THE BOYS’ BOOK OF BUCCANEERS

                                   BY

                            A. HYATT VERRILL

                               AUTHOR OF
                “AN AMERICAN CRUSOE,” “THE BOYS’ OUTDOOR
           VACATION BOOK,” “THE BOYS’ BOOK OF WHALERS,” ETC.


                              ILLUSTRATED


                                NEW YORK
                         DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
                                  1923




                           Copyright, 1923,
                    By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, Inc.

                      PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. BY
                       The Quinn & Boden Company

                          BOOK MANUFACTURERS
                           RAHWAY NEW JERSEY




CONTENTS


                                                                   PAGE

Chapter I      Who and What Were the Buccaneers?                      1

    Pirates and buccaneers. How the buccaneers originated. The first
    buccaneers. Settlement of Tortuga. How the buccaneers received
    their name. How the first prizes were taken. Originators of
    accident insurance. Pieces of eight and the origin of the dollar.
    Organization of the buccaneers.


Chapter II      Some Buccaneers and Their Ways                       14

    Pierre le Grand, the first famous buccaneer. How Le Grand took the
    admiral’s ship. Esquemeling and his chronicles. Bartholomew
    Portugues and his deeds. A remarkable escape. Rock Brasiliano. A
    brutal buccaneer. Brasiliano’s ruse. Francis L’Ollonois the cruel.
    The most bloodthirsty buccaneer. Cruelties of L’Ollonois. How
    L’Ollonois took Maracaibo. The death of L’Ollonois.


Chapter III      Morgan and His Road to Fame                         39

    Bravery of Spaniards. Attitude of the buccaneers. Early life of
    Morgan. The truth about Morgan. Queer character of Morgan.
    Treatment of prisoners. Buccaneers and Indians. Port Royal, the
    lair of the buccaneers. Attack on Old Providence. Morgan’s first
    raids. Morgan’s attack on Puerto Príncipe. The buccaneers in Cuba.
    Morgan prepares to attack Porto Bello. The Gold Road. Capture of
    Porto Bello. Morgan’s brutality. An exchange of pleasantries.


Chapter IV      The Sacking of Maracaibo                             64

    Morgan gathers a great fleet. Morgan’s treachery. Morgan’s narrow
    escape from destruction. Tortures and butcheries. Morgan is
    blockaded. The buccaneers defeat the Spanish fleet. Morgan’s ruse.
    The buccaneers escape from Maracaibo.


Chapter V      The Taking of San Lorenzo                             81

    Morgan’s greatest undertaking. The buccaneers’ greatest fleet. The
    capture of St. Catherine. The governor’s treachery. The buccaneers
    sail for the Chagres. Attack on San Lorenzo. The battle. How
    accident won the day. Valiant Spaniards. Capture of the castle. The
    buccaneers start for Panama. Hardships of the journey. In sight of
    Panama.


Chapter VI      The Sack of Panama                                  100

    The Jolly Roger. Buccaneers’ standards. How the buccaneers dressed.
    The battle before Old Panama. The buccaneers take the city.
    Morgan’s fury. Burning of Panama. Looting and torturing. Morgan’s
    vengeance. Morgan demands ransoms. Morgan’s gallantry. The return
    to the coast. Division of booty. Morgan deserts his men.


Chapter VII      The Misfortunes of Monsieur Ogeron                 119

    The golden altar of San José. Arrest of Morgan. Morgan knighted.
    The ex-buccaneer suppresses piracy. The end of Sir Henry Morgan.
    Ogeron sails for Curaçao. The buccaneers come to grief. How Ogeron
    escaped. Ogeron returns to Puerto Rico. Defeat of the buccaneers.
    Le Sieur Maintenon and his misfortunes. Odd characters among the
    buccaneers. The buccaneer poet. A buccaneer naturalist. The
    divinity student who was a buccaneer. Ringrose the navigator.


Chapter VIII      A Perilous Undertaking                            133

    A mad scheme. The plan of Sharp and his fellows. The buccaneers
    start across Darien. A terrible journey. Aid from the Indians. The
    buccaneers sight El Real de Santa Maria. Attack on the town. The
    buccaneers’ chagrin. The buccaneers go on towards Panama. Humanity
    wins its reward. In sight of the town. The Spanish fleet. A daring
    attempt. How the buccaneers took the Spanish fleet. Capture of the
    Santissima Trinidad. Valuable prizes. Dissensions and desertions.
    Trading with the Dons. Messages from the governor. Sawkins
    remembers an old friend. Loss of Captain Sawkins.


Chapter IX      The “Most Dangerous Voyage” of Captain Sharp        150

    More desertions. Captain Sharp tells his plans. An amazing program.
    An awful trip. What happened to Wafer. The transformed galleon
    starts on its cruise. Raids on the coast. At Juan Fernandez. The
    men want religion. Sharp is deposed. Watling and his ways. Sharp’s
    prophecy. The prophecy fulfilled. Watling’s death. Sharp takes
    command. The buccaneers repulsed. Mutinies and deserters. Sharp
    refits the Blessed Trinity. The buccaneers set forth on their most
    dangerous voyage. The buccaneers miss the Straits of Magellan.
    Around the Horn through unchartered seas. Up the Atlantic. At the
    journey’s end. The treasure the buccaneers threw away.


Chapter X      The Last of the Buccaneers                           174

    The buccaneers in the South Sea. The cruise of the Revenge. The
    Bachelors’ Delight. Davis and his raids. The cruise of the Cygnet.
    Reunion of old friends. The buccaneers are disappointed. Swan’s
    defeat. Ringrose’s death. Across the Pacific. The buccaneers in
    Madagascar. Townley takes vast treasure. The end of Townley. The
    sack of Guayaquil. Back to the Antilles. Buccaneers in the East
    Indies. Red Legs. A moral pirate. Red Legs’ chivalry. The penalty
    of a scolding wife. Major Stede Bonnet. An unfortunate pirate. End
    of Bonnet. The pirates in the Virgin Islands. Hamlin at St. Thomas.


Chapter XI      Kidd, the Pirate Who Wasn’t a Pirate                192

    Pirate treasure in fact and fancy. The truth about pirate treasure.
    Kidd’s unfounded fame. The true story of Captain Kidd. Trial of
    Captain Kidd. Death of Captain Kidd. A Don Quixote of the sea.
    Prince Rupert of the Rhine. A romantic figure. Shipwreck of Prince
    Rupert’s fleet. The death of Prince Rupert.


Chapter XII      Picturesque Pirates                                208

    The “Man with the glove in his hat.” My Lord, the Earl of
    Cumberland. The cruise of The Scourge of Malice. The Earl’s attack
    on Puerto Rico. The English take San Juan. The unseen foe. A losing
    battle. The Earl retreats. The most famous real pirate. Blackbeard.
    A monster in human form. Blackbeard’s courage. Blackbeard’s ways.
    Blackbeard’s castle. Origin of Blackbeard. How Blackbeard became a
    pirate. Blackbeard’s appearance. How Blackbeard amused his men. A
    pirate’s joke. A much-married pirate.


Chapter XIII      The End of Blackbeard                                 225

    Lieutenant Maynard’s attempt. The attack on the pirates. Maynard
    repulsed. A hand to hand battle. The fight. Maynard and Blackbeard
    fight a duel. A gruesome sight. Blackbeard’s death. The end of the
    pirates. The Lafitte brothers. Who the Lafittes were. The
    Baratarians. Smugglers. The governor’s proclamation. Denounced as
    pirates. Lafitte’s trial. The arrival of the British. Lafitte’s
    patriotism. The governor’s attack. The Baratarians destroyed.
    Lafitte proffers his services to General Jackson. Bravery of
    Lafitte and his men. Pardons. What became of the Lafittes. The end
    of piracy. What we owe the buccaneers.








ILLUSTRATIONS


At dawn the buccaneers sailed away.                        Frontispiece

                                                            FACING PAGE
Money of the buccaneers’ times                                       16
Cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish ship
  they saw                                                           17
He managed to secure two earthen wine jars and plugged their
  necks, with the idea of using them as floats                       34
The buccaneers swarmed over the ship’s rails                         35
Sir Henry Morgan, the most famous of the buccaneers, with one
  of his crew                                                        76
Burning the galleon                                                  77
The buccaneers’ fleet                                               116
The ruined tower of the cathedral in Old Panama                     117
Near the cathedral are the walls of the ancient fort                117
Dampier wrote his journal during lulls between battles              140
Piraguas. It was in boats like these that the earlier buccaneers
  captured their first Spanish ships                                141
Two ships were promptly fired and sunk                              168
The battered, patched old galleon sailed southward around Cape Horn 169
The merchants bid for the loot brought ashore                       188
All were in the best of spirits, smoking, drinking, spinning
  yarns of the sea                                                  189
The last of the pirate ships, the Vigilant, as she was originally
  rigged. Now a packet in the West Indies                           244










THE BOYS’ BOOK OF BUCCANEERS


CHAPTER I

WHO AND WHAT WERE THE BUCCANEERS?


Jack looked up from the book he had been reading. “Father,” he asked,
“what was a buccaneer? Cousin Fred says buccaneers and pirates were the
same thing, and Jim says they were not, and in this story they speak of
pirates and buccaneers both.”

“Fred and Jim are both wrong and both right,” replied Mr. Bickford.
“Buccaneers were pirates, but pirates were not necessarily buccaneers.
But nowadays the two are often confused and writers of stories do not
seem to realize the difference and make it still more confusing. When
Fred comes over to-night bring him into the library, and I’ll try to
straighten out the puzzle and tell you about the buccaneers.”

“Say, Fred!” cried Jack, when his cousin came bouncing into Jack’s den
that evening. “You were way off. Buccaneers were not the same as
pirates. Dad says so, and he’s going to tell us all about them
to-night. Come on down to the library.”

“That’ll be dandy,” agreed Fred, enthusiastically. “And of course if
Uncle Henry says they’re not the same, why they’re not, but I always
thought they were. I wonder if Captain Kidd was a pirate or a
buccaneer.”

“Ask Dad, he knows!” laughed Jack, as the two raced downstairs to Mr.
Bickford’s library.

They found him surrounded by books with odd, old-fashioned, worn
leather bindings and with some faded and yellowed maps and cuts on the
table before him.

“Well, boys,” he greeted them, “I suppose you want to know all about
the buccaneers who sailed the Spanish Main, eh?”

“Yes, and Fred wants to know if Captain Kidd was a pirate or a
buccaneer,” replied Jack.

“Neither!” laughed his father. “Captain Kidd was, as you boys would
say, ‘the goat’ of a lot of unprincipled men. But we’re getting ahead
too fast. We’ll discuss the famous Kidd when we come to him.”

“Well, that gets me!” declared Fred, as the boys found comfortable
seats in the big leather chairs. “Captain Kidd not a pirate!”

“Pirates,” began Mr. Bickford, leaning back in his chair, “have been
known ever since men first used boats. The earliest histories mention
them. There were Phœnician pirates, Greek pirates, Roman pirates, and
the old Vikings were nothing more or less than pirates. Then there were
the Malay pirates, the Tripolitan pirates and the Chinese pirates who
still exist, and we still have harbor pirates, oyster pirates and river
pirates. A pirate is any one who preys upon shipping or steals
merchandise in a boat, and he may be and usually is a sneaking,
cowardly rascal without a redeeming feature. Moreover, a pirate preys
on any one and every one, and while some pirates, such as the Vikings,
confined their forays to certain nations and their ships and did not
molest others, yet most pirates loot, murder and destroy with
impartiality and fall upon their own countrymen or others alike. But
the buccaneers were very different. In the first place, buccaneers were
not known until comparatively recent times and the first buccaneers had
their origin in 1625.

“At that time England was at war with Spain, and the Spanish Government
claimed all the New World and decreed that any ships found trading in
the Caribbean or neighboring waters, or any settlers found upon the
islands or the Spanish Main, were pirates and would be treated as
such.”

“But, Dad, what is the Spanish Main?” asked Jack, interrupting.

“I don’t wonder you ask,” replied his father. “To read of it one would
think it a body of water, for we hear of ‘sailing the Spanish Main.’
But in reality it was the mainland of South and Central America and
when the buccaneers spoke of ‘sailing the Spanish Main’ they meant
skirting the coast. But to continue. Of course the British and French
claimed many of the West Indies and, despite the dangers, settlers went
to them. Among the others that were settled was the island of St.
Kitts, which was settled by both French and English. Although the
settlers quarreled among themselves, still they managed to exist and
were becoming fairly prosperous when in 1625 the Spanish vessels swept
down upon them, burned their plantations and, after killing many of the
settlers, drove them into the woods. Without homes or means the
survivors sought to reëstablish themselves, but a few set sail in
little dugout canoes seeking new lands. In these little craft they
reached Santo Domingo, which was then known as Hispaniola, and was a
stronghold of the Spaniards. But it was such a marvelously rich and
promising country that the fugitive Frenchmen landed and sent back for
their companions. At first the Dons knew nothing of these new arrivals,
but as they increased, word of their presence reached the authorities,
and soldiers were sent to drive them off or destroy them.

“At that time Hispaniola was teeming with wild cattle, wild hogs, wild
horses and wild dogs, descendants of the animals introduced by the
Spaniards, and the Frenchmen occupied most of their time hunting and
killing these creatures. Their hides were valuable, and their meat was
preserved by drying it over fires or transforming it into a product
known to the Spaniards as ‘bucan.’ Thus the Frenchmen became known as
‘bucaniers,’ from which the name ‘buccaneer’ was derived. So you see
the buccaneers were not pirates at all at that time, and the name has
no connection with piracy.

“Owing to their occupation, the buccaneers became expert shots, good
woodsmen, hardy, reckless and daring, and they hated the Dons like
poison. But they could not stand against the Spanish troops and so,
taking to their canoes, they fled to the island of Tortuga, off the
northern coast of what is now Haiti. Here there were a few Spanish
settlers, but they were so outnumbered by the buccaneers that they made
no objection to their new neighbors. The Dons, however, had no
intention of letting the buccaneers alone and sent expeditions to drive
them off. Then the buccaneers started a merry game of puss in the
corner. When the Dons arrived at Tortuga the buccaneers slipped over to
the mainland, and when the Spaniards sought them there they sneaked
back to the island. By this time they had been joined by many English,
a few Portuguese and a number of Dutch, and feeling their numbers were
sufficient to make a stand, they proceeded to fortify Tortuga. They
selected a high rocky hill on the summit of which was a deep depression
and with infinite labor converted this into a fort, mounted cannon and
stored a supply of wood and ammunition. Then they destroyed the only
approach—a narrow defile—and the fort could only be reached by means of
ladders lowered from the parapets.

“For a long time the Dons left them alone, realizing the impossibility
of taking the fort, and the little settlement prospered and grew. The
French sent out a governor and there at the very threshold of the Dons’
richest possession the handful of buccaneers lived and plied their
trade. But although they were composed of half a dozen different races,
one and all hated the Spaniards and soon, not content with
buccaneering, they became ambitious and with reckless bravery set out
in small canoes with the intention of capturing Spanish ships. It seems
incredible that these rough, untrained hunters could seize a heavily
armed ship swarming with sailors and soldiers, but nevertheless they
did. Lying in wait in the track of ships they would pull to the first
Spanish galleon that appeared and, while their expert marksmen would
pick off the Spanish gunners and the helmsman, they would dash
alongside, so close that the cannon could not bear upon them. Jamming
the ship’s rudder with their boat, they would swarm up and over the
bulwarks, pistols and swords in hand and knives in teeth and, yelling
like demons, would rush the crew, cutting, slashing, shooting and
stabbing. Seldom did they fail, and thus having secured ships and guns,
to say nothing of treasure, they would sail back to their lair, flushed
with victory. Then, having good ships and plenty of heavy guns, they
transformed their prizes into privateers and set sail in search of more
Spanish ships to conquer.

“You must remember that at this time England and France were at war
with Spain, and hence the buccaneers were in no sense pirates. Many of
them were given commissions to prey on the Dons as privateers, and
their acts were considered a legitimate part of warfare and were
encouraged and fostered by the officials.

“And having gone thus far they realized that organization was
necessary. Hence a sort of association was formed, or perhaps we might
call it a society, which they called ‘Brethren of the Main’ and laws,
rules and agreements were drawn up, to which, oddly enough, the
buccaneers were wonderfully faithful.

“Another interesting thing is the fact that these buccaneers were the
originators of life and accident insurance. Before a ship set out a
council was held, and papers were drawn up stating how large a share of
the loot each man should have for his services, aside from his ‘lay’ of
loot, and how much should be paid for the death of a man or injuries
received. Thus the loss of a right arm was valued at six hundred pieces
of eight or six slaves; a left arm was valued at five hundred pieces of
eight or five slaves; a right leg, five hundred pieces of eight or five
slaves; a left leg, four hundred pieces of eight or four slaves; an eye
or a finger, one hundred pieces of eight or one slave.”

“Please, Dad,” cried Jack. “Do tell us what a piece of eight is before
you go on. We read about them and about doubloons and onzas, but no one
seems to know what they are.”

“That’s a question well put,” replied Mr. Bickford. “A piece of eight
was a silver coin of eight reals. As a real was nominally twelve and
one-half cents, or half a peseta of twenty-five centavos, the piece of
eight was nominally a dollar of one hundred centavos. The doubloon was
one hundred reals, or about ten dollars, and was a gold coin, while the
onza, or double doubloon, was two hundred reals, or about twenty
dollars, and was also of gold. But as the peseta is really worth only
twenty cents in present values the piece of eight is worth eighty
cents, and if you go to any money exchange you can buy Spanish silver
‘dollars,’ as they are called, for eighty cents, which are genuine
‘pieces of eight.’ For smaller coins, the old Dons and buccaneers used
what were called ‘cross money.’ These were irregular-shaped slugs cut
from the pieces of eight and with the lettering hammered out, leaving
only the cross-shaped center of the Spanish shield to prove the coin
was minted silver of a definite value. Sometimes, if the piece did not
bear this cross, the priests stamped a cross upon it to prove its
genuineness—a sort of hall mark so to speak. These odd cross money
coins are still in use in remote parts of Panama and, although no two
are exactly alike in size or shape, the natives recognize them as
quarters, eighths or sixteenths of a piece of eight, or in other words,
as half reals, one-real and two-real pieces. And speaking of these old
coins, did you ever know that the piece of eight was the grandfather of
our own dollar, and was the forerunner of the metric system, and that
our symbol for the dollar came from the sign used to designate the
piece of eight?”

“No, indeed,” declared Fred. “Do tell us about that.”

“In the old days,” smiled Mr. Bickford, as he continued, “nearly all
countries used the piece of eight as the standard of exchange and
barter. It was used in the American colonies, but after the United
States were formed it was decided to mint a standard coin for the new
republic. As the piece of eight was the recognized standard, the new
coin was made of the same weight and value to avoid trouble and
confusion in trade and commerce. All the accounts had been kept in
pieces of eight, the symbol for which was a figure eight with a line
through it like this, $, and which may have originally been a figure
eight with a line through it or, as some claim, a conventional Pillar
of Hercules such as appeared on the pieces of eight, and so the
accountants and clerks found it easier to use the same symbol with the
addition of another line to designate dollars than to evolve a new
symbol. So you see our dollar sign is really a modification of the old
sign for the piece of eight.”

“Gosh! I’ll be more interested in dollar signs now,” declared Jack,
“and every time I see one I’ll remember what a piece of eight was.”

“As I was saying,” went on his father, “the agreements and papers were
drawn up, a captain was chosen, the buccaneers made forays into the
Spanish territory and stole what cattle and hogs and other supplies
they required, and the ships set forth to capture Spanish prizes and
raid the towns on the Spanish Main.

“The crews were rough, reckless, daredevils of every race; soldiers of
fortune who had drifted to Tortuga and joined the Brethren, and as they
had everything to gain and nothing to lose they exhibited bravery, took
risks and performed deeds which have never been equaled. But they were
not real pirates by any means—except in the eyes of the Spaniards. They
never molested French or British ships, they were openly welcomed and
aided in the French or British islands, and even when peace was
declared and the buccaneers still continued to prey upon the Dons, the
authorities winked at them and gave them refuge. But in time
dissensions arose between the English, the Dutch and the French
buccaneers at Tortuga, and the various nationalities separated and each
took separate spots for their strongholds. The Virgin Islands were
favorite lairs, for the Danish and Dutch owners were safe from their
attacks by sheltering the freebooters, who spent money as recklessly as
they won it, and the buccaneers had stringent rules, and the death
penalty was inflicted upon any man who molested the persons or
properties of the friendly islanders. The British buccaneers made Port
Royal, Jamaica, their stronghold, and that town became famed as the
richest and wickedest city in the world. Another lair was a little
island in Samaná Bay in Santo Domingo, and the Cayman Islands south of
Cuba, the Bay Islands off Honduras and several islands off the Coast of
Venezuela also became nests for the freebooters.

