about them,
and the clouds had not yet yielded to the tropical sun as they pushed on
over a path more difficult than before. In about two hours' time a band
of twenty Spaniards began to appear in the distance, and the Indians
were also visible, but Morgan could obtain no prisoners, though he
offered a reward of 300 crowns for every Spaniard brought in. When
pursued the enemy hid themselves in caves and eluded all search.

At last, toiling slowly up a high mountain, the adventurers unexpectedly
beheld from the top the South Sea glittering in the distance. This
caused them as great joy as the sight of "Thalatta" did to the soldiers
of Xenophon. They thought their expedition now completed, for to them
victory was a certainty. They could discern upon the sea, never before
beheld, a large ship and six small boats setting forth from Panama to
the islands of Tavoga and Tavogilla, which were only six leagues
distant. Fortune smiled upon them to-day, for, descending this
mountain, they came into a grassy prairie valley, full of all sorts of
cattle, which were being pursued by mounted Spaniards, who fled at the
sight of the Buccaneers. Upon these animals Morgan's men rushed with the
avidity of half-starved hunters, the eagerness of sailors to obtain
fresh meat, and all the haste that brave men exhibit to get at an enemy.
One shot a horse, another felled a cow, but the greater part slaughtered
the mules, which were the most numerous. Some kindled fires, others
collected wood, and the strongest hunted the cattle, while the invalids
slew, and skinned, and flayed. The whole plain was soon alight with a
hundred fires. The hungry men cut off lumps of flesh, carbonadoed them
in the flame, and ate them half raw with incredible haste and ferocity.
"They resembled," Esquemeling says, "rather cannibals than Christians,
the blood running down their beards to the middle of their bodies." But
no hunger, no fear, no passion threw Morgan off his guard. Hungry and
weary himself, and sympathising with his men's hunger, he saw the
danger of this reckless gluttony, which produced a reaction of inertness
as dangerous as intoxication. Dreading surprise, for he was surrounded
by enemies, he beat a false alarm, and seizing their arms, his men,
ashamed of their excess, renewed their march. The remainder of the meat,
half-roasted or quite raw, they strung to their bandoliers. "The very
look of these men," says Esquemeling, "was enough to have terrified the
boldest, for we know that in love as well as war, the eyes are the
soonest conquered." Morgan, anxious at not having yet obtained a
prisoner as guide, again despatched a vanguard of fifty men, who about
evening saw in the distance 500 Spaniards, who shouted to them they knew
not what.

Soon after, almost at dusk, mounting a small eminence, they saw a better
sight than even the South Sea--the highest steeples of Panama, bright in
the sunset; upon this, like the German soldiers at the sight of the
Rhine, the Buccaneers gave three cheers, to show their extreme joy,
leaping and shouting, and throwing their hats into the air as if they
had already won the victory. At the same time the drums beat stormily
and proudly, and each man shot off his piece, while the red flag was
displayed and waved in defiance of the Spaniard, and high above all the
trumpet sounded.

The camp was pitched for the night by the men, who waited impatiently
for the morning when the battle should join; with equal pride and
courage 200 mounted Spaniards shouted in return as they dashed up within
musket shot, "To-morrow, to-morrow, ye dogs, we shall meet in the
savannah;" and as they ended, their trumpet sounded clearer than even
that of Morgan's. These horsemen were soon joined by several companies
of infantry and several squadrons of cavalry, who wheeled round them
within cannon shot. These troops had been despatched when the sounds of
the Buccaneers' approach reached the gates of the city. There were still
two hours of light, but Morgan determined not to fight till early in the
morning, when he might be able to move freely in the unknown country,
and when there would be a whole clear, bright day for the battle. As
night drew on all the Spaniards retired to the city, excepting seven or
eight troopers, who hovered about to watch the enemy's motions and give
the alarm, if a night attack was contemplated. On his side Morgan placed
double sentinels, and every now and then ordered false alarms to be beat
to keep his men on the alert. Those who had any meat left ate it raw, as
they had often done when hunters. No fires were allowed to be kindled,
and the men lying, ready armed, on the grass, waited eagerly for the
daylight. 120 cavaliers again joined the Spanish scouts, and affected to
maintain a strict blockade, and the city all night played with its
biggest guns upon the camp, but being at so great a distance did little
harm to the Buccaneers.

At daybreak of the tenth day of their march the Spaniards beat the
_Diane_, and Morgan, replying heartily, began with great eagerness to
push forward to the city, the Spaniards wheeling cautiously around his
wings. One of the guides warned Morgan against the high road, which he
knew would be blocked up and crowded with ambuscades, and the army
defiled into a wood to the right, where the passage was so difficult
that none but Buccaneers could have forced a way, "very irksome indeed,"
says Esquemeling. The Spaniards, completely baffled and astonished by
this diversion, left their batteries in a hurry, and, without any
distinct plan of attack, crowded out into the plain. After two hours'
march the Buccaneers reached the top of a small hill. From this eminence
they could now see their goal, and Panama, with all the roofs that hid
its treasure, lay before them. Below, on the plain, they might also
discern the Spanish army drawn up in battalia, awaiting their descent.
Even Esquemeling admits that the forces seemed numerous. "There were two
squadrons of cavalry, four regiments of foot, and a still more terrible
enemy, a huge number of wild bulls, roaring and tossing their horns,
driven by a great number of Indians, and a few negroes and mounted
matadors." The historian, more truthful in his confessions than his
boasts, says, "They were surprised with fear, much doubting the fortune
of the day; yea, few or none there were but wished themselves at home,
or at least free from the obligation of that engagement, it so nearly
concerning their lives. Having been for some time wavering in their
minds, they at last reflected on the strait they had brought themselves
into, and that now they must either fight resolutely or die, for no
quarter could be expected from an enemy on whom they had committed so
many cruelties. Hereupon they encouraged one another, resolving to
conquer or spend the last drop of their blood."

They then divided themselves into three battalions, sending before 200
Buccaneers, very dexterous at their guns, who descended the hill,
marching directly upon the Spaniards, and the battle closed. The Spanish
cavalry uttered cries of joy, as if they were going to a bull-fight. The
infantry shouted "Viva el rey!" and the vari-coloured silks of their
doublets glistened in the sun. The Buccaneers, giving three cheers,
charged upon the enemy. The forlorn hope Morgan despatched against the
cavalry and the bulls. The cavalry galloped forward to meet them, but,
the ground being marshy, they could not advance with speed, and sank one
by one before the unceasing dropping fire of 200 Buccaneers, who fell on
one knee and poured in a full volley of shot, the foot and horse in vain
trying to break through this hot line of flame and death. The bulls
proved as fatal to those who employed them, as the elephants to Porus.
Driven on the rear of the Buccaneers, they took fright at the noise of
the battle, a few only broke through the English companies, and trampled
the red colours under foot, but these were soon shot by the old hunters;
a few fled to the savannah, and the rest tore back and carried havoc
through the Spanish ranks.

The firing lasted for two hours; at the end of that time the cavalry and
infantry had separated, and the troopers had fled, only about fifty of
their number succeeding in escaping. The infantry, discouraged at their
defeat, and despairing of success, fired off one more volley, and then
threw down their arms; the victory was won. Morgan, having no cavalry,
could not pursue, and a mountain soon hid the fugitives from the
Buccaneers' sight, who would not follow, expecting the flight was a mere
decoy to lure them into an ambuscade. The Buccaneers, weary and faint,
threw themselves down to rest. A few Spaniards, found hiding in the
bushes by the sea-shore, were at once slain, and several cordeliers
belonging to the army, being dragged before Morgan, were pistolled in
spite of all their cries and entreaties. A Spanish captain of cavalry
was taken prisoner by the English musketeers, who had hitherto given no
quarter, and confessed that the governor of Panama had led out that
morning 2000 men, 200 bulls, 1450 horse, and twenty-four companies of
foot, 100 men in each, sixty Indians, and some negroes. In the city, he
said, were many trenches and batteries, and at the entrance a fort with
fifty men and eight brass guns. The women and wealth had all been sent
to Tavoga, and 600 men with twenty-eight pieces of cannon were inside
the town, defended by ramparts of flour sacks. The ambuscade had been
waiting fifteen days in the savannah, expecting Morgan.

On reviewing their men, the English found a much greater number of
killed and wounded than they had expected, so Esquemeling confesses, but
does not give the number. Oexmelin puts the loss at only two killed and
two wounded, an incredible statement, trustworthy as he generally is.
The Spaniards lost 600 men.

"The pirates, nothing discouraged," says the former historian, "seeing
their number so diminished, but rather filled with greater pride,
perceiving what huge advantage they had obtained against their enemies,
having rested some time, prepared to march courageously towards the
city, plighting their oaths one to another, that they would fight till
not a man was left alive. With this courage they recommenced their
march, either to conquer or be conquered, carrying with them all the
prisoners."

They avoided the high road from Vera Cruz, on which the Spaniards had
placed a battery of eight pieces of cannon, and selecting that from
Porto Bello, they advanced to the town before the people could rally,
and while the exaggerated rumours of the defeat were still
uncontradicted. Trembling fugitives filled the streets, and terror was
in every face.

The Spaniards fought desperately, but without hope. In spite of Morgan's
endeavour to maintain strict discipline, his men began to undervalue the
enemy, and to advance straggling and reckless. The Spaniards, observing
this, fired a broadside, killing twenty-five or thirty of the vanguard
at the first discharge, and wounding nearly as many, but before they
could reload were overpowered and slain at their guns, the Buccaneers
stabbing all whom they met.

Of this attack, Esquemeling gives the following graphic but rambling
account: "They found much difficulty in their approach to the city, for
within the town the Spaniards had placed many great guns at several
quarters, some charged with small pieces of iron, and others with musket
bullets. With all these they saluted the pirates at their approaching,
and gave them full and frequent broadsides, firing at them incessantly,
so that unavoidably they shot at every step great numbers of men. But
neither these manifest dangers of their lives, nor the sight of so many
as dropped continually at their sides, could deter them from advancing,
and gaining ground every moment on the enemy; and though the Spaniards
never ceased to fire and act the best they could for their defence, yet
they were forced to yield after three hours' combat, and the pirates
having possessed themselves, killed and destroyed all that attempted in
the least to oppose them."

Morgan was now master of Panama, as he had been of St. Catherine's, la
Rancheria, Maracaibo, and Gibraltar, but his vigilance did not yet
relax. As soon as the first fury of their entrance was over, he
assembled his men, and commanded them, under great penalties, not to
drink or taste any wine, as he had been informed by a prisoner that it
had been poisoned by the Spaniards. Though much wealth had been hidden,
great warehouses of merchandise, they rejoiced to find, were still well
stocked with silks, cloths, and linens. Morgan's only fear now was, that
with so small a body of men as remained to him, the Spaniards might
rally, or his men, grown intoxicated by success and intent on plunder,
be cut off without resistance. Having placed guards at all the important
points of defence within and without the city, he ordered twenty-five
men to seize a boat laden with merchandise, that owing to the low water
in the harbour could not put out to sea. The command of this vessel he
gave to an English captain.

The houses of Panama were built chiefly of cedar, and a few of stone.

Fortunately, Michael Scott sketches for us nearly the whole scenery of
Morgan's march. One side of the harbour of Chagres is formed, he says,
by a small promontory that runs 500 yards into the sea. This bright
little bay looks upon an opposite shore, long and muddy, and covered
with mangroves to the water's brink. On the uttermost bluff is a narrow
hill, with a fort erected on its apex. The rock is precipitous on three
sides. The river of Chagres is about 100 yards across, and very deep. It
rolls sluggishly along, through a low, swampy country. It is covered
down to the water with thick sedges and underwood, and where the water
is stagnating, generates mosquitoes and fevers. The gigantic trees grow
close to the water, and are laced together by black, snake-like withes.
Here and there, black, slimy banks of mud slope out near the shore, and
on these, monstrous alligators roll or sleep, like logs of rotting
drift-wood. For some miles below Cruz, where the river ceases to be
navigable by canoes, oars are laid aside, and long poles used to propel
the boats, like punts, over the shoals. Panama is distant about seven
leagues from Cruz. The roads are only passable for mules: in some places
it has been hewn out of the rock, and zig-zags along the face of hills,
in parts scarcely passable for two persons meeting.

"The scenery on each side is very beautiful, as the road winds for the
most part amongst steeps, overshadowed by magnificent trees, among
which birds of all sizes, and of the most gorgeous plumage, are
perpetually glancing, while a monkey every here and there sits grimacing
and chattering overhead. The small, open savannahs gradually grow
larger, and the clear spaces widen, until the forest you have been
travelling under breaks into beautiful clumps of trees, like those of a
gentleman's park, and every here and there are placed clear pieces of
water, spreading out full of pond-turtle, and short grass, that sparkles
in the dew."

As you approach the town, the open spaces become more frequent, until at
length you gain a rising ground, about three miles from Panama, where
the view is enchanting. Below lies the city, and the broad Pacific,
dotted with ships, lies broad and glassy beyond.

Basil Hall, an accurate but less poetical observer, sketches the bay of
Panama, its beach fringed with plantations shaded by groves of oranges,
figs, and limes, the tamarinds surmounting all but the feathery tops of
the cocoa-nut trees; the ground hidden with foliage, among which peep
cane-built huts and canoes pulling to shore. Tavoga he describes as a
tangle of trees and flowers. "The houses of the city, very curious and
magnificent," says Esquemeling, "and richly adorned with paintings and
hangings, of which a part only had been removed." The buildings were all
stately, and the streets broad and well arranged. There were within the
walls eight monasteries, a cathedral, and an hospital, attended by the
religious. The churches and monasteries were richly adorned with
paintings, and in the subsequent fire may have perished some of the
masterpieces of Titian, Murillo, or Velasquez. The gold plate and
fittings of these buildings the priests had concealed. The number of
rich houses was computed at 2000, and the smaller shops, &c., at 5000
additional. The grandest buildings in the town were the Genoese
warehouses connected with the slave trade; there were also long rows of
stables, where the horses and mules were kept that were used to convey
the royal plate from the South to the North Pacific Ocean. Before the
city, like offerings spread before a throne, lay rich plantations and
pleasant gardens.

Panama was the city to which all the treasures of Peru were annually
brought. The plate fleet, laden with bars of gold and silver, arrived
here at certain periods brimming with the crown wealth, as well as that
of private merchants. It returned laden with the merchandise of Panama
and the Spanish main, to be sold in Peru and Chili, and still oftener
with droves of negro slaves that the Genoese imported from the coast of
Guinea to toil and die in the Peruvian mines. So wealthy was this golden
city that more than 2,000 mules were employed in the transport of the
gold and silver from thence to Porto Bello, where the galleons were
loaded. The merchants of Panama were proverbially the richest in the
whole Spanish West Indies. The Governor of Panama was the suzerain of
Porto Bello, of Nata, Cruz, Veragua, &c., and the Bishop of Panama was
primate of the Terra Firma, and suffragan to the Archbishop of Peru. The
district of Panama was the most fertile and healthy of all the Spanish
colonies, rich in mines, and so well wooded that its ship-timber
peopled with vessels both the northern and the southern seas; its land
yielded full crops, and its broad savannahs pastured innumerable herds
of wild cattle.

The Buccaneers found the booty in the half-devastated town ample beyond
their expectations, in spite of all that had been destroyed, buried, or
removed. The stores were still full of wealth, which not even a month of
alarm had given the merchants time to remove to their overcharged
vessels. Some rooms were choked with corn, and others piled high with
iron, tools, plough-shares, &c., for Peru. In many was found "metal more
attractive," in the shape of wine, olive oil, and spices, while silks,
cloths, and linen lay around in costly heaps.

Morgan, still afraid of surprise, resorted to a reckless scheme to avert
the danger. The very night he entered Panama he set fire to a few of the
chief buildings, and before morning the greater part of the city was in
a flame, although the first blaze had been detected in the suburbs. No
one knew his motive, and few that the enemy had not done it. He
carefully spread a report, both among the prisoners and his own people,
that the Spaniards themselves were the authors of the fire. The citizens
and even the English strove to extinguish the flames, by blowing up some
houses with gunpowder and pulling down others, but being of wood, the
fire spread rapidly from roof to roof. In less than half an hour a whole
street was consumed. The Genoese warehouses and many of the slaves were
burnt, and only one church was left standing; 200 store buildings were
destroyed. Oexmelin seems to lament chiefly the slaves and merchandise,
and scarcely even affects a regret for the stately city. The ruins
continued to smoke and smoulder for a month, and at daybreak of the
morning after their arrival, little of the great city they had lately
seen glorious in the sunset remained but the president's house, where
Morgan and his staff lodged, a small clump of muleteers' cottages, and
two convents, that of St. Joseph and that of the Brothers of the
Redemption. Still fearful of surprise, the adventurers encamped outside
the walls in the fields, from a wish to avoid the confusion, and in
order to keep together in case of an attack by a superior force. The
wounded were put into the only church that had escaped the fire.

The next day Morgan despatched 160 men to Chagres to announce his
victory, and to see that his garrison wanted for nothing. They met whole
troops of Spaniards running to and fro in the savannah, but, in spite of
their expectations, they never rallied. In the afternoon the Buccaneers
re-entered the city, and selected houses of the few left to barrack in.
They then dragged all the available cannon they could find and placed
them round the church of the Fathers of the Trinity, which they
entrenched. In this they placed in separate places the wounded and the
prisoners. The evening they spent in searching the ruins for gold,
melted or hidden, and found much spoil, especially in wells and
cisterns.

A few hours after, Morgan's vessels returned with three prizes, laden
with plate and other booty, taken in the South Sea. The day they
sailed, arriving at one of the small islands of refuge near Panama, they
took a sloop with its crew of seven men, belonging to a royal Spanish
vessel of 400 tons, laden with church plate and jewels, removed by the
richest merchants in Panama; there were also on board all the religious
women of the nunnery, with the valuable ornaments of their church, and
she was so deeply laden as not to require ballast. It carried only seven
guns and a dozen muskets, had no more sails than the "uppermost of the
mizen," was short of ammunition and food, and even of water. The
Buccaneers received this intelligence from some Indians who had spoken
to the seamen of the galleon when they came ashore in a cock-boat for
water. Had they given chase they might have easily captured it, but
Captain Clark let the golden opportunity slip through his hands.
Thinking himself sure of his prize as he had got her sloop, his men
spent the night in drinking the rich wines they found in the sloop, and
reposing in the arms of their Spanish mistresses, the more beautiful for
their tears and despair. During these debaucheries the galleon slipped
by and was no more seen, and so they lost a prize of greater value than
all the treasure found in Panama. In the morning, weary of the revel,
they crowded all sail and despatched a well-armed boat to pursue the
cripple, ascertaining that the Spanish ship was in bad sailing order and
incapable of making any resistance. In the islands of Tavoga and
Tavogilla they captured several boats laden with merchandise. Informed
by a prisoner of the probable moorings of the galleon, Morgan, enraged
at her escape, sent every boat in Panama in pursuit of her, bidding them
seek till they found her. They were eight days cruising from port to
creek. Returning to the isles, they found here a large ship newly come
from Payta, laden with cloth, soap, sugar, biscuit, and 20,000 pieces of
eight; another small boat near was also taken and laden with the divided
merchandise. With these glimpses of wealth the boats returned to Panama
somewhat consoled for the loss of their larger prize. The Buccaneers'
vessels now began to excite the astonishment of the Spaniards, they
being the first Englishmen, since Drake, who had appeared as enemies on
those seas.

During this expedition Morgan had employed the rest of his men in
scouring the country in daily companies of 200, one party relieving
another, and perpetually bringing in flocks of pale and bleeding
prisoners, or mules laden with treasure. Some tortured the captives,
others explored the mines, and the rest burnt glittering heaps of gold
and silver stuffs, merely to obtain the metal, expecting to have to
fight their way back to their ships at Chagres, and not wishing to be
encumbered with unwieldy bundles on that toilsome and dangerous march.
Morgan, complaining much of the fruitless labours of his foragers, at
last placed himself at the head of 350 men, and sallied into the country
to torture every wealthy Spaniard he could meet.

The following anecdote presents us with such a complete picture of the
demoralisation of a panic, that it reminds us of Thucydides' description
of Athens during the plague, or Boccaccio's of Florence during the
raging of the pest. On one occasion Morgan's men met with a poor
Spaniard, who, during the general confusion, had strolled into a rich
man's house and dressed himself in the costume of a merchant of rank. He
had just stripped off his rags, and, first luxuriating in a change of
costly Dutch linen, had slipped on a pair of breeches of fine red
taffety, and picking up the silver key of some coffer, had tied it to
one of his points. Esquemeling represents the man as a poor retainer of
the house. He was still wondering childishly at his unwonted finery,
when the Buccaneers broke into the house and seized him as a prize.
Finding him richly dressed and in a fine house, they believed him at
once to be the master. His story they treated as a subtle invention. In
vain he pointed to the black rags he had thrown off--in vain he
protested, by all the saints, that he lived on charity, and had wandered
in there and put on the clothes by the merest chance, and without a
motive but of venial theft. Spying the little key at his girdle they
became sure that he lied, and they demanded where he had hid his
cabinet. They had at first laughed at his ingenious story--they now grew
angry at his denials of wealth. They stretched him on the rack and
disjointed his arms, they twisted a cord round his wrinkled forehead
"till his eyes appeared as big as eggs, and were ready to fall out," and
as he still refused to answer, they hung him up and loaded him with
stripes. They then cut off his nose and ears, singing his face with
burning straw till he could not even groan or scream, and at last,
despairing of obtaining a confession, gave him over to their attendant
band of negroes to put him to death with their lances. "The common sport
and recreation of the pirates," says Esquemeling, "being such
cruelties."

They spared no sex, age, or condition; priest or nun, peasant or noble,
old man, maiden, and child were all stretched on the same bed of
torture. They granted no quarter to any who could not pay a ransom, or
who would not pay it speedily. The most beautiful of the prisoners
became their mistresses, and the virtuous were treated with rigour and
cruelty. Captain Morgan himself seduced the fairest by alternate
presents and threats. There were women found base enough to forsake
their religion and their homes to become the harlots of a pirate and a
murderer. But to his iron heart love found a way, and enervated the mind
of the man whom nothing before could soften.

After ten days spent in the country beyond the walls, Morgan returned to
Panama, and found a shipload of Spanish prisoners newly arrived. Amongst
these was a woman of exquisite beauty, the wife of a Spanish merchant,
then absent on business in Peru. He had left her in the care of some
relations, with whom she was captured. Esquemeling says: "Her years were
few, and her beauty so great, as, peradventure, I may doubt whether in
all Christendom any could be found to surpass her perfections, either of
comeliness or honesty." Oexmelin, a more skilful observer, and who saw
her, being a sharer in the expedition, describes her hair as ink black,
and her complexion of dazzling purity. Her eyes were piercing, and the
Spanish pride, usually so cold and repulsive, served in her only as a
foil to her surpassing beauty, and to attract respect. The roughest
sailors and rudest hunters grew eloquent when they praised her. The
common men would willingly have drawn swords for such a prize. But their
commander was already the slave of her whom he had captured. His
demeanour changed: he was no longer brutal and truculent: he became
sociable in manner, and more attentive to the richness of his dress, for
lovers grow either more careless or more regardful of their attire.

The Buccaneer's aspect was changed. He separated the lady from the other
prisoners, and treated her with marked respect. An old negress, who
waited on her, served at once as an attendant and a spy. She was told to
assure her mistress, that the Buccaneers were gentlemen and no thieves,
and men who knew what politeness and gallantry were as well as any. The
lady wept and entreated to be placed with the other prisoners, for she
had heard that her relations were afraid of some plot against her good
fame.

The lady, like other Spanish women, had been told by their priests and
husbands, that the Buccaneers had the shape of beasts and not of men.
The more intelligent reported they were robbers, murderers, and
heretics; men who forswore the Holy Trinity, and did not believe in
Jesus Christ. "The _oaths_ of _Morgan_," says Esquemeling, with most
commendable gravity, "_soon convinced her that he had heard of a God_."
It was said, that a woman of Panama who had long desired to see a
pirate, on their first entrance into the city cried out, "Jesu Maria,
the thieves are men, like the Spaniards, after all;" and some
volunteers, when they went out to meet Morgan's army, had promised to
bring home a pirate's head as a curiosity.

Morgan, refusing to restore the beauty to her friends, treated her with
more flattering care than before. Tapestries, robes, jewels, and
perfumes, lay at her disposal. Such kindness, after all, was cheap
generosity, and part of this treasure may even have been her husband's.
In her innocence, she began to think better of the Buccaneers. They
might be thieves, but they were not, she found, atheists, nor very
cruel, for Captain Morgan sent her dishes from his own table. She at
first received his visits with gratitude and pleasure, surprised at the
rough, frank kindness of the seaman, and loudly denounced his
slanderers, that had so cruelly attempted to poison her mind against
him, her guardian and protector. The snares were well set, and the bird
was fluttering in. But Heaven preserved her, and she passed through the
furnace unhurt. Morgan soon threw off his disguise, and offered her all
the treasures of the Indies if she would become his mistress. She
refused his presents of gold and pearl, and resisted all his artifices.
In vain he tried alternately kindness and severity. He threatened her
with a thousand cruelties, and she replied, that her life was in his
hands, but that her body should remain pure, though her soul was torn
from it. On his advancing nearer, and threatening violence, she drew out
a poignard, and would have slain him or herself, had he not left her
uninjured. Enraged at her pride, as he miscalled her virtue, he
determined to break her spirit by suffering. She was stripped of her
richest apparel, and thrown into a dark cellar, with scarcely enough
food allowed her to support life, and the chief demanded 30,000 piastres
as her ransom, to prevent her being sold as a slave in Jamaica. Under
this hardship the lady prayed like a second Una daily to God, for
constancy and patience. Morgan, now convinced of her purity, and afraid
of his men, who already began to express openly their sympathy with her
sufferings, to account for his cruelty, accused her to his council of
having abused his kindness by corresponding with the Spaniards, and
declared that he had intercepted a letter written in her own hand. "I
myself," says Esquemeling, "was an eye-witness of the lady's sufferings,
and could never have judged such constancy and chastity to be found in
the world, if my own eyes and ears had not assured me thereof." Amid the
blood, and dust, and vapour of smoke, the virtue of this incomparable
lady shines out like a pale evening star, visible above all the murky
crimson of an autumn sunset.

A new danger now arose to Morgan from this adventure, for the seamen
began to murmur, saying that the love of this beautiful Spaniard kept
them lingering at Panama, and gave the Spaniards time to collect their
forces, and surprise them on their return. But Morgan, having now stayed
three weeks, and nothing more being left to plunder, gave orders to
collect enough mules to carry the spoil to Cruz, where it could be
shipped for Chagres, and so sent homeward.

There can be no doubt that various causes had for some time been
undermining the long subsisting attachment between Morgan and his men.
He had shown himself a slave to the passions which enchained their own
minds, and their riches perhaps made them independent, and therefore
mutinous. It was while the mules were collecting that he became aware of
the loaded mine over which he stood. A plot was discovered, in which
there were 100 conspirators. They had resolved to seize the two vessels
they had captured in the South Sea, and with these to take possession of
an island, which they could fortify for a stronghold. They would then
fit out the first large Spanish vessel they could obtain, and with a
good pilot and a bold captain start privateering on their own account,
and work home by the straits of Magellan. As the spoil had not yet been
divided, it is probable that all these men had broken the Buccaneer
oath, and had secreted part of the plunder. They had already hidden in
private places, cannons, muskets, provisions, and ammunition. They were
on the very point of raising the anchor, when one of them betrayed the
scheme, and Morgan at once ordered the vessel to be dismasted and the
rigging burnt. The vessels he would also have destroyed, but these he
spared at the intercession of the friend he had appointed their captain.
From this time all confidence seems to have ceased between Morgan and
his men. Many a king has been made a tyrant by the detection of a
conspiracy. The men dreaded his vengeance, and he their treachery. From
this hour he appears to have resolved to enrich himself and his
immediate friends at any risk, leaving the French to shift for
themselves. It is not improbable but that the old French and English
feud may have had something to do with this quarrel. In war it ceased,
but rankled out again in peace. The French seem to have been his
greatest enemies, and the English friendly or indifferent. This
distinction is visible even in the historians, for Esquemeling speaks of
him with mere distrust, and Oexmelin with bitter hatred.

In a few days the mules were ready, and the gold packed in convenient
bales, for Spanish or English gold it was all one to the mules. The
costly church plate was beaten up into heavy shapeless lumps, and the
heavier spoil was left behind or destroyed. Better burn it, they
thought, than leave it to the accursed Spaniard, for we always hate
those whom we have injured. The artillery of the town being carefully
spiked, and all ready to depart, Morgan informed his prisoners that he
was about to march, and that he should take with him all those who were
either unable or unwilling at once to bring in their ransom. The sight
was heart-rending, and the panic general. At his words, says the
historian, there was not one but trembled, not one but hurried to write
to his father, his brother, or his friends, praying for instant
deliverance or it would be too late. The slaves were also priced, and
hostages were sent to collect the money. While this was taking place, a
party of 150 men were sent to Chagres to bring up the boats and to look
out for ambuscades, it being reported that Don Juan Perez de Guzman, the
fugitive president of Panama, had entrenched himself strongly at Cruz,
and intended to dispute the passage. Some prisoners confessed that the
president had indeed so intended, but could get no soldiers willing to
fight, though he had sent for men as far as Carthagena; for the
scattered troopers fled at the sight of even their own friends in the
distance.

Having waited four days impatiently for the ransom, Morgan at last set
out on his return on the 24th of February, 1671. He took with him a
large amount of baggage, 175 beasts of burden laden with gold, silver,
and jewels, and about 600 prisoners, men, women, children, and slaves,
having first spiked all the cannon and burnt the gun-carriages. He
marched in good order for fear of attack, with a van and rear-guard, and
the prisoners guarded between the two divisions.

The departure was an affecting sight, as even the two historians, who
were Buccaneers themselves and eye-witnesses, admit. Lamentations,
cries, shrieks, and doleful sighs of women and children filled the air.
The men wept silently, or muttered threats between their teeth, to avoid
the blows of their unpitying drivers. Thirst and hunger added to their
sufferings. Many of the women threw themselves on their knees at
Morgan's feet and begged that he would permit them to return to Panama,
there to live with their dear husbands and children in huts till the
city could be rebuilt. But his fierce answer was, that he did not come
there to hear lamentations, but to seek money, and that if that was not
found, wherever it was hid, they should assuredly follow him to Jamaica.
All the selfishness and all the goodness of each nature now came to the
surface. The selfish fell into torpid and isolated despair--the good
forgot their own sufferings in trying to relieve those of others.

Some gazed at each other silently and hopelessly; others wailed and
wept, a few cursed and raged. Here stood one mourning for a
brother--there another lamenting a wife. Many believed that they should
never see each other again; but would be sold as slaves in Jamaica. The
first evening the army encamped in the middle of a green savannah on the
banks of a cool and pleasant river. This was a great relief to the
wretched prisoners, who had been dragged all day through the heat of a
South American noon by men themselves insensible to climate--urged
forward by the barrels of muskets and blows from the butts of pikes.
Some of the women were here seen begging the Buccaneers, with tears in
their eyes, for a drop of water, that they might moisten a little flour
for their children, who hung crying at their parched and dried-up
breasts. The next day, when they resumed the march, the shrieks and
lamentations were more terrible than before. "They would have caused
compassion in the hardest heart," says Esquemeling; "but Captain Morgan,
as a man little given to mercy, was not moved in the least." The lagging
Spaniards were driven on faster with blows, till some of the women
swooned with the intense heat, and were left as dead by the road-side.
Those who had husbands gave them the children to carry. The young and
the beautiful fared best. The fair Spaniard was led between two
Buccaneers, still apart from the rest. She wept as she walked along,
crying that she had entrusted two priests in whom she relied to procure
her ransom money, 30,000 piastres, from a certain hidden place, and that
they had employed it in ransoming their friends. A slave had brought a
letter to the lady and disclosed the treachery. Her complaint being told
to Morgan he inquired into it, and found it to be true. The religious
men confessed their crime, but declared they had only borrowed the
money, intending to repay it in a week or so. He therefore at once
released the lady, and detained the monks in her place, taking them on
to Chagres and despatching two men to obtain their ransom.

On arriving at Cruz the mules were unloaded, preparatory to embarkation.
The Buccaneers encamped round the king's warehouse, where it was stored.
Three days were given to collect the ransom. The Spaniards, tardy or
unwilling in the collection, brought in the money the day after. Vast
quantities of corn, rice, and maize were collected here for victualling
the ships. Morgan embarked 150 slaves, and a few poor and obstinate
Spaniards who had not yet paid their ransom. The monks were redeemed,
and escaped happy enough. A part of the Buccaneers marched by land. Many
tears of joy and sorrow were shed when the prisoners and those who were
liberated took farewell.

On reaching Barbacoa the division of the spoil began. Mustering his men,
Morgan compelled them all to swear they had concealed nothing, even of
the smallest value, and, what was more unusual, he ordered them all to
be individually searched from top to toe, down even to the very soles of
their shoes. This search was suspicious and insulting. The Frenchmen,
hot-blooded and mutinous, would have openly resisted had they not been
in the minority. Morgan allowed himself to be first searched to lessen
the general discontent, and one man in every company was employed as
searcher. No precautions were neglected that could be suggested by long
experience of plundering.

This unusual vigilance was a mere cloak for Morgan's own dishonesty.
Every man was now compelled to discharge his musket before the
searchers, that they might be sure no precious stones were hidden in the
barrel. These searchers were generally the lieutenants of each crew, and
had all taken an additional oath to perform their duty with fidelity.
The murmurs against Morgan had now reached such a height, and were so
hourly increasing, that many Frenchmen threatened to take his life
before they reached Jamaica. The more temperate controlled the younger
and the more impetuous, and the band reached Chagres without any revolt.
They found the garrison short of provisions and glad to be relieved, but
the wounded had nearly all died of their wounds.

From Chagres Morgan sent a great boat to Porto Bello with all the St.
Catherine's prisoners, and demanded a ransom for sparing the castle of
Chagres. The people of Porto Bello replied they would not give one
farthing, and he might burn it as he chose.

The day after their arrival, Morgan divided the booty. It amounted to
only 443,000 pounds, estimating at ten piastres the pound. The jewels
were sold unfairly, the admiral and his cabal buying the greater part
very cheap, having already, it was believed, retained all the best of
the spoil. Every one had expected at least 1000 pieces each, and was
disappointed and indignant at receiving only about 200. There was an end
now to all co-operation between English and French adventurers, and the
hopes of a Buccaneer republic were at an end for ever. The murmurs
again rose incontrollably high, and some proposed to seize Morgan and
force him to a fair division.

The suspected admiral, trying in vain to pacify them, and finding he
could obtain no price for Chagres, divided the provisions of the fort
among the vessels, removed the cannon and ammunition, then demolished
the fortifications, and burnt the buildings. Suddenly taking alarm, or
more probably following a preconcerted plan, Morgan sailed out of the
harbour without any signal or notice, and hurried to Jamaica, followed
by four English vessels, whose captains had been his confidants.

In the first paroxysm of their rage, the French adventurers would have
pursued Morgan, and attacked his vessel, but he escaped while they were
still hesitating. We shall find him finally settled in Jamaica, and
married to the daughter of the chief person of the island, a sure proof,
says the indignant and philosophical Oexmelin, that any one is esteemed
in this world provided he has money.

The same vivacious writer gives a lively picture of the rage of the
crews at the treacherous flight of Morgan. They shouted, swore, stamped,
clenched their fists, gnashed their teeth, and tore their hair, fired
off their pistols in the air, and brandished their arms, with
imprecations loud and deep. They longed for the plunder they had lost,
and longed still more eagerly for revenge. They never now mentioned the
Welsh name but with an execration. Strange anomaly of the human mind,
that men who lived by robbery, should be astonished at a small theft
committed by a comrade! In the first bitterness of their vexation, they
drew their sabres, and hewed and thrust at their imaginary enemy. They
bared their arms, and pointed out to each other the cicatrices of their
half-healed wounds.

Confirmations of the admiral's treachery reached them from every side.

They remembered that Morgan had been latterly unusually reserved and
unsociable, closeting himself with a few English confidants, to whom he
had been seen whispering even during public conferences. He had, it was
now recollected, grown silent during all discussions, and more
particularly when the booty was mentioned.

Oexmelin (a surgeon) also mentions, that on one occasion, as he was
visiting a wounded Buccaneer, Morgan came up to the hammock, and said in
English, thinking he could not be overheard, "Courage, get soon well,
you have helped me to conquer, and you must help me to profit by the
conquest." Another day, as Oexmelin was searching by the river for a
medical herb, he turned round suddenly, and saw Morgan secreting
something in the corner of a canoe, and looking frequently over his
shoulder to see if he was observed. When he observed Oexmelin, he looked
troubled, and, coming up, asked him what he was doing there, to which
the surgeon made no answer, but, stooping down, picked the plant he was
in search of, and began to tell him its properties. Morgan turned off
the subject, beginning to converse on indifferent topics, and, although
the proudest of men, insisted on accompanying him home. Oexmelin took
care to find an opportunity afterwards to rummage the canoe, but found
nothing; but this same canoe he always observed Morgan took great care
of, and never permitted to row out of his sight. But these stories none
had dared to utter, for since the victory of Panama, the admiral, always
proud, sensual, and cruel, had grown every day more stern, and had
rendered himself dreaded by his severities.

The adventurers sought for a long time some means of avenging themselves
on Morgan for his successful treachery. They at last heard that he had
resolved to take possession of St. Catherine's island, being
apprehensive of the governor of Jamaica. In this spot he had determined
to fortify himself, renew his Buccaneering, and defy both open enemies
and treacherous friends. The Buccaneers agreed to waylay him on his
passage, and carry him off, with his wife, children, and ill-gotten
treasure. They then planned either to kill him, or compel him to render
an account of the spoil of Panama. But an unexpected accident saved
Morgan, and defeated their scheme of vengeance. At the very crisis, a
new governor, Lord G. Vaughan, arrived at Port Royal, and brought a
royal order for Morgan to be sent to England to answer the complaints of
the King of Spain and his subjects. Of his trial we hear nothing, but we
soon after see the culprit knighted by Charles II., and appointed
Commissioner of Admiralty for Jamaica. The king, who frolicked with
Rochester, and smiled at the daring villany of Blood, had no scruples in
disgracing knighthood by such an addition.