“At first, of course, all the buccaneers were equal. There were none
who knew more of buccaneering than the others, all pooled their
resources and the captains were elected by vote or won their place
through owning a ship or having captured one. But gradually certain men
won fame and prestige for their cruelty, their daring or their success,
and rapidly rose to recognized leadership and became famous as
buccaneer chiefs.








CHAPTER II

SOME BUCCANEERS AND THEIR WAYS


“Now, having learned why the buccaneers were so called and how they
came into existence, we’ll take up a more interesting matter, and I’ll
try to tell you something of the men themselves, of the most famous
buccaneers and of their deeds,” continued Mr. Bickford.

“Certain famous buccaneers’ names are almost household words—such as
Morgan, Montbars, L’Ollonois and your friend Captain Kidd, who, as I
said, was no buccaneer—but others, who did even braver and more
terrible things and were the most noted of buccaneers in their day, are
almost unknown to the world to-day. Among these was Pierre Le Grand,
Brasiliano, Bartholomew Portugues, Sawkins, Sharp, Davis, Red Legs,
Cook, Dampier, Mansvelt, Prince Rupert and many others.”

“But you’ve forgotten Drake and Hawkins and Blackbeard,” put in Jack.

“None of those men were buccaneers,” his father declared. “Drake and
Hawkins were privateers—Drake being Admiral of Queen Elizabeth’s
navy—and won their fame in the destruction of the Spanish Armada. Later
they attacked and took towns on the Spanish Main and destroyed Spanish
ships, but they were neither pirates nor buccaneers. In fact, they were
both dead before buccaneers became of any importance as sea rovers. On
the other hand, Blackbeard was an ordinary pirate—a sea robber who made
no attempt to discriminate between friend and foe and scuttled and
robbed ships of his own countrymen as readily as those of other
nationalities. But as he was an interesting character and was among the
last of the important or dangerous pirates of the Caribbean I will tell
you something of his life and career later.

“The first buccaneer to rise to any fame was Pierre Le Grand, or as he
was oftener called, Peter the Great, a native of Dieppe in Normandy. Le
Grand’s first and only achievement, and the one which brought him fame,
was the taking of the Vice Admiral of the Spanish fleet near Cape
Tiburon in Haiti. With a small boat manned by twenty-eight of the rough
buccaneers Le Grand set forth in search of prizes and cruised among the
Bahamas, but for many days saw no ship. Provisions were running low,
his men were grumbling and he had about decided to give up in despair
when they sighted a huge Spanish ship which had become separated from
the rest of the convoy. Setting sail they headed for the vessel and at
twilight were very close. In order to force his men to their utmost, Le
Grand ordered one of his crew to bore holes in the bottom of the boat
and then, running their tiny craft alongside the Don, and armed only
with swords and pistols, the buccaneers swarmed over the sides of the
doomed ship. Taken absolutely by surprise, for the Spaniards had not
dreamed that the handful of ragged men in a tiny sail boat intended to
attack them, the crew of the ship, nevertheless, resisted stoutly. But
they were ruthlessly cut down and while some of the buccaneers drove
the Spaniards across the deck, others with Le Grand at their head,
dashed into the cabin where the unsuspecting Vice Admiral was enjoying
a quiet game of cards with his officers.

“As Le Grand leaped across the room and placed his pistol at the
Admiral’s breast the dumbfounded Spaniard exclaimed, ‘Lord bless us!
Are these devils or what?’

“But he soon realized that whatever they were his ship was in their
hands and that he and his men were prisoners. Le Grand, however, was
neither a brutal nor a bloodthirsty wretch, as were many of his
successors, and, having impressed as many of the Spanish seamen into
his service as he required, he set the others, including the Admiral
and the officers, ashore, and set sail with his prize for France. So
great was the booty he secured by this one coup that he gave up
buccaneering and settled down in France for life.

“But his deed fired the buccaneers on Tortuga with dreams of easily
acquired prizes and riches, and soon a host of the rough hunters and
woodsmen were cruising about in small boats and attacking every Spanish
ship they saw. Indeed, many, unable to secure sailboats, actually went
a-pirating in tiny dugout canoes, and so daring and reckless were they
that, despite their handicaps, they took two huge galleons laden with
plate within the first month, as well as many smaller vessels. Now that
they had seaworthy ships and plenty of wealth at their disposal they
became bolder and bolder, and were soon not only cruising the Caribbean
Sea, and taking ships, but were attacking the fortified and wealthy
towns along the Central and South American coast with success. And let
me mention here that it was very seldom that the buccaneers made use of
the larger ships in their piratical raids. The smaller vessels were
faster, they were more easily handled, and when necessity arose they
could slip through narrow, shoal channels through which the Spanish
men-of-war could not follow. The buccaneers’ vessels seldom carried
over six guns, many had but two or three, but they swarmed with men
armed to the teeth, and the buccaneers depended far more upon a dashing
attack and hand-to-hand fights than upon cannon fire.”

“Excuse me, Dad,” interrupted Jack, “but are there books that tell all
these things?”

“Yes, Jack,” replied Mr. Bickford. “And the best and most complete is a
book called ‘The Buccaneers of America.’ It was written by a buccaneer,
a man named Esquemeling, who took part in nearly all the most famous of
the buccaneers’ raids and served with Morgan, L’Ollonois and many other
buccaneer chiefs. His own history is almost as interesting as that of
any of the men of whom he wrote. He was a Hollander by birth, but went
to Tortuga as a clerk for the West India Company of France. The
company, however, found that although the buccaneers were quite willing
to purchase goods it was quite another matter when it came to paying
for them, and as a result, the West India Company abandoned their
agency in Tortuga and gave orders that all their goods and chattels on
the island should be sold for what they would bring. This included
servants of the company as well, and Esquemeling found himself sold for
a slave for thirty pieces of eight. His master was a cruel, tyrannical
man and abused his Dutch slave shamefully, although offering to let him
buy his freedom for three hundred pieces of eight. Esquemeling,
however, as he says himself, ‘was not master of one in the whole
world.’ Finally Esquemeling became weak and ill from abuse and
inadequate food, and his cruel master, fearing the man would die and he
would be out of pocket and without a slave as well, disposed of the
sick Hollander for seventy pieces of eight. His new master was a
surgeon and a kindly man and, having doctored Esquemeling and restored
him to health and strength, at the end of a year he gave him his
liberty, exacting only the promise that Esquemeling should pay him one
hundred pieces of eight when in a position to do so. Being, as he
himself says, ‘at liberty but like unto Adam when he was first created,
that is, naked and destitute of all human necessities,’ and with no
means of earning a livelihood, Esquemeling threw in his lot with the
buccaneers and he remained with them for a number of years. Being by
profession a clerk, Esquemeling kept the logs and accounts of the
buccaneers and also a journal of his own in which he recorded all the
details and events of his adventurous life. His work is, in fact, the
only authentic account of these men, and his quaint phraseology and
droll remarks are very amusing. I have the book here, boys, and you’ll
find it more interesting and absorbing than any story or fiction of the
buccaneers that ever was written.

“The first buccaneer of note with whom Esquemeling sailed was
Bartholomew Portugues, so called as he was a native of Portugal.
Portugues left Jamaica in a small ship of four small carronades with a
crew of thirty men, and went cruising off Cuba. A few days later he met
a heavily armed galleon bound to Havana from Cartagena and at once
attacked her. Although the Spaniard carried a crew of over seventy, in
addition to passengers, and was armed with twenty heavy cannon, yet
Portugues assaulted the Dons without hesitation and after a desperate
battle in which nearly fifty Spaniards were killed and wounded, the
buccaneers took the galleon with a loss of only ten men killed and four
wounded. Owing to contrary winds Portugues could not return directly to
either Tortuga or Jamaica and so set sail for Cape San Antonio at the
western extremity of Cuba. There he made necessary repairs to his prize
and secured a supply of fresh water. As they were setting sail the
buccaneers were surprised by three great Spanish ships and, greatly
outnumbered, were taken prisoners and stripped of the booty they had so
recently secured, a treasure of over ten thousand pieces of eight, in
addition to valuable merchandise. We can imagine the chagrin of the
buccaneers at this turn of fate and no doubt they gave themselves up
for lost. But luck was with them. Two days after they had been made
prisoners a great storm arose, the vessels became separated and the one
containing the buccaneers was driven to Campeche in Yucatan. When the
residents learned that Portugues and his fellows were captives on board
there was great rejoicing, and the authorities sent off to the ship
demanding that the buccaneers be delivered to them. After a
consultation, however, it was decided safer to leave the prisoners
aboard and in preparation for a general hanging a number of gibbets
were erected on shore. These were in plain view of the buccaneers, and
Portugues resolved to make a desperate effort to escape and to cheat
the expectant Dons of the grewsome spectacle. He managed to secure two
earthen wine jars and, having plugged their necks with the idea of
using them as floats, he waited patiently for darkness. But the sentry,
who hitherto had been a careless, sleepy fellow, was unusually alert,
and seeing this, Portugues seized a knife which he had surreptitiously
obtained and, to quote Esquemeling, ‘gave him such a mortal stab as
suddenly deprived him of life and the possibility of making any noise.’
Then the buccaneer captain leaped into the sea and aided by his
extemporized water-wings managed to gain the shore. But his troubles
had only begun. At once the hue and cry of his escape was raised, and
for three days Portugues concealed himself in a hollow tree without
food while the Dons searched all about. At last, abandoning their hunt,
the Spaniards returned to the town, and Portugues set out afoot for the
Gulf of Triste, where he hoped to find other buccaneers to aid him in
rescuing his comrades.

“It is almost impossible to imagine what this meant or the seemingly
insurmountable hardships the buccaneer captain deliberately faced, and
it is also a most striking example of the faithfulness of the
buccaneers to one another, which was one of the chief causes why they
were so successful. Remember, Portugues was unarmed, for he had left
the knife in the sentry’s back, he was without food, he had been half
starved by his captors, and yet he calmly set out on a one hundred and
fifty mile tramp through the jungle and along the jagged rocks of the
seacoast; through a country infested by mosquitoes and stinging
insects, by savage hostile Indians, and through swamps reeking with
malaria. Every settlement and town had to be avoided, as they were all
filled with his enemies, the Spaniards, and throughout that long and
terrible journey the buccaneer subsisted entirely upon the few
shellfish he found along the shore and upon the roots of forest herbs.

“Moreover, several large and many small rivers crossed his route and
not being able to swim his case seemed hopeless. But while searching
about the banks of the first large stream, looking for a possible ford,
he found an old plank with a few large spikes in it. After tremendous
efforts he managed to withdraw these nails and with infinite patience
whetted them against stones until he secured a sharp knifelike edge.
Just think of that, boys, when you read of modern hardships endured by
men left to their own resources in a forest. Imagine rubbing a ship’s
spike back and forth upon a stone until it has been transformed into a
knife!

“But the preparation of the nails, incredible as it sounds, was not the
worst of his labors. With these crude implements the buccaneer actually
hacked off branches of trees, cut vines and pliant reeds and with these
constructed a raft with which he crossed the stream. At every large
river he repeated the work and eventually arrived safely at the Gulf of
Triste fourteen days after escaping from the ship. Here, as he had
expected, he found a buccaneer vessel with a captain whom he knew and,
telling of his comrades’ plight, he begged the captain to lend him a
boat and twenty men to go to his men’s rescue. This the captain gladly
did, and eight days later, Portugues was back at Campeche. So small was
the boat that the Spaniards never dreamed that its occupants were
enemies or buccaneers, but thought it a craft from shore bringing off
cargo, and they watched it approach without the least fear or
preparations for defense.

“Thus the buccaneers completely surprised the Dons and after a short,
sharp struggle were in possession of the ship and had released the
imprisoned buccaneers—or rather most of them, for the Dons had hanged a
few.

“Realizing that other Spanish vessels might appear and attack him with
overwhelming force at any time, Portugues at once set sail in the ship
wherein he had so long been a helpless captive, and once more in
possession of his booty with vast riches in addition. Steering a course
for Jamaica he was off the Isle of Pines when the fickle fate which
always followed him once more turned her back and the ship went upon
the reefs of the Jardines. The ship was a total loss and sunk with all
her treasure, while Portugues and his comrades barely escaped with
their lives in a canoe. Although they managed to reach Jamaica without
misfortune, luck had deserted Portugues for all time and while he tried
time after time to recoup his fortunes all his efforts were in vain. He
became an ordinary seaman and was soon forgotten.

“Another buccaneer whose exploits were as remarkable as Portugues’ and
whose most notable exploits also took place in Yucatan, was a Dutchman
who was nicknamed Rock Brasiliano, owing to his long residence in
Brazil. As an ordinary mariner he joined the buccaneers in Jamaica and
soon so distinguished himself by his bravery and resourcefulness that
when, after a dispute with his captain, he deserted the ship, he was
chosen chief by a number of his fellows and, securing a small vessel,
he set forth to capture a prize. Within a few days he seized a large
Spanish ship with a vast treasure aboard which he carried into Jamaica
in triumph. This exploit at once brought him fame and men flocked to
his service. But, unlike Portugues, who seems to have been a very
decent and respectable sort of rascal, Brasiliano was a drunken, brutal
scallawag. As Esquemeling says, ‘Neither in his domestic or private
affairs had he good behavior or government over himself.’ When drunk,
as he always was when ashore, his favorite amusement was to race up and
down the streets, beating, stabbing or shooting all whom he met, very
much as our Western ‘bad men’ used to ‘shoot up’ a town in the old
days.

“Moreover, Brasiliano was unspeakably bloodthirsty and cruel. Whenever
he captured Spaniards he put them to the most horrible tortures, and in
order to force them to reveal the hiding places of their treasures he
would flay them alive, tear them limb from limb or roast them on spits
over slow fires. As a result, he became a feared and dreaded man, and
the mere mention of his name caused the Dons to shudder and to huddle
within their stockades. Nevertheless Brasiliano was a brave, a
resourceful and a most remarkable man and performed some most
noteworthy exploits. On one occasion he was cruising off the coast of
Yucatan when a violent storm drove his ship upon the rocks, and he and
his men escaped with only their muskets and a slender stock of
ammunition. They landed on a desolate, uninhabited stretch of coast
midway between Campeche and the Gulf of Triste and, quite undeterred by
their plight, commenced an overland march towards the Gulf exactly as
Portugues had done. But they had not proceeded far when they were
surprised by a cavalcade of over one hundred Spanish horsemen. Despite
the fact that the buccaneers numbered less than thirty, yet they had no
thought of either retreat or surrender, but at once prepared to meet
the oncoming cavalry. Expert marksmen as they were, a Don fell for
every bullet fired and for an hour the handful of buccaneers kept the
Spaniards at bay until, finding the cost too heavy, the cavalry
retreated towards the town. Killing the wounded and stripping the dead
of their arms and equipment, the buccaneers continued on the journey
mounted on the horses of the dead Dons, the total loss of Brasiliano’s
forces being but two killed and two wounded. Quite encouraged by their
success, the buccaneers approached a little port and saw a boat lying
at anchor in the harbor and protecting a fleet of canoes that were
loading logwood. With little trouble the buccaneers captured the canoes
and with wild shouts and yells bore down upon the little gunboat. The
Spaniards aboard, terrified at sight of the buccaneers, surrendered
after a short fight, but, to the buccaneers’ chagrin, they found
scarcely any provisions on their prize. This did not trouble them long,
however, and promptly killing the Spaniards’ horses they dressed them,
salted the meat and, thus equipped, sailed forth to capture more
vessels. In this they were highly successful, and in a few weeks
Brasiliano sailed into Port Royal with nearly one hundred thousand
pieces of eight and much merchandise. But the buccaneers invariably
wasted all their hard-won money recklessly. It was not uncommon for one
of them to spend several thousand pieces of eight in a single night of
drinking, gambling and carousing and so, within a few days, Brasiliano
and his men were forced to go to sea again. Having had good fortune at
Yucatan, he set sail for Campeche, but fifteen days after his arrival
on the coast he was captured with several of his men while spying on
the city and harbor in a canoe. They were at once cast into a dungeon
to await execution, but Brasiliano was by no means at the end of his
resources. By some method he managed to secure writing materials and
composed a most wonderful letter purporting to be written by another
buccaneer chief and in which the supposed author threatened dire
reprisals on any Spaniard captured by the buccaneers if Brasiliano and
his men were harmed. This epistle was delivered to the Governor—though
how on earth Brasiliano managed it no one knows—and His Excellency,
having had plenty of experience with buccaneers, was so frightened at
its contents that he at once liberated his prisoners, only exacting an
oath that they would abandon buccaneering. Then, to insure their
keeping their promise, he sent them as sailors on a galleon bound for
Spain. With their wages from the trip they at once returned to Jamaica
and, regardless of pledges, were soon harassing and murdering the Dons
right and left.

“But neither Portugues or Brasiliano could compare in cruelty, daring,
bloodthirstiness or rascality with Francis L’Ollonois. In his youth
L’Ollonois was transported to the West Indies as a bond servant, or
virtually a slave, and, winning his freedom, made his way to Tortuga
and joined the buccaneers.

“So unspeakably cruel and bestially inhuman was this Frenchman that
even his fellow buccaneers sickened of his ways and Esquemeling speaks
of him as ‘that infernal wretch’ or ‘that despicable and execrable
pirate.’ For a time after joining the Brethren of the Main, L’Ollonois
served as a common seaman, but his courage and reckless daring soon
brought him to the attention of Monsieur de la Place, the governor of
Tortuga, who was heartily in sympathy with the buccaneers. The governor
therefore provided L’Ollonois with a ship and outfitted him, the
agreement of course being that La Place should have a share of the
booty taken. Within a very short time L’Ollonois had taken several
vessels and immense riches, while his awful cruelties made him a
dreaded and famed character throughout the Caribbean. Indeed, so
merciless was he that the Dons, rather than surrender to the monster,
would leap into the sea or blow out their own brains, knowing that
quick death by any means was preferable to the tortures they would
endure at L’Ollonois’ hands. His first disaster occurred when his ship
was wrecked on the coast of Yucatan. The men all escaped, but were
immediately attacked by the Spaniards, who killed the greater portion
of the buccaneers and wounded L’Ollonois. Seeing no means of escape the
captain smeared himself with blood and sand and crawling among the dead
bodies lay motionless. The Dons were completely fooled and, not
recognizing L’Ollonois and thinking him merely a dead sailor, left the
field after a brief search for the buccaneer chief, whereupon he made
for the woods and lived upon roots until his wounds healed. Then,
having stolen garments from a Spaniard whom he killed, the rascal
walked calmly into Campeche. Here he conversed with several slaves and,
promising them liberty in return for their services, he succeeded in
getting a large canoe and with the slaves to help he reached Tortuga in
safety. In the meantime the Spaniards were rejoicing at thought of the
dread L’Ollonois being killed, for his men, who had been made
prisoners, told the Dons that he had fallen in the battle.

“His next raid was on the town of Cayos in Cuba, and word of his
approach was sent post-haste to the governor at Havana. We can readily
imagine the amazement and terror of His Excellency when this dreaded
buccaneer, who was supposed to be safely dead at Campeche, bobbed up
alive and well at Cuba. At first the governor could not believe it, but
nevertheless he dispatched a ship with ten guns and with a crew of
eighty to attack the buccaneers and commanded the captain not to dare
to return unless he had totally destroyed the pirates. In addition, he
sent aboard a negro as a hangman with instructions that every buccaneer
taken alive should be hanged, with the exception of L’Ollonois, who was
to be brought alive to Havana. No doubt the governor wished to make
sure of the buccaneer chieftain’s death this time, but fate decreed
otherwise. Instead of trying to escape, the buccaneers, when they
learned of the warship coming to attack them, set forth in two canoes
and unexpectedly bore down on the Spanish ship as she lay at anchor in
the Estera River. It was two o’clock in the morning when they drew near
the doomed vessel, and the watch, seeing the canoes and not dreaming
that they contained buccaneers, hailed them and asked if they had seen
any pirates. To this the buccaneers replied that they had seen no
pirates or anything like them. The watch thus satisfied was turning
away when the canoes dashed close and the buccaneers swarmed over the
ship’s rails. Taken completely by surprise, still the Dons put up a
gallant fight and for some time the battle raged desperately. But, as
usual, the buccaneers, though but twenty-one all told, triumphed and
drove the surviving Spaniards into the hold. Then, stationing his men
by the hatchway with drawn swords, L’Ollonois ordered the prisoners to
come up one at a time, and as fast as they appeared his men struck off
their heads. The last to appear was the negro hangman who begged
piteously for mercy, but L’Ollonois, after torturing him to confession
of various matters, murdered him like the rest. Only one man was spared
and to him L’Ollonois gave a note addressed to the governor in which he
informed His Excellency of the fate of his men and assured him that he
would never give quarter to any Spaniard and only hoped to be able to
torture and kill His Excellency as well.

“With the ship captured from the Spaniards, L’Ollonois cruised along
the Spanish Main, took several ships and returned to Tortuga with the
idea of fitting out a large company of ships and boldly attacking the
Spanish towns and cities, as well as their vessels. The fleet he
gathered together consisted of eight ships, the largest carrying ten
guns, and with six hundred and sixty buccaneers. But long before they
reached the South American coast they were flushed with success. Near
Porto Rico they captured a ship of sixteen guns laden with cacao and
with treasure consisting of forty thousand pieces of eight and over ten
thousand dollars’ worth of jewels, and near the island of Saona they
took the payship of the Dons and obtained nearly four tons of
gunpowder, many muskets and twelve thousand pieces of eight. It would
be tiresome to describe in detail their arrival at Maracaibo, their
taking of the forts and their capture of the town. The Spaniards
resisted valiantly, but were beaten back and then commenced a series of
orgies, of cruelties and of inhumanities which are almost without an
equal. The people, as soon as they realized the town would fall to
L’Ollonois and his freebooters, took to the outlying country, and these
refugees the buccaneers hunted down and dragged before their chief. In
order to make them confess where they had hidden their
valuables—although L’Ollonois had already obtained vast plunder—they
were put on the rack, broken on the wheel, cut to pieces, flayed alive
and subjected to every cruelty and torture the corsairs could devise.
For fifteen days the buccaneers occupied the town and butchered and
tortured the inhabitants until, convinced that no more loot could be
secured, they left Maracaibo, sailed up the Lake and took the town of
Gibraltar. Here they were ambushed and many killed, but in comparison
to the losses of the Dons the buccaneers suffered little, losing but
forty men killed and about fifty wounded, while over five hundred
Spaniards were killed and several hundred taken prisoners. Many of the
captives died from starvation or illness under the buccaneers’
treatment, many more were butchered for pure sport and hundreds were
put to the torture. Then, not satisfied, L’Ollonois threatened to burn
the town unless he was paid ten thousand pieces of eight and when this
was not instantly forthcoming he actually set fire to the place.
However, the money being eventually paid, the buccaneers had the
decency to aid the inhabitants in putting out the conflagration, for,
oddly enough, they usually kept to their promises, and after eighteen
days set sail for Maracaibo again. Here they demanded a payment of
thirty thousand pieces of eight under penalty of having the town
destroyed, and the poor harassed and cowed Dons managed to raise the
sum and with heartfelt thanks saw the fleet sail away. When Tortuga was
reached and a division of spoils made it was found that over two
hundred thousand pieces of eight had been taken in addition to immense
stores of silks, gold and silver plate and jewels.

“Hardly had he landed when L’Ollonois prepared for another raid and
with seven hundred men set sail with six ships for Honduras. Here the
beastly buccaneer chief tortured and killed and robbed to his heart’s
content, but finding comparatively little loot and thinking the
inhabitants had secreted their wealth, he became mad with fury and
outdid all his former inhuman acts. On one occasion, when a prisoner
insisted that he did not know the route to a certain town, L’Ollonois
slashed open the fellow’s breast with his sword, tore out his still
throbbing heart and bit and gnawed at it with his teeth, as Esquemeling
says, ‘like a ravenous wolf,’ and threatened to serve the other
prisoners in the same manner unless they showed him the way to San
Pedro. This they did, but the Spaniards had placed ambuscades and the
buccaneers were compelled to fight savagely every inch of the way.
Finally the Dons agreed to deliver the town if the buccaneers would
grant quarter for two hours, but no sooner was the time up than
L’Ollonois hurried his men after the people, robbed them of what they
had and slaughtered them without mercy. But L’Ollonois was too bestial
and cruel even for his own men. A short time after the sack of San
Pedro, dissensions arose and the party divided, the majority of the
buccaneers leaving with Moses Vanclein to raid the coast towns of Costa
Rica and Panama. From that time on L’Ollonois had nothing but ill luck
and soon afterwards his ship was wrecked off Cape Gracias à Dios. With
the remains of the wreck, the buccaneers set to work to construct a
small boat, and to sustain themselves, planted gardens. For six months
they were marooned until the boat was completed, and L’Ollonois, with
part of his crew, set out for the San Juan River in Nicaragua. But fate
had turned against him which as Esquemeling naïvely remarks, ‘had long
time been reserved for him as a punishment due to the multitude of
horrible crimes which in his wicked life he had committed.’ Attacked by
the Spaniards and their Indian allies, he was forced to retreat with
heavy loss and, still hoping to retrieve his fortunes, headed southward
for the coasts of Darien. And here the villain met with the end he so
richly deserved. He was taken by the savage Indians of the district,
was torn to pieces while alive and his limbs cast into a fire. Finally,
that no trace or memory of him might remain, the savages scattered his
ashes in the air.”








CHAPTER III

MORGAN AND HIS ROAD TO FAME


“Ugh!” exclaimed Jack, as his father ceased speaking. “Wasn’t he the
most awful creature! Gosh, I always thought the buccaneers were brave
men and heroes.”

“There is no question of their bravery,” replied Mr. Bickford, “and
L’Ollonois was an exceptionally cruel villain. But as a rule the
buccaneers were no more cruel or bloodthirsty than the Spaniards or
even their more respectable countrymen. You must remember that human
standards have changed a great deal since the days of the buccaneers.
In their time human life was held very cheaply. The theft of a few
cents’ worth of merchandise was punishable by death. Men and women had
their ears cut off, their tongues pierced or their eyes put out for
most trivial crimes, and torture by rack, wheel or fire was considered
a perfectly legitimate means of securing confessions of guilt from
suspected persons. We must not therefore judge the buccaneers too
harshly. To us they appear inhuman monsters, but in their days they
were no worse than the usual run of men. Moreover, you must remember
that their crews were made up of the roughest, toughest element.
Renegades, fugitives from justice, criminals, cut-throats and thieves,
and that they looked upon the Spaniards as natural enemies and worthy
of no more pity or consideration than wild beasts. Finally, consider
the temptation that ever spurred them on and excited their passions and
their worst instincts. Gold and riches were to be had for the taking,
the Dons were legitimate prey, and they were beyond the pale of the
law, if not actually protected by the authorities. Take a crowd of
sailors to-day, give them arms and a ship, and license to kill, rob and
destroy, and you would find them as reckless, as cruel and as devilish
as the old buccaneers, if not more so. And much of their success
depended upon the reputation they had for cruelty. The very mention of
some of the more famous pirates’ names would create a panic among the
Dons and make victory comparatively easy, and for this reason the
buccaneers practiced cruelties that were absolutely uncalled for, but
which they looked upon as a part of their profession.”

“It seems to me the Spaniards were awful cowards,” said Fred, as his
uncle paused. “They were always licked by the buccaneers, although
there were more of them.”

“That’s a great mistake,” Mr. Bickford assured him. “In nearly every
case the Spaniards showed marvelous bravery and courage in resisting
the buccaneers and in several instances their courage was absolutely
heroic. Very often they refused to surrender until every man fell, and
time and time again their commanders committed suicide when they found
that resistance was hopeless. But they were fearfully handicapped. The
buccaneers knew beforehand just what to expect and the strength of the
garrisons, they usually attacked at night and they invariably surprised
the Dons. The Spaniards had no idea how many men were attacking, and
they were packed together in forts, stockades or towns, while the
buccaneers could scatter, could seek the shelter of trees or buildings
and were constantly on the move. Finally, the buccaneers were expert
marksmen, trained woodsmen and were absolutely reckless of life and
limb while, in addition, the Spaniards knew that the more valiantly
they resisted the less quarter they would receive in the end. Perhaps
there are no better examples of the Spaniards’ bravery than that shown
by the garrisons of Porto Bello and of San Lorenzo, which were taken by
Sir Henry Morgan, the most famous of the buccaneers.”

“Oh, do tell us about him!” cried the two boys in unison.

“Very well,” laughed Mr. Bickford. “But I’m afraid your ideals will be
rudely shattered when you learn the truth of Morgan, and before I tell
you of his most famous exploits let me ask you a question. Have you any
idea how long Morgan was a buccaneer or how long his career of fame
lasted?”

“Why, no,” replied Jack. “I never thought about it, but I suppose it
was years and years.”

“I thought he was a buccaneer all his life,” declared Fred.

Mr. Bickford smiled. “Nearly all the famous buccaneers led short lives
and merry ones,” he said. “But of them all I think the famous Morgan’s
career was the shortest. From the time he first came into notice as a
corsair until he dropped out of sight was barely five years, and all
his most famous or rather infamous exploits took place within a space
of three years.”

“Jiminy, he must have been a fast worker!” exclaimed Jack.

“Yes, he was what you might call a ‘hustler,’” laughed his father. “And
it undoubtedly was the speed with which he carried out his nefarious
projects that made him successful to a large extent. But like many
another famous man, Morgan’s deeds have been greatly exaggerated, and
his real character was very different from that we are accustomed to
attribute to him, for romance, imagination and fiction have, through
the passing years, surrounded him with a halo of false gallantry,
bravery and decency. In reality Morgan was an ignorant, unprincipled,
ruthless, despicable character, utterly selfish and heartless,
dishonorable and with scarcely a redeeming trait, aside from personal
courage. But like many of the buccaneers he displayed most remarkable
and contradictory traits at times. It is said that whenever a priest or
minister fell into his clutches he compelled the clergyman to hold
divine services on the ship, and that on more than one occasion, he
shot down his own men for not attending service or for disrespectful
behavior during a religious ceremony. What became of the unfortunate
clerics after Morgan was done with them is not recorded, but the
chances are that he compelled them to walk the plank or put an end to
their careers in some equally summary manner, for that was ‘Harry
Morgan’s way,’ as he was fond of saying.”

“But tell me, Dad,” asked Jack, “did the buccaneers always kill or
torture their prisoners?”

“No,” his father assured him. “As a rule they treated their prisoners
with consideration. Some of the more bloodthirsty tortured and
butchered them out of hand, but in most cases the prisoners were either
held for ransom or were set ashore or turned loose in boats. It was, in
a way, to the buccaneers’ advantage to give quarter, for they knew that
in case any of their number fell into the Spaniards’ hands they would
be treated according to the way they had treated Spanish captives—or
perhaps worse—for the Dons were past masters in the art of devising
most atrocious tortures.

“And before I tell you of Morgan and his deeds let me point out one or
two other matters which will help you to understand much that would
otherwise puzzle you boys and which is little known. In several
places—as in the Isle of Pines off Cuba—the Spaniards were friendly
with the buccaneers and gladly aided them, while the corsairs made it a
point always to pacify and maintain friendly relations with the
Indians. This was a most important matter for them. All along the South
and Central American coasts were Indian tribes, and the buccaneers
depended very largely upon the red men for provisions, canoes and
guides. The Indians hated the Dons and willingly joined the buccaneers
against them, and even the most savage tribesmen usually welcomed the
freebooters and helped them in every way. Moreover, they knew the
country and were most valuable as guides and pilots, and there are
innumerable records of the buccaneers showing the greatest forbearance
towards the savages. Even when they were attacked by Indians with whom
they had not established relations they refrained from retaliating, but
either propitiated the natives or moved bag and baggage from the
locality, and the most severe punishment was meted out to the
buccaneers by their leaders if they molested the Indians or interfered
with them in any way. As a result, many of their greatest triumphs were
made possible by their Indian allies.

“But to return to Morgan. He was, by birth, a Welshman, the son of a
well-to-do farmer, but his imagination being fired by tales of
adventure in the West Indies he ran away from home and reached Bristol
with the intention of shipping on a vessel bound to Barbados. But young
Morgan knew little of what was to befall him. According to a common
custom of those days the master of the ship sold him as a bond servant,
or in other words a slave, as soon as the ship reached Barbados, and
the embryo buccaneer found himself far worse off than as a farmer’s boy
in Wales. Nevertheless, he served his time, secured his liberty and
made his way to Jamaica, which was then the headquarters of the English
buccaneers.

“And now let me digress a bit and explain how a British colony happened
to be a notorious lair of the buccaneers. You remember that I told you
about Tortuga and how the British and French freebooters had disputes
and dissensions and that the English corsairs transferred their
headquarters to Port Royal, Jamaica. At that time, you must remember,
Spain and England were at war, and the British authorities gladly gave
commissions as privateers to the buccaneer leaders. Thus they were
looked upon, not as pirates, but as auxiliaries of the British navy,
and even after peace was declared and they continued to prey upon the
Spaniards, the authorities winked at them. They brought vast sums to
the island ports, spent it recklessly and freely, and disposed of the
merchandise they had taken for a mere song. As a result, the ports
prospered and became rich through their dealings with the buccaneers;
merchants and traders did a lively business, shipyards and outfitting
shops sprang into existence; drinking places, gambling houses and every
form of vice catered to the corsairs and thrived amazingly, and every
one prospered. The buccaneers thus had safe refuges where they could
spend their loot, refit their ships and organize their expeditions, and
they were careful not to molest or injure the inhabitants or their
property. Indeed, Jamaica’s prosperity was largely built upon the trade
with the corsairs, and not until infamous Port Royal was utterly
destroyed by an earthquake on June 7, 1692, and the ‘wickedest city in
the world’ slid bodily into the sea, with all its riches and over three
thousand of its inhabitants, did it cease to be a clearing house, a
gigantic ‘fence’ and a haven for the buccaneers. Then the few
survivors, frightened, feeling that the wrath of God and His vengeance
for their wickedness had been visited upon them, moved across the bay
and founded the present city of Kingston and paved the way for a
respectable and honest development of the island.”

“Gosh, I should think some one would go down there and get back all
that treasure!” exclaimed Fred.

“It’s rather strange that no one has attempted it,” said Mr. Bickford.
“The water is not deep—in calm weather the outlines of the ruins may
still be traced under the sea—and the native colored folk tell weird
tales of ghostly pirate ships tacking back and forth at dead of night,
striving to find the lost port; of the bells of the pirates’ church
tolling through storms from beneath the waves, and of spectral figures
walking the beach and gazing seaward as though awaiting ships that
never come.”

“Did the buccaneers have a church?” cried Jack in surprise.

“I don’t wonder you ask,” replied his father. “Yes, that was one of the
odd things about them. Altogether the buccaneers were most paradoxical
rascals. With all their villainies many of them were deeply religious
at times and there are instances—as I shall tell you later—of crews
actually mutinying because their captains made them work on Sunday and
did not hold services aboard their ships. They seemed to feel that
their notoriously wicked stronghold at Port Royal was not complete
without a church and so they built one. They fitted it with bells taken
from some raided church of the Dons, they provided altar pieces,
vestments, candelabra and holy vessels of gold and silver, chalices set
with priceless jewels, even paintings and tapestries torn and looted
from the desecrated churches and cathedrals of the Spanish towns, and
attended services in a house of God made a mockery and a blasphemy by
its fittings won by blood and fire and the murder of innocent men,
women and children.

“And it was to this den of iniquity, this world-famed lair of the
buccaneers, that young Morgan came after gaining his liberty in
Barbados. Perhaps he had no idea of turning corsair and intended to get
honest employment or even to make his way back to his father’s farm in
Wales. But whatever his purpose may have been he found no ready means
of earning a livelihood and enlisted as a seaman on a buccaneer ship.
He was an apt pupil and was thrifty, and after the first two or three
voyages he had saved enough money from his share of plunder to purchase
a ship, or rather a controlling interest in one. He now was a
full-fledged buccaneer captain and in his own vessel set sail for
Yucatan, where he took several prizes and returned triumphantly to
Jamaica. Here he met an old corsair named Mansvelt, who was busy
organizing an expedition to pillage the towns along the Main, and
Mansvelt, seeing in Morgan a most promising young villain, offered him
the post of Vice Admiral of his fleet. With fifteen ships and five
hundred men, Mansvelt and Morgan sailed away from Port Royal and swept
down on the island of Old Providence—then known as St. Catherine—off
the Costa Rican coast, and which at the time was strongly garrisoned by
the Spaniards. After a short battle the island surrendered, and the
buccaneers, after plundering the place, destroying the forts and
burning the houses, sailed off with their holds crowded with prisoners.
These they put safely ashore near Porto Bello and then cruised along
the coasts of Panama and Costa Rica. The Dons, however, were everywhere
on the lookout and every town swarmed with troops. Realizing that an
attempt to take the places would be well nigh useless the buccaneers
returned to St. Catherine, where they had left one hundred of their
men, to find that the buccaneer in charge—Le Sieur Simon—had repaired
the forts and defenses until the place was well nigh impregnable.
Mansvelt’s idea was to retain the island as a basis for piratical raids
against the mainland, but he realized that he could not expect to hold
it with his handful of men, so he set out for Jamaica to enlist the aid
of the governor. His Excellency, however, frowned on the proposal. Not
that he was unwilling to aid his buccaneer friends, but he realized
that any such overt act must reach the ears of His Majesty the King
and, moreover, he could ill spare the necessary men and guns from the
garrison at Jamaica. Not despairing of carrying out his project,
Mansvelt made for Tortuga with the idea of getting help from the
French, but before he arrived he died. Meanwhile the buccaneers at St.
Catherine realized their reënforcements were not forthcoming and
decided to abandon the place, but before this could be done they were
attacked by a superior force of Spaniards and surrendered. Evidently,
too, the wily Governor of Jamaica had been thinking over the matter and
surreptitiously dispatched a party of men and a number of women in a
British ship to St. Catherine. Never suspecting that the isle had
fallen into the Dons’ hands they sailed boldly in and were made
prisoners and were transported to Porto Bello and Panama, where the men
were forced to labor like slaves at constructing fortifications.

“Morgan now, by Mansvelt’s death, was in command of the fleet, and with
the idea of carrying out his former chief’s intentions he wrote letters
to various prominent merchants in New England and Virginia, asking for
funds and supplies to enable him to retain possession of St. Catherine.
Before replies were received, however, he had word of the recapture of
the island by the Spaniards and, abandoning this project, set out for
Cuba. His original idea was to attack Havana, but deeming his force of
twelve ships and seven hundred men too small for this he decided upon
Puerto Príncipe—now known as Camagüey—as the town to ravage. This town,
which had originally been upon the northern coast of Cuba, had been
moved inland to escape the raids of the buccaneers, but this fact did
not deter Morgan in the least. Landing upon the coast, Morgan and his
men started overland, but unknown to them a Spanish prisoner on one of
the ships had managed to escape and, swimming ashore, had made his way
to the town and had warned the inhabitants. As a result, the people
were up in arms, the roads were barricaded, and the buccaneers were
forced to approach through the jungle.

“After a short but bloody battle the buccaneers gained the town, but
the Dons, barricaded in their houses, kept up a galling fire until
Morgan sent word that unless they surrendered he would burn the city
and cut the women and children to pieces before the Spaniards’ eyes.
This threat had its effect, and the Dons at once surrendered. Thereupon
Morgan immediately imprisoned all the Spaniards in the churches without
food or drink, and proceeded to pillage, drink and carouse. These
diversions they varied by dragging forth the half-starved prisoners and
torturing them to make them divulge the hiding places of their wealth,
but fortunately for the poor people, the majority of women and children
perished for want of food before Morgan and his men could wreak more
terrible deaths upon them. Finally, finding nothing more could be
secured, Morgan informed the survivors of the citizens that unless they
paid a large ransom he would transport them to Jamaica to be sold as
slaves and would burn the town. The Dons promised to do their best, but
finally, feeling convinced that they could not raise the sum and that
to remain longer in the vicinity might result in disaster, Morgan
consented to withdraw upon delivery of five hundred head of cattle.
These being furnished, he compelled the prisoners to drive the beasts
to the coast and to butcher, dress and salt them and load the meat
aboard his ships. While this was going on Morgan exhibited one of his
odd kinks of character which were always creeping out. One of the
French buccaneers was busily cutting up and salting an ox for his own
use when an English corsair came up and calmly took possession of the
marrow bones. Words and insults resulted, a challenge was issued and a
duel arranged, but as they reached the spot selected for the fight the
Englishman drew his cutlass and stabbed the Frenchman in the back,
killing him treacherously. Instantly the other French buccaneers
started an insurrection, but before it had gone far Morgan interposed,
ordered the offending Englishman chained and promised to have him
hanged when they reached Jamaica, which he did.

“The taking of Puerto Príncipe, although a notable exploit, was,
nevertheless, a most unprofitable venture, the entire booty obtained
amounting to barely fifty thousand pieces of eight. As a result, the
men were so dissatisfied that the French buccaneers refused to follow
Morgan farther. Morgan’s next exploit was the most daring that the
buccaneers had ever attempted, for it was nothing more or less than an
attack upon the supposedly impregnable forts of Porto Bello, the
Atlantic terminus of the Gold Road across the Isthmus of Panama.”

“Please, Dad, what was the Gold Road?” asked Jack, as his father
paused.