In the autumn of 1680, the Earl of Carlisle, then governor of Jamaica,
finding his constitution undermined by the climate, returned to England,
leaving Morgan as his deputy.

His opportunity of revenge had now come, and he remembered his old
dangers of ruin and assassination. Many of the Buccaneers were hung by
his authority, and some of them were delivered up to the governor of
Carthagena. A new governor arrived, and terminated his cruelties, and
the justice inspired by a personal hatred. He still remained
commissioner. In the next reign he was thrown into prison, where he
remained three years. Of his final fate we know nothing certain.




CHAPTER III.

THE COMPANIONS AND SUCCESSORS OF MORGAN.

    Dispersion of the fleet--Oexmelin's interview with the old
    Buccaneer--Adventure with Indians--Esquemeling's Escapes--1673.
    D'Ogeron's Escape from the Spaniards--1676. Buccaneers' Fight at
    Tobago against the Dutch--1678. Captain Cook captures a Spanish
    vessel--1679. Captains Coxen and Sharp begin their cruise.


On the departure of Morgan, the Buccaneers, without food, and without
leaders, underwent many sufferings, and remained uncertain what to do.

Oexmelin and a few of his French friends being informed by a female slave
that an old Buccaneer lived in the neighbourhood, determined to go to
him and barter goods, as they were told that, although a Spaniard, such
was his custom. Following the slave with great expectation, they reached
the veteran's fort after about six hours' march. The Buccaneers' "peel"
towers were scattered all over the West Indies, and Waterton mentions
seeing the ruins of one near Demerara. This fort was defended by a fosse
of immense depth, and by massy walls of an extraordinary thickness,
flanked at each corner by a bastion well supplied with cannon. The
Frenchmen displayed their colours and beat their drums as a greeting,
yet no one appeared, and no one answered; but, at the end of a quarter
of an hour, they saw a light in one of the bastions, and perceived a man
about to discharge a cannon. Throwing themselves on their faces with
professional dexterity, the shot flew over their heads, and they then
rose and retreated out of range. Believing at once that they had been
betrayed, for many dangers had made them suspicious, they were about to
cut their guide to pieces, when, running from them, she cried to the
gunner, "Why is your master false to his word? did he not promise to
receive these gentlemen?" "It is true," cried the soldier, "but he has
changed his mind; and if you and your people do not go off, I will blow
out your brains." The Buccaneers, enraged at the insolence of this
threat, and the capricious change of intention, were about to attempt to
storm the place, when four Spaniards advanced and demanded a truce, in
the name of their master. "We had," they explained, "been alarmed at
your numbers, and feared foul play or treachery." The old adventurer was
now willing to receive them, if they would send four of their band as
ambassadors and hostages. Oexmelin was one of the four chosen. They found
the old man, grey and venerable, seated between two others. He was so
old and feeble that he could not speak audibly, but he smiled and moved
his lips, and stroked his long white beard, as they entered, and they
could observe that he was pleased to see once more the well-remembered
dress of the Buccaneer seamen. His majestic bearing was impressive.
Though he could not rise to welcome them, he bent his head in answer to
their greetings, and beckoned to one of his attendants to speak for him.
By his orders they were at once taken to his store-rooms, where they
bartered their goods, and obtained all that they required. They first
eagerly selected some brandy, and Oexmelin is never tired of repeating
"ses gens l'aiment avec passion." On their way back to the ships with
the guide, delighted at their success, the Spaniards who carried the
goods they had bought told them their master's history. He was, it
appeared, properly speaking, neither an adventurer nor a Castilian, but
a Portuguese, who had lived long both with adventurers and with
Spaniards. A Spanish ship had picked him up in a drifted canoe when
quite a boy, and he had been employed among the slaves in a cocoa
plantation, where he soon became a successful steward, and much beloved
by his master. His patron sent every year a vessel to his plantation to
be loaded with cocoa. One day, as the steward was on board
superintending the lading, a sudden squall came on, snapped the cable,
and drove them out to sea. He being a good pilot, and accustomed to
navigation, attempted to put back to land as soon as the storm abated,
but the slaves, with one voice, declared that they would not return, and
that he should not take them, for they knew that their master would
suspect, and would cruelly punish them. At that time the slightest
offence of a slave was punished with death. The steward remonstrated
with them; but the slaves resolved to be free, although they knew not
where to steer. At this crisis the bark was pursued by a Buccaneer
vessel, from which a storm for a short time released them, but they were
eventually overtaken and captured.

The Buccaneer captain brought these prisoners to the fortress they had
just visited. Here he became again a faithful steward, and finally
inherited the place at his master's death, and continued to trade with
the Buccaneers, as his predecessor had done. The fortress had been
originally built to repel the Spaniards, who had been several times
beaten off with loss.

It is very seldom that we can follow the Buccaneer to the last scene of
all: he flashes across our scene from darkness to darkness, and we hear
of him no more. In the present instance, Oexmelin enables us to fill up
the vacuum and tell out the tale. In a subsequent voyage he returned to
the old spot, the scene of an oft told story. Devastation had fallen
upon the devastator, the fortress was completely demolished and no
dwelling remained. He ascertained from the Spaniards that the old man
had died and left his riches to his two sons, who, impatient of a
slothful wealth, and with imaginations excited from their youth by the
recital of Buccaneer adventures, had at last turned Flibustiers. Before
their father's death they had often expressed a wish to conquer the
country of the ferocious Bravo Indians, but he had always discouraged
them from the dangerous and unprofitable expedition, being afraid of
attacks from the Spaniards in their absence. They were never heard of
again, but report was current that, having been shipwrecked, the two
Buccaneers had been taken by the Indians, and killed and eaten.

Leaving the Boca del Toro, about thirty leagues distant from Chagres,
Oexmelin and his companions arrived at the country of the very dreaded
Bravo Indians. These people were known to be warlike cannibals, cruel
and very treacherous. They were expert archers, and could discharge
their arrows, like the Parthians, even when in full retreat. They had
axes and spears, and wore metal ornaments, the clash of which animated
them to the charge. They carried tortoise-shells for shields, which
covered their whole bodies, and were most to be dreaded when few in
number and quite overpowered, for they would then throw themselves like
wild-cats on the foe, and think only of destroying their enemy's life,
regardless of their own. Morgan, who seems to have made every
preparation for an extensive Buccaneer empire, had often sworn to
totally destroy this nation which had slain so many shipwrecked men, and
so frequently frustrated his plans. No Buccaneer historian ever seems
to have reflected that these savages, rude as they were, fought as
patriots defending their country. We sing of Tell and rave of Wallace,
but we have no interest in a hero without breeches!

These Indians had at first been friendly to the Buccaneers, who had sold
them iron in exchange for food, but on one fatal occasion, at a
Buccaneer debauch, a quarrel had arisen, and some Indians had been
killed and their wives carried off. From this time irreconcilable hatred
existed between the two people, and to be wrecked on the Bravo shore was
equivalent to certain death. On reaching Cape Diego (so called, like
many other points of land, from an old adventurer), Oexmelin was
compelled by hunger to feed on crocodile eggs, which were found buried
in the sand. Meeting here with some French adventurers, they all removed
to an adjacent spot, where they caught turtle and salted it for the
voyage.

Ascending a river to obtain provisions, they surprised and killed two
Indians, of whom one had a beard-case of tortoise-shell and another of
beaten gold: the latter they took for a chief. Putting off from here,
and meeting with contrary winds that drove them from Jamaica, they
returned again to Chagres, and were pursued by a ship of Spanish build,
which they feared had been sent from Carthagena to rebuild the fort.

They attempted in vain to escape, and were clearing the decks, preparing
to fight to the last, when the enemy hoisted the red flag, and proved to
be one of their companions' vessels driven back by the _bise_, or
north-east wind. They lost two days' sail by this accident, more than
they could regain in a fortnight, and returned to the Boca del Toro to
get provisions and kill sea-cows, and then passed on to the Boca del
Drago. The islands here they knew to be inhabited, for the fragrance of
the fruits was wafted on the sea wind. One day a fishing party gave
chase to two Indians in a canoe, which they instantly drew ashore and
carried with them into the woods. This boat, weighing above 2,000 lbs.
and requiring 11 men afterwards to launch it, was made of wild cedar,
roughly hewn; being nimble the savages both escaped the Buccaneers. A
pilot who had been often in those parts, told them that a few years
before, a Buccaneer squadron arriving in that place, the men went in
canoes to catch the humming birds that swarmed round the flowering trees
of the coast. They were observed by some Indians who had hid themselves
in the trees, who, leaping down into the sea, carried off the boats and
men before their companions could arrive to their aid. The admiral
instantly landed 800 men to rescue the prisoners, but so many Indians
collected that they found it necessary to retreat in haste to their
ships.

The next day the Buccaneers arrived at Rio de Zuera, but the Spaniards
were all fled, leaving no provisions; they therefore filled their boats
with plantains, coasting for a fortnight along the shore to find a
convenient place to careen, for the vessel had now grown so leaky that
slaves and men were obliged to work night and day at the pumps. Arriving
at a port, called the Bay of Blevelt, from a Buccaneer who used to
resort there, half the crew were employed to unload and careen the bark
on the shore, and half to hunt in the woods--still much afraid of the
Indians, though they had as yet seen none.

The huntsmen shot several porcupines of great size, and many monkeys and
pheasants. The men took great pleasure in the midst of their danger in
this pursuit. They laughed to see the females carrying their little ones
on their backs, just like the negro women, and they admired the love and
fidelity which some showed when their friends were wounded, and were
delighted when they pelted their pursuers with fruit and dead boughs.
The men were obliged to shoot fifteen or sixteen to secure three or
four, as even when dead they remained clinging to the trees, and
remained so for several days, hanging by their fore-paws or their tails.
When one was wounded the rest came chattering round him, and would lay
their paws on the wound to stop the flow of blood, and others would
gather moss from the tress to bandage the place, or, gathering certain
healing herbs, chew them and apply them as a poultice. If a mother was
killed the young ones would not leave the body till they were torn away.

But these amusements were soon to come to an end. The Indians were upon
their track. They had been now eight days hunting. It was the daybreak
of the ninth day, and the fishermen and hunters were preparing their
nets and guns to start for the sea and for the woods. The slaves were on
the beach burning shells to make lime, which served instead of pitch for
the vessels, and the women were drawing water at the wells which had
been dug in the shore. A few of them were washing dishes, and others
sewing, for they had risen earlier than usual. While the rest went to
the wells, one of them lingered behind to pick some fruit that grew near
the beach. Seeing suddenly some Indians running from the spot where she
had left her companions, she ran to the tents, crying, "Indians,
Indians, Christians, the Indians are come." The Buccaneers, running to
arms, discovered that three of their female slaves were lying dead in
the wood, pierced with fourteen or fifteen flint-headed arrows. These
darts were about eight feet long, and as thick as a man's thumb; at one
end was a wooden hook, tied on with a string, at the other, a case
containing a few small stones. Searching the woods, no traces of
Indians, or any canoes, were to be found, and the Buccaneers, fearing
they should be surrounded and overpowered, re-embarked all their goods,
and sailed in great haste and fear.

They soon arrived at Cape Gracias à Dios, and rejoiced to find
themselves once more among friendly Indians; and at a port where
Buccaneer vessels often resorted, the rudest sailors giving thanks to
God for having delivered them out of so many dangers, and brought them
to a place of refuge. The Indians provided them with every necessary,
and treated them with friendship. For an old knife or hatchet the men
each bought an Indian woman, who supplied them with food. These people
often went to sea with the Buccaneers, and, remaining several years,
returned home with a good knowledge of French and English. They were
used as fishermen, and for striking tortoises and manitees, one Indian
being able to victual a vessel of 100 men. Oexmelin's crew having on
board two sailors who could speak the Indian tongue, they were unusually
well received.

This nation was not more than 1700 in number, including a few negro
slaves, who had swum ashore from a wreck, having murdered the Spanish
crew, and, in their ignorance of navigation, stranded the vessel. Some
of them cultivated the ground, and others wandered about hunting and
fishing. They wore little clothes but a palm leaf hat, and a short
apron, made of the bark of some tree. Their arms were spears, pointed
with crocodile's teeth. They believed in a Supreme Being, and, as
Esquemeling quaintly says, "believe not in nor serve the devil, as many
other nations of America do, and hereby they are not so much tormented
by him as other nations are." Their food was chiefly fruit and fish.
They prepared pleasant and intoxicating liquors from the plantain, and
from the seed of the palm, and at their banquets every guest was
expected to empty a four-quart calabash full of achioc, as the palm
drink was called, merely a whet to the feast to follow. Their achioc was
as thick as gruel. When they were in love, they pierced themselves with
arrows to prove their sincerity. When a youth wished to marry a maiden,
the first question of the bride's father to the lover was, whether he
could make arrows, or spin the thread with which they bound them. If he
answered in the affirmative, the father called for a calabash of achioc,
and he himself, the bride, and the bridegroom, all tasted of the
beverage. When one of these hardy women was delivered, she rose, went to
the nearest brook, washed and swathed the child, and went about her
ordinary labour. When a husband died, the wife buried him, with all his
spears, aprons, and ear jewels, and for fifteen moons after (a year)
brought meat and drink daily to the grave. Some writers contend that the
devil visited the graves, and carried away these offerings to the manes;
but Esquemeling says, he knows to the contrary, having often taken away
the food, which was always of the choicest and best sort. At the end of
the year, an extraordinary custom prevailed. The widow had then to open
the grave, and take out all the bones; she scraped, washed, and dried
them in the sun; then placed them in a satchel, and for a whole year was
obliged to carry them upon her back by day, and sleep upon them by
night. At the end of the year, she hung up the bag at her door-post, or,
if she was not mistress of her house, at the door of her nearest
relation. A widow could not marry again till this painful ceremony was
completed, and if an Indian woman married a pirate, the same custom
prevailed. The negroes maintained the habits of their own countries.

After refreshing themselves in this friendly region, the Buccaneers
steered for the island de los Pinos, and, arriving in fifteen days,
refitted their vessel, now become dangerously leaky. Half the crew were
employed in careening, and half in fishing, and by the help of some of
the Cape Gracias Indians who accompanied them they killed and salted a
sufficient number of wild cattle and turtle to revictual the ship. In
six hours they could capture fish sufficient for a thousand persons.
"This abundance of provision," says Esquemeling, "made us forget the
miseries we had lately endured, and we began to call one another again
by the name of _brother_, which was customary among us, but had been
disused in our miseries." They feasted here plentifully, and without
fear of enemies, for the few Spaniards who were on the island were
friendly, and past dangers grew mere dreams in the distance. Their only
anxiety now was about the crocodiles, which swarmed in the island, and,
when hungry, would devour men.

On one occasion a Buccaneer and his negro slave, while hunting in the
wood, were attacked by one of these monsters. With incredible agility it
fastened upon the Englishman's leg, and brought him to the ground. The
negro fled. The hunter, a robust and courageous man, drawing his knife,
stabbed the crocodile to the heart, after a desperate fight, and then,
tired with the combat and weak with loss of blood, fell senseless by its
side. The negro, returning, from curiosity rather than compassion, to
see how the duel had ended, lifted his master on his back and brought
him to the sea-shore, a whole league distant, where he placed him in a
canoe and rowed him aboard. After this, no Buccaneer dared to go into
the woods alone, but the next day, sallying out in troops, they killed
all the monsters they could meet. These animals would come every night
to the sides of the vessel and attempt to climb up, attracted probably
by the smell of food. One of these, when seized with an iron hook,
instead of diving or swimming, began to mount the ladder of the ship,
till they killed him with blows of pikes and axes. After remaining some
time here they sailed for Jamaica, and arrived there in a few days after
a prosperous voyage, being the first adventurers who had arrived there
from Panama since Morgan.

In 1673, when the war between the French and Hollanders (Dutch) was
still raging, the inhabitants of the French West Indian colonies
equipped a fleet to attack the Dutch settlements at Curaçoa, engaging
all the Buccaneers that could be induced to join the white flag, either
from hopes of plunder or from hatred to the Dutch. M. D'Ogeron, the
Governor of Tortuga, the planner of this invasion, headed the fleet in a
large vessel named after himself, built by himself, and manned by 500
picked adventurers. His unlucky star led them to misfortune. The new
frigate ran upon the rocks near the Guadanillas Islands, and broke into
a thousand pieces, during a storm near Porto Rico. Being at the time
very near to land, the governor and all his men swam safe to shore. The
next day, discovered by the Spaniards, they were attacked by a large
force, who supposed they had come purposely to plunder the islands as
the Buccaneers had done before. The whole country, alarmed, rose in
arms. The shipwrecked men were surrounded by an overpowering army, who,
finding them almost without arms, refused to give them quarter, slew the
greater part without mercy, and made the remainder prisoners. Binding
them with cords, two by two, they drove them through the woods into the
open champaign. To all inquiries as to the fate of their commander,
whom they could not distinguish from the rest, they replied that he had
sunk with the wreck. D'Ogeron, following up this deception with French
sagacity, behaved himself as a mere half-witted suttler, diverting the
Spanish soldiers by his tricks and mimicry, and was the only Buccaneer
whom they allowed to go at liberty. The troopers at their camp fires
gave him scraps from their meals and rewarded him with more food than
his companions.

Among the prisoners there was also a French surgeon who had on former
occasions done some service to the Spaniards, and him they also allowed
to go at large. D'Ogeron agreed with him to attempt an escape at all
risks, and after mature deliberation, they both agreed upon a plan, and
succeeded in escaping safely into the woods, and in making their way to
the sea-side. They determined to attempt to build a canoe, although
unsupplied with any tool except a hatchet. By the evening they reached
the sea-shore, to their great joy, and caught some shell fish on the
beach from a shoal that ran in upon the sands in pursuit of their prey.
Fire to roast them they obtained by rubbing two sticks together in the
Indian fashion. The next morning early they began to cut down and
prepare timber to build the canoe in which to escape to Vera Cruz. While
they were toiling at their work they observed in the distance a large
boat, which they supposed to contain an enemy, steering directly towards
them. Retreating to the woods, they discovered as soon as it touched
land that it held only two poor fishermen. These unsuspecting men they
determined if possible to overpower, and to capture the boat. As the
mulatto came on shore alone, with a string of calabashes on his back to
draw water, they killed him with a blow of their axe, and then slew the
Spaniard, who, alarmed at the sound of voices, was attempting in vain to
push from the shore. Having filled the dead man's calabashes they set
sail, using the precaution of taking the dead bodies with them out into
the deep sea, in order to conceal their death from the Spaniards.