“The Gold Road,” answered his father, “was the roughly paved highway
leading from the old city of Panama on the Pacific to Nombre de Dios
and Porto Bello on the Caribbean. If you will look at the map here you
will see Porto Bello situated about twenty-five miles east of Colón
with Nombre de Dios just beyond. Nombre de Dios, however, was abandoned
after its capture by Sir Francis Drake, and the terminus of the road
became Porto Bello. To-day the place is of no importance—a small
village of native huts—but the ruins of the old castles and forts are
still standing in a good state of preservation, and the place is
historically very interesting. Moreover, just off the port Sir Francis
Drake’s body was buried at sea. But to resume. The Gold Road was the
only route from the Pacific to the Atlantic and over it all the vast
treasures won by the Spaniards from the west coasts of North, South and
Central America and Mexico were transported on mule-back to be shipped
to Spain. Over it were carried the millions in gold, silver and jewels
of the Incas; over it was carried the output of countless fabulously
rich mines, incalculable wealth in pearls from the islands off Panama,
emeralds from Colombia, bullion and plate, the stupendous wealth
wrested by the ruthless Dons from Indian princes, princesses and kings;
such a treasure as the world had never seen before. In long mule trains
the vast wealth was carried over the Gold Road through the jungle,
escorted by armed men, accompanied by shackled slaves, and in Porto
Bello it was stored in the great stone treasure house to await the
galleons and their armed convoy to carry it to Spain. Naturally, with
such incredible fortunes stored in Porto Bello, the Spaniards used
every effort and spared no expense to make the place so impregnable
that there was no chance of its falling to the buccaneers, and in all
New Spain, aside from Havana, there was no spot more strongly fortified
and garrisoned than Porto Bello. The defenses consisted of two immense
castles or forts, several batteries and outlying bastions and a
garrison of nearly four hundred men, all seasoned veterans and heavily
armed. To attack this formidable spot Morgan had nine vessels, several
of them small boats, and a total force of four hundred and sixty men.
No buccaneer had dreamed of attacking Porto Bello since the completion
of its defenses—although in 1602 it had been taken and sacked by
William Parker—but Morgan counted on a complete surprise, an assault
made under cover of darkness from the land side and conducted by one of
his men who had once been a prisoner in Porto Bello.

“Arriving at the River Naos, they traveled upstream a short distance
and then struck out through the forest. As they neared the city, Morgan
sent the former prisoner of the Spaniards, with several men, to kill or
capture the sentry at the outlying fort, and, creeping upon him, they
made him a prisoner before he could give an alarm and brought him bound
and gagged to Morgan. Under threat of torture and death if he gave an
alarm, the fellow was marched before the buccaneers and, without being
seen, they surrounded the first fort. Their prisoner was then ordered
to call to the garrison, tell them an overwhelming force had surrounded
them and advise them to surrender or otherwise they would be butchered
without mercy. The garrison, however, spurned the advice and instantly
commenced firing into the darkness. Although their shots did little
damage, yet they served to arouse the city and prepare the other forces
for the attack. With wild yells and shouts the battle was on, and
although the Dons fought most valiantly the outlying fort fell to the
buccaneers, and Morgan, as good as his word, put every living occupant
to death, thinking this would terrorize the other garrisons. In order
to do this the more effectually, Morgan shut the survivors, men and
officers together, in a store-room and, rolling in several kegs of
powder, blew the entire company to bits. Then, like fiends, he and his
men rushed towards the city. All was confusion, despite the warning the
Spaniards had received, and the inhabitants, who had not had time to
reach the protection of the forts, rushed screaming hither and thither,
casting their valuables into wells and cisterns, hiding in corners and
filled with terror. Bursting into the cloisters, the buccaneers dragged
out the monks and nuns and urging them with blows and pricks of their
swords, forced them to raise the heavy scaling ladders to the walls of
the forts, Morgan thinking that the Dons would not fire upon the
religious men and women. But in this he was mistaken. The Governor, who
throughout had been stoutly defending the castle, had held his own and
had wrought terrific execution upon the buccaneers. Time after time the
corsairs rushed forward through the storm of bullets and round shot,
striving to reach the castle doors, but each time the Dons hurled
grenades, burning tar, hot oil and molten lead upon them and drove them
back. And when Morgan threatened to force the nuns and priests to place
the ladders the brave old Governor replied that ‘never would he
surrender while he lived,’ and that he ‘would perform his duty at any
costs.’ Despite the piteous appeals of the friars and the nuns as they
were beaten forward to the walls, the Governor gave no heed and ordered
his men to shoot them down as though they were buccaneers. Carrying
fireballs and grenades which they heaved among the garrison, the
buccaneers poured over the parapets. Knowing all was lost, the soldiers
threw down their arms and begged for quarter, but the courageous
Governor, sword in hand, backed against a wall and prepared to resist
until the last. Even the buccaneers were won by his bravery and offered
quarter if he would surrender, but his only answer was to taunt them
and shout back that, ‘I would rather die a valiant soldier than be
hanged as a coward.’

“So struck was Morgan by the man’s heroism that he ordered his men to
take him alive, and over and over again they closed in upon him. But he
was a magnificent swordsman; before his thrusts and blows the
buccaneers fell wounded and dead, and deaf to the entreaties of his
wife and children, the brave man fought on. At last, finding it
impossible to make him prisoner, Morgan ordered him to be shot down,
and the brave old Don fell, with his blood-stained sword, among the
ring of buccaneers he had killed. The castle was now in Morgan’s hands,
and, gathering together the wounded Spaniards, he callously tossed them
into a small room, ‘to the intent their own complaints might be the
cure of their hurts, for no other was afforded them,’ as Esquemeling
puts it.

“Then, devoting themselves to a wild orgy of feasting and drinking, the
buccaneers gave themselves up to debauchery and excesses until, as
Esquemeling points out, they were so maudlin that ‘fifty men might
easily have taken the city and killed all the buccaneers.’ But
unfortunately the fifty men were not available, and on the following
day as usual the buccaneers proceeded to loot the town and torture the
people into confessions of the hiding places of their riches. Many died
on the rack or were torn to pieces, and while the buccaneers were
practicing every devilish cruelty they could invent, word of the taking
of Porto Bello had been carried by fugitives to the governor of Panama.
He immediately prepared to equip an expedition to attack the
buccaneers, but before it arrived Morgan was getting ready to leave,
having been in possession of Porto Bello fifteen days. Before
departing, however, he sent word to the Governor General, demanding a
ransom of one hundred thousand pieces of eight if he did not wish Porto
Bello burned and destroyed. Instead of sending the ransom, the Governor
dispatched a force of armed men to attack the buccaneers. This Morgan
had expected, and, stationing a hundred of his men in ambush in a
narrow pass, he put the Spaniards to rout and repeated his threats to
the people of the unfortunate town. By hook and by crook the
inhabitants managed to raise the huge sum, and Morgan commenced his
evacuation in accordance with his promise.

“As he was doing so a messenger arrived from the Governor General
bearing a letter requesting Morgan to send him ‘some small pattern of
the arms wherewith he had, by such violence, taken a great city.’
Evidently the Governor imagined that the buccaneers possessed some
novel or marvelous arms, for he could not believe that the place had
fallen to the English through ordinary means. Morgan received the
messenger courteously and with a flash of grim humor handed him a
pistol and a few bullets, telling him to carry them to the Governor and
to inform him that ‘he desired him to accept that slender pattern of
arms wherewith he had taken Porto Bello and to keep them for a
twelvemonth, after which time he would come in person to Panama and
fetch them away.’

“Evidently, too, the haughty old Governor had a sense of humor, for ere
Morgan sailed away the messenger returned, bearing a message of thanks
from the Governor, a gold ring which he was requested to accept with
His Excellency’s compliments and a letter stating that Morgan ‘need not
give himself the trouble of visiting Panama, for he could promise that
he should not speed as well there as he had at Porto Bello.’

“With the vast loot he had won, a treasure amounting to a quarter of a
million pieces of eight, thousands of bales of silks, vast stores of
merchandise and fabulous sums in bullion, plate and jewels, Morgan left
the harried shores of Panama and set sail for Port Royal, where he
arrived in safety and was welcomed and lauded as the greatest buccaneer
of them all.”








CHAPTER IV

THE SACKING OF MARACAIBO


“But I thought Morgan was Governor of Jamaica and a ‘Sir,’” said Jack.

“He was. I’m coming to that presently,” replied his father. “Of course,
Morgan, having taken Porto Bello and thus won the greatest fame,
buccaneers flocked to him, begging for a chance to join him on his next
expedition. Indeed, he could have easily raised a force of several
thousand men, but Morgan, despite his faults, was a wise man, a born
leader and an experienced buccaneer and he knew that too large a force
would be a disadvantage. But realizing that he could command any number
of ships and men, he foresaw the possibility of accomplishing such
feats as no buccaneer had ever before undertaken. Naming the Island of
La Vaca, or Cow Island, south of Santo Domingo, as a rendezvous, Morgan
and his old captains set sail and there awaited the coming of the
buccaneers. And from every lair they flocked to his standard. French
and English, Dutch and Danes, from Tortuga Samaná, the Virgins and the
Caymans, they sped to join their fortunes with Morgan. Even the
Governor of Jamaica sent forth a ship, a brand-new vessel from New
England mounting thirty-six guns, the largest buccaneer ship that had
ever borne down upon the hapless Dons. Next in size to her was a French
ship, a vessel of twenty-four iron guns and twelve brass carronades
which happened to be lying at anchor at the island. Upon her Morgan
cast envious eyes and used every argument to induce her captain to join
with him. The French, however, were distrustful of the English and
flatly refused. And then the redoubtable Morgan showed his teeth and
proved himself the cowardly, underhand, treacherous rascal that he was
in reality. It seemed that some time previously this big French vessel
had been short of provision at sea and, meeting a British buccaneer,
had secured supplies, giving in payment not ready cash but bills of
exchange on Jamaica and Tortuga. Knowing of this, Morgan, finding he
could not induce the French captain to join him, seized upon the
incident as a means to carry out his nefarious ends. Inviting the
French commander and his officers to dine aboard his ship, Morgan
received them hospitably, but no sooner were they seated than he and
his men whipped out pistols, seized the Frenchmen and bound them as
prisoners. Stating that he had seized them as pirates for having taken
provisions from a British ship without pay, he informed the unhappy
Frenchmen that he intended to hang them and to confiscate their ship as
warning to others. But fate intervened and brought a just and speedy
retribution upon Morgan and his men for their treacherous act. Having
thus possessed himself of the French flagship, Morgan called a council
at which it was agreed to go to Saona Island and wait for the plate
fleet from Spain. Then, as usual, the buccaneers boarded their ships
and held a farewell feast in celebration of their coming voyage,
drinking, carousing and, as was customary, discharging their guns in
salute to one another. Half drunk, hilarious and careless, the men did
not notice that a gun discharged upon the big flagship of the fleet
dropped a bit of smoldering wadding onto the deck. There was a terrific
explosion and the vessel was blown to bits, destroying three hundred
and fifty English buccaneers and the unfortunate French prisoners who
were confined in the hold. Only thirty members of the crew, including
Morgan, escaped, they having been within the cabin at the high poop of
the vessel and away from the main force of the explosion.

“But instead of being a wholesome lesson to Morgan and his fellows,
this accident only enraged them, and, claiming that their ship had been
blown up by the French prisoners—despite the fact that they were
manacled and far from the magazine—they at once seized all the French
ships in the harbor and sent them with their crews as prisoners to
Jamaica, with word that they had been found with papers authorizing
them to commit piracy against the British. In reality the papers were
merely permits from the Governor of Barracoa permitting the French to
trade in Spanish ports and to ‘cruise against English pirates,’ the
clause being inserted as a cloak to cover the reason for the permits.
But despite their protests and the fact that they had repeatedly aided
the English buccaneers against the Dons, Morgan’s influence was such
that the Frenchmen were imprisoned and several were hanged when they
reached Jamaica.

“Morgan’s brutality was still further shown when, eight days after the
explosion, he sent out boats to gather up the bodies of the buccaneers
which were now floating about, not, as Esquemeling assures us, ‘with
the design of affording them Christian burial, but only to obtain the
spoil of their clothes and attire.’ Rings were cut from their dead
fingers, earrings torn from their ears, their weapons and garments
stripped from the corpses and the naked bodies cast back for the
sharks. Then, the loot from their dead comrades having been auctioned
off, the buccaneers set sail with fifteen ships—the largest carrying
fourteen guns—and nine hundred and sixty men.

“Sending some of his ships and men to plunder the farms and villages of
Santo Domingo for provisions and cattle, Morgan continued to Saona. But
his men met with reverses on the island, many of the buccaneers were
killed, and though they escaped they were empty-handed and dared not
return to Morgan with their tale of reverses. Impatient at the delay,
Morgan at last decided to go on without them, and, with his fleet
reduced to eight ships and a force of five hundred men, he started for
the Gulf of Maracaibo.

“Since it had been looted by L’Ollonois, Maracaibo and its neighboring
city of Gibraltar had prospered and grown immensely rich, the
fortifications had been greatly strengthened and a Spanish fleet was
constantly cruising near to prevent raids by the buccaneers. Arriving
off the port at night, Morgan drew close to the harbor bar unseen and
opened fire at daybreak. From morn until night the battle raged until,
feeling that they could not hold out another day, the garrison
evacuated the fort at nightfall and left a slow match leading to the
magazine in the hopes of blowing up the buccaneers if they entered. In
this they were very nearly successful, but Morgan himself discovered
the burning fuse and stamped it out when within six inches of the
explosives.

“Finding his ships could not enter the shallow harbor, Morgan embarked
in boats and canoes and after terrific fighting silenced one fort after
another and took the town. Then began an awful scene of butchery and
torture. All that L’Ollonois had done in the stricken town before was
repeated a hundredfold. The people, rounded up and shackled, were
broken on the wheel, torn to pieces on the rack, spread-eagled and
flogged to a pulp. Burning fuses were placed between their fingers and
toes. Wet rawhide thongs were twisted about their heads and allowed to
dry until, as they shrunk, the wretches’ eyes burst from their skulls
and many were cut to pieces a bit at a time or flayed alive. Those who
had no treasures whose hiding place they could divulge died under their
torments, and those who confessed were too far gone to recover. For
three terrible weeks this awful work went on, the buccaneers sparing
neither young nor old, men, women or children, and daily scouring the
countryside to bring new victims to the torture chambers. Then,
satisfied he had every cent that it was possible to secure, Morgan
loaded his remaining prisoners on his ships and sailed for Gibraltar as
L’Ollonois had done. He had sent prisoners ahead, demanding the
surrender of the town and threatening to torture and butcher every
living soul if resistance were made, but notwithstanding this the
inhabitants and the garrison put up a stiff fight. Finding he could not
take the place by assault, Morgan started his men overland through the
woods, and the people, realizing the buccaneers would take the place,
fled with what valuables they could gather into the country, first
having spiked the guns and destroyed the powder in the forts. As a
result the buccaneers entered the city without a shot fired and found
no living soul save one half-witted man. Despite the fact that he was a
demented, helpless creature the buccaneers ruthlessly placed him on the
rack until he begged for mercy and promised to guide his tormentors to
his riches. Following him, they were led to a tumble-down house
containing nothing of any value with the exception of three pieces of
eight—all the poor man’s earthly possessions. The buccaneers, however,
had gotten a crazy idea that the fellow was a rich man masquerading as
a dunce, and when in reply to their question he announced that his name
was ‘Don Sebastian Sanchez’ and ‘I am brother to the Governor,’ instead
of being convinced that he was crazy, the buccaneers believed his
ridiculous words and tortured him anew. Despite his shrieks and
heart-rending appeals he was racked, his limbs were stretched by cords
passed over pulleys and with immense weights attached to them, he was
scorched to a crisp by burning palm leaves passed over his face and
body, and not till the miserable wretch had died after half an hour of
this fiendish torment did the buccaneers cease their efforts to wring
from him the secret of his supposed wealth.

“The next day the buccaneers captured a poor farmer and his two
daughters and threatened them with torture, but the cowering wretches
agreed to lead the buccaneers to the hiding places of the inhabitants.
Seeing their enemies coming, the Spaniards fled still farther, and the
disgruntled Englishmen hanged the peasant and his daughters to trees by
the wayside. The buccaneers then set diligently at work, scouring the
countryside for prisoners. In one spot they captured a slave, and,
promising him freedom and vast amounts of gold if he would show them
the hiding places of the Dons, he readily agreed and led them to a
secluded house where the buccaneers made prisoners of a number of
Spaniards. Then, to make sure that their slave guide would not dare
desert them, the buccaneers forced him to murder a number of the
helpless Dons before the eyes of the others. This party of Spaniards
totaled nearly two hundred and fifty and these the buccaneers examined
one at a time, torturing those who denied knowledge of treasure. One
man, over seventy years old, a Portuguese by birth, was reported by the
treacherous slave to be rich. This the old fellow stoutly denied,
claiming that his total wealth was but one hundred pieces of eight and
that this had been stolen from him two days previously. In spite of
this and his age, the buccaneers, under Morgan’s personal orders, broke
both his arms and then stretched him between stakes by cords from his
thumbs and great toes. Then, while suspended in this way, the inhuman
monsters beat upon the cords with sticks. Not content with this, they
placed a two hundred pound stone upon his body, passed blazing palm
leaves over his face and head, and then, finding no confession could be
wrung from him they carried him to the church and lashed him fast to a
pillar where he was left for several days with only a few drops of
water to keep him alive. How any mortal could have survived—much less
an aged man—is miraculous, but live he did and finally consented to
raise five hundred pieces of eight to buy his liberty. The buccaneers,
however, scoffed at this, beat him with cudgels and told him it would
take five thousand pieces of eight to save his life. Finally he
bargained for freedom for one thousand pieces, and a few days later,
the money having been paid, he was set at liberty, though, as
Esquemeling tells us, ‘so horribly maimed in body that ’tis scarce to
be believed he survived many weeks after.’

“But even these fearful and disgusting torments were mild as compared
to some that Morgan inflicted on the men and women in his mad lust to
wring their riches from them. Dozens were crucified, others were staked
out by pointed sticks driven through them into the earth; others were
bound with their feet in fires, others roasted alive. For five long,
awful weeks they continued their unspeakable atrocities until, finding
further efforts useless, and fearing that his retreat to sea would be
cut off, Morgan left the stricken town, carrying a number of prisoners
for hostages.

“At Maracaibo they learned that Spanish warships had arrived and that
three armed vessels were blockading the harbor mouth. The largest of
these carried forty guns, the second thirty and the smallest
twenty-four. That the buccaneers, with no heavy guns and with only
small vessels, could escape seemed impossible, but Morgan once more
showed himself the resourceful commander and sent a Spanish prisoner to
the Admiral in command of the ships demanding a free passage to sea as
well as a ransom if Maracaibo was not to be burned. To this the Admiral
replied contemptuously, telling Morgan that, provided he would
surrender all the plunder and prisoners he had taken, he would allow
him and his men to depart, but otherwise would totally destroy them and
give no quarter. This letter Morgan read aloud to his men, asking them
whether they preferred to fight or lose their plunder. The reply was
unanimously that they had rather fight till their last drop of blood
rather than abandon what they had won. Then one of the men suggested
that they fit up a fire ship, disguise her by logs of wood dressed as
men on deck and with dummy cannon at the ports, and let her drift down
on the Spanish vessels. Although all approved the idea, still Morgan
decided to try guile and diplomacy—with a deal of bluff—before
resorting to strenuous measures. Consequently he dispatched another
messenger to the Admiral, offering to quit Maracaibo without firing it
or exacting ransom, and agreeing to liberate all the prisoners if he
and his men were allowed to pass. But the doughty old Spanish commander
would have none of this and replied that unless Morgan surrendered
according to the original terms within two days he would come and take
him.

“Finding cajolery useless, Morgan at once hustled about to make the
most of his time and to try to escape by force. A ship taken at
Gibraltar was loaded with brimstone, powder, palm leaves soaked in
pitch and other combustibles. Kegs of powder were placed under the
dummy guns and dressed and armed logs were posed upon the decks to
resemble buccaneers. Then all the male prisoners were loaded into one
boat; all the women, the plate and the jewels into another; the
merchandise and things of lesser value in a third. Then, all being
ready, the little fleet set forth with the fireship in the lead. It was
on the 30th of April, 1669, that the buccaneers started from Maracaibo
on this desperate, dare-devil effort to escape, and night was falling
as they sighted the three Spanish warships riding at anchor in the
middle of the entry to the lake. Unwilling to proceed farther, Morgan
anchored his boats, maintained a sharp watch and at daybreak hoisted
anchors and headed directly for the Spanish ships. Realizing that
Morgan was actually about to attempt to battle with them, the Dons
hoisted anchors and prepared to attack. Manned by its courageous if
villainous crew, the fireship crashed straight into the Spanish
flagship and instantly its men threw grappling irons, binding their
combustible vessel to the warship and then, touching match to fuses,
took to the small boats. Before the Dons realized what had happened the
fireship was a blazing mass; the powder exploding threw flaming tar and
brimstone far and near; and in an incredibly short space of time the
Spanish flagship was a seething, roaring furnace and, blowing in two,
sank to the bottom of the lake. Meanwhile the second warship, fearing a
like fate, was run ashore by its crew and was set afire by the
Spaniards to prevent her falling into the buccaneer’s hands, while the
third ship was captured by Morgan’s men.