They steered at once for Porto Rico, and passed on to Hispaniola. A
fair wind soon brought them to Samana, where they found a party of their
people. Leaving the surgeon to collect men at Samana, D'Ogeron sailed to
Tortuga to collect vessels and crews to return and deliver his
companions, and revenge his late disaster. He sailed eventually with 300
men, and took great precautions to prevent the Spaniards being aware of
his coming, using only his lower sails in order that his masts should
not rise above the horizon. In spite of this the Spaniards, informed of
his approach, had placed troops of horse upon the shore at various
assailable points.

D'Ogeron landed his men under favour of a discharge from his great guns,
which drove the horsemen into the woods, where, as he little suspected,
the infantry lay in ambush. Eagerly pursuing, his men, who thought the
victory their own, found themselves hemmed in on every side. Few escaped
even to the ships. The Spaniards, cruel from the reaction of fear, cut
off the limbs of the dead and carried them home as trophies. They
lighted bonfires on the shore as tokens of defiance to the retreating
fleet.

The first prisoners were now treated worse than ever. Some of them were
sent to Havannah and employed on the fortifications all day, and chained
up like wild beasts at night to prevent their desperate attempts at
escape. Many were sent to Cadiz, and from thence escaped over the
Pyrenees into France, and, assembling together, like sworn members of a
common brotherhood, returned by the first ship to Tortuga.

These very men some time after equipped a small fleet, under command of
Le Sieur Maubenon, which sacked Trinidad, and put the island to a ransom
of 10,000 pieces of eight, and from thence proceeded to the Caraccas.

The Buccaneers fought against the Dutch, in 1676, and helped the French
to recover Cayenne, that had been taken by Vice-Admiral Binkes. After
this conquest, M. D'Estrees attacked Tobago, but was repulsed with the
loss of 150 killed, and 200 wounded. His ship, the _Glorieux_, of
seventy guns, was blown up, and two others stranded; several of the
Dutch vessels were, however, burnt.

D'Estrees, returning to Brest, was ordered back to Tobago, with twenty
sail of vessels of war, besides a great number of small craft. 1500 men
were landed, and, approaching a fortified place called Le Cort, summoned
Heer Binkes to surrender. The French began their attack by throwing
fire-balls into the castle; the third grenade fell upon some loose
powder in the path leading to the magazine, and blew it up. Heer Binkes
and all his officers but one were killed. 500 French instantly stormed
the works, killing all but 300 men, who were sent prisoners to France.
D'Estrees then destroyed every fort and house in the island, and sailed
away.

It was in 1678 that the same Comte D'Estrees collected 1200 Buccaneers
from Hispaniola, and twenty vessels of war, besides fire-ships, to
capture Curaçoa, which could have been taken with 300 Buccaneers and
three vessels. This fleet was, however, lost on the Isles d'Aves, as we
shall describe in Dampier's voyage.

In the year 1678, Captain Cook loaded his vessel with logwood, at
Campeachy, and, while anchoring at the island of Rubia, on his way to
Tobago, was captured by three Spanish men-of-war, who left his crew upon
the shore, and carried off his ship and cargo. They had not lain there
long before a Spanish sloop of sixteen men arrived, laden with cocoa and
plate, and gave them opportunity for escape and for revenge. Borrowing
muskets of the Dutch governor, they employed six of their men in seizing
the sloop's boat as it came to land, and then embarked and took the
larger vessel, leaving their prisoners bound upon the beach, to watch
the combat that would decide their fate. Two men navigated, two more
loaded the guns, and two others fired into the enemy as fast as they
could pour their shot into the stern-ports. The Spaniards resisted
stoutly for some time, but, seeing their priest and captain shot dead,
threw their arms overboard, and cried for quarter. The Buccaneers gave
the Dutch governor a handsome reward, with a recompence for the arms,
and divided among themselves about £4,000 worth of plate. On arriving
at Jamaica they burnt the prize, and embarked their goods for England.

In the year of our Lord 1679, a Buccaneer fleet of five sail, commanded
by Captains Coxen, Essex, Alliston, Rose, and Sharp, set sail from
Port-Royal, and steered for the island of Pines, losing two vessels in
their passage, at the Zamballos islands. They met a French ship, whose
commission was only for three months, and showed its captain, with great
exultation, their forged commission for three years, purchased for only
ten pieces of eight.




CHAPTER IV.

THE CRUISES OF SAWKINS AND SHARP.

    Land at Darien--March Overland--Take Santa Maria--Sail to
    Panama--Ringrose is wrecked--Failure of Expedition--Driven off by
    Spanish Fleet--Coxen accused of cowardice--Sharp elected
    Commander--Plunder Hillo and take La Serena--Take Aries--Saved with
    difficulty--Conspiracy of slaves--Land at Antigua--Return to
    England--Sharp's trial--Seizes a French ship in the Downs, and
    returns to Jamaica.


The cruises of Sawkins and Sharp are recorded in the travels of
Ringrose, who was present at all their exploits. At this time the
Buccaneers widened their field of operations, and passed from the South
into the North Pacific. The whole coast of South America, on either
side, met the fate of the West Indian islands. The gold mines of Peru
were the next object of their speculation.

A fleet which took Porto Bello a second time rendezvoused at Boca del
Toro. A new expedition was then formed to follow Captain Bournano, a
French commander, who had lately attacked Chepo, to Tocamora, a great
and very rich place, whither the Darien Indians had offered to conduct
him, in spite of a late treaty with the Spaniards.

The vessels first dispersed into coves and creeks to careen and salt
turtle, and then reunited at the Water key. The fleet consisted of nine
vessels, with a total of 22 guns and 458 men, in the following
order:--Captain Coxen, a ship of 80 tons, with 8 guns, and 197 men;
Captain Harris, 150 tons, 5 guns, and 107 men; Captain Bournano, 90
tons, 6 guns, and 86 men; Captain Sawkins, 16 tons, 1 gun, and 35 men;
Captain Sharp, 25 tons, 2 guns, and 40 men; Captain Cook, 35 tons, and
43 men; Captain Alleston, 18 tons, and 24 men; Captain Row, 20 tons,
and 25 men; Captain Macket, 14 tons, and 20 men.

The expedition sailed March 26, 1679. The first place to touch at was
the Zemblas Islands, where they traded with the friendly Indians, who
brought fruits and venison in exchange for beads, needles, knives, and
hatchets. These Indians were quite naked, but richly decorated with gold
and silver plates of a crescent form, and gold rings worn in the nose,
which they had to lift up when they drank. They were generally painted
with streaks of black and red, but were a handsome race, and frequently
as fair as Europeans. The sailors believed that they could see better by
night than by day.

The Indians dissuaded the captains from the march upon Tocamora, and
agreed to guide them to the vicinity of Panama. The way to Tocamora,
they declared, was mountainous and uninhabited, and ran through wild
places, where no provisions could be obtained. In this change of plan,
Row and Bournano, whose crews were all French, separated, being
unwilling to risk a long march by land, and remained at the Zemblas,
while Andræas, an Indian chief, guided the remaining vessels to the
Golden Island, a little to the westward of the mouth of the great river
of Darien. There the seven remaining vessels rendezvoused April 3, 1680.

They here agreed to follow the Indians' advice, and attack the town of
Santa Maria, situated on the river of the same name, which runs into the
South Sea by the gulf of St. Miguel. It was garrisoned by 400 soldiers,
and from hence the gold gathered in the neighbouring mountains was
carried to Panama, on which they could march if they could not find
enough at Santa Maria.

On the 5th of April they landed 331 men, leaving Captains Alleston and
Macket to guard the ships in their absence. Each man carried with him
three or four "dough-boys" (cakes), trusting to the rivers for drink.
Captain Sharp, who went at their head, was still faint from a late
sickness. His company carried a red flag and a bunch of white and green
ribbons. The second division, led by Captain Richard Sawkins, had a red
flag, striped with yellow. Captain Peter Harris, with the third and
fourth divisions, had two green flags; Captain John Coxen, two red
flags; while Captain Edmund Cook bore red colours, striped with yellow,
with a hand and sword for the device. All the men carried fusees,
pistols, and hangers.

The Indian guides led them through a wood and over a bay two leagues up
a woody valley, along a good path, with here and there old plantations.
At a river, then nearly dry, they built huts to rest in. Another Indian
chief, a man "of great parts," and called Captain Antonio, now promised
to be their leader, as soon as his child, who was then sick, had died,
which he expected would be next day. This Indian warned them against
lying in the grass, which was full of large snakes.

The men, breaking some of the stones washed down from the mountains,
found them glitter like gold; but, in spite of this, several grew tired
and returned to the ships, leaving only 327 sailors and six Indian
guides.

The next day they ascended a very steep hill, and found at the foot of
it a river, on which Andræas told them Santa Maria was built. About
noon they ascended another and higher mountain, by so perpendicular and
narrow a path that only one man could pass at a time. Having marched
eighteen miles, they halted that night on the banks of the same river,
much rain falling during both nights. The next day they crossed the
river, after wading sometimes up to the knee, sometimes to the middle,
in a steep current. At noon they reached the Indian village, near which
the king of Darien resided. The houses were neatly built of
cabbage-tree, with the roofs of wild canes, thatched with palmito royal,
and were surrounded by plantain walks; they had no upper storeys. The
king, queen, and family, came to visit them in royal robes. Like most
savages, he was all ornament and nakedness, gold and dirt. His crown was
made with woven white reeds, lined with red silk. In the middle was a
thin plate of gold, some beads, and several ostrich feathers; in each
ear a gold ring; and in his nose a half-moon of the same metal. His robe
was of thin white cotton, and in his hand he held a long bright lance,
sharp as a knife. The queen wore several red blankets, and her two
marriageable daughters and young child were loaded with coloured beads,
and covered with strips of rag. The women seemed "free, easy, and
brisk," but modest and afraid of their husbands. The king gave the
sailors each three plantains and some sugar-canes to suck, but, after
that regal munificence, did not disdain to sell his stores like his
subjects, who proved very cunning dealers in their purchases of knives,
pins, and needles. Resting here a day, Captain Sawkins was appointed to
lead the forlorn hope of eighty men. Their march still lay along the
river, and here and there they found a house. The Indians, standing at
the doors, would present each with a ripe plantain or cassave root, or
count them by dropping a grain of millet for each one that passed. They
rested at night at some native houses.

The next day Sharp, Coxen, and Cook, and ninety men, embarked in
fourteen canoes to try how far the stream was navigable, Captain
Andræas being with them, and two Indians in each canoe serving as
guides. But the water proved more tedious than the land; for at the
distance of every stone's-cast, they were constrained to get out of the
boats and haul them over sands, rocks, or fallen trees, and sometimes
over spits of land. That night they built huts on the bank, being worn
out with fatigue.

The next day proved a repetition of the past; at night a tiger came near
them, but they dared not fire for fear of alarming the Spaniards. The
following day was worse than before, and their men grew mutinous and
suspicious of the Indians, who, they thought, had divided the troop in
order to betray them. The fourth day, resting on "a beachy point of
land," where another arm joined the river, they were joined by their
companions, whom they had sent their Indians to seek, and who had grown
alarmed at their continued absence. That night they prepared their arms
for action. On the morrow they re-embarked, in all sixty-eight canoes
and 327 Englishmen, with fifty Indian guides. They made themselves
paddles, threw away the Indian poles, and rowed with all speed, meeting
several boats laden with plantains. About midnight they arrived within
half-a-mile of Santa Maria, and landed. The mud was so deep that they
had to lay down their paddles and lift themselves up by the boughs of
the trees; then cutting a way through the woods, they took up their
lodging there for the night, hoping to surprise the Spaniards.

At daybreak, to their disappointment, they were awoke by the discharge
of a musket and the beating of a drum. The Spaniards had already
prepared some lead for their reception, and had sent away their gold to
Panama. Directly they emerged into the plain, the enemy ran into a large
palisaded fort, twelve feet high, and began to fire quick and close. The
vanguard, running up, pulled down part of the stockade and broke in and
took them prisoners, the whole 280 men. A few English were wounded, not
one being killed of the fifty men who led the attack. 200 other
Spaniards were in the mines conveying away the gold, the mines there
being the richest of the western world. Twenty-six Spaniards were
killed in the fort and sixteen wounded, but the governor, priest, and
chief men all escaped by flight. The town proved to be merely a few cane
houses, built to check the Indians, who frequently rebelled. Some days
before, three cwt. of gold had been sent in a bark to Panama, the same
quantity being despatched twice or thrice a-year.

During the fight the Indians, frightened at the whistling of the
bullets, had hid themselves in a hollow; when all was over they entered
the place, with great courage stabbing the prisoners with their lances,
and putting about twenty to death in the woods, till the Buccaneers
interfered. In the town the Indians found the eldest daughter of the
Darien king, whom one of the garrison had carried off, and who was then
with child by him. Rather than be left to the mercy of the Indians, this
man offered to lead them to Panama, where they hoped to capture all the
riches of Potosi and Peru. Sawkins in a canoe attempted in vain to
overtake the governor and his officers, and rather than return
empty-handed, resolved to go to Panama, to satisfy what Ringrose calls
"their hungry appetite of gold and riches."

Captain Coxen was chosen commander, and the booty and prisoners sent
back to the ships under a guard of twelve men. The Indians, being
rewarded with presents of needles and beads, also returned, all but the
king. Captain Andræas, Captain Antonio, and the king's son, King Golden
Cap (bonete d'oro), as the Spaniards called him, resolved to go on,
desiring to see Panama sacked, and offering to aid them with a large
body of men. The Spanish guide declared he would not only lead them into
the town, but even to the very door of the governor of Panama's
bed-chamber, and that they should take him by the hand, and seize him
and the whole city, before they should be discovered by the Spaniards.

After remaining two days at Santa Maria, they departed April 17th, 1680,
for Panama.

They embarked in thirty-five canoes and a piragua which they had found
lying at anchor, rowing down the river to the gulf of Belona, where
they would enter the South Sea and work round to Panama. At the request
of the Indian king the fort, church, and town were all burnt. The
Spanish prisoners, afraid of being put to death by the savages if left
behind, collected some bark logs and leaky canoes, although the
Buccaneers could scarcely find boats for themselves, and went with them.

Ringrose and four other men were put in the heaviest and slowest canoe,
and, getting entangled between a shoal two miles long, and obliged to
wait for high water, the boat being too heavy to row against tide, were
soon left behind. At night, it being again low water, they stuck up an
oar in the river, and, in spite of a weltering rain, slept all night by
turns in the canoe. The next morning, rowing two leagues, they overtook
their companions filling water at an Indian hut, there being no more for
six days' journey. Hurrying to a pond a quarter of a mile distant with
their calabashes, they returned to their boats and found the rest again
gone and out of sight. "Such," moralises Ringrose, "is the procedure of
these wild men, that they care not in the least whom they lose of their
company or leave behind. We were now more troubled in our minds than
before, fearing lest we should fall into the same misfortune we had so
lately overcome."

They rowed after them as fast as possible, but in vain, and lost their
way among the innumerable islands of the river's mouth; but at last,
with much trouble and toil, hit the Bocca Chica, the desired passage.
But though they saw the door, they could not pass through, the "young
flood" running violently against them--although it was only a
stone's-cast off, and not a league broad. Here, then, in despair they
put ashore, fastening the rope to a tree, almost covered by a tide that
flowed four fathoms deep.

As soon as the tide turned, they rowed to an island about a
league-and-a-half from the river's mouth, in the gulf of St. Miguel, in
much danger from the waves, their boat being twenty feet long, but not
quite a foot-and-a-half broad. Here they rested for the night, wet
through with the continual and impetuous rain, without water to drink,
and unable to light a fire, "for the loss of our company, and the
dangers we were in," says Ringrose, "made it the sorrowfullest night
that, until then, I ever experimented." None slept that tedious night,
for a vast sea surrounded them on one side, and the mighty power of the
Spaniards on the other. They were all without shoes, and their clothes
were drenched through. They could see nothing but sea, mountain, and
rock.

At break of day they rowed past several islands to the Point St.
Laurence, one man incessantly employed in baling. As they passed one of
these islands, a huge sea overturned their boat, but they gained the
beach, swimming for life, and the canoe came tumbling beside them. The
arms fast lashed at the bottom of the boat, the locks cased and waxed
down like the cartouche boxes, and powder horns, escaped uninjured, but
the bread and fresh water were either spoiled or lost. While carefully
wiping and cleaning their arms, for a Buccaneer's musket was as his wife
and child to him, they saw another canoe tossed to shore, a little to
leeward. This proved to be six of the Spanish prisoners, who had escaped
in an old piragua which was split to pieces, the English boat, formed of
wood, six inches thick, having escaped unhurt. A common misfortune makes
all men friends, and the English and Spaniards sat down together and
broiled their meat amicably at the same fire. They then held a council,
discussing for two or three hours what course to take, and all the men
but Ringrose were for returning and living with the Indians, if they
could not reach the ships lying in the northern sea. With much ado,
Ringrose prevailed on them to persist for one day longer, and, just as
they were concluding their debate, the man on the look-out cried that he
saw Indians. Pursued into the woods by two Buccaneers, they found that
he was one of the expedition, and had arrived with seven others in a
great canoe. They were glad to see them, and declared, to their joy,
that, all in one canoe, they could overtake the boats in the course of a
day. On seeing the Spaniards (Wankers they called them), they would
have put them to death but for Ringrose's interposition, for his men
stood by indifferent. They then insisted on keeping one as a slave.
Ringrose, still fearing for their lives, gave the five Spaniards his own
canoe, and bade them shift for their lives. Now in a large canoe, with a
good sail, and a fresh and strong gale, they made brave way, with
infinite joy and comfort of heart, the smooth and easy passage, and the
pleasant, fresh ripple of the sea, filling them with hope and gladness;
but that very evening it grew very dark, and rained heavily. Suddenly
two fires were seen to blaze up from the opposite shore of the
continent, and the Indians, thinking they must indicate the encampment
of their people, shouted, "Captain Antonio, Captain Andræas," and made
for the shore as fast as they could pull. The canoe, however, had hardly
got amongst the breakers, before sixty Spaniards, armed with clubs,
leaped from the woods; and, drawing the boat on land, made all the crew
their prisoners. Ringrose seized his gun, and prepared for resistance,
but was pulled down by four or five of the enemy. The Indians, leaping
overboard, escaped nimbly into the woods. Ringrose spoke to his captors
in French and English, without obtaining any answer. On addressing the
strangers in Latin, he discovered that they were the Spanish prisoners
from Santa Maria, who had been liberated, for fear they might escape
when nearer Panama, and inform the city of the Buccaneers' approach. The
Englishmen were presently taken with shouts of joy into a hut made of
boughs, and examined by the Spanish captain, who meditated retaliating
upon them the injuries inflicted on the town. At this critical juncture,
the Spaniards whom Ringrose had liberated came in, and explained how
they had been delivered from the Indians. On hearing this, the Spanish
captain rose, and, embracing Ringrose, said, "The English were good
people, and very friendly enemies, but the Indians very rogues, and a
treacherous nation." He then made him sit down and eat with him, and
consented, for the kindness he had shown his countrymen, to give him and
all his men, and even the Indians, if they could find them, their lives
and liberties, which otherwise would have been forfeited. Finally,
giving them a canoe, the noble-hearted enemy bade them go in God's name,
praying that they might be as fortunate as they had been generous. All
that night they skirted a dangerous and iron coast, without daring to
land.