“But Morgan and his men were not out of the trap yet. The forts
controlled the harbor entrance and, flushed with their easy victory
over the ships, the buccaneers landed and attacked the castle. But they
failed miserably in this and after heavy losses withdrew to their
boats.

“The following day Morgan, having made a prisoner of a Spanish pilot
and learning from him that the sunken ships carried vast riches, left a
portion of his men to recover what they could and sailed back to
Maracaibo with the captured warship. Here, being once more in a
position to dictate terms, he sent a demand to the Admiral, who had
escaped and was in the castle, demanding thirty thousand pieces of
eight and five hundred head of cattle as his price for sparing the town
and his prisoners. He finally consented to accept twenty thousand
pieces of eight with the cattle, however, and the following day this
was paid. But Morgan was shrewd and refused to deliver the prisoners
until he was out of danger and had cleared the harbor, and with his
captives set sail. To his delight he found that his men had recovered
nearly twenty thousand pieces of eight in coins and bullion from the
sunken ships, but he was still doubtful of being able to pass the
forts. He thereupon notified his prisoners that unless they persuaded
the Governor to guarantee him safe passage he would hang all the
captives on his ships. In view of this dire threat a committee of the
prisoners went to His Excellency, beseeching him to grant Morgan’s
demands. But Don Alonso was no weakling. His reply was to the effect
that, had they been as loyal to their King in hindering the buccaneer’s
entry as he intended to be in preventing their going out that they
would not have found themselves in such troubles. Very crestfallen the
poor fellows returned with the ill news. But for once Morgan was not as
ruthless as was his wont and forgot all about his threat to execute the
blameless captives. He, however, sent word to Don Alonso that if he was
not permitted to pass he would get by without a permit and, feeling
that he might fail, he at once proceeded to divide the booty. This
totaled over a quarter of a million pieces of eight in money, vast
quantities of plate and jewels, silks, merchandise of various kinds and
many slaves.

“All being properly divided, the question arose as to how the little
flotilla would pass to sea under the heavy guns of the castle, but this
Morgan accomplished by a most brilliant ruse. On the day before he
planned to make his dash he loaded his canoes with men and had them
paddled towards the shore as if intending to land them. Here, among the
low-hanging foliage, the boats waited for a while and then, with all
but two or three men lying flat in the bottoms of the canoes, they
paddled back to the ships. This was repeated over and over again, and
the Spaniards, seeing canoes full of men coming ashore and apparently
empty craft returning, were convinced that Morgan intended to make an
attack on the land side of the fort. In order to defend themselves the
Dons moved practically all their guns and the greater part of their men
to the landward side of the castle, exactly as Morgan had foreseen.
Then, as night fell, Morgan weighed anchor and without setting sail let
his ships drift down with the ebb tide. Not until they were under the
walls of the fort were sails hoisted and all speed made towards the
harbor mouth.

“With shouts and cries the Dons gave the alarm and madly they ran and
scurried to get their guns back in position, but the wind was fresh and
fair and before the first shot was fired the buccaneers were almost out
of range. A few balls tore through the sails, a few round shot
splintered the bulwarks and the high poops, and a few men fell, but the
damage was of little moment. Out of reach of the guns, Morgan brought
his ships to, and, loading his prisoners into small boats, sent them
ashore. Then, with a parting shot of seven guns in a broadside, Morgan
spread sails once more and headed for Jamaica.”








CHAPTER V

THE TAKING OF SAN LORENZO


“Well, he certainly was clever for all his cruelty,” said Fred. “But
what a beast he was. Seems to me he was the worst of all the
buccaneers. Even L’Ollonois had some good points.”

“Yes,” agreed Mr. Bickford. “Morgan could have made a name for himself
as a great general, or an admiral, perhaps, if he had turned his
talents to honest purposes. But he was too much of a rascal and too
unprincipled to succeed for long, even in piracy. When he returned from
taking Maracaibo he believed there was nothing he could not
successfully carry out and he began to consider taking even richer and
more strongly fortified spots than those he had ravished.

“At that time the three richest cities in the New World were Cartagena,
Panama and Vera Cruz, and of these the richest was Panama. To Panama
all the wealth and treasure from the western coasts of South and
Central America and Mexico and the Orient were brought, as well as the
fortunes in pearls from the pearl islands, and from Panama, as I have
already explained, the riches were carried over the Gold Road to Porto
Bello.

“But while Panama was so rich, yet it had been free from attacks by
buccaneers owing to its position. It was on the Pacific and in order to
reach it the buccaneers would be compelled either to sail around Cape
Horn; cross the Isthmus overland, or ascend the Chagres River and then
go overland. To cross by the Gold Road meant that the forts at Porto
Bello would have to be taken, and even after that the buccaneers would
be exposed to ambuscades and constant attacks and might well have their
retreat cut off. At the mouth of the Chagres was a most powerful
fort—San Lorenzo—commanding the river mouth, while Panama itself was
very strongly fortified and protected. It seemed impossible that the
buccaneers could ever reach the place and yet that was just what Morgan
planned to do.

“Although it seemed a harebrained scheme, yet so famed had Morgan
become that men flocked to his call, clamoring to go on the hazardous
expedition, and Morgan appointed the Island of Tortuga as the
rendezvous. Here flocked the sea rovers from far and near. They came in
ships, boats, canoes and even tramped overland across hostile
Hispaniola (Santo Domingo) to join him, until the greatest crowd of
buccaneers and the greatest gathering of buccaneer ships the world had
ever seen were assembled at Tortuga on October 24, 1670.

“To provision the fleet, Morgan equipped four ships with four hundred
men and dispatched them to La Rancheria near the present port of Rio de
la Hacha in Colombia. His plan was for them to raid the coast towns,
seize what maize and cattle were required and come back with supplies
and salted meat, thus obtained free of cost. In this the ships were
more than successful, for, at the end of five weeks, they returned
laden with maize and beef and with a huge amount of loot, for they had
taken a Spanish ship, had seized the town and had robbed it and the
inhabitants, and had resorted to all their customary barbarities to
wring the last piece of eight from the people.

“Everything was now in readiness, and Morgan set sail for Cape Tiburón,
Haiti, where vessels from Jamaica were to join him. These brought his
force up to thirty-seven ships and two thousand fighting men, exclusive
of sailors and boys, by far the greatest buccaneer force that ever had
set sail to ravish the Spanish cities. Morgan’s flagship carried
twenty-two large and six small guns, there were several ships of
twenty, eighteen and sixteen guns and the smallest mounted four.
Finding it impossible to command such a huge fleet by himself, Morgan
divided it into two squadrons with a vice admiral, commanders and
captains for each, and to these he issued elaborate commissions to act
against the Spaniards, for all the world as though he were the King of
England.

“The next matter to attend to was the agreement as to compensation for
death or accidents, and the trip was considered so hazardous that the
amounts to be paid were double the usual sums. Then the fleet set sail
for Old Providence or, as the buccaneers called it, St. Catherine, for
in order to be sure that his retreat was not cut off, Morgan realized
he must destroy this heavily fortified spot and leave a garrison of his
own in charge. Moreover, he knew that outlaws and brigands were
imprisoned there, and that these men, if released, would join his
forces and would be invaluable as guides in crossing the Isthmus of
Panama.

“On the 29th of December, 1670, they reached St. Catherine, which
Morgan expected to take easily. However, since his former attack under
Mansvelt, the Dons had greatly strengthened the forts. Landing about
one thousand men, Morgan attempted to take the place by land, but the
Spaniards kept up a galling fire, the buccaneers were without
provisions—as they had expected to live off their enemies—and at night
a pouring rain came on, drenching the buccaneers to the skin. At this
time, so tired, hungry and miserable were the men that, had the Dons
but known it, they could easily have wiped out the buccaneers with a
force of less than one hundred men, and no doubt had they done so
Panama would have been saved. The rain continued incessantly the next
day and the buccaneers were able to do nothing. So starved and
desperate were they that when an old horse was discovered in a field
they instantly killed it and fought over it like wolves, devouring even
the offal. By this time the men began to grumble, and even suggested
giving up and became mutinous. Morgan, seeing that unless something was
done at once his expedition would be a failure, resorted to his old
game of bluff, and sent a canoe with a flag of truce to the Governor,
demanding the surrender of the island and threatening to give no
quarter unless it was done at once. So terrified were the Dons that the
Governor merely asked two hours to consider and at the end of that time
sent to Morgan and offered to deliver the place provided Morgan would
agree to carry out a deception by which it would appear that the
Governor was overpowered.

“The proposition was that Morgan should come at night and open an
attack on St. Jerome fort, while at the same time his fleet approached
Santa Teresa fort and landed men at the battery of St. Matthew. The
Governor was then to pass from one fort to the other and purposely fall
into the buccaneer’s hands. He was then to pretend that the English
forced him to betray his men and was to lead the buccaneers into St.
Jerome. But he stipulated that no bullets should be used in the
buccaneers’ guns and guaranteed that his men would fire into the air.
To this treacherous scheme Morgan agreed and the island was of course
taken in a sham battle. But within a short time His Excellency bitterly
repented of his deed. The buccaneers looted right and left, they tore
down houses to make fires for cooking the stolen poultry and livestock
and they made prisoners of all the Spaniards on the island. These
totaled four hundred and fifty, including one hundred and ninety
soldiers and eight bandits who at once joined Morgan’s force. As there
was nothing in the way of valuables in the place the people escaped the
customary tortures, and, shutting the women in the churches, Morgan
ordered the men into the country to secure provisions.

“Having accumulated a vast supply of food, many tons of powder, immense
quantities of arms and many cannon, Morgan prepared to attack San
Lorenzo at the Chagres mouth. He had no mind to risk his own precious
neck in this desperate venture, however; but making himself comfortable
at St. Catherine, he dispatched four ships with about four hundred men
under Captain Brodely, a notorious buccaneer who had served with Morgan
under Mansvelt. Anchoring his ships about three miles from the mouth of
the Chagres, Brodely landed his men and attempted to attack the castle
by land. But despite their brigand guides the buccaneers discovered
that it was impossible to approach the fort under cover, the country
having been cleared for a long distance about the fort, while in
addition the deep mangrove swamps made progress next to impossible. But
the buccaneers dared not turn back and face Morgan, and so, although
fully exposed to the fire from the fort, they rushed across the open
space with drawn swords in one hand and fireballs in the other, but the
firing was terrific. The Dons had erected heavy palisades outside of
the fortress walls, and presently the buccaneers were compelled to
retreat. At nightfall, however, they made another assault, throwing
their fire balls at the palisades, attempting to scale them and
fighting like demons. But they were beaten off again and again, and
their case seemed hopeless when, by the merest accident, fate played
into their hands. In the heat of the assault, one of the buccaneers was
struck by an arrow in the back, which completely penetrated his body.
Mad with pain, the fellow drew the missile out through his breast,
wrapped a bit of rag around it and, dropping it into his musket, fired
it back into the fort.

“But the buccaneer’s hasty and unthinking act won the day for the
corsairs. The cotton rag about the arrow caught fire from the powder,
it fell unnoticed upon some palm-thatched houses within the fort, and
ere the Dons realized what had happened the buildings were ablaze.
Madly the Spaniards strove to quench the flames, but the fire was
beyond control, it reached a magazine, and there was terrific
explosion. During the confusion and panic that ensued the buccaneers
rushed to the palisades and, piling inflammable material about them,
soon had them burning furiously. Presently the stakes began to fall,
carrying down masses of earth that had been piled between them, and
over these the yelling buccaneers swarmed to the assault. Under a rain
of stink pots and fire balls, boiling oil and molten lead hurled at
them by the garrison, the English fell everywhere, and at last, seeing
they could not gain the inner works, they withdrew once more.

“But despite their losses they were elated, for the palisades were
blazing everywhere and by midnight they were entirely consumed. When
morning dawned only the charred and fallen stakes remained and great
masses of earth had filled the ditch. The commandant, however, had
stationed his men upon these mounds and both sides kept up an incessant
fire of musketry. Within the castle the flames still raged, for the
only available water in the fort was contained in a huge cistern in the
lower part of the castle. Moreover, a party of the buccaneers was
detailed to snipe the Spaniards fighting the fire and carrying water,
while the others, hiding as best they could, picked off the men at the
guns and those guarding the fallen palisades. Noticing one spot where
the Governor himself was stationed in command of twenty-five picked
troops, Captain Brodely led a sudden charge and succeeded in taking the
breach.

“Even the buccaneers were amazed at the valiant resistance they met,
and, in his chronicles of the battle, Esquemeling particularly calls
attention to the courageousness of the Dons. Once within the walls,
however, the battle was practically won and, fighting hand to hand with
pistols, pikes, daggers, swords and even stones, the British and the
Spaniards battled furiously. Not a Spaniard asked for quarter; the
Governor fell, fighting to the last, with a bullet through his brain,
and when finally the few survivors saw that their cause was hopeless
they leaped from the parapets into the river rather than surrender. And
when the buccaneers found themselves masters of the fortress they
discovered that of the three hundred and fourteen soldiers who had
formed the garrison only thirty remained alive, and of these over
twenty were seriously wounded, while not a single living officer was to
be found.

“The buccaneers, however, were greatly troubled, despite their hard-won
victory—which had cost them nearly two hundred men—for the prisoners
informed them that a party of volunteers had managed to steal from the
fort, had passed through the buccaneers’ lines and had carried word of
the attack and of Morgan’s coming to Panama. All plans of a surprise
were now hopeless and realizing that quick work was necessary Captain
Brodely at once sent a ship to St. Catherine bearing word to Morgan of
the taking of San Lorenzo.

“Hastily lading his ships with provisions and the unfortunate prisoners
he had taken, Morgan left a garrison of his own men in the strongest
fort, burned the town, destroyed the other forts, cast the cannon into
the sea and set sail for the Chagres. Eight days after the fall of the
castle he arrived, but his men were so elated at seeing the British
flag flying from the castle that they succeeded in running four of the
ships onto a bar at the river’s mouth. One of these was Morgan’s
flagship, and while all the goods and persons on the vessels were saved
the ships were a total loss. As soon as he landed, Morgan ordered his
St. Catherine prisoners to be put to work repairing the fort and
setting up new palisades and, leaving a force of five hundred men at
the fort and with one hundred and fifty more upon his ships, Morgan set
sail up the Chagres in small boats with a force of two thousand two
hundred men. Thinking to be able to supply himself and his men with
provisions taken from the Spaniards, Morgan carried practically no
supplies and this very nearly caused the utter failure of his
expedition.

“It was on the 18th of January, 1671, that Morgan left San Lorenzo in
his five boats and thirty-two canoes, with several pieces of light
artillery and all the pomp of a military organization, even to drummers
and trumpeters. The first day they covered barely twenty miles,
reaching a spot known as Los Bracos. But already the men were suffering
from hunger and being cramped and crowded in the small boats. Landing,
they went in search of food, but the Dons, having been forewarned, had
fled, carrying with them or destroying everything edible, and the
buccaneers were ‘forced to stay their bellies with a pipe of tobacco.’

“The following day they continued to Cruz de Juan Gallego, but, finding
the river very low and choked by fallen trees, they were here compelled
to forsake the boats and march overland, leaving one hundred and sixty
men to guard the boats and their retreat. After a long march they
reached a spot on the river where canoes could be used, and with
infinite labor the company was transported up stream to Cedro Bueno.
The buccaneers were by now on the verge of starvation, but there was
nothing to do but keep on, and at noon on the fourth day they
discovered a settlement. But not a soul was there and not a morsel to
eat, save a few crumbs of bread and a number of leather bags. Famished,
the buccaneers fell upon the leathern sacks and devoured them. For an
account of this I can do no better than read you Esquemeling’s
narrative. He says: ‘Thus they made a huge banquet of the bags of
leather which doubtless would have been more grateful unto them if
divers quarrels had not arisen concerning who should have the greatest
share. They conjectured that five hundred Spaniards had been there,
more or less, and these they were now infinitely desirous to meet,
intending to devour some of them rather than perish. Whom they would
certainly in that occasion have roasted or boiled had they been able to
take them. Some persons who were never out of their mothers’ kitchens
may ask how these pirates could eat, swallow and digest those pieces of
leather so hard and dry. To whom I only answer: That could they once
experiment with hunger, or rather famine, they would certainly find the
manner, by their own necessity, as the pirates did. For these first
took the leather and sliced it in pieces. Then did they beat it between
stones and rub it, often dipping it in the water of the river to render
it supple and tender. Lastly they scraped off the hair and roasted or
broiled it over a fire. And thus being cooked they cut it in small
morsels and eat it, helping it down with frequent gulps of water, which
by good fortune they had near at hand.’

“And when night fell on the close of the fourth day and not a scrap of
food had been found in any of the deserted settlements and camps, the
pirate who had had the foresight to retain a small piece of leather was
indeed a happy man, for the others went supperless to sleep.

“At noon of the fifth day they reached Barbacoas, where in a cave, the
buccaneers, to their intense joy, discovered two sacks of meal, two
jars of wine and some bananas. These Morgan divided among the men who
were suffering the most, and somewhat encouraged they proceeded on that
terrible march. On the sixth day the men proceeded very slowly, partly
from weakness and partly owing to the rough character of the land, and
to keep themselves alive they devoured grasses, leaves and roots. But
at noon they found a barrel of corn at a deserted plantation and
without waiting devoured it dry and raw. Hardly an hour later they met
an ambuscade of Indians, and feeling confident that they would be
victors and would secure plentiful provisions they threw away the
precious corn. But to their chagrin the Indians, after discharging a
shower of arrows, disappeared like shadows in the forest, leaving no
food and nothing to mark their presence save half a dozen dead
buccaneers.

“On the seventh day the buccaneers prepared and cleaned their arms,
expecting to meet resistance just ahead, and then, crossing the river,
they hurried forward to the village of La Cruz. As they approached they
saw smoke rising above the trees, and, convinced that this meant the
place was occupied, they made all haste towards it. Judge of their
disgust when they found the village deserted and in flames, with, as
Esquemeling humorously remarks, ‘nothing wherewith to refresh
themselves unless it were good fires to warm themselves, which they
wanted not.’

“But a search revealed something to eat—a few stray dogs and cats which
they butchered and devoured raw and bleeding, and hardly had they
completed this horrid repast when a party of the men found a sack of
bread and sixteen jars of wine in the ruins of a stable. Scarcely had
they commenced to eat and drink, however, when they were taken
violently ill, and they at once decided the wine had been poisoned,
although, as their chronicler very wisely says, it was more probable
that it was ‘their huge want of sustenance in that whole voyage and the
manifold sorts of trash they had eaten.’

“Whatever the cause, it compelled the expedition to remain there for an
entire day. This village, then called La Cruz, was on the site of the
present Las Cruces, the head of navigation on the Chagres and from
which a branch of the Gold Road led to Panama about twenty-five miles
distant. On the eighth day, Morgan sent forward a scouting party of two
hundred men to find the best route and to learn of any ambuscades. This
they did to their sorrow when, at Quebrada Obscura, they were met with
a hurricane of arrows shot by Indians from hiding places in the deep
forest on the summits of the cañon’s walls. A number of the buccaneers
were killed and many wounded and a few Indians fell, but seeing such
overwhelming numbers of the British approaching they soon took to their
heels, and the buccaneers passed on and entered the savanna country.

“Here they suffered greatly, being compelled to pass the night in the
open in a pouring rain and enduring agonies from biting insects and
mosquitoes. On the morning of the ninth day they came to a steep hill
from the summit of which they saw the Pacific gleaming in the sun and
with two ships sailing from Panama to Taboga. Elated at finding
themselves so near their goal they hurried down the slope and in a
little meadow discovered a number of cattle, horses and asses. Hastily
butchering and dressing these they kindled huge fires, half cooked the
still warm flesh over the flames and gorged themselves like beasts.
Indeed, to once more quote Esquemeling, ‘they more resembled cannibals
than Europeans at this banquet, the blood many times running down from
their beards to their middles.’

“Continuing, they came at evening in sight of a party of two hundred
Spaniards, who challenged them and then retreated, and before nightfall
they saw the tower of the cathedral of Old Panama looming against the
sky. Sounding their trumpets, beating their drums, throwing hats in
air; leaping and shouting with joy, the buccaneers, knowing the end of
their awful march was over, pitched their camp for the night in
preparation of an assault on the morrow.

“But the buccaneers were not to rest in peace. Fifty horsemen appeared,
taunting and insulting the English just out of gunshot, and soon the
big cannon of the forts began to thunder and roar and the shot fell all
about the buccaneers’ camp. Soon thereafter a party of fully two
hundred cavalry galloped across the fields from the town, and presently
the buccaneers discovered that they were completely surrounded and,
from being the besiegers they had been transformed into the besieged.

“But having done so much and survived, the rough corsairs gave no
thought or worry to this and ‘began every one to open his satchel and
without napkin or plate fell to eating very heartily the remaining
pieces of bulls’ and horses’ flesh which they had reserved since noon.
This being done they laid themselves down upon the grass with great
repose and huge satisfaction, expecting only with impatience the
dawning of the next day.’ Thus does Esquemeling describe that fateful
evening, the close of the day which foreshadowed the doom of the
richest city of New Spain and which ere another sun set would be a
blazing funeral pyre and a bloody shambles with the shrieks and screams
of tortured beings rending the air and rising loud above the roaring of
the flames.”








CHAPTER VI

THE SACK OF PANAMA


“There’s something I’d like to ask, Uncle Henry,” said Fred, as Mr.
Bickford paused in his narrative and reached for an old book. “You
spoke of the British flag flying from San Lorenzo. I thought the
pirates always used a black flag with a skull and bones.”

“And, Dad, how did they dress?” asked Jack. “Did they wear uniforms or
did they dress like the pictures of pirates, with big earrings and
handkerchiefs about their heads and their sashes stuck full of pistols
and knives?”

“Those are questions well taken,” replied Mr. Bickford, “and really
important if we are to understand the truth about the buccaneers and
their lives. The ‘Jolly Roger’ was never the emblem of the ‘Brethren of
the Main,’ as they called themselves, but later, after the buccaneers
were dispersed and a few had turned out-and-out pirates, the black flag
with its symbol of death became a recognized pirate standard. But in
the heydey of the buccaneers, when they attacked only Spanish ships and
Spanish cities, they fought under the colors of their
countries—British, French or Dutch, as the case might be, and very
often, in one fleet, there would be ships under the various flags. In
addition, each prominent buccaneer leader had his own colors—much as
merchant shipowners have their house flags—which were flown on all the
ships under the leader. The flag might be of almost any conventional
design, but it was known and recognized by all the buccaneers.

“Thus, Bartholomew Sharp’s flag was a blood-red burgee bearing a bunch
of white and green ribbons; Sawkins’ colors were a red flag striped
with yellow; Peter Harris flew a plain green ensign; John Coxon used a
plain red burgee; Cook used a red flag striped with yellow and bearing
a hand with a sword; Hawkins’ was appropriately a red flag with a black
hawk upon it and so on. In garments, the buccaneers were not by any
means uniform or particular. The rank and file of sailors dressed in
rough clothes, as a rule, like the ordinary seamen of their times, in
loose knee trousers or ‘shorts,’ coarse shirts and low, heavy shoes on
their bare feet and with knitted caps or bandannas on their heads. Many
wore the costume of the real buccaneers of the woods—rawhide shoes and
leg coverings, leather jackets and trousers and palm hats, while the
majority wore any odds and ends they could pick up. After a foray they
often togged themselves out in the garments of their victims—brocades,
silks and satins, gold lace and plumed hats, often stiff and caked with
the life-blood of their late owners. But the ordinary buccaneer was a
spendthrift drunkard ashore and any finery he possessed usually went to
pay for his debaucheries before he had been on land twenty-four hours,
after which he was left half naked. The leaders or captains, however,
dressed like dandies. To be sure, their wardrobes were often made up of
miscellaneous pieces looted from the wealthy Spaniards, and, like their
men, they were not over particular as to the condition they were in,
but they were more or less thrifty, had plenty of ready cash and spent
small fortunes in buying the most brilliant and costly costumes and
trappings. Here, for example, is a description of the costume worn by
Morgan. ‘A fine linen shirt brave with Italian lace with velvet
waistcoat of scarlet, much laced with gold and a plum-colored greatcoat
reaching to his knees and with great gold buttons fashioned from
doubloons and trimmed with heavy braid of gold. Upon his legs, breeches
of saffron silk, belaced like unto his shirt and ruffled, and hose of
sky-blue silk. Soft top boots of red cordovan with huge buckles of
silver beset with gems and his hat of Sherwood green belaced with gold
and gemmed, and wherein was placed a crimson plume draping onto his
shoulder. His periwig was lustrous brown and at his side he bore a
Toledo rapier, jeweled at the hilt, on a belt of gray shagreen buckled
with gold, and bore also a staff, gold headed and tasseled.’ Quite a
striking figure, surely, reminding us of one of the ‘three musketeers.’
And here is the description of another buccaneer chieftain: ‘A long
surtout of green satin with wide skirts slit far up the arms to give
his muscles play. Breeches wide and short of bullock-blood satin and
hose of canary silk.’ So you see the pirate or buccaneer of fiction is
by no means typical of the real thing. However, in one respect they
were all much alike. When on the ‘warpath,’ as we may say, they wore
all the pistols and daggers they could stow in belts or sashes, they
invariably carried heavy curved cutlasses with peculiar scallop
shell-shaped hilts and, in addition, they carried muskets slung over
their shoulders with horns of powder and pouches of bullets. Moreover,
men and officers alike were inordinately fond of gewgaws and jewelry,
and rings in ears were almost universal, as they were with all seamen
of their time and for years later.

“And now let us return to Morgan and his men encamped on the plain
before ‘ye goodlye and statlye citie of Panama.’

“Early the next day—the tenth after leaving San Lorenzo—Morgan
marshaled his men upon the plain and with drums beating and trumpets
blaring, marched like a miniature army towards the doomed city. It was
soon evident that to follow the high road would cost the buccaneers
dearly, and at his guides’ suggestion Morgan made a detour, in order to
approach the city through the woods. This was totally unexpected by the
Spaniards and in order to check the buccaneers’ advance the troops were
compelled to leave their forts and guns and meet the enemy in the open.
The Spanish numbered four regiments of foot soldiers, totaling
twenty-four hundred; two squadrons of cavalry, amounting to four
hundred men, and a large number of slaves who were driving a herd of
two thousand wild bulls which they expected would charge the buccaneers
and cause consternation among them.

“Reaching a low hill, the English looked with amazement at the
overwhelming forces sent to meet them and for the first time their
confidence began to waver. As Esquemeling puts it, ‘Yea, few there were
but wished themselves at home or at least free from the obligation of
that engagement wherein they perceived their lives must be narrowly
concerned.’ But they had come too far, had undergone too many
hardships, and had the richest city of the New World too near, to
falter or turn back and, knowing no quarter would be given them, they
swore a solemn oath to fight until death.

“Dividing his men into three troops, Morgan then ordered the best
marksmen, to the number of two hundred, to scatter and advance and pick
off the Spaniards before the main body of buccaneers charged. The Dons
at once attempted a charge of cavalry, but the rains had softened the
ground and had transformed it to a quagmire; they could not maneuver
properly and the accurate fire from the buccaneer sharpshooters brought
them down by scores. Notwithstanding this, the Spaniards fought
courageously and the infantry tried again and again to force their way
through the buccaneers in order to support the cavalry. Then the bulls
were urged forward; with cracking whips and shouts from the slaves they
were stampeded towards the buccaneers, and like an avalanche they came
plunging on, a sea of wildly tossing horns, thundering hoofs and
foaming nostrils. But the buccaneers were the last men in the world to
be demoralized by cattle. They had made hunting savage wild bulls their
profession and with shouts, trumpets and waving hats they turned the
stampede to one side while the few bulls that kept on and dashed among
the British were shot down or hamstrung ere they did the least damage.

“The battle had now raged for two hours; practically all the Spanish
cavalry were killed or unhorsed, and the infantry, discouraged and
demoralized, fired one last volley and then, throwing down their
muskets, fled to the city. Many were not able to gain the town and
tried to conceal themselves in the woods, but these the buccaneers
hunted down and butchered wherever found.

“Upon the field the Dons had left six hundred slain, in addition to
several hundred wounded, and the buccaneers had lost, between killed
and wounded, nearly half as many. Weary with their long tramp overland
and the battle, the English were in no condition to follow up their
victory, but Morgan forced them on and after a short rest they resumed
their march towards the city. The approach, however, was directly under
the fire of the cannon in the forts and with the great guns roaring
constantly and the buccaneers falling at every step the English kept
doggedly on until, after three hours of fighting, they were in
possession of the city.

“Madly they rushed hither and thither, ruthlessly cutting down and
pistoling all they met, men, women and children, broaching rum casks,
looting shops and houses, destroying for mere lust and wantonness
until, after a great deal of difficulty, Morgan got his men under
control and, assembling them in the market place, gave strict orders
that none should touch or drink any liquor owing to the fact, so he
said, that he had won a confession by torture from prisoners that all
the wine had been poisoned. In reality, he undoubtedly foresaw that,
should his men become drunk, they would fall easy victims to the
Spaniards and that the Dons thus might retake the city.

“Morgan, however, was in a frenzy, an overpowering passion, a
demoniacal rage, for the people, having been warned of his coming, had
carried off the bulk of the riches in the city. The most precious altar
pieces, the wonderful gold altar of San José church, the chests of
coins, the bullion and plate, vast fortunes in gems and the most
valuable merchandise had all been loaded hurriedly onto ships which had
sailed away, no one knew whither, long before the buccaneers arrived.
There were to be sure, boats within the harbor, but it was low tide—the
tide in the Pacific rises and falls for nearly twenty feet—the boats
were high and dry, and Morgan could not even send a craft in chase of
the fleeing treasure ships.

“Beside himself with rage, Morgan secretly ordered the city fired and
in a moment the place was a hell of raging flames. Morgan, in order to
excite his men the more, and to bring greater revenge upon the
Spaniards, claimed that the Dons had started the blaze, but there is no
question that he was the culprit, for Esquemeling, who was present,
does not hesitate to make the statement. Morgan, however, had
overstepped his mark; even his men fought valiantly side by side with
the Spaniards to extinguish the flames, but to no avail. In half an
hour an entire street was a smoldering heap of ruins and as most of the
city consisted of flimsy houses of native cedar and of thatched and
wattled huts it burned like tinder. And here let me point out that the
accepted ideas of this old city of Panama are very erroneous. Because
the ruins left standing are of stone, the public, and many historians,
have assumed that it was a city of stone buildings. This, however, was
not the case. Esquemeling particularly states that, ‘all the houses of
the city were built of cedar, being of curious and magnificent
structure and richly adorned within, especially with hangings and
paintings, being two thousand of magnificent and prodigious building
with five thousand of lesser quality.’ Moreover, in the official
description of the city, preserved in the Archives of Seville, it is
stated that the houses were of wood, and they were divided into two
classes,—those with and those without floors, the latter being greatly
in the majority. Thus it is easily seen how a fire would sweep the city
and wipe it out of existence in a few hours, leaving only the solidly
built stone buildings remaining. Of these there were a number,
including eight monasteries, two churches and a hospital, the
cathedral, the slave market, the governor’s palace, the treasury and
the forts. One of the finest buildings was the slave exchange owned by
Genoese slave merchants, and within this, when the town fell to the
buccaneers, were over two hundred, cowering, helpless slaves. Guarding
the doors that none might escape, Morgan ordered the place burnt and
for hours the screams and shrieks of the manacled, helpless blacks and
Indians drowned all other sounds as the poor creatures were slowly
roasted to death.

“For four weeks the city burned, while the buccaneers camped within the
charred ruins, but taking great care not to become separated, as they
well knew that large numbers of the Spaniards were lurking near, fully
armed and ready to take advantage of the least carelessness on the part
of the invaders.

“In the meantime, the buccaneers searched the ruins for loot, explored
the wells and cisterns and recovered large amounts of hidden treasure
and valuables which had survived the flames. Meanwhile, too, Morgan
sent out five hundred heavily armed men to scour the surrounding
country and bring in all prisoners and valuables they could find, and
two days later they returned, bringing over two hundred captives. Each
day new parties were sent out and constantly they returned bearing more
loot and additional captives until the countryside for miles about was
a desolate uninhabited waste.

“Then, to wring confessions of where the miserable folk had secreted
their valuables, Morgan commenced such a series of devilish tortures
and inhumanities as the world had probably never seen before or since.
One poor wretch who was a mere serving man was captured while wearing a
pair of his master’s ‘taffety breeches’ which he had donned in the
confusion of the attack. Moreover, hanging to the trousers was a small
key, and these things convinced the buccaneers that the fellow was
well-to-do and that the key belonged to some secret chest containing
his wealth. In vain the fellow protested that he knew nothing of it,
that the garments and the key were his master’s and that he was merely
a servant. Paying no heed to his screams, the buccaneers placed him on
the rack and stretched him until his arms were pulled from their
sockets. Still the man protested his ignorance and the inhuman monsters
twisted a thong about his forehead until his eyes popped from their
orbits. Even this awful torture was, of course, without result, and
stringing him up by the thumbs, they flogged him within an inch of his
life, sliced off his ears and nose, singed his bleeding sightless
features with burning straw and, still unsuccessful in their attempts
to learn the supposed secret of his treasure, they ordered a slave to
run him through with a lance. There is no need to describe other
examples of Morgan’s fiendishness. He spared neither young nor old, men
or women, and the priests and nuns were treated with even greater
cruelty than any others. Only the most prominent and important men and
women were free from tortures, and these Morgan herded together to
hold, under threat of death or worse, for ransom.

“For three weeks the buccaneers occupied the ruined city, torturing,
slaying, committing every devilishness imaginable, until even Morgan’s
men sickened with the sights and a large portion of them planned to
steal away in a ship and desert their leader. Morgan, however, heard of
the plot, destroyed all the ships and ordered preparations made to
leave the city and return to San Lorenzo. But before he left he sent
certain prisoners to outlying districts demanding ransoms for those he
held, and for days wealth flowed in from friends of the captives and
many were freed. Still, hundreds remained, and on the 14th of February,
1671, Morgan and his men left the city, and, with one hundred and
seventy-two pack mules laden with booty and six hundred prisoners, he
started on the long and terrible overland trip.

“Never did heaven look down upon a more pitiable, awful spectacle than
that presented by the buccaneers with their captives. Surrounded by the
armed buccaneers, the prisoners—many of them tender, high-bred ladies
and young children—were forced over the rough trail and across rivers.
‘Nothing,’ says Esquemeling, ‘was to be heard save the lamentations,
cries, shrieks and doleful sighs of those who were persuaded that
Morgan designed to transport them to his own country as slaves.’ Given
barely enough food and water to sustain life, many of them wounded, all
terrified and frightened, they were forced on by blows, curses, prods
with swords or rawhide lashes. Women, unable to endure, fell upon their
knees and implored Morgan to permit them to go back to their loved ones
to live in huts of straw as they had no houses left, but to one and all
he replied, with a laugh, that he came not to hear lamentations and
cries but to gain money. Often, the women and children would stagger
and fall, and if unable to rise were pistoled or run through, the
others staggering over their dead bodies. And yet, in the midst of this
awful march, Morgan exhibited that strange paradoxical nature of his
and performed a gallant and commendable act. It happened that among the
prisoners was a lady who belonged on the island of Taboga, a most
lovely and virtuous woman according to Esquemeling, and to her
buccaneer guards she stated, amid her sobs and shrieks, that she had
sent two priests to secure her ransom, but that having obtained the
money they had used it to secure the release of their own friends. This
tale reached Morgan’s ears and instantly he halted his men, made an
investigation and finding it true at once released the woman, made her
a present of the amount of her ransom, swept off his plumed hat, bent
his knee and kissed her finger-tips and, with expressions of deepest
sorrow for her state, sent her happily on her way with an armed escort.
Then, to even scores, he made prisoners of the treacherous priests,
and, as Esquemeling tells us, ‘used them according to the deserts of
their incompassionate intrigues.’

“By the time La Cruz was reached on March 5, 1671, the bulk of the
captives who still lived had been ransomed, and, embarking with those
remaining and with a number of new prisoners taken at La Cruz, Morgan
and his men started down the Chagres.

“When midway to San Lorenzo, Morgan again halted, ordered every one
searched to be sure they had concealed no booty and, to show his
fairness, insisted that he too must be searched, ‘even to the soles of
his boots.’ Then once more they resumed their way, and on March 9th
reached the mouth of the Chagres and the fortress.

“Soon after he arrived, Morgan loaded a boat with the prisoners he had
taken at St. Catherine and sent them to Porto Bello with a demand that
a ransom should be paid for the evacuation of San Lorenzo without its
being destroyed. This time, however, Morgan’s bluff was called, and a
message was returned stating that not a farthing would be paid and
Morgan could do as he pleased with the castle.

“Meantime, the loot was divided—Morgan doing the dividing—and at once
grumblings and complaints arose and the men openly accused Morgan of
keeping far more than his agreed share. And there is little wonder that
they did, for, despite the immense booty taken, Morgan gave but two
hundred pieces of eight to each man!

“Then Morgan showed his yellow streak and, sneaking secretly aboard his
ship, while at his orders his men were demolishing the fort, he sailed
away, leaving the buccaneers to follow as best they might. With
scarcely any provisions, with no commander of experience, the deserted
buccaneers were in a sad state. As Esquemeling quaintly says, ‘Morgan
left us all in such a miserable condition as might well serve for a
lively representation of what reward attends wickedness at the latter
end of life.’ As a matter of fact, they separated, took to sea in the
remaining ships and scattered to the four winds, carrying on a
desultory and more or less successful buccaneering life on their own
account. Thus, by treachery, Morgan possessed himself of his men’s
hard-won loot, he double-crossed and deserted the men who, rough and
villainous as they were, had stood by him through thick and thin and
had made his most famous deed possible, and his career as a buccaneer
was over.

“But the monuments to his awful deeds remain. Above the placid Chagres’
mouth old Fort San Lorenzo still frowns down. Its quaint sentry boxes
jut from the battered walls; the great guns lie rusting and corroded in
the crumbling embrasures; piles of round shot are overgrown with weeds
and vines; the cisterns where the Dons dipped the water to quench the
flames caused by that blazing arrow are still there. Within the
dungeons are rusty leg irons, manacles and heavy chains; the patched
walls, where Morgan’s toiling prisoners repaired the breaches of his
buccaneers’ attack, are plainly visible; and the deep trench, half
filled with the piles of dirt whereon the gallant Governor made his
last stand, are there for all to see.

“And across the Isthmus—by the shores of the Pacific—looms the lonely,
ruined tower of the cathedral in Old Panama. Near it are the walls of
the ancient fort, the gaunt arches of a burned monastery, the solid
massive walls of the slave mart wherein those cowering wretches were
roasted at Morgan’s orders and, spanning a little stream, is the stone
bridge over which the buccaneers fought and fell as they took the city.
Half hidden in the jungle are the treasure vaults that once held
incalculable fortunes in plate and gold, in ingots and jewels, in
pieces of eight, onzas and doubloons. Among the shrubbery one may still
pick up bits of glass and china, hinges and locks, buttons and stray
coins, even an occasional pistol barrel or sword hilt, all warped,
misshapen, melted by the flames that wiped Old Panama from the map when
Morgan, in his rage, fired the richest city of New Spain and left death
and destruction, smoldering ruins and distorted bleeding corpses to
testify to the most wanton, ruthless deed ever perpetrated by a
buccaneer.”








CHAPTER VII

THE MISFORTUNES OF MONSIEUR OGERON


“Gosh, I’m glad the Spaniards fooled Morgan and got most of their
things away!” exclaimed Jack. “What became of the treasure, Dad; did
they bring it back after Morgan left?”

“No one knows what became of the bulk of it,” replied his father. “One
or two of the ships were never heard from. They were probably wrecked
or perhaps their crews mutinied and made off with the valuables. One
vessel was driven ashore on the coasts of Darien and the treasure went
down with it. The priceless cargoes of others were buried in
out-of-the-way spots and no one has ever discovered them as far as
known, while a few of the ships returned after the buccaneers had gone.
Of course the town was in ruins and, realizing that the situation was
too exposed, the Dons moved a few miles to the west and built the
present city of Panama, using the stones and bricks from the ruins in
making the more important buildings. And here let me tell you a little
story—a most romantic and fascinating tale that throws some light on
the question of what became of the treasures the Spaniards saved from
Morgan’s clutches.

“In the old city the richest and most famed church was that of San
José. Like all the churches, it received its tithe or share of all gold
and riches passing through Panama, but the brothers who owned San José
saw fit to use their share to fashion a huge altar of beaten gold, a
marvelous, glorious structure unequalled in all the world and which
became famed far and wide. Indeed it is said that it was mainly the
stories of the golden altar of San José and the heavily jeweled
vestments and images in the church that led Morgan to sack the town.
When word of the taking of San Lorenzo reached Panama, the priests of
San José church hurriedly removed the far-famed altar piecemeal and
loading it onto a ship sailed away. Months later, when the new city was
being built, the priests returned and busied themselves in building a
new San José church near the harbor shores in the new city. But they
were evidently no longer rich. The church was a tiny, obscure,
unattractive affair half hidden among other buildings, as it still
stands to-day, at the corner of Avenue A and 8th Street in Panama City.
And within the church, in place of the wonderful altar of beaten gold,
they erected a plain white altar—the poorest of all among the churches
in the city. Time went on. There were slave uprisings, fires,
rebellions against Spain and insurrections. The country was turbulent
and unsettled, but the brothers of San José church had nothing to tempt
robbers, bandits or revolutionists and they and their little stucco
church were left in peace. Even the fires that swept the town and
destroyed many of the larger churches spared the little affair on
Avenue A. Then came the Americans and the Canal; Panama won her
independence, Uncle Sam sanitized the city, established law and order,
and bloody, unsettled days were a thing of the past.