The next morning, after sailing, paddling, and rowing for a few hours,
they saw a canoe suddenly making towards them. It was one of the English
boats, which had mistaken them for a Spanish piragua. They at once
conducted them to a deep bay, sheltered by rocks, where the rest lay at
anchor. They were all delighted to see Ringrose and his men, having
given them up as lost. They then made their way with all speed to a
hilly island, about seven leagues distant, and surprised an old man, who
was stationed there to watch. The road up to the hut was very steep, and
the Buccaneers surrounded the old man, who did not see them till they
had already entered his plantain walk. They were much encouraged by his
declaration, that no tidings of their arrival had yet reached Panama.
About dusk, two of their boats surprised a small bark that came and
anchored outside the island. The crew had been absent eight days from
the city, landing soldiers on the adjacent shore, to curb and drive back
the Indians. The crews of the smaller canoes now crowded into this
vessel to the number of 137 men, together with Captain Cook and Captain
Sharp, the latter of whom Ringrose calls "a sea artist, and valiant
commander."

Next morning, rowing all day over shallow water, they chased a bark,
which Captain Harris took after a sharp dispute, putting on board a
prize crew of thirty men. During this pursuit the vessels scattered, and
did not reunite till next day at the island of Chepillo, a preconcerted
rendezvous. They again chased a bark, but with less success, and Captain
Coxen's canoe missed the prize, owing to a breeze springing up, having
one man killed and another wounded, and, what was worst of all, the
vessel not only escaped, but spread the alarm at Panama. At Chepillo
they took fourteen negro and mulatto prisoners, and secured two fat
hogs, plenty of plantains, and some good water. Believing it useless now
to attack Panama, the Buccaneers resolved to hurry on to the town to at
least surprise some of the shipping. Their boats had the addition of
another piragua, which they found lying at Chepillo. Before starting,
the captains cruelly decided, for reasons which Ringrose could not
fathom, to allow the Indians to murder all the Spanish prisoners before
their eyes, the savages having long thirsted for their blood. But by a
singular coincidence the prisoners, though without arms, forced their
way by a sudden rush through all the Indian spears and arrows, and
escaped unhurt into the woods, to the chagrin of both white and black
savages.

Staying only a few hours at Chepillo, the boats started at four o'clock
in the evening, intending to reach Panama, which was only seven leagues
distant, before the next morning. The next day (St. George's day),
before sunrise they arrived at Panama, "a city," says Ringrose, "which
has a very pleasant prospect seaward." They could see all the ships of
the city lying at anchor at the island of Perico, two leagues distant,
where storehouses had been built. There now rode at anchor five great
ships and three smaller armadillas, (little men-of-war). This fleet,
which had been hastily manned to defend the city, as soon as they saw
the Buccaneers, weighed anchor, got under sail, and bore down at once
upon them, directly before the wind, and with such velocity as to
threaten to run them down. The Spanish admiral's vessel was manned by
ninety Biscayans, agile seamen and stout soldiers. They were all
volunteers, and had come out to show their valour under the command of
Don Jacinto de Barahona, high-admiral of those seas. In the second were
seventy-seven negroes, led by a brave old Andalusian, Don Francisco de
Peralta. In the third, making 228 men in all, were sixty-five mulattoes,
under Don Diego de Carabaxal. The Spaniards had strict orders given them
to grant no quarter.

To add to the disparity of numbers, only a few of the Buccaneers' boats
were able to arrive in time. The first five canoes that came up, leaving
the heavy piraguas still lagging behind, contained only thirty-seven
men, and these were tired with rowing in the wind's eye, and trying to
get close to the windward of the enemy. The lesser piragua coming up
with thirty-two more men, made a total force of sixty Buccaneers,
including the king of Darien, engaged in this daring resistance to an
overwhelming force.

Carabaxal's vessel, passing between Sawkins's and Ringrose's canoes,
fired at both, wounding four men in the former and one in the latter,
but being slow in tacking, the Spaniard paid dear for his passage, the
first return volley killing several men upon his decks. Almost before
they had time to reload, the admiral passed, but the Buccaneers' second
volley quite disabled their giant antagonist, killing the man at the
helm; and the ship ran into the wind and her sails lay aback. She fell
now like a lamed elephant at the mercy of the hunters; the canoes,
pulling under her stern, fired continually upon the deck, killing all
who dared to touch the helm, and cutting asunder the mainsheet and
mainbrace. Sawkins, whose canoe was disabled, went next into the piragua
to meet Peralta, leaving the four canoes to harass the admiral. Between
Sawkins and Peralta, lying alongside of each other, the fight was
desperate, each crew trying to board, and firing as quick as they could
load. In the mean time the first vessel tacked about and came to relieve
the admiral, but the canoes, seeing the danger of being beaten from the
admiral's stern and allowing him to rally, sent two of their number
(Springer and Ringrose) to meet Peralta. The admiral stood upon his
quarter-deck, waving his handkerchief as a signal for his captains to
come at once to his help. The canoes pursued Peralta, and would have
boarded him had he not given them the helm and made away.

Giving a loud shout, the remaining boats wedged up the admiral's rudder
and poured in a blinding volley, that killed the admiral and chief
pilot. Two-thirds of the Spaniards being now killed, many wounded, and
all disheartened at the bloody massacre of the Buccaneers' shot, cried
for quarter, which they had been already several times offered, and at
once surrendered. Captain Coxen then boarded the prize, taking with him
Captain Harris, who had been shot through both legs as he was heading a
boarding party. They put all their other wounded men on board, and,
manning two canoes, hurried off to aid Sawkins, who had already been
three times beaten off by Peralta.

Coming close under his side and giving him a full volley, they were
expecting a return, when suddenly a volcano of fire spouted up from the
deck, and all the Spaniards abaft the mast were blown into the air or
sea. While the brave captain, leaping overboard, was helping the
drowning men in spite of the rain of shot and the pain of his own burns,
another jar of powder blew up in the forecastle. Under cover of the
smoke and confusion, Sawkins boarded and took the ship, or at least all
that was left of it. Ringrose says it was a miserable sight, not a man
but was either killed or desperately wounded, blind, or horribly burnt
with the powder. In some cases the white wounds where the flesh had
peeled to the bone, showed through the blackening of the powder. The
admiral had but twenty-five men left out of eighty-six, and of these
twenty-five only eight were now able to bear arms.

The blood ran down the deck in streams, and every rope and plank was
smeared with gore.

Peralta, as prudent as he was brave, attempted by every possible
argument, forgetful of his own wounds and the death of his men, to
induce the Buccaneers not to attack the remaining vessels in the
harbour. In the biggest alone he said there were 350 men, and the rest
were well defended. But a dying sailor, lifting up his head from the
deck, contradicted him, and said that they had not a man on board, all
their crews being placed in the armadillas. Trusting to dying treason
rather than living fidelity, the Buccaneers instantly proceeded to the
island, and found the ships deserted. The largest, _La Santissima
Trinidada_, had been set on fire, the crew, loosing her foresail, having
pierced her bottom. The captains soon quenched the fire, and stopping
the leak turned their prize into a floating hospital-ship. They found
they had eighteen men killed and twenty-two wounded (only two of whom
died) in this desperate sea battle, which began an hour after sunrise
and ended at noon. The third vessel, it appeared, while running away had
met with two others, but even with this reinforcement refused to fight.

Their brave prisoner, Peralta, now that all was over, broke out into
repeated praises of their courage, which was so congenial to his own. He
said: "You Englishmen are the valiantest men in the whole world, always
desiring to fight open, while all other nations invent all the ways
imaginable to barricade themselves, and fight as close as possible."
"Notwithstanding all this," adds Ringrose, "we killed more of our
enemies than they of us." Two days after the battle the Buccaneers
buried Captain Harris, a brave Englishman of the county of Kent, whose
death was much lamented by the fleet.

The new city of Panama, built four miles more easterly than that which
Morgan burnt, had been three times destroyed by fire since that event. A
few people still lived round the cathedral in the old town. The new city
was bigger than the old one, and built chiefly of brick and stone, and
was defended by a garrison of 300 soldiers and 1,000 militiamen. They
afterwards learnt that the troops were then absent, and that if they had
landed instead of attacking the fleet, they might have taken the place,
all the best shots being on board the admiral's vessel.

In the five vessels taken at Perico there was much spoil. The
_Trinidada_ (400 tons) was laden with wine, sugar, sweetmeats, skins,
and soap. The second, of 300 tons, partly laden with bars of iron, one
of the richest commodities brought into the South Sea, was burnt by the
Buccaneers, because the Spaniards would not redeem it. The third, of 180
tons, laden with sugar, was given to Captain Cook; the fourth, an old
vessel (60 tons), laden with meal, was burnt as useless, with all her
cargo. The fifth, of 50 tons, with a piragua, fell to the lot of Captain
Coxen. The two armadillas, the rigging and sails being saved, and a bark
laden with poultry, were also burnt.

Captain Coxen, indignant at charges made against him of cowardice in the
late action, determined to rejoin the ships in the northern seas,
together with seventy men who had assisted in his election. The Indian
king, Don Andræas, and Don Antonio, returned with him. The king left his
son and nephew in the care of Captain Sawkins, who was now
commander-in-chief, and desired him not to spare the Spaniards. A few
days after Captain Sharp returned from the King's islands, having taken
a Spanish vessel and burnt his own. Captain Harris's crew had also taken
a vessel, and, dismasting their own, turned their prisoners adrift in
the hulk, and soon after taking a poultry vessel, the meanest of the
Spaniards were treated in the same way.

Having remained now ten days at Panama, the fleet steered to the island
of Tavoga, where they found a village of 100 houses quite deserted, and
many of these were burnt by the carelessness of a drunken sailor. The
Panama merchants came here to sell the Buccaneers commodities and to
purchase the plunder from their own vessels, giving 200 pieces of eight
for every negro. Staying eight days, they captured a vessel from
Truxillo laden with money to pay the garrison of Panama, while in the
hold were 2,000 jars of wine and fifty jars of gunpowder. A flour vessel
from the same place informed them that a ship was coming in a few days
laden with 100,000 more pieces of eight.

To a message from the President, who sent by some merchants to ask why
they came into those parts, Captain Sawkins replied, that he came to
assist the King of Darien, the true lord of the country, and he required
a ransom of 500 pieces of eight for each sailor, and 1,000 for the
commander. He must also promise not to molest the Indians, who were the
natural owners of the soil. Hearing from the messengers that a certain
priest, now bishop of Panama, formerly of Santa Martha, lay in the
city, Sawkins, remembering that he had been his prisoner when he took
that city five years before, sent him two loaves of sugar as a present.
The next day the bishop replied by forwarding him a gold ring. The
President, at the same time, sent another letter, desiring to see his
commission, that he might know to what power to complain. Sawkins
replied, that as yet all his men were not come together, but when they
had met, they would come up to Panama, and bring their commissions on
the muzzles of their guns, at which time he should read them as plain as
the flame of gunpowder would let him.

The men growing now mutinous for fresh meat, Sawkins was compelled to
give up his hopes of capturing the rich vessel from Peru, and to sail to
the island of Otoque, to buy fowls and hogs, losing two barks, one with
seven, and the other with fifteen men. While lying off the pearl fishery
of Cayboa, Sawkins and Sharp made an unfortunate attack with sixty men
on the town of Puebla Nueva. They were piloted up the river in canoes
by a negro prisoner. A mile below the town, great trees had been laid
to block up the stream, and before the town three strong breastworks
were thrown up. Sawkins, running furiously up the sloping ramparts, was
shot dead, and his men driven back to their boats, two men being killed,
and three wounded, in the retreat, which was made in pretty good order.
They soon after, however, captured a vessel laden with indigo, and burnt
two others. This Captain Sawkins, Ringrose says, was as valiant and
courageous as any, and, next to Captain Sharp, the best beloved. His
death was much lamented, and occasioned another overland expedition.
Sharp, surrendering his last prize to Captain Cook, took his vessel and
gave it to the sixty-three men who wished to return home. They led with
them all the Indians to serve as guides overland.

Before they started, Sharp, in full council on board the _Trinidada_,
offered to insure to all who would carry out Sawkins's scheme, and go
home by the Straits of Magellan, a £1000 profit, but none would stay.
Ringrose himself acknowledges he should have left with them, but was
afraid of the Indians, and the long and dangerous journey in the rainy
season.

At Cayboa, the men took in water and cut wood, killing alligators, and
salting deer and turtle. Here two "remarkable events" happened to
Ringrose. In the first place, he ate an oyster so large that he found it
necessary to cut it into four large mouthfuls: secondly, as he was
washing himself in a pond, some drops fell on him from a mançanilla
tree, and these drops broke out into a red eruption that lasted a week.
Here Sharp burnt one of his prizes for the sake of the iron work, and
received Captain Cook, whose men had revolted, on board his own ship,
making John Cox, a New Englander, commander in his stead.

Sharp now determined to careen at the island of Gorgona, and then to
proceed to Guayaquil, where Captain Juan, the captain of the Tavoga
money ship, assured them they might throw away their silver and lade
with gold. They selected Gorgona, because, on account of the perpetual
rain, the Spaniards seldom touched there. The sailors, who had lost
their money at gambling, were impatient of these delays, and declared
that the Spaniards would now gain time, and the whole coast be alarmed,
and on the defensive. But the richer men, wanting rest, decided for
Gorgona.

In this island, they fished their mainmast, shot at whales, killed
monkeys, snakes, and turtle for food, being short of provision, caught a
large sloth, and killed a serpent, fourteen inches thick, and twelve
feet long. While moored here, Joseph Gabriel, the Chilian, who stole the
Indian king's daughter, died of a malignant calenture. He had been very
faithful, and discovered many plots and conspiracies among the prisoners
of intended escapes and murders.

Sharp now abandoned the design on Guayaquil, and resolved to attack
Arica, the dépôt of all the Potosi plate. An old man who had served much
with the Spaniards, promised them £2000 a-man.

After a fortnight's sail they arrived at the island of Plate, so called
from Drake dividing his plunder there among his men. The Spaniards had a
tradition, that he took twelve score tons of plate in the galleon
armada, and that each of his forty-five men had sixteen bowls full of
coined money--his ships being so full that they were obliged to throw
much of it overboard. In the adjoining bay of Manta, in Cromwell's time,
a Lima vessel, laden with thirty millions of dollars, on its way as a
present to Charles I., was lost by keeping too near the shore. While
catching goats on this island, on which the cross of the first Spanish
discoverer still stood, they were joined by Captain Cox, whom they had
lost a fortnight before, as they feared, irrecoverably. They killed and
salted on this island 100 goats in a day, and one man alone, in a few
hours, in one small bay turned seventeen turtle. Peralta congratulated
them on getting as far to windward in two weeks as the Spanish captains
did in three months, from their keeping boldly so far from the shore.

While passing Guayaquil, they espied a Spanish vessel and gave chase.
Being hailed in Spanish by an Indian prisoner, to lower their topsails,
the enemy replied they would pull down the Englishman's first, and
answered with their arquebuses to the Buccaneers' muskets, till, one
bullet killing the man at the helm and another cutting their maintop
halliards, they cried out for quarter. There were thirty-five men on
board, including twenty-four Spaniards and several persons of quality.
The captain's brother, since the death of Don Jacinto de Barahona at
Panama, was admiral of the armada. The Buccaneers' rigging was much cut
during the fight, and two men were wounded, besides a sailor who was
shot by an accident. The captain, it appears, had in a bravado sworn to
attack their fleet if he could meet it. The Spaniard, a very "civil and
meek gentleman," informed them that the governor of Lima, hearing of
their visit to Panama, had collected five ships and 750 sailors; while
two other vessels and 400 soldiers, furnished by the viceroy, were
preparing to start. A patache with twenty-four guns was also lying at
Callao, ready to remove the king's plate from Arica. At Guayaquil they
had built two forts, and mustered 850 men of all colours. The same day
the English unrigged their new prize and sank her.

Reckoning up the pillage, they found they had now 3,276 pieces of eight,
which were at once divided. The same day they punished a Spanish friar,
who was chaplain in the last prize, and, shooting him on the deck, flung
him overboard before he was dead. "Such cruelties," says Ringrose,
"though I abhorred very much in my heart, yet here I was forced to hold
my tongue and not contradict them, as having no authority to oversway
them." The prisoners now confessed they had killed a boat full of the
Buccaneers' men, lost near Cayboa, and had discovered from the only
survivor the plan on Guayaquil.

Captain Cox's vessel being so slow as to require towing, they sank it,
so there were now 140 men and boys and fifty-five prisoners in one and
the same bottom. While to the leeward of Tumbes, Peralta told them a
legend of a priest having once landed there in the face of 10,000
Indians, who stared at his uplifted cross. As he stepped out of his boat
on the shore, before the water could efface his footprints, two lions
and two tigers came out of the woods to meet him, but when he gently
laid the cross on their backs, they fell down and worshipped it, upon
which all the Indians came forward and were baptised.

The night they passed Paita they espied a sail and gave chase, following
it by the lights which it showed through negligence. Scantiness of
provisions made them more eager in the pursuit, and coming up the
Spaniard instantly lowered all her sails and surrendered. The Buccaneers
casting dice as to who should first board, the lot fell to the larboard
watch. The vessel contained fifty packs of cocoa, and a great deal of
raw silk and India cloth, besides many bales of thread stockings. The
prize being plundered and dismasted, the prisoners were turned adrift in
it, supplied with only a foresail, some water, and a little flour. The
chief prisoners, as Don Thomas de Argandona, commander of the Guayaquil
vessel, and his friends Don Christoval and Don Baltazar, gentlemen of
quality, Captain Peralta, Moreno, a pilot, and twelve slaves, to do the
drudgery, were still kept. The next day the sailor wounded in taking the
Guayaquil vessel, died, and was buried with ceremony, three French
volleys being fired as the body was let down into the deep.

Their next expedition was to attack Arica with 112 men, first sending
five boats to capture some fishermen at the river of Juan Diaz, whom
they might employ as spies.

To their great chagrin they found the landing impracticable, and the
whole coast in arms. Troops of horse covered the low hills round the
bay, and close beneath six ships rode at anchor. Abandoning this
project, these indefatigable marauders (more pirates than real
Buccaneers) despatched four canoes and fifty men, to plunder the town of
Hillo. On the shore the English were met by some horsemen, who fled
after a few volleys. Marching to the town, they forced their way through
a small breastwork of clay and sandbags, and took the town. Keeping good
watch for fear of surprise, a dying Indian, wounded in the skirmish,
told them that the townspeople had heard from Lima nine days before, and
expected their coming. In the town they found pitch, wine, oil, and
flour, and sixty of the ablest men were sent up the adjoining valley to
reconnoitre. They found it beautifully planted with fig, lemon, lime,
olive, and orange trees, and four miles up came to a sugar-mill, the
greater part of the sugar having been removed. The Spaniards, watching
them from the hills, rolled stones upon them, but hid themselves when a
musket-shot was fired in retaliation. Captain Cox and a Dutch
interpreter being despatched with a flag of truce to the Spaniards, they
agreed to give eighty beeves as a ransom for the mill, and a message was
despatched to Captain Sharp not to injure the drivers of the oxen when
they came. Hearing that sixteen beeves had already arrived at the port,
the men, contrary to Ringrose's opinion, returned to the ships laden
with sugar, and found the whole story of the oxen's arrival a mere _ruse
de guerre_. The Spaniards being appealed to promised the cattle should
arrive that night, but at last declared the wind was so high they could
not drive the herds. Enraged at this delay, the Buccaneers, who had now
taken in water, marched 100 men up the valley, and burned the house, the
mill, and the canes, carried off the sugar, broke the oil jars, and
cracked the copper wheels. Near the shore they were charged by a body of
300 horsemen, who took them by surprise, but not before they had thrown
down the sugar and taken up their arms.