“Then for days the priests of San José church busied themselves with
mysterious doings behind closed doors and at last, lo and behold, where
the white altar had stood, once more gleamed the ancient altar of gold!
Through all the years the friars had guarded their secret well. Under
its coating of white paint the famed altar had been hidden with never a
suspicion of its existence and now that it was safe the white paint had
been cleaned off and once more the glorious altar of precious metal
glowed and scintillated in the sunlight pouring upon it through the
stained glass windows. It is one of the sights of Panama of to-day, but
few know of its existence, still fewer know of its history and in the
little church on a back street few tourists realize that there stands
the most wonderful and the only real treasure salvaged from the ancient
city destroyed by the buccaneers.

“And now, boys, let us go back to Morgan and follow his career after he
returned to Jamaica from the looting of Panama. While he had been away,
peace between Spain and England had been declared, and the King of
England, hearing that Jamaica’s Governor encouraged the buccaneers and
even shared in their raids, appointed a new governor and ordered the
old one to appear before the Crown and explain his behavior. Thus, when
Morgan arrived at Jamaica, he found himself declared a pirate and
placed under arrest along with the ex-governor. And with his
discredited official friend the buccaneer chieftain was transported to
England to stand trial for piracy.

“No one knows exactly what arguments Morgan used or how he managed it;
but he was a glib talker, a man of great personal magnetism and,
moreover, had vast riches at his disposal, and doubtless he employed
all these resources to the best of his ability. At any rate, instead of
being hung as he richly deserved, he was knighted by the king, was
appointed Lieutenant Governor of Jamaica and sent back to the island
with instructions to suppress piracy. Maybe the King had method in his
madness and thought that if it took a thief to catch a thief it would
be well to have a pirate to catch pirates. And in this he was not
mistaken. Morgan, having already won the enmity of his former comrades
and being discredited as a buccaneer, turned upon the corsairs, and
with all the cruelty and unscrupulousness he had exhibited when
attacking the Dons, he hunted down the buccaneers, hanged them without
trial and sent expeditions out to destroy them. But he was such an
utterly unprincipled and dastardly wretch that he could not play fair
even as a reformed buccaneer. While destroying buccaneers with one hand
he was aiding them with the other and secretly was providing funds and
help for his brother and a few chosen friends in their piratical
ventures. Owing to rumors of this and complaints of his tyrannical
rule, the King at last recalled him and Morgan, sailing from Jamaica,
passed into oblivion. Very little is known of what became of him. Some
claim he settled down in England and lived quietly upon the proceeds of
his robberies; others say he settled in the West Indies, and there is
even a rumor that he was assassinated by one of his old shipmates.
Whatever his end, he died unknown, unhonored, hated for a traitor, a
most atrocious scallawag; after a meteoric career of but five years and
the only buccaneer who was ever made a ‘Sir.’

“Now for a change, let me tell you of a buccaneer who found the
Spaniards more than a match for him and met his Waterloo at the hands
of the Dons. This was no less a personage than the Governor of Tortuga,
Monsieur Bertram Ogeron. After Morgan’s raid on Panama, in 1673 to be
exact, war broke out between the French and Dutch, and this gave an
excuse to the French buccaneers of Tortuga to attack their former
friends of the Dutch West Indies. Governor Ogeron, who was quite a
famed buccaneer, built and fitted out a large armed vessel which he
named the Ogeron in honor of himself and, manning it with five hundred
buccaneers, prepared to swoop down on the island of Curaçao. But when
nearing Porto Rico and sailing through the Mona Passage between that
island and Santo Domingo, a violent storm drove his ship upon the
Guadanillas rocks, completely destroying it. Fortunately, or perhaps
unfortunately as it turned out, all the men escaped in boats to the
main island of Porto Rico. Almost at once they were discovered by the
Spaniards who recognized them as French buccaneers, and the castaways
being unarmed and helpless they were immediately made prisoners.
Although the French begged for mercy and quarter, the atrocities they
had committed in the past were still fresh in their captors’ minds and,
finding buccaneers at their mercy, they proceeded to wreak vengeance.
In a short time they had tortured and killed the majority of the
captives and then, securely binding those left alive, they started to
drive them across the island to San Juan as slaves. Throughout all
this, Ogeron had remained unknown to the Dons, pretending to be a
half-witted fool, and his men, to all the Dons’ queries, insisted that
their commander had been drowned. Thinking him a poor demented fellow
the Spaniards left him free and obtained no little amusement from his
crazy capers and insane behavior. Indeed, they found him so diverting
that they treated him with kindness, fed him from their own meals,
while the other buccaneers were given barely enough to sustain life,
and allowed him full liberty. Also among the buccaneers was another
favored man, a surgeon, who was also left free in order that he might
use his services for the Dons’ benefit, and the two at once plotted to
escape and, returning to Tortuga, bring an expedition to Porto Rico to
rescue their fellows. Watching their chance, they took to the woods and
made towards the coast. This they reached safely, but found themselves
almost as badly off as before, for there was not a scrap of food to eat
and no chance of getting shelter or making their way to Tortuga. But
they were resourceful men and, wandering along the shore, they
succeeded in capturing a number of fish in the shoal water. Then, by
rubbing sticks together, they obtained fire, roasted the fish and the
next day proceeded to cut down trees with the intention of making a
raft. Fortunately they had brought along a small hatchet, their only
tool and weapon, and with this they undertook their herculean job. They
were thus busily at work when, to their delight, they saw a canoe
approaching and, hiding in the bushes, they watched it as it drew
towards the beach and discovered that it contained two men,—poor
fishermen,—a Spaniard and a mulatto. Picking up several calabashes, the
mulatto stepped from the little craft and started up the beach,
evidently intent on securing water. Stealing stealthily after him the
buccaneers, to quote Esquemeling’s words, ‘assaulted him and,
discharging a great blow on his head with the hatchet, they soon
deprived him of life.’ Hearing his cries, the Spaniard started to
escape, but was quickly overtaken and butchered. Then, securing a
plentiful supply of water in the dead man’s calabashes, they set sail
and a few days later arrived safely at a buccaneers’ lair in Samaná
Bay, Santo Domingo.

“Here Ogeron told his story, gathered together all the buccaneers he
could find and with a number of ships and several hundred men started
on his voyage of rescue and vengeance. The Dons, however, saw his fleet
approaching and prepared to give the buccaneers a warm welcome.
Unsuspecting, the buccaneers fell into an ambuscade, great numbers were
killed and the survivors who did not manage to escape to their ships,
were made prisoners. Ogeron himself escaped and shamed and beaten
returned to Tortuga, abandoning all hopes of rescuing his unfortunate
comrades. In the meantime, the Dons slaughtered the wounded Frenchmen,
cut off a few heads and limbs of the corpses to prove to their first
prisoners the fate of their friends who had attempted their rescue, and
drove the poor fellows on towards the capital. Here in San Juan they
were put to work at building the massive fortress of San Cristóbal
while a few were transported to Havana as laborers on the
fortifications there. But the Dons took no chances with them. Although
but a handful of half-starved, shackled slaves yet the buccaneers’
reputation was such that the Spaniards kept them constantly under
guard, confining them in separate cells at night, for, to once more
quote Esquemeling’s quaint phraseology, ‘the Spaniards had had divers
proofs of their enterprises on other occasions which afforded them
sufficient cause to use them after this manner.’

“And to make assurance doubly sure, each time a ship sailed for Spain
parties of the prisoners were placed on board, transported to Europe
and set at liberty. The buccaneers, however, had an almost uncanny
faculty of getting together, even when widely separated, and ere long
all the prisoners had met in France and were soon back in their old
haunt at Tortuga ready for another foray. But they had had enough of
Ogeron as a leader and joining Le Sieur Maintenon sailed for Trinidad
which they sacked and ransomed for ten thousand pieces of eight and
then set forth for the conquest of Caracas. Here, once more, they met
defeat, for while they took the port of La Guaira they were
ignominiously beaten back on the awful trail over the mountains to
Caracas. Many were killed, more were made prisoners and only a handful
of survivors escaped and returned, broken and penniless, to Tortuga.”

“Well, I’m glad the Dons did beat them,” declared Fred. “Seems to me
the buccaneers had it their own way too often.”

“Yes, that is true,” assented Mr. Bickford, “but you must bear in mind
that only the successes of the buccaneers were recorded as a general
thing. No doubt they were defeated repeatedly and nothing said of the
matter, and if the Spaniards’ story were told it might read very
differently. Now that I have told you of Morgan, of the ruthless
buccaneers, such as Portugues, L’Ollonois and their kind, let me tell
you of the most remarkable expedition ever undertaken by the
buccaneers; a trip without a parallel in history and which, for sheer
daredevil bravery, indomitable courage, splendid seamanship and
wonderful adventures is worthy of a place in the history of the
greatest navigators and discoverers of the world. Moreover, this ‘most
dangerous voyage,’ as the buccaneer historian calls it, was of real
value to the world, as it resulted in scientific discoveries and data,
in geographical knowledge and facts about the Indians which otherwise
might never have been recorded.”

“It seems funny to think of buccaneers being interested in science or
geography or such things,” said Jack, as his father searched through a
volume for the chapter he desired. “How did it happen, Dad?”

“One of the members of the expedition was a man named Dampier,” replied
his father. “He was the son of an English farmer and at seventeen was
apprenticed as a boy aboard a merchant ship sailing to the West Indies.
Deserting the ship, he tried his fortunes as a logwood cutter, but
finding this held little chance for either riches or excitement, he
joined the buccaneers. But Dampier was at heart a naturalist and an
author. He was fond of study, was a keen observer and wherever he went
he invariably wrote notes recording all he had seen and made excellent
maps and sketches. One would hardly expect the career of a buccaneer to
favor literary work and yet Dampier managed to write an excellent book
while on a buccaneer ship. Often he would be obliged to drop pen and
paper in the middle of a chapter in order to help his comrades battle
with a Spanish ship or take a town, but he kept it up with fanatical
persistence, carried his manuscript and his writing materials with him
wherever he went and left most valuable records. What a queer picture
he must have presented as he sat on a gun carriage busily jotting down
notes on natural history or making sketches of the rugged wooded shores
of some buccaneers’ lair, which he always speaks of as ‘a particular
draught of my own composure,’ while, beside his ink horn, was his
loaded pistol and his trusty cutlass ready for any emergency. His copy
he kept in a joint of bamboo, which, he says, ‘I stopt at both ends,
closing it with Wax so as to keep out any water. In this way I
preserved my Journal and other writings from being wet, tho’ I was
often forced to swim.’

“And along with the author-naturalist, Dampier, was many another odd
character. There was Foster, who spent his hours between battles
composing sentimental poetry and who wrote ‘Soneyettes of Love’ aboard
a buccaneer ship; Richard Jobson, a divinity student and chemist, who
carried along with his sword and pistols a well-thumbed Greek Testament
which he translated aloud for the edification of his piratical mates,
and, lastly, Ringrose, the pilot and navigator, whose carefully kept
log has given us the true history of this ‘most dangerous voyage and
bold assaults of Captain Bartholomew Sharp.’”








CHAPTER VIII

A PERILOUS UNDERTAKING


“Among the buccaneers who ravished the Caribbean and the Spanish Main,
but who had not joined Morgan in his endeavors, were Captain
Bartholomew Sharp, Peter Harris, Richard Sawkins, Captain Cook,
Alleston, Row and Macket. As a whole, they were far superior men to
Morgan and his kind, although no less daring, and in March, 1680, these
various buccaneer leaders chanced to meet at a favorite lair of the
corsairs, Bocas del Toro, on the Atlantic coast of what is now Panama.
Deploring the lack of rich cities to sack and the difficulty of taking
the Spanish galleons, now guarded by armed convoys, and cursing the
fate that had decreed peace between Spain and England, the disgruntled
buccaneer captains sought for new fields for their activities.

“Morgan’s raid on Panama had proved that there were rich pickings on
the Pacific, but the relentless persecution of the buccaneers by the
British authorities in the Caribbean made life uncomfortable for them,
and after a deal of discussion it was agreed that the Pacific coasts
held the best promise of fortunes to be won. But to talk of raiding the
Dons’ towns and seizing their ships on the Pacific was one thing and to
do it was quite a different matter. To sail around the Horn was a long
and tedious voyage beset with greatest dangers and to cross by the Gold
Road or the Chagres, while possible, was not only perilous, but would
be but repeating Morgan’s raid. Then, into their presence, came one
Bournano, a French buccaneer, who reported that while peace had been
established between the savage Indians of Darien and the Spaniards, yet
the Indians were still friendly to the buccaneers and hated the Dons.
Indeed, Bournano stated further that the Indians had promised to lead
him and his men to a rich town called Tocamora and that he had agreed
to return to raid the place as soon as he could secure more ships and
men.

“This exactly suited the assembled buccaneers; it was unanimously
agreed to join fortunes with the Frenchman, and, supplying their ships
with sea turtles and maize, the captains set sail for Darien. The fleet
consisted of nine vessels with four hundred and seventy-seven men and
without adventure they arrived at the San Blas Islands. Here the
Indians welcomed them, for the San Blas tribe had, from time
immemorial, been allies of the corsairs, but when they learned of the
buccaneers’ purpose they frowned upon it. Tocamora, they said, was in a
mountainous country; the way was long and rough, it was in an
uninhabited district where food was scarce, and the place was not as
rich as had been reported. Instead, the Indians suggested that the
buccaneers should cross the Isthmus, take the outlying city of El Real
de Santa Maria, which was the depot for all the gold from the
incredibly rich mines of Darien, and then proceed to attack the new
city of Panama. It was a wild, harebrained, daring and almost hopeless
scheme, but it appealed to the buccaneers and, aside from Captain Row
and Bournano, all agreed to follow the Indians’ advice.

“On April 5, 1680, the buccaneers landed on the mainland three hundred
and thirty-one strong, and, leaving a few men and Captains Alleston and
Macket to guard the ships, the dauntless buccaneers started on their
terrible march, carrying for provisions but three cakes of cassava each
and all heavily armed.

“Following their Indian guides, the buccaneers divided into six
companies and entered the jungle. The very first day their hardships
began. So impenetrable was the forest that it was necessary to hew a
way every yard, there were rivers to cross, swamps to wade through, and
clouds of mosquitoes made life miserable. The first day four men gave
up and returned to the coast, but the others, of whom, as I have said,
Dampier was a member, kept doggedly on. Through pouring rain, climbing
precipitous mountains, swimming rivers, the buccaneers proceeded on
their way and at the close of the second day had covered nearly
eighteen miles. Often, as Ringrose tells us, they were obliged to cross
the same river over and over again, but at noon of the third day they
came to a village of the wild Kuna Indians. Ringrose and Dampier
describe the Indians very well, speaking particularly of the painted
wooden crowns, the red caps and the gold nose rings worn by the chiefs,
exactly as they are to-day. The Indians were friendly, they supplied
the buccaneers fruit and provisions, and the footsore corsairs spent
the day resting in the Indians’ huts. On the tenth of April a river
large enough to be navigable by canoes was reached, and Captains Sharp,
Coxon, Cook and Ringrose, with seventy men, embarked in fourteen
dugouts. But they soon found that gliding down the Chukunaque River was
by no means a relief from the overland tramp. Fallen trees and bars
filled the stream; at every few yards the buccaneers were compelled to
haul their craft bodily over the obstructions, and, being separated
from their comrades, they began to fear the Indians intended to cut
them off and betray them to the Spaniards. On April 13th they reached
the junction of the Tuira and Chukunaque Rivers, and in the afternoon
of the same day they were overjoyed to see their missing companions who
had come through the jungle in safety. Throughout this awful trip,
Dampier had preserved his writings in his ‘joyente of bamboo,’
carefully jotting down, despite all difficulties, his observations of
bird and animal life, notes on plants and descriptions of the Indians
and their lives. But the difficulties of the crossing were practically
over. In sixty-eight canoes the three hundred and twenty-seven men
embarked with fifty Indians and swept swiftly down stream towards
unsuspecting El Real. Camping a scant half mile above the town, the
buccaneers prepared to attack at dawn and were awakened by the drums of
the garrison. Priming their pistols and muskets, the buccaneers marched
on the village, which was surrounded by a twelve-foot palisade, but the
corsairs made short work of this and took the town with a loss of but
two men wounded. Within were two hundred and sixty men, but the
buccaneers soon learned, to their chagrin, why no resistance had been
made. The gold, brought from the mines, and, which they had hoped to
gain, had been taken the day before to Panama—a treasure of three
hundred pounds of bullion—and there was utterly nothing worth taking in
the place, which was a mere outpost of straw and palm-thatched huts.
Unlike Morgan and his fellows, Sharp and his men treated the Dons
humanely and even prevented their Indian allies from butchering the
captives, a diversion they had started the moment they had entered the
place. Disappointed at their ill luck, the buccaneers were more than
ever determined to attack Panama, and, choosing Captain Coxon as
commander, the buccaneers, deserted by all but three Indians, prepared
for the most hazardous venture ever attempted. Cut off, as they were,
from retreat by the long journey through the jungle, in a hostile
country, without provisions or ships, yet these fearless, indomitable
men were about to hurl themselves upon the most strongly fortified town
on the Pacific, and attack a city of thousands with less than three
hundred and twenty men, for twelve of their number had left and had
gone back with the Indians after taking El Real.

“On April 17, 1680, the buccaneers embarked in thirty-six canoes and
slipping down river with the ebb tide entered the great Gulf of San
Miguel. Soon the party became separated, and Ringrose’s canoe was
wrecked. Without food or clothing other than the few rags on their
bodies and with no shoes on their feet, the buccaneers set forth afoot.
By good fortune they met Indians, secured canoes, and, sending their
prisoners back free, they continued on their way. The very next night,
seeing fires on shore, the weary fellows thought they had found their
missing comrades and hastily landed, only to fall into the hands of a
party of Spaniards. But here the humane actions of the buccaneers were
rewarded. The Dons, learning who their captives were, and hearing from
a prisoner how the British had saved them from massacre by the Indians,
fed and clothed the buccaneers and gave them their liberty.

“The next morning, to every one’s unspeakable delight, the other
parties were met. Several small sailboats were also captured, and now,
once more well equipped and confident, the entire party gathered at
Chepillo Island and prepared for their descent on Panama, about thirty
miles distant. And here, too, the buccaneers suddenly, for ‘reasons
which I can not dive into,’ as Ringrose puts it, threw aside their
former humanity and ordered the Indians to butcher the few remaining
Spanish prisoners. Luckily, the captives managed to escape, however,
and only one was killed. Rowing stealthily along the shores under cover
of the night, and drenched by torrential rains, the buccaneers came at
dawn within sight of the city to find two great ships and three smaller
men-of-war anchored in the bay and ready to resist the buccaneers. Here
were unexpected troubles. They had counted on taking the place by
surprise, on being led into the city by a captive whose life they had
saved, and, instead, their presence was known and five powerful armed
ships swarming with Spaniards were prepared for them. And, to make
matters worse, a large part of their men were absent. During the night
and the storm they had become separated, the largest of the boats, in
command of Captain Sharp, had put into outlying islands for water, and
the heavier piraguas were far astern of the lighter canoes. These, five
in number and with one piragua, contained but sixty-eight out of the
three hundred odd buccaneers, and these were weary with their long row
and in no condition to fight. But there was no time for indecision. The
three Spanish war vessels were already bearing down upon the
buccaneers, and although so near that Ringrose says they feared they
would be run down, yet the English fell to their oars and, pulling
desperately into the wind, evaded the Dons’ ships and got to windward.
Realizing that the sooner they struck the better, the buccaneers turned
their boats and, pulling directly towards the huge Spanish ships,
picked off the helmsmen and the gunners with their muskets. With their
vessels aback, unable to maneuver, the Dons were, for the moment,
helpless, and while their broadsides threw round shot and chain shot
among the buccaneers and killed a number, the light swift boats were
hard targets to hit, and before a second broadside could be fired they
were under the vessels’ side where the cannons could not reach them.
Then the battle raged thick and fast. Picking off the Dons whenever
they showed their heads above the bulwarks, cutting sheets and braces
with their shots, the buccaneers forced their tiny craft under the
warships’ sterns, jammed the rudders, and, sinking their own craft to
make sure the men must do or die, they swarmed up ropes, chains and
quarter galleries onto the Spaniards’ decks.