Ringrose shall tell the rest: "We being in good rank and order," he
says, "fairly proffered them battle upon the bay; but as we advanced to
meet them, they retired and rid towards the mountains, to surround us,
and take the rocks from us, if possibly they could. Hereupon, perceiving
their intentions, we returned back and possessed ourselves of the said
rocks, and also of the lower town, as the Spaniards themselves did of
the upper town (at the distance of half-a-mile from the lower), the
hills and the woods adjoining thereunto. The horsemen being now in
possession of those quarters, we could perceive as far as we could see,
more and more men resort unto them, so that their forces increased
hourly to considerable numbers. We fired at one another as long as we
could see, and the day would permit. But in the mean time we observed
that several of them rid to the watch hill and looked out often to the
seaward. This gave us occasion to fear that they had more strength and
forces coming that way, which they expected every minute. Hereupon, lest
we should speed worse than we had done before, we resolved to embark
silently in the dark of the night." They carried off a great chest of
sugar (seven pounds and a-half to each man), thirty jars of oil, and
much fruit, wild and cultivated. From appearances next morning they
believed the enemy had also fled in the night, as only fifty men could
be seen. The prisoners, seeing a comet at dusk, told the Englishmen that
many such appearances had preceded the arrival of the Buccaneers in the
South Sea. Their brave prisoner, Captain Peralta, began at this time to
show signs of insanity, his mind being shaken by continued hardship and
despair at his long imprisonment.

The Buccaneers next landed 100 men, hoping to take by surprise the city
of La Serena. Here, too, they found the Spaniards vigilant, and had to
break through 100 horsemen to reach the town, killing three officers and
wounding four men. The town contained seven great churches and many rich
merchants' houses surrounded by gardens. The inhabitants had fled, and
either carried away or buried all their treasures, and a Chilian
prisoner said the Spaniards had killed most of their negro and even
their Chilian slaves, for fear of their revolting and joining the
Buccaneers. A party of forty men, with a Chilian guide, searched the
woods in vain to secure prisoners for guides. The Spaniards, sending a
flag of truce, agreed to pay 95,000 pieces of eight as ransom for the
town; but, not bringing it in, the place was set on fire. Taking
advantage of an earthquake, the Spaniards opened the sluices and
inundated the streets. Every house, Ringrose says, was separately fired
to render the conflagration complete. Two parties were then despatched
laden with booty to the ships, who on their way beat up an ambuscade of
250 Spanish horse. During their absence, a daring attempt was made to
burn their ship. The enemy hired a man who floated under the stern of
the ship on a horse's hide, blown out like a bladder. He then stuffed
oakum and brimstone between the keel and the stern-post, and set the
rudder on fire. The men, alarmed at the smoke, ran up and down, not
knowing where the fire could be, and believing the prisoners had done it
in order to escape. The source of the evil was at last discovered, and
the flames extinguished. The Buccaneers, before sailing, released all
their prisoners, not knowing what to do with them, and fearing that they
would revolt or perhaps try to burn the ship.

On reaching the island of Juan Fernandez, they solemnized the festival
of Christmas by discharging three volleys of shot, and killing sixty
goats in one day. The shore was covered so thick with seals that they
were obliged to shoot a few in order to land. They then filled 200
water-jars, and were nearly lost in a place called "False Wild Harbour,"
where they killed several sea-lions. Their beds they made of fern. It
was on this island, their pilot told them, a deserted sailor (Alexander
Selkirk) had lived five years.

The men now in the midst of storms and dangers, were all in a mutiny.
Some were for going back to England or the plantations, and returning by
the straits of Magellan; others for continuing longer in those seas. All
agreed to depose Captain Sharp and elect John Watling, an old privateer,
"and a stout seaman." The next Sunday was the first, says Ringrose, that
had been kept by common consent since the death of Sawkins, who would
throw the dice overboard if he found any in use on that day.

Juan Fernandez abounded in cabbage palms and building timber. The fish
swarmed in such quantities that they could be caught with the bare hook,
one sailor in a few hours capturing enough for the whole crew. Shoals a
mile long were seen in the bay. While busily employed in catching fish,
shooting goats, and cutting timber, the hunters suddenly gave the alarm
of three Spanish men-of-war approaching the island, and, slipping their
cables, the Buccaneers put out hurriedly to sea. In the confusion,
William, a Mosquito Indian, who could not be found at the time, was left
behind to endure the hardships that a few days before he may have heard
the pilot relate as experienced by the celebrated Alexander Selkirk (the
prototype of Robinson Crusoe).

The three Spanish vessels proved to be the _El Santo Christo_, of 800
tons, carrying twelve guns; the _San Francisco_, of 600 tons, with ten
guns; and a third of 350 tons. As soon as they came in sight, they hung
out "bloody flags;" and the Buccaneers, nothing daunted, did the same.
The English, keeping close under the wind, were very unwilling to fight,
as the Spaniards held together, and their new commander, Watling, showed
a faint heart. The trio eventually sheered off, glad to escape
uninjured.

Determining to pay a second visit to Arica, twenty-five men and two
canoes were despatched to obtain guides from the island of Yqueque. On
the shore of the mainland they found a hut built of whales' bones, a
cross, and some broken jars.

They brought away from the island, which they could not at first
discover, two old white men and two Indians. The people of Arica, they
found, came to this place to buy clay, and the natives were obliged to
fetch all the water they used from the mainland. The Indians wore no
clothes, and chewed leaves which dyed their teeth green. One of the old
prisoners being examined was shot to death by order of the commander,
who believed him to be lying, although, as it afterwards appeared, he
told nothing but the truth. Sharp was troubled and dissatisfied at this
cruel and rash order, and, taking water and washing his hands, he said,
"Gentlemen, I am clear of the blood of this old man, and will warrant
you a hot day for this piece of cruelty whenever we come to fight at
Arica." The other prisoner said that he was the superintendent of fifty
slaves belonging to the governor of the town. These slaves caught fish
and sold them when dried in the inland towns. There were then three
Chilian ships and a bark in the harbour, and a fortification of twelve
guns in the town. The people had already, he said, heard from Coquimbo
of their arrival, and removed and buried their treasure. There were
also, they heard, breast-works round the town, and barricades in every
street.

Disregarding these warnings, the Buccaneers embarked next day in a
launch and four canoes, rowing and sailing all night, in hopes of
surprising Arica. At daybreak they hid themselves under the cliffs for
fear of being seen, and at night began again to row. On Sunday (Jan.
30), 1680--"sacred to the memory of King Charles the Martyr"--they
landed among some rocks four miles to the south of the town, ninety-two
men going on shore, the rest staying to defend the boats. The signal
agreed on was, that at one smoke, they should come up to the harbour in
one canoe; but if there were two smokes, they should "bring all away,
leaving only fifteen men with the boats." Mounting a steep hill, they
could see no Spaniards, and hoped that the surprise was complete; but as
they were descending the other side, three horsemen on the look-out hill
rode down at full speed and alarmed the city. The forty men who attacked
the fort with hand grenades, seeing their companions overpowered, ran
down into the valley to join them. "Here the battle was very desperate,
and they killed and wounded two more of our men from their outworks
before we could gain upon them. But our rage increasing with our wounds,
we still advanced, and at last beat the enemy out of all, and filled
every street in the city with dead bodies. The enemy made several
retreats from one breast-work to another, but, we had not a sufficient
number of men to man all places taken. Insomuch, that we had no sooner
beat them out of one place but they came another way, and manned it
again with new forces and fresh men." So says Ringrose.

Imprudently overburdening themselves with prisoners, they found there
were in the place 400 soldiers from Lima, 200 armed townsmen, and 300
men garrisoning the fort. Being now nearly masters of the place, the
English sent to demand the surrender of the fort, and, receiving no
answer, advanced to the attack. Several times repulsed, the Buccaneers
at last mounted the top of a neighbouring house and fired down into the
castle; but, being again surrounded by the enemy, they were obliged to
desist. The number and vigour of the enemy increased hourly, and, almost
overpowered, the English were compelled to retreat to the hospital where
the surgeons were tending the wounded. Captain Watling and both
quartermasters were killed, and many were disabled. We will let Ringrose
tell the rest:--

"So that now, the enemy rallying against us, and beating us from place
to place, we were in a very distracted condition, and in more likelihood
to perish, every man, than escape the bloodshed of that day. Now we
found the words of Captain Sharp true, being all very sensible that we
had a day too hot for us, after that cruel heat in killing and
murdering in cold blood the old Mestizo Indian.

"Being surrounded with difficulties on all sides, and in great disorder,
having nobody to give orders, what was to be done? We were glad to have
our eyes upon our good old commander, Captain Bartholomew Sharp, and beg
of him very earnestly to commiserate our condition, and carry us off. It
was a great while before he would take any notice of our request, so
much was he displeased with the former mutiny of our people against him,
all which had been occasioned by the instigation of Mr. Cook.

"But Mr. Sharp is a man of an undaunted courage, and excellent conduct,
not fearing in the least to look an insulting enemy in the face, and a
person that knows both the theory and practice of navigation as well as
most do. Hereupon, at our earnest request and petition, he took upon him
the command in chief again, and began to distribute his orders for our
safety. He would have brought off our surgeons, but they, having been
drinking while we assaulted the fort, would not come with us when they
were called. They killed and took of our number twenty-eight men,
besides eighteen that we brought off, who were desperately wounded. At
that time we were all extremely faint for want of water and victuals,
whereof we had none all that day. We were likewise almost choked with
the dust of the town, being so much raised by the work that their guns
had made, that we could scarce see each other. They beat us out of the
town, then followed us into the savannahs, still charging as fast as
they could. But when they saw that we rallied, again resolving to die
one by another, they ran from us into the town, and sheltered themselves
under their breast-works. Thus we retreated in as good order as we
possibly could observe in that confusion. But their horsemen followed us
as we retired, and fired at us all the way, though they would not come
within reach of our guns, for theirs reached further than ours, and
outshot us above one-third. We took the sea-side for our greater
security, which when the enemy saw, they betook themselves to the
hills, rolling down great stones and whole rocks to destroy us.
Meanwhile, those of the town examined our surgeons, and other men whom
they had made prisoners. These gave them our signs that we had left to
our boats that were behind us, so that they immediately blew up two
fires, which were perceived by the canoes. This was the greatest of our
dangers; for had we not come at that instant that we did to the
sea-side, our boats had been gone, they being already under sail, and we
had inevitably perished every man. Thus we put off from the shore, and
got on board about ten at night, having been involved in a bloody fight
with the enemy all the day."

The Buccaneers, thus cruelly baffled, plied for some time outside the
port, hoping to be revenged on the three ships, but they did not venture
out. Arica Ringrose describes as a square place, with the castle at one
corner. The houses were only eleven feet high, and built of earth. It
was the place of embarkation for all minerals sent to Lima. Of the
English prisoners, only ten survived. The Spaniards lost more than
seventy men, three times as many being wounded, and of forty-five allies
from Hillo only two returned alive.

On dividing the plate, they found only thirty-seven pieces of eight fell
to each man. Landing at Guasco, they took in 500 jars of water, and
carried off 120 sheep, 80 goats, and 200 bushels of flour. At Hillo they
surprised the townsmen asleep, and heard a false report that 5000
Englishmen had taken Panama. They carried off eighteen jars of wine and
some new figs, and, ascending to the sugar-work they had before visited,
laded seven mules with molasses and sugar. The townsmen told them, that
the owner of the mill had brought an action against them for having done
him more injury than the Buccaneers.

A few days after this another mutiny broke out, and forty-seven men,
refusing to serve any longer under Captain Sharp, landed near the island
of Plate, with five Indian slaves to serve as guides. Near the island
of Chica they captured two Spanish vessels, one of them the very ship
they had captured before at Panama. They heard here that some of their
overland parties had taken a good ship at Porto Bello. Capturing some
Spanish shipwrights at this place, they employed them for a fortnight in
altering their vessel, and then set them at liberty, with some others of
their prisoners, giving them one of their prizes, and manning the other
with six men and two slaves.

They now agreed in council to bear up for Golfo Dolce, there to careen
their vessels, and then to cruise about under the equinoctial. They
landed in Golfo Dolce, and, treating kindly some Indians whom they took
prisoners, bought honey and plantains of them. Here they learned that
the Spaniards, having treacherously captured forty Darien chiefs, had
forced the natives into a peace. Having careened here, they soon after
captured a rich prize, the _San Pedro_, bound from Truxillo to Panama,
deeply laden with 37,000 pieces of eight, in chest and bags, besides
plate. This was the same vessel they had taken the year before, and it
was now their prize a second time in fourteen months. The crew consisted
of forty men, besides friars and merchants. Taking out part of her
lading of cocoa, they cut down her masts and turned her adrift with all
the old slaves, as "_a reward for good service_," taking new ones from
the prize. Francisco, a negro, who had attempted to escape by swimming
on shore in the Golfo Dolce, they retained as a prisoner, as a
punishment for his insubordination. From this prize each Buccaneer
received 234 pieces of eight, much being left for a future division.
They learnt from this vessel that a new Viceroy of Peru, arrived at
Panama, had not dared to venture to Lima in his ship of twenty-five
guns, but had waited for the armada as a convoy. A few days later, they
captured the packet that ran between Lima and Panama. A friar and five
negroes escaped on shore, but two white women were captured. Rummaging
the boat, they found nothing of value but a letter announcing the
departure of the viceroy with four ships. The prisoners and the boat
were then released. "That week," says Ringrose, "we stood out to sea
all night long, most of our men being fuddled."

The next day they captured a Spanish vessel that had at first frightened
them by its size. The volleys of the Buccaneers soon drove the Spaniards
into the hold and made them cry for quarter, having killed the captain
at the first fire, and wounded the boatswain. Captain Sharp and twelve
others were the first to board. She proved to be _El Santo Rosario_,
commanded by Don Diego Lopez, bound from Callao to Panama. The crew were
forty in number. She was deeply laden with plate and coined money, and
carried 620 jars of wine and brandy. At Cape Passao Sharp sank the bark
taken at Nicoya, preserving her rigging, and disabling the last prize
set the prisoners adrift in it, keeping only the one man, named
Francisco, who had described himself as the best pilot in those seas.
They then divided the booty, which came to ninety-four pieces of eight a
man. From these prisoners they learned that their men taken at Arica had
been kindly treated at Callao. Of the last party that one had been
captured, and the rest had had to fight their way overland through
Indians and Spaniards. Ten Buccaneers were also announced as about to
enter the South Sea. In August they landed again to kill goats on the
island of Plate, where Ringrose and James Chappel, a quartermaster,
fought a duel on shore, with what result we do not know. The same
evening a conspiracy of the slaves was detected, in which they had
plotted to slay all their masters when in drink, not sparing any. The
ringleader, San Jago, a prisoner from Yqueque, leaped overboard when the
plot was discovered, and was shot by the captain. The rest, being
terrified at his death, were forgiven, and the same night the usual
debauch took place in spite of the danger. From their pilot they heard
that a Lima vessel bound for Guayaquil had run ashore lately on Santa
Clara, losing 100,000 pieces of eight, that would have been their prize.
They heard also that the Viceroy of Peru had beheaded the great Admiral
Ponce for not destroying the Buccaneer fleet while at Gorgona.

They next made a descent on Paita, but found the place garrisoned by
three companies horse and foot, well armed, from Puira, twelve leagues
up the country. 150 musketeers and 400 lancers occupied a hill and a
breast-work, and fired upon the canoes. Had they suffered them to land
they might have killed them to a man. Finding the whole coast now
alarmed, they bore at once away for the Straits of Magellan. Touching at
some unknown islands, they were almost inclined to winter there. Here
they shot geese, made broth of limpets, and one of the boats captured an
Indian and shot another dead. The prisoner was clad in a seal's skin,
and carried a net to catch penguins. He was so strong as to be able to
open mussels with his fingers, and they kept him as a slave, and called
him Orson. They then proceeded to divide eight chests of money still
unallotted, and each man received 322 pieces of eight. On December 7th
Captain Sharp received intelligence of a conspiracy to shoot him during
the ensuing festivities of Christmas-day. The only precaution he took
was at once to divide all the wine in store, believing that no sober man
would attempt so dastardly an act. Each mess received three jars. The
cold grew now so intense that several of the negro slaves had their feet
mortify, and some died. Christmas-day was celebrated by killing a fat
sow, this being the first flesh the men had eaten since they left the
island of Plata. By January 16th the days grew very hot again, and the
nights cool and dewy. The men, weary of the voyage, offered a piece of
eight "each man" to him who first discovered land. The sight of birds
soon indicated this, and January 28th the look-out spied Barbadoes; but
hearing of peace they dared not put in for fear of being seized, and
therefore steered for Antigua, much afraid of frigates, and shunning
even a Bristol interloper that lay in the offing. Ringrose says: "Here I
cannot easily express the infinite joy we were possessed with all this
day, to see our own countrymen again." They then freed a negro
shoemaker, whom they had kept as a prisoner, and who had been very
serviceable during the voyage. To Captain Sharp the men gave a mulatto
boy as slave, for a token of the respect of his whole company to him for
having led them safely through so many dangerous adventures. They then
divided the last parcels of money, and received twenty-four pieces of
eight a man. A little Spanish shock dog, taken from a prize, was also
sold at the mast by public outcry, for forty pieces of eight, the owner
promising all he gained should be devoted to a general feast. Captain
Sharp bought the dog, saying he would eat it if they did not soon get
leave to land. 100 pieces of eight was also added to the store, the
boatswain, carpenter, and quartermaster having quarrelled about the last
dividend.

On reaching Antigua Sharp sent a canoe ashore to buy tobacco and other
necessaries, and to ask leave of the governor to land. The conclusion of
Ringrose's book tells the rest: "The gentry of the place and common
people were very willing and desirous to receive us, but on Wednesday,
February 1st, the governor flatly refused us entry, at which all the
gentry were much troubled, showing themselves very kind to us; hereupon
we agreed among ourselves to give the ship to those of our company who
had no money left them of all their purchase in this voyage, having lost
it at play, and then put ourselves on board two ships bound for England.
So I myself and thirteen more of our company went on board Captain
Robert Porteen's ship called the _Lisbon Merchant_, set sail from La
Antigua February 11th, and landed in England March 26th, anno 1682."

On his arrival in England Captain Sharp was tried for piracy and
acquitted. He at once resolved to return to the West Indies, but all the
merchant ships refused to carry him, afraid he would tempt their men to
revolt against their master, and run away with the ship for a privateer,
as he had done before. No promises or entreaties could avail, and he
seemed doomed to remain a prisoner in an island for which he entertained
no filial affection.

He therefore hit upon a desperate scheme, worthy of such a man.
Collecting a little money he bought an old, half-rotten boat, lying near
London-bridge, for £20, and embarked with sixteen desperadoes equally
fearless as himself, carrying a supply of butter and cheese, and two
dozen pieces of salt beef. He sailed down the river and reached the
Downs, and there he boarded and captured a French vessel and sank his
boat. By a foray on Romney Marsh he supplied himself with cattle, and
sailed away like a bold Buccaneer as he was, to die no one knows where.




CHAPTER V.

DAMPIER'S VOYAGES.

    Leaves Captain Sharp--Land march over the Isthmus--Joins Captain
    Wright--Wreck of the French fleet--Returns to England--Second voyage
    with Captain Cook--Guinea coast--Juan Fernandez--Takes
    Ampalla--Takes Paita--Dampier's scheme of seizing the mines--Attacks
    Manilla galleon--Captain Swan--Death unknown. Van Horn--Captures
    galleons--Takes Vera Cruz--Killed in a duel by Le Graff.


Dampier, one of the wisest and best of English travellers, was himself a
Buccaneer. Son of a Somersetshire farmer, he went early to sea, and
became a freebooter without much compunction, just at the time when the
brothers of the coast were sinking into mere pirates. "No peace beyond
the line" was their early motto; "Friends to God and enemies to all
mankind," was the later. The flag, once reddened by the Spaniards'
blood, grew now black with the shadows of death and of the grave.

Dampier was among those who left Captain Sharp after the dreadful
repulse from Arica. His party consisted of forty-four Englishmen and two
Mosquito Indians, who determined to re-cross the Isthmus of Darien, and
return to the North Pacific Ocean. They carried with them a large
quantity of flour and chocolate mixed with sugar, and took a mutual and
terrible oath, that if any of their number sank from fatigue, he should
be shot by his comrades, rather than allow him to fall into the hands of
the Spaniards, who would not only torture him horribly, but compel him
to betray his companions.

In a fortnight after leaving the vessels they landed at the mouth of a
river in the Bay of St. Michael, where unloading their provisions and
arms they sank their boats; and while preparing for the inland journey,
the Indians caught fish, and built huts for them to sleep in. The next
day they struck into an Indian path and reached a village, but found,
to their alarm, that the Spaniards had placed armed ships at the mouths
of all the navigable rivers to intercept them on their return. Hiring an
Indian guide, they reached the day after a native house, but the savage
would neither give them food nor information. At any other time the
Buccaneers would have at once put him on the rack, or hung him at his
own door, but they felt this was no place to be angry, for their lives
lay in the enemy's hands. Neither dollars, hatchets, nor knives, would
move this stubborn man, till a sailor pulled a sky blue petticoat from
his bag and threw it over the head of the Indian's wife. Delighted with
the gift, she coaxed her husband till he gave them information and found
a guide. It had rained hard for two days, the country was difficult and
fatiguing, and there was no path that even an Indian eye could discover.
They guided themselves by day by the rivers, and at night by the stars.
They had frequently to ford the rivers twenty or thirty times in twelve
hours. Rain, cold, fatigue, and hunger made them forget even the
Spaniards.

In a few days they reached the house of a young Spanish Indian, who had
lived with the bishop of Panama, and who received them kindly. Here,
while resting to dry their arms and powder, their surgeon, Mr. Wafer,
had his knee burnt by an accidental explosion. After dragging himself
along with pain for another day, he determined to remain behind with two
or three more. He stayed five months with the Indians, and the published
account of his experiences still exists.

The rainy season that frightened Mr. Ringrose had now set in, and the
thunder and lightning was frequent and violent. The valleys and river
banks were overflowed, and the Buccaneers had to sleep in trees or under
their shade, instead of building warm and sheltering huts. In the very
height of their misery, the slaves fled and carried away all they could.
Dampier, whose only anxiety was to preserve his journal, placed it in a
bamboo, closed at both ends with wax. In fording one of the rivers, a
Buccaneer, who carried 300 dollars on his back, was swept down the
stream and drowned, but the survivors were too hopeless and weary to
look for either body or gold.

In eighteen days the English reached the river Concepcion, and,
obtaining Indian canoes, rowed to Le Sound's Key, one of the Samballas
islands, where Buccaneers rendezvoused. Here they embarked on board a
French privateer, commanded by Captain Tristian, dismissing their Indian
guides with presents of money, beads, and hatchets. At Springer's Key,
Tristian joined them with other vessels, and would have attacked Panama
had not Dampier and his men deterred them. For a week the council
deliberated about the available towns worth plundering from Trinidad to
Vera Cruz. The French and English could not agree, but at last all
sailed for Carpenter's River, touching at the isle of St. Andreas. The
ships separated in a gale; and Dampier taking a dislike to his French
commander, induced Captain Wright, an Englishman, to fit out a small
vessel and cruise for provisions along the coast. While the sailors
shot pecary, deer, parrots, pigeons, monkeys, and cuvassow birds, their
Mosquito Indians struck turtle for their use.

On returning to Le Sound's Key they were joined by Mr. Wafer, who had
escaped from the Darien Indians, but he was so painted and bedizened
that it was some time before they could recognize him. An Indian chief
had offered him his daughter in marriage, and he had only got away by
pretending to go in search of English dogs for hunting. Passing
Carthagena, they cast wistful eyes at the convent dedicated to the
Virgin, situated on a steep hill behind the town. There was immense
wealth hoarded in this place, rich offerings being frequently made to
it, and many miracles worked by our Lady. Any misfortune that befel the
Buccaneer was attributed to this Lady's doing, and the Spaniards
reported that she was abroad that night the _Oxford_ man-of-war blew up
at the isle of Vaca, and that she came home all wet, and with clothes
soiled and torn.

Captain Wright's company pillaged several small places about the Rio de
la Hache and the Rancherias pearl fisheries, and captured, after a
smart engagement, an armed ship of twelve guns and forty men, laden with
sugar, tobacco, and marmalade, bound to Carthagena from Santiago, in
Cuba. The Dutch governor of Curaçoa, having much trade with the
Spaniards, would not openly buy the cargo, but offered, if it was sent
among the Danes of St. Thomas, to purchase it through his agents. The
rovers, declining this, sold it at another Dutch colony, and then sailed
for the isle of Aves, so called from the quantity of boobies and
men-of-war birds. On a coral reef, near this island, Count d'Estrees had
shortly before lost the whole French fleet. He himself had first run
ashore, and firing guns to warn the rest of the danger, they hurried on
to the same shoal, thinking, in the darkness, that he had been attacked
by the enemy. The ships held together till the next day, and many men
were saved. The ordinary seamen died of hunger and fatigue, but the
Buccaneers, hardier, and accustomed to frequent wrecks, made the escape
an excuse for revel and debauchery. As Dampier says, they, "being used
to such accidents, lived merrily, and if they had gone to Jamaica with
£30 in their pockets, could not have enjoyed themselves more; for they
kept a gang by themselves and watched when the ships broke up, to get
the goods that came out of them, and, though much was staved against the
rocks, yet abundance of wine and brandy floated over the reef where they
waited to take it up." * * "There were about forty Frenchmen on board
one of the ships, in which was good store of liquor, till the after part
of her broke, and floated over the reef and was carried away to sea,
with all the men drinking and singing, who, being in drink, did not mind
the danger, but were never heard of afterwards."

This wreck having left the Bird Island a storehouse of masts and spars,
the Buccaneer vessels had begun to repair thither to careen and refit.
Among others, a Captain Pan, a Frenchman, had been there. A Dutch vessel
of twenty guns, despatched from Curaçoa to fish up the sunken cannon,
observing the privateer, resolved to capture him before he began his
diving. Pan, afraid of the Dutchman's superior force, abandoned his
vessel, and, landing his guns, prepared to throw up a redoubt. While
thus engaged, a Dutch sloop entered the road, and at night anchored at
the opposite end of the island. In the night, Pan, with two canoes,
boarded the ship, and made off, leaving his empty hulk for the Dutch
man-of-war.

At this island, Dampier's men careened their largest vessel, scrubbed
the sugar prize, and recovered two guns from the wreck. At the island of
Rocas, a Knight of Malta, captain of a French thirty-six gun ship,
bought ten tons of their sugar. Failing to sell any more sugar at Petit
Guaves, they sailed for Blanco, an uninhabited island, full of
lignum-vitæ trees, and teeming with iguanas, that were to be found in
the swamps, among the bushes, or in the trees. Their eggs were eaten by
the Buccaneers, who made soup of the flesh for their sick.

While cruising on the Caraccas coast, they landed in some of the bays,
and took seven or eight tons of cocoa, and three barks laden with
hides, brandy, earthenware, and European goods. Returning to the Rocas,
they divided the spoil, and Dampier and nineteen others embarking in one
of the prizes, reached Virginia July 1682.

Dampier's next voyage was with a Creole, named Cook, who arrived at
Virginia with a French vessel he had captured by a trick at Petit
Guaves. He had been quartermaster, or second in command, under a French
Flibustier named Gandy. By the usual Buccaneer law, he had been made
captain of a large Spanish prize. The French commanders in the same
fleet, jealous of this promotion, seized the ship, plundered the English
prize crew, and sent them ashore. Tristan, another French captain, took
ten of them with him to Petit Guaves. Cook and his nine companions,
taking advantage of a day when Tristan and many of his men were absent,
overpowered the rest of the crew, sent them ashore, and sailed to the
Isle à la Vache. Here he picked up a crew of English Buccaneers, and
steered for Virginia, taking two prizes by the way, one of which was a
French vessel, laden with wines. He then sold his wine and two of the
ships, and equipped the largest, the _Revenge_, with eighteen guns.
Amongst the crew were Dampier, Wafer, and Cowley, all of whom have
written narratives of their voyages. They sailed from the Chesapeak on
the 23rd of August 1683, and captured a Dutch vessel, laden with wine
and provisions. At the Cape de Verd islands they encountered a dreadful
storm, that lasted a week. While the ship scudded before wind and sea
under bare poles, she was suddenly broached to by order of the master,
and would have foundered but for Dampier and another man who, going
aloft and spreading out the flaps of their coats, righted the ship. At
the isle of Sal, the sailors feasted on flamingo tongues. These birds
stood in ranks round the feeding ponds, so as to resemble a new brick
wall. They purchased here some ambergris, which Dampier says he had in a
lump of 100 lbs. weight. Its origin was at that time unknown; it is now
believed to be a secretion of the whale. The governor and his court at
this island rejoiced in rags, their revenues being small, and drawn
principally from the salt ponds, from which the island derives its name.
Having dug wells, watered, and careened, they went to Mayo to obtain
provisions, but were not allowed to land, as only about a week before
Captain Bond, a pirate of Bristol, had carried off the governor and some
of his people.

Steering to the Straits of Magellan, they were driven to the Guinea
coast, and there captured a Danish ship by a stratagem. Captain Cook,
concealing his men under deck, approached the Dane like a weak, unarmed
merchant vessel. When quite close, he commanded in a loud voice the helm
to be put one way, while by a preconcerted plan the steersman shifted
into another, and fell on board the Dane, which was captured with the
loss of only five men. She was double their size, carried thirty-six
guns, and was equipped and victualled for a long voyage.

This vessel they called _The Bachelor's Delight_, and they at once
burned the _Revenge_, that she might "tell no tales."

During frequent tornadoes near the straits, being short of fresh meat,
the sailors caught sharks during the calms, and boiling their flesh,
stewed it with pepper and vinegar. When they reached the Falkland, or
Sebald de Weist islands, as they were then called, Dampier proposed to
the captain to reach Juan Fernandez by Cape Horn, avoiding the straits.
Their men being privateers, wilful, and not much in command, he feared
would not give sufficient attention in a passage so difficult, and,
though he owns they were more than usually obedient, he says he could
not expect to find them at an instant's call in critical moments. At
these islands they found the sea for a mile round red with shoals of
small, scarlet-shelled lobsters. Dampier's advice was not taken, but on
entering the South Sea they met the _Nicholas_, of London, a vessel
fitted out ostensibly as a trader, but being in reality a Buccaneer. The
captain came on board, related his adventures, and gave them a supply of
bread and beef. They reached Juan Fernandez together, and heard from the
_Nicholas_ of a vessel from London, called the _Cygnet_, commanded by
Captain Swan, which was sailing in those latitudes. It was a trader,
holding a licence from the Duke of York, then High Admiral of England.

The crews discovered on the island the Mosquito Indian left behind by
Captain Watling, in Lussan's expedition, because he was hunting goats
when the vessel sailed. He was warmly greeted by Dampier, a
fellow-countryman named Robin, and some old messmates. Robin, running up
to him, fell flat on his face at his feet, and then rose and embraced
him. They found he had killed three goats, and prepared some cabbage
palms, to feast his visitors. The interview, writes Dampier, was tender,
solemn, and affecting. When abandoned, William had nothing with him but
his gun and a knife, some powder, and some shot. By notching his knife
into a saw, he cut his gun barrel into pieces. These he hammered in the
fire, and ground them into lances, harpoons, hooks, and knives. He
hunted goats, fished, and killed seals. His clothes he made of skins,
and with these also he had lined his hut; and he had contrived to elude
the search of the Spaniards. Wild goats, originally brought by the
Spaniard, abounded on the hills and in the grassy valleys. There was
abundance of water and good timber, and the bays abounded with seals and
sea-lions, that covered the sea for a mile.

Remaining here sixteen days, for the sake of the sick and those ill with
the scurvy, and getting in water and provision, Cook then steered for
the American coast, standing out fourteen or fifteen leagues to escape
the notice of the Spaniard. The ridges were blue and mountainous. They
soon captured a timber ship from Guayaquil laden with timber for Lima,
from whose crew they heard that their arrival was known. They anchored
next at the sandy islet of Lobos de la Mar, and scrubbed their ships.
Captain Eaton, of the _Nicholas_, proposing to march with them in their
descents, and the two vessels mustering 108 able men, Cook soon took
another prize, and Eaton two more, which he pursued. They were laden
with flour from Lima for Panama, and in one of them was eight tons of
quince marmalade. The prisoners informed them that, on the rumour of
their approach, 800,000 pieces of eight had been landed at an
intermediate port. They sailed next to the Galapagos islands, abandoning
a design on Truxillo, which they heard had been lately fortified. On
these rocky, barren shores they feasted on turtle, pigeons, fish, and
the leaves of the mammee tree. Off Cape Blanco, Captain Cook died, and
was buried on land.

Capturing some Spanish Indians who had been sent as spies by the
Governor of Panama, they used them as guides, and landed on the coast in
search of cattle. Here a few of the men were surprised by fifty armed
Spaniards, and their boat burned. The sailors thus imperilled waded out
neck deep to an insulated rock near the shore, and remained there for
seven hours exposed to the Spanish bullets, till they were taken off by
a boat from their ship just as the tide was rising to devour them. The
Spanish, lurking in ambush, made no attempt to resist the rescue.

The quartermaster, Edward Davis, was now elected commander; and after
cutting lancewood for the handles of their oars, they bore away for Ria
Lexa, steering for a high volcano that rises above the town and the
island that forms the harbour. But here, too, the Spaniards had thrown
up breast-works and placed sentinels, and the Buccaneers sailed for the
Gulf of Ampalla and the island of Mangera. Davis captured the padre of a
village and two Indian boys, and, proceeding to Ampalla, informed the
people that he commanded a Biscay ship, sent by the King of Spain to
clear those seas of pirates, and that he had come there to careen. The
sailors were well received, and entertained with feasts and music, and
they all repaired together to celebrate a festival by torchlight in the
church. Here Davis hoped to cage them till he could dictate a ransom,
but the impatience of one of his men frustrated the plan. Pushing in a
lingering Indian, the man spread an alarm, the people all fled, and the
Buccaneers, firing, killed one of their chiefs. They remained, however,
good friends, and these very Indians soon after helped to store the
ship with cattle belonging to a nunnery, situated on an island in the
gulf. On leaving, Davis gave them one of his prize ships, and a quantity
of flour, and released the priest who had helped him in his first
stratagem.

The crews now quarrelled, and Davis, who claimed the largest share of
the common plunder, left them, taking Dampier with him. Eaton touched at
Cocos island, purchased a store of flour, and took in water and cocoa
nuts. Davis landed at Manta, a village near Cape St. Lorenzo, and
captured two old women, in order to obtain information. They learnt that
many Buccaneers had lately crossed the isthmus, and were coming along
the coast in canoes and piraguas. The viceroy had left no means untried
to check them; the goats on the uninhabited islands had been destroyed,
provisions were removed from the shore, and ships even burnt to save
them from the enemy. At La Plata, Davis was joined by Captain Swan in
the _Cygnet_, who had turned freebooter in self-defence. He had been
joined by Peter Harris, who commanded a small bark, and was nephew of
the Buccaneer commander killed in a sea-fight at Panama three years
before. They now sent for Eaton, but found from a letter at the
rendezvous at Lobos, that he had already sailed for the East Indies.
While the ships were refitting at La Plata, a small bark taken by Davis,
after the Spaniards had set it on fire, captured a Spaniard of 400 tons,
laden with timber, and brought word that the viceroy was fitting out ten
frigates to sweep them from the seas. Captain Swan, at this crisis,
turned wholly freebooter, and cleared his ship of goods by selling them
to every Buccaneer on credit. The bulky bales he threw overboard, the
silks and muslins he kept, and retained the iron bars for ballast. In
compensation for these sacrifices, the Buccaneers agreed to set aside
ten shares of all booty for Captain Swan's owners.

Having cleaned the vessels and fitted up a fire-ship, the squadron
landed at Paita, but found it deserted. Anchoring off the place, they
demanded as ransom 300 pecks of flour, 3000 pounds of sugar,
twenty-five jars of wine, and 1000 of water, and having coasted six days
and obtained nothing, they burnt the town in revenge, and sailed away.
They found afterwards that Eaton had been there not long before, landed
his prisoners, and burnt a ship in the road. Burning Harris's vessel,
which proved unseaworthy, the squadron steered for the island of Lobos
del Tierra, and, being short of food, took in a supply of seals,
penguins, and boobies, their Mosquito men supplying them with turtle,
while the ships were cleaned and provided with firewood, preparatory to
a descent upon Guayaquil. Embarking in their canoes, they captured in
the bay a small ship laden with Quito cloth and two vessels full of
negroes. One of these they dismasted, and a few only of the slaves they
took with them. From disagreement between the two crews, the expedition
failed. Having lain in the woods all night, and cut a road with great
difficulty, they abandoned the scheme without firing a shot, when almost
within a mile of the town, which they believed was alarmed, and on the
watch.

Dampier now proposed a scheme as feasible and grand as any of
Raleigh's. He declared that they never had a greater opportunity of
enriching themselves. His bold plan was, with the 1000 negroes lying in
the three prizes, to go and work the gold mines of St. Martha. The
Indians would at once join them from their hatred of the Spaniards. For
provision they had 200 tons of flour laid up in the Galapagos islands;
the North Sea would be open to them; thousands of Buccaneers would join
them from all parts of the West Indies; united they would be a match for
all the forces of Peru, and might be at once masters of the west coast
as high as Quito. This golden cloud melted into mere fog. The Buccaneers
returned to La Plata, divided the Quito cloth, and turned the Guayaquil
vessel into a tender for the _Swan_. The old Buccaneers of Davis now
quarrelled with the new recruits in the _Swan_, accused them of
cowardice and of having baulked the attempt on Guayaquil, and complained
of having to supply them with flour and turtle, for they had neither
provisions nor Indian fishermen. Unable to divorce, the ill-assorted
pair proceeded to attack together Lavelia, in the Bay of Panama. From
charts found in the prizes they checked the deceptions and errors of the
Spanish and Indian prisoners whom they employed as pilots. Their object
was now to search for canoes in rivers unvisited by the Spaniards, where
their schemes might remain still undiscovered.

Such rivers abounded from the equinoctial line to the Gulf of St.
Michael. When five days out from La Plata they made a sudden swoop on
the village of Tomaco, and captured a vessel laden with timber, with a
Spanish knight, eight sailors, and a canoe containing twelve jars of old
wine. A boat party that rowed up the St. Jago river visited a house
belonging to a lady of Lima, whose servants traded with the Indians for
gold, several ounces of which were found left by them in their
calabashes when they fled.

The twin vessels next sailed for the island of Gallo, capturing by the
way a packet boat from Lima, fishing up the letters, which the Spaniards
had thrown overboard attached to a buoy. From these they learnt that the
governor of Panama was hastening the departure of the triennial plate
fleet from Callo to Panama, where it would be carried on mules across
the isthmus. To intercept this fleet and to grow millionaires in a day
was now their only dream. They proceeded at once to careen their ships
at the Pearl islands in the bay of Panama. Their force consisted of two
ships, three barks, a fire-ship, and two small tenders. Near the
uninhabited island of Gorgona they captured a flour ship, and landing
most of their prisoners at Gorgona, they proceeded to the bay, captured
a small provision boat, and continued their watch, cruising round the
city.

Having cut off all communication between Panama and the islands in the
bay, Davis proposed an exchange of prisoners, surrendering forty monks,
whom he was glad to get rid of, for one of Harris's band and a sailor
who had been surprised while hunting on an island. The Lima fleet still
delaying, the Buccaneers anchored at Tavoga, an island abounding in
cocoa and mammee trees, and beautiful water. About this time they were
nearly ensnared by a Spanish ship, sent to the island at midnight under
pretence of clandestine traffic. This scheme originated in Captain Bond,
an English pirate who had deserted to the enemy. The squadron, which had
scattered in alarm, to avoid the fire-ship, were just re-uniting and
looking for their abandoned anchors, when a cry rose that a fleet of
armed canoes were steering direct towards them through the island
channel. This was the French Flibustiers of which we have given an
account in the adventures of Ravenau de Lussan. After joining in the
sea-fight off Panama, and the descent upon Leon and Ria Lexa, the
Buccaneers again split into small parties. Dampier joined Swan and
Townley, who determined to cruise along the shores of the mine country
of Mexico, and then, sailing as high as the south-west point of
California, cross the Pacific, and return to England by India. At
Guatalico, famous for its blowing rock, they landed their sick for a few
days, and obtained provisions, and, in a descent near Acapulco, stopped
a string of sixty laden mules and killed eighteen beeves, carrying off
all the cattle safely to their ships.

To obtain provisions, Swan sacked the town of St. Pecaque, on the coast
of New Gallicia, where large stores were kept for the use of the slaves
of the neighbouring mines. A great many of these he carried off the
first day on horseback and on the shoulders of his men. These visits
were repeated--a party of Buccaneers keeping the town till the Spaniards
had collected a force. Of this Captain Swan gave his men due warning,
exhorting them, on their way to their canoes with the burdens of maize,
to keep together in a compact body, but they chose to follow their own
course, every man straggling singly while leading his horse, or carrying
a load on his shoulder. They accordingly fell into the ambush the
Spaniards had laid for them, and to the amount of fifty were surprised
and mercilessly butchered. The Spaniards, seizing their arms and loaded
horses, fled, before Swan, who heard the distant firing, could come to
the assistance of his men. Fifty-four Englishmen and nine blacks fell in
this affair, which was the most severe the Buccaneers had encountered
in the South Sea. Dampier relates that Captain Swan had been warned of
this disaster by an astrologer he had consulted before he sailed from
England. Many of the men, too, had foreboded the misfortune; and the
previous night, while lying in the church of St. Pecaque, had been
disturbed by frequent groanings which kept them from sleeping.

This disaster drove Swan from the coast to careen at Cape St. Lucas, the
south point of California--in revenge for his loss leaving his pilot and
prisoners on an uninhabited island. While lying here, Dampier was cured
of dropsy by being buried all but his head in hot sand. The whole 150
men were now living on short allowances of maize, and the fish the
Indians struck salted for store. One meal a-day was now the rule, and
the victuals were served out by the quartermaster with the exactness of
gold. Yet, even in this distress, two dogs and two cats received their
daily shares. They now started for their cruise among the Philippines.
In a long run of 7,302 miles they saw no living thing--neither bird,
fish, nor insect, except one solitary flight of boobies. At the end of
the voyage the men were almost in mutiny at the want of food, and had
secretly resolved to kill and eat their captain (Swan), and afterwards,
in regular order, all who had promoted the voyage. At the island of
Gualan, where there was a Spanish fort and a garrison of thirty men, the
Buccaneers traded with the natives, who took them for Spaniards from
Acapulco.

Captain Eaton, who had visited the island before them on his way to
India, had, at the instigation of the Spaniards, plundered and killed
many of the natives, and driven the rest to emigration. While trading
here the Acapulco vessel arrived, and, being signalled by the governor,
took to flight; but in her hurry to escape ran upon a shoal, from which
she was with difficulty extricated. Swan, who now grew anxious for quiet
commerce, discouraged the pursuit, and proceeded quietly on his voyage.
At Mindanao, Captain Swan and thirty-six men were left behind by his
crew, who were only anxious for plunder, and soon after captured a
Spanish vessel bound for Manilla. Captain Swan was eventually drowned
while attempting to escape to a Dutch vessel lying in the river. Weary
of the mean robberies of the crew, who now turned mere pirates, Dampier
left them at the Nicobar islands, and, embarking in canoes, reached
Sumatra, and eventually sailed for England.

The Buccaneers left behind in the South Sea prospered, and made many
successful descents. At Lavelia Townley captured the treasure and
merchandise landed from the Lima ship in the former year, for which Swan
had watched so long in vain, and for which the Buccaneers had fought in
the Bay of Panama. Townley died of his wounds. Harris followed Swan
across the Pacific; and Knight, another English Buccaneer, satiated with
plunder, returned home laden with Spanish gold; and off Cape Corrientes
they lay in wait in vain for the Manilla ship, the great prize aimed at
by all adventurers. Soon after, a malignant fever breaking out among the
crews, many left the squadron and returned towards Panama, carrying
back the Darien Indians, but leaving the Mosquito Indians in the
_Cygnet_.

Davis sailed from Guayaquil to careen at the Galapagos islands, which
were in the South Pacific what Tortuga was in the North, the harbour and
sanctuary of the Buccaneers. In returning by Cape Horn, Davis discovered
Easter island, and left five of his men and five negro slaves on Juan
Fernandez. These men had been stripped at the gambling-table, and were
unwilling to return empty-handed. The _Bachelor's Delight_ eventually
doubled Cape Horn, and he reached the West Indies just in time to avail
himself of a pardon offered by royal proclamation.

Dampier reached England in 1691, and having published his travels, was
sent out in 1691 by William III. on a voyage of discovery to New
Holland, and was wrecked near Ascension. In Queen Anne's reign, during
the war of the succession, he commanded two privateers, and cruised
against the Spaniards in the South Sea. His objects were to capture the
Spanish plate vessels sailing from Buenos Ayres, to lie in wait for the
gold ship from Boldivia to Lima, and to seize the Manilla galleon. Off
Juan Fernandez he fought a French Buccaneer vessel for seven hours, but
parted without effecting a capture. So strong were his old Flibustier
habits upon him, that he confesses it with reluctance he attacked any
vessel not a Spaniard. Before they reached the proper latitude the
Boldivia vessel had sailed.

Captain Stradling, the commander of his companion ship, parted company.
A surprise of Santa Maria, in the bay of Panama, failed, but Dampier
made a few small prizes. While lying in the gulf of Nicoya, his chief
mate, John Clipperton, mutinied, and, seizing his tender, with its
ammunition and stores, put out to sea. A worse disappointment awaited
the commander--off the Fort de Narida he came suddenly upon the Manilla
galleon, and gave her several broadsides before she could clear for
action. But even at this disadvantage the Spaniards' twenty-four
pounders soon silenced Dampier's five pounders, drove in the rotten
planks of his vessel, the _St. George_, and compelled him to sheer
off--the galleon's crew quadrupling that of the English.

The men growing despondent and weary of the voyage, Dampier put
thirty-four of them into a prize brigantine of seventy tons, and
appointed one named Funnel as their commander. Allowing them to sail for
India, he with twenty-nine men returned to Peru and plundered the town
of Puna. The vessel being no longer fit for sea, they abandoned her at
Lobos de la Mar, and embarking in a Spanish brigantine crossed the
Pacific. In India, Dampier, having had his commission stolen by some of
his deserters, was imprisoned by the Dutch. When he reached England at
last, he found that Funnel had returned and published his voyage to the
West Indies. A few of his men who had lost their money in gambling
remained in the _Bachelor's Delight_ with Davis.

It is supposed he now fell into very extreme poverty, for in 1708 we
find him acting as pilot to the two Bristol privateers that
circumnavigated the globe, and were as successful as he had been
unfortunate. At Juan Fernandez the commander, Woodes Rogers, brought off
the celebrated Alexander Selkirk, who had been abandoned here four years
before, by Dampier's mutinous consort, Captain Stradling, and, by the
traveller's advice, the poor outcast was made second mate of the _Duke_.
At Guayaquil, where Dampier commanded the artillery, they obtained
plunder to the value of £21,000, besides 27,000 dollars, as ransom for
the town. Off Cape Lucas they captured a rich Manilla ship, laden with
merchandise, and containing £12,000 in gold and silver. They also
encountered the great Manilla galleon, but were beaten off after a
severe engagement with a loss of twenty-five men. After a run of two
months they reached Gualan, and obtained provisions by anchoring under
Spanish colours. Visiting Batavia, they waited a long time at the Cape
for a home-bound fleet, and in July, 1711, entered the Texel
five-and-twenty sail, Dutch and English; and in October sailed up the
Thames with booty valued at £150,000. Of the great Dampier we hear no
more, and his very burial place is unknown.

VAN HORN was originally a common Dutch sailor, who, having, by dint of
the prudence of his nation, saved 200 dollars, entered into partnership
with a messmate who had laid by the same sum, and, going to France,
obtained a privateer's commission, and fitted up a fishing-boat with a
crew of thirty men. Cruising first as Dutch, he then purchased a large
vessel at Ostend, and, hoisting the French flag, made war on all
nations. The French court ordered M. d'Estrees to detain this Flying
Dutchman, whose commission had now expired, and a ship was sent for the
purpose; but as the commander had no orders to proceed to extremities,
and Van Horn was determined not to go alive, he was suffered to escape.
Quite undaunted he proceeded to Puerto Rico, entered the bay, sounding
his trumpets, and, sending on shore, told the governor that he had come
to offer his services to escort the galleons which were then ready to
sail. The governor accepted the offer, and Van Horn sailed off with
them; but being soon joined by some Buccaneer companions, he turned on
the prey, seized the richest, sank some others, and pursued the rest.
Such was the commencement of this adventurer's career. His after life
was worthy of such a beginning.

Van Horn was immensely rich. He usually wore a string of pearls of
extraordinary size, and a large ruby of great beauty. His widow lived
afterwards at Ostend.

In 1683, Van Horn, who had all his life fought under French colours,
though not very scrupulous about what nation a vessel was, so it were
rich, having gone to St. Domingo to sell negroes, had his ship
confiscated by the Spanish governor. The Buccaneer's ungovernable
passions could no more brook such an insult than a knight would have
borne a blow. Buccaneer pride desired revenge; Buccaneer cupidity
desired redress. Resolved on vengeance, the angry Dutchman hastened to
Petit Guaves, and took out a commission from the governor of Tortuga,
and at once enrolled 300 of the bravest Buccaneers, with a determination
of attacking Vera Cruz. Among his crew were enrolled several of the
leading Buccaneer chiefs. Grammont, who had lately lost his ship at the
Isles des Aves, lately a commander, was now a mere volunteer. Such were
the vicissitudes of Buccaneer life. Laurence de Graff was also there. He
was a Dutchman like Van Horn, but one came from Ostend and the other
from Dort. Among the less celebrated were Godefroy and Jonqué. Their
numbers soon swelled to 1,200 picked men, in six vessels, under the
command of Van Horn and De Graff, who had each a frigate of fifty guns,
while the rest had simple barks. Their common aim was Vera Cruz, the
emporium of all the riches of New Spain, and they needed no other
incitement to urge them to speed and unity.

From some Spanish prisoners they heard that two large vessels laden with
cocoa were hourly expected at Vera Cruz from the Caraccas. The
Buccaneer leaders instantly fitted up two of their largest ships in the
Spanish fashion, and, hoisting the Spanish flag, sent them boldly into
the harbour, as if just returning as peaceful but armed traders from a
long and successful voyage. It was the eve of the Assumption, crowds of
sailors and townsmen lined the quays, and the expectant populace cheered
the rich merchantmen as they steered with a stately sweep into the
haven. The keener eyes, however, soon observed that the Caraccas vessels
advanced very slowly, although the wind was good, and their suspicions
became excited almost before the Buccaneers could work into port. Some
even ran to tell the governor that all was not right, but Don Luis de
Cordova told them that their fears were foolish, the two vessels he knew
by unmistakable signs to be the two vessels he expected; and he returned
the same answer to the commander of the fort at St. Jean d'Ulloa, who
also sent to bid him be upon his guard.

About midnight the French, under cover of the dark, landed at the old
town, about three leagues to the west of the more modern city. They
obtained easy access to the place, and surprised the governor in his
bed. The drowsy sentinels once overpowered, the small fortress with its
twelve guns was in the possession of their men. At every corner pickets
were placed. The surprise was so complete, that when the tocsin rang at
daybreak, the watchmen being alarmed at some musket shots they heard,
they found the town already bound hand and foot. At the first clang of
the bell, the garrison rushed out of their barracks, and ranged
themselves under their colours, but saw the French already in arms at
the head of all the principal streets. They were surrounded and
helpless. When the day broke, nobody dare show themselves, for all those
who ran out armed were instantly struck down. Sentinels were placed at
every door in the principal streets, a barrel of powder with the lid off
by their sides, ready to fire the train that connected one with the
other at the least signal of danger. We believe it was on this occasion
that Van Horn forced a monk into the cathedral, who preached to the
people on the vanity of worldly riches, and the necessity of abandoning
them to the spoiler. The Buccaneers then drove all the Spaniards into
their houses, and forced the women and children into the churches. Here
they remained, crowded together, weeping and hungry, for three days,
while their enemies collected the booty. The Buccaneers, now safe,
abandoned themselves, as usual, to debauchery and gluttony--some dying
from immoderate gluttony. Fortunately for this wretched people, the
bishop of the town, happening to be near Vera Cruz at the time, began to
treat for their ransom. It was fixed at two million piastres, of which a
part was paid the very same day--the Buccaneers only dispensing with the
remaining million, as the Vice-Royal was already approaching the town at
the head of a large force. Dangers were now hemming in the Dutchman and
his band. About eleven o'clock in the morning, the look-out on the tower
of St. Catherine's reported that a fleet of fourteen sail was
approaching the city.

The Buccaneers, alarmed, sprang to arms. Aghast at this intelligence,
the French, dreading to be shut in between two fires, decided upon an
immediate retreat. The townspeople, terrified at the prospect of being
massacred by their infuriated and despairing enemies, were as
apprehensive of danger as the Buccaneers themselves. Van Horn embarked
with speed all the plate and cochineal, and the more valuable and
portable of the spoil, and waited eagerly for the ransom which was now
almost in sight. It, however, never arrived, for the drivers of the
mules, hearing the firing, halted till the fleet came within sight. The
Buccaneers had no time to lose, and compensated themselves by carrying
off 1,500 slaves to their vessels, which lay moored at some leagues'
distance, at Grijaluc, a place of safety.

They spent the night in great disorder, in continual apprehension of
being attacked by the Spanish fleet, which was, at the same time,
congratulating itself on reaching Vera Cruz unharmed. The danger of the
Buccaneers was indeed not yet removed, for they had neither water nor
sufficient provisions, and some 1,500 prisoners were on board. About
these hostages the leaders differed in opinion, and words ran high. The
two chiefs fought, and Van Horn received a sword thrust in the arm from
De Graff. The several crews took up their captains' quarrels, and would
have come to blows, had not De Graff divided the prey, and at once set
sail. Van Horn followed, but died on the passage, a gangrene having
formed upon a wound at first very slight. He was devotedly beloved by
his men, says Charlevoix, though he was in the habit of cutting down any
sailor whom he saw flinch at his guns. He left his frigate with his
dying breath to Grammont, who reached St. Domingo, after dreadful
sufferings, having lost three-fourths of his prisoners by famine--his
patache being cast away and taken by the Spaniards. De Graff's vessel
was also wrecked, but the crew made their way one by one to St. Domingo,
where, in spite of the ill reception of the governor, they were welcomed
by the hospitality of the inhabitants, who longed to share the treasure
of Vera Cruz. The governor, M. de Franquesnoy, without fortress or
garrison, and exposed to the inroads of the Spaniards, could make no
resistance to these wild refugees, who, on one occasion, hearing that he
intended to seize upon part of the Vera Cruz booty, surrounded his house
to the number of 120 men, and threatened his life. At this time, a
general outbreak of the French was expected.

It was in the very next year that the governor of Carthagena, hearing
that Michael le Basque and Jonqué were cruising near his port, sent two
vessels against them, one of 48 guns and 300 men, and the other of 40
guns and 250 men, with a small bark as a decoy. The Buccaneer chiefs
each commanded a vessel of 30 guns and 200 men. They both grappled the
Spaniards, held them for an hour and a-half, swept their decks with
musketry, tortured them with hand grenades and missiles, and eventually
bore them off in triumph. All the Spaniards who were not killed were put
on shore with a note to the governor, thanking him for having sent them
two such good vessels, as their own had long been unfit for service.
They, moreover, promised to wait fifteen days off Carthagena for any
other vessel he might wish to get rid of, provided he would send money
in them, of which they were in great need.

END OF VOL. II.

LONDON: SERCOMBE AND JACK, 16 GREAT WINDMILL STREET.





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