“Ringrose and his party attacked the Admiral’s ship, and leaping over
the bulwarks cut down the Admiral, swept like demons among the Spanish
crew, cutting, slashing, shooting and converting the decks to a bloody
shambles. Not until two-thirds of the crew were killed did the Dons
surrender, however. With the flagship in their hands, Captain Coxon
took charge and at once sent two canoes of buccaneers to aid Sawkins,
who had thrice been beat back from the decks of the other warship.
Hardly had the reënforcements arrived when two explosions took place on
the ship and in the confusion the buccaneers swarmed onto the ship’s
deck and took the vessel without resistance, for not one Spaniard was
left alive and uninjured aboard! But on every ship the slaughter was
terrific. Of the original crew of eighty-six on the flagship, only
twenty-five men remained alive and only eight of these were able to
stand. Indeed, even Ringrose and his fellows, hardened to slaughter and
bloodshed as they were, were amazed at the butchery they had wrought,
and, in their journals, Ringrose and Dampier state that ‘blood ran down
the decks in whole streams and not one place upon the ships was found
that was free of blood.’ And yet this victory, this awful carnage, had
been carried out by sixty-eight buccaneers in frail canoes and small
boats, truly a most marvelous feat of daring and bravery, and, more
remarkable yet, the buccaneers’ losses amounted to but eighteen killed
and twenty-two wounded!

“With the two men-of-war in their possession the buccaneers at once
sailed for the big galleons, but, to their surprise, found them
absolutely deserted, every member of their crews having been placed
aboard the warships in their attack upon the buccaneers. But before
deserting their ships the Dons had made every effort to prevent any
possibility of their falling into the buccaneers’ hands. The largest
galleon, which was called the Santissima Trinidad (Blessed Trinity) had
been set afire and scuttled, but the buccaneers’ victory was so rapidly
won that they reached her in time, extinguished the fire, stopped the
leak and transferred their wounded to her. The battle had begun soon
after sunrise and by noon the last shot had been fired, the fleet was
in the hands of the buccaneers, and the standards of Sawkins, Sharp,
Coxon and the others were floating from the mastheads in place of the
gold and scarlet banners of Spain.

“Never in the annals of the buccaneers had such a victory been won;
never had there been a sharper, bloodier battle, and even the captive
Spanish captains were loud in their praise and admiration of the valor
of the English. ‘Captain Peralta declared,’ says Ringrose, that ‘surely
you Englishmen are the valiantest men in the world, who designed always
to fight open whilst other nations invented all ways imaginable to
barricade themselves and fight as close as they could, and yet,
notwithstanding, you killed more of your enemies than they of you.’

“And there, resting upon a gun still hot from recent fighting, Dampier
drew his paper and ink-horn from his bamboo joint and on the
blood-stained deck proceeded to make one of his ‘particular draughts’
of the harbor and to write an account of the brave and exciting deeds
through which he had just passed.

“It was, of course, out of the question for the buccaneers to attempt
to take Panama, for the defenses were powerful, it was surrounded with
an immense, heavily armed wall, it swarmed with soldiers, as well as
its thousands of citizens, and the large ships could not approach
within cannon shot. But the buccaneers had little cause to complain.
They had taken five ships, the largest, the Holy Trinity, a galleon of
four hundred tons, and while the cargoes consisted of sugar, skins,
soap and flour of little value, still, with good ships under their
command, the buccaneers were in a position to take prizes and raid
towns. To retain all five ships was not practical and, accordingly, two
were promptly fired and sunk. Those saved were the Trinity; a
sugar-laden ship of about two hundred tons, which was taken over by
Cook; and a fifty-ton piragua in command of Coxon. Coxon was
disgruntled, having been accused of backwardness in the fight, and
three days after the battle he left the buccaneers with twenty of his
sympathizers and sailed away to Darien to march back to the Atlantic
and his ship, taking with him the Indian guides.

“A day or two later, Captain Sharp arrived, having taken a small
Spanish bark while on his search for water, and shortly afterwards
Captain Harris turned up, also with a prize. During Sharp’s absence,
Sawkins had been elected commandant, and, having turned loose all but
their most important prisoners, the buccaneers proceeded to Taboga
Island to repair and refit the captured ships.

“While there the buccaneers were visited by a number of Spanish
merchants from Panama who brought various supplies and goods to sell to
the buccaneers, for, incredible as it may seem, the corsairs had a most
remarkable habit of dealing fairly with tradesmen, even though they
were slaughtering and robbing others. To these Spanish merchants the
buccaneers disposed of much of the material they had found on the
ships, and Ringrose informs us that they paid excellent prices,
offering two hundred pieces of eight for each slave the English could
spare. You may wonder why unprincipled robbers and cut-throats like the
buccaneers should dispose of their goods when they could have so easily
possessed themselves of their visitors’ money without giving anything
in return, but it was one of their codes of honor to deal fairly under
such conditions and there is no record that they ever used violence or
robbed a visitor or one who came to them on a friendly mission.

“While at Taboga, several ships were captured by the buccaneers, one of
which proved a rich prize, as it contained two thousand jars of wine,
fifty kegs of gunpowder and fifty-one thousand pieces of eight. Also,
from this ship, the English learned of a galleon due from Lima with
over one hundred thousand pieces of eight, and, rubbing their hands
with satisfaction, the buccaneers proceeded to make ready to receive
her.

“Meanwhile, the governor of Panama sent a message to Sawkins asking
why, in time of peace, British had attacked Spaniards and for what
reason the buccaneers had come to Panama. To this Sawkins facetiously
replied that they had come ‘to assist the King of Darien, who was true
Lord of Panama,’ and that ‘having come so far they should have some
satisfaction.’ Adding that ‘should His Excellency be pleased to send
five hundred pieces of eight for each man and one thousand for each
commander and would promise not further to annoy the Indians, but give
them full liberty, then the buccaneers would depart peacefully,
otherwise they would remain to get what they might!’ And here also
occurred another of the odd incidents which showed the buccaneers’
strange natures and point of view. One of the Spanish merchants brought
word to Captain Sawkins that the Bishop of Panama had formerly been the
Bishop of Santa Marta and had been a captive of Sawkins when the latter
took the place. Thereupon Sawkins sent the Bishop two loaves of sugar
with his best wishes. In return, the Bishop sent a gold ring and his
compliments and also a second message from the Governor. This time His
Excellency wished to know from whom the buccaneers had commissions and
to whom he should complain of the damages they had done. Evidently
Sawkins was a humorous man, for he replied that, ‘As yet the company
are not all together, but when they are they will visit His Excellency
in Panama and bring their commissions in the muzzles of their guns, at
which time you shall read them as plain as the flame of powder can make
them.’ But such interchanges of pleasantries did not serve to satisfy
the impatient men, and provisions were getting woefully low. In vain
their commanders urged that they await the arrival of the plate ship
from Peru. They demanded action and food and at last, finding open
mutiny would break out if he refused, Sawkins hoisted sail and, leaving
Taboga, cruised westward along the coast in search of towns to sack and
vessels to capture. In this they were quite successful. They took
Otoque Island, looted the pearl catch from Coiba and attacked Puebla
Nueva. But they met with disaster as well. Two of their vessels
foundered, with a loss of twenty-two men, and on the attack upon Puebla
Nueva brave Captain Sawkins met his death, and the buccaneers were
beaten off.








CHAPTER IX

THE “MOST DANGEROUS VOYAGE” OF CAPTAIN SHARP


“Say, that beat anything that Morgan did!” exclaimed Jack. “And yet, I
never even heard of Sharp or Sawkins and the rest.”

“Very true,” replied his father. “Many of the most remarkable deeds and
adventures of the buccaneers and many of the most noted leaders have
been practically forgotten. Fiction has kept alive such men as Morgan,
while others, who were far more worthy of being perpetuated, are
unknown to the world at large. As I said before, Sharp and his men
outdid every other buccaneer and yet not one person in a thousand ever
heard of them or the ‘most dangerous voyage.’”

“But it seems to me they were really pirates,” said Fred. “They knew
the war was over and it was a low, mean trick to tell the Indians to
kill the prisoners after the Spaniards had treated them so well.”

“Of course they were pirates,” agreed his uncle. “As I told you in the
beginning, the buccaneers were pirates—even though pirates were not
always buccaneers—and the buccaneers freely admitted the fact. Indeed,
Esquemeling, Ringrose and the other chroniclers always wrote of
themselves and their fellows as pirates. And as far as letting the
Indians butcher the captives was concerned, you must remember that
Ringrose’s party were the ones who received the favors from the Dons
and he was merely a pilot or navigator and had no say in regard to the
orders given by the captains. Moreover, the ‘reasons he could not dive
into’ were perhaps sufficient to warrant the leaders’ orders. But to
return to the doings of the buccaneers after their defeat at Puebla
Nueva. Sawkins was liked and respected by all the men; he was brave,
courteous, fair and, for a buccaneer, very honorable, and when he was
killed and Bartholomew Sharp was given command of the expedition many
men refused to continue with the latter. They had joined the venture
under Sawkins, they did not care to be under any one else and they
disliked Sharp. Moreover, the new commander announced that it was his
intention to fit the Blessed Trinity as a buccaneer ship, to cruise
along the west coast of South America, ravishing the Spanish towns, and
to return to the Caribbean by sailing through the Straits of Magellan
and completely circumnavigating South America. Even the hardy and
daredevil buccaneers were amazed at this. It was a venture fraught with
the greatest hazard, a voyage such as no buccaneer had ever undertaken,
and there were those who openly expressed the opinion that Sharp must
have gone mad to think of it.

“And there is little wonder that they thought him insane. Imagine a
lone ship—and a half-burned, far from seaworthy galleon at that—going
pirating in the Pacific where every town, every man, every ship was an
enemy; where there was not a friendly harbor in which to lie; where
Spanish warships were numerous; where there was no buccaneers’ lair in
which to refit or provision and secure men, and where the buccaneers
were completely cut off, separated by thousands of miles, from their
own countrymen. And then, even if the ship and its crew survived, think
of the thousands of perils to be faced at every turn in attempting to
navigate the almost unknown Antarctic seas and to round South America
and sail for thousands of miles across the Atlantic to the West Indies.
It was a scheme so wild, so dangerous and so unheard of that nearly
one-third of the men refused to stand by Sharp, and nearly seventy men
declared their intention of braving the perils and hardships of a
return march through the jungles of Darien rather than attempt the
voyage. Among these deserters was Dampier; Wafer, the surgeon; Jobson
of the Greek Testament, and others. Ringrose himself freely admits in
his ‘log’ that he was minded to accompany them and would have done so
had he not been more afraid of the jungle and the Indians than of the
proposed voyage. It is fortunate for us that he stuck to the ship, for
otherwise we would have no record of that marvelous cruise.

“And the deserters had anything but an easy time of it, and often, ere
they reached the Caribbean and their own ships, they heartily wished
that they had remained with Captain Sharp.

“Bad as the crossing had been before, it was now a thousand times
worse. It was the height of the rainy season; it poured incessantly day
and night; the forest was little more than a vast morass and the rivers
were swollen, raging torrents. The Indians refused to guide the men,
owing partly to the weather conditions and partly as they were
disgusted at having been cheated out of their revenge on the Dons and
the joy of butchering them, and the buccaneers were in a sad plight. In
vain they offered beads, cloth, hatchets and similar articles of trade
for guides. They were in despair until one of the men, evidently
familiar with women’s ways, dug a sky-blue petticoat from among his
loot and slipped it quickly over the head of the chief’s wife. His ruse
worked like a charm. The wife added her arguments to those of the
buccaneers, and the chief, throwing up his hands in despair, agreed to
lead the buccaneers across the Isthmus. But even with their Indian
guide their plight was pitiable. They plunged through deep swamps,
fought their way through wicked, thorn-covered jungles, hacked and
hewed a pathway through the forest, swam swollen rivers, were drenched
with rain, infested with ticks, tortured by mosquitoes and almost
starved. For days at a time they could not light a fire; they had no
shelters; the clothes were torn from their bodies; their sodden shoes
fell from their blistered, bleeding feet. Sometimes a whole day’s labor
would result in less than two miles of progress and their best time was
but five or six miles a day. For twenty-three days they endured every
hardship and torture, traveling one hundred and ten miles and losing
their way a hundred times despite their Indian guide. On the morning of
the eighth day they reached a river so wide and swift none dared to
attempt it, and after a deal of argument it was decided to choose a man
by lot to swim the torrent with a line. The lot fell upon one George
Gayney. Unfortunately for him he was an avaricious fellow and insisted
on carrying his share of loot—three hundred pieces of eight—in a bag
lashed to his back. When midway across he was whirled about by the
current, he became entangled in the rope and was carried under and
drowned. But another took his place, the rope was gotten across and,
half-drowned, the party reached the opposite bank. A few days later
they found poor Gayney’s body with the bag of coins still lashed to his
back, but so miserable and spent were the men that they did not even
bother to secure the silver but left the corpse there upon the river’s
bank, money and all. Another unfortunate was the surgeon, Wafer. By an
accidental discharge of some powder he received a serious wound in the
leg and, unable to walk, was left with some Indians to recover. While
convalescing he used his skill for the Indians’ benefit, and the
redmen, impressed by what they considered magic, treated him like a
god. To show their gratitude and esteem they stripped him of his ragged
garments, painted him from head to foot with every color of the rainbow
and enthroned him in a regal hut. But Wafer had no mind to pass his
remaining days as an Indian witch doctor or medicine man. Watching his
opportunity he stole away, and garbed only in his coat of paint,
sneaked off through the forest towards the coast. Months later, after
untold hardships, he came in sight of the sea, and, without thinking of
his appearance, rushed toward a party of buccaneers who fortunately
were at hand nearby. For an instant the buccaneers gaped in amazement,
utterly at a loss to understand who the nude, gorgeously painted
creature was, and not until he shouted to them in English did they
realize that it was the long-lost surgeon, Wafer. Never had buccaneer
appeared before in such guise; they roared with laughter, and many were
the rude jests and coarse jokes passed at the doctor’s expense. But
poor Jobson, the divinity student, was less fortunate. He too had been
overcome and left behind, and while he eventually managed to rejoin his
comrades he was too far spent to recover and a few days later he died,
his Greek Testament still clasped in his hand. But aside from Gayney
and Jobson no lives were lost, and a few days after reaching the
Caribbean shores the buccaneers were rescued by a French buccaneer,
Captain Tristian, along with the loot they had carried throughout their
awful journey, and Dampier’s ‘joyente of bamboo’ which the
naturalist-buccaneer had preserved unharmed and within which was the
closely written journal wherein he had daily set down every event of
interest or note.

“Meanwhile, back at Coiba Island, Sharp and his companions were
preparing for their momentous undertaking. Stripping the other vessels
of all fittings and arms, Sharp scuttled and burned them and proceeded
to equip the Blessed Trinity for a pirate ship. Her high and ornately
gilded poop was in the way, and with axes and hatchets the buccaneers
hacked and chopped away the galleries and moldings, knocked off a tier
or two of cabins and, hastily boarding it up, mounted guns with their
grim muzzles protruding from what once had been the stained glass
windows. Ports were cut in bulwarks and topsides, the decks were
stripped of all unnecessary gear, the rigging was overhauled, and the
ship with the holy name was ready for her most unholy work. At Coiba
they laid in a supply of turtles, salted deer meat, and water, and on
the afternoon of June 6, 1679, they sailed forth from Coiba Island on
their marvelous voyage.

“It is not necessary to relate in detail all that took place
thereafter. They cruised along the coast, captured all the ships they
saw and either sunk them or, cutting away all but one mast, filled them
with their prisoners and set them adrift to sink or sail as the fates
decreed. Sharp at times showed intense cruelty, and whenever priests
were taken he ordered them butchered out of hand and often tossed them
overboard while still living. Ringrose says, ‘Such cruelties, though I
abhorred very much in my heart, yet here was I forced to hold my tongue
as having no authority to oversway them.’ And they captured many a
town, too. Arica, Hilo, Coquimbo, La Serena, were attacked, sacked and
burned; but the buccaneers often came near to destruction also. Only by
luck did they escape, and at La Serena the Dons, under cover of
darkness, swam to the Trinity on inflated hides, placed combustibles
and explosives between the rudder and the stern post of the ship and
fired them. Just in time the buccaneers discovered the source of the
blaze and prevented the loss of ship and all within her. Fearing their
numerous prisoners would plot successfully against them, the
buccaneers, after this, set all the Dons ashore and, finding it
necessary to refit, sailed to Juan Fernandez island.

“It was now December, and the buccaneers spent a wild and riotous
Christmas upon the isle, firing salutes, building bonfires, singing and
shouting, drinking and carousing; frightening the seals and the birds
with their wild cries, startling the goats with their ribald laughter;
gambling and making merry, for which we can scarcely blame them, for it
was the first holiday they had had since leaving Coiba, five months
before.

“And here at Juan Fernandez dissensions among the men once more arose.
Some were for going home at once; others wished to remain longer, while
all declared they would sail no longer under Sharp for the
reason—incredible as it may seem—that he had failed to observe the
Sabbath! So here on Juan Fernandez the ungodly pirates deposed their
commander because he was not sufficiently religious and in his stead
elected a hoary old buccaneer named John Watling. Sharp, naturally
resenting this, was quickly silenced by being cast, willynilly, into
the hold, where he had ample chance to think over his wicked past and
moralize on the psychology of men who would slit a friar’s throat one
moment and clamor for prayers and divine services the next.

“Under their new captain the Sabbath was rigorously observed, and
Ringrose writes, speaking of the first Sunday under Watling’s command,
‘This day was the first Sunday that ever we kept by command and consent
since the loss and death of our valiant commander, Captain Sawkins. Our
generous-hearted commander threw the dice overboard, finding them in
use on the said day.’

“Under Watling, the Trinity sailed to Iquique and there captured
several prisoners, among them an aged Indian from whom they sought to
obtain information of Arica, which they planned to raid the second
time. Evidently, from what transpired, Captain Sharp had seen the error
of his ways and had made up his mind to be a most moral pirate in
future. Having been released from the hold, he was on deck when the
Indian prisoner was questioned, and he protested most vehemently
against Watling’s orders to shoot the prisoner because, so the
buccaneers imagined, he had not told them the truth. Finding his pleas
for the Indian in vain, Sharp dipped his hands in a basin of water and
dramatically declared, ‘Gentlemen, I am clear of the blood of this old
man. And I will warrant you a hot day for this piece of cruelty
whenever we come to fight at Arica.’

“And verily did the buccaneers learn to their sorrow how they had
misjudged the Indian and how true was Sharp’s prophecy, for Arica had
been strongly fortified and garrisoned, just as the captive had
related; the buccaneers were ignominiously defeated with heavy loss;
Captain Watling and a number of other officers were killed, and the
beaten and decimated buccaneers clamored loudly for Bartholomew Sharp
once more to take command. Sharp, however, refused at first to listen
to them, having had enough of their fickle natures, but finding that,
unless he or some one took charge immediately all would be destroyed,
he at last consented, and after severe fighting managed to get the
survivors to their ship, although the surgeons were left behind. In
fact the buccaneers had the closest shave of all their lives at Arica.
Not only were they beaten back, killed and wounded by scores, and
forced to retreat to the outlying country in disorder, but the Dons
were on the point of destroying their boats when they were rallied by
Sharp, and only by a sharp hand-to-hand struggle did the English
succeed in recovering them. Now, however, the men looked upon Sharp
with reverence and awe, for not only had he saved their lives, but with
the superstition of sailors, they remembered his prophecy, believed he
had occult power and cursed the late Watling right and left for having
destroyed the Indian prisoner and disregarded Sharp’s warning.

“The buccaneers were now greatly reduced in numbers. They had lost
twenty-eight killed and eighteen desperately wounded, as well as about
a dozen who had fallen into the Spaniards’ hands, and of the original
one hundred and forty men who had set sail on the wild adventure in the
Trinity a bare seventy now remained who were in condition to work or
fight. But lack of men did not trouble Sharp in the least. Heading
northward, they ravished city after city, leaving a trail of blood and
smoke behind them, and at last put into the Gulf of Nicoya, battered,
weatherbeaten and vastly in need of repairs to both themselves and
their ship. But when off San Miguel dissensions had once more arisen,
and forty-seven more of the men deserted and headed overland across
Darien as had those who had gone before. Their experiences were much
the same as those others, although as the rainy season had not come on
they were more fortunate, but they had many narrow escapes and many
adventures nevertheless.

“With his forces now reduced to less than fifty men Sharp put into the
Gulf, took prizes of the ships there, raided the villages and by good
luck succeeded in making prisoners of some shipwrights and carpenters
who were engaged in building ships for the Spaniards. These artizans he
impressed into his service and at once proceeded to put the battered
Blessed Trinity into condition for the long and dangerous voyage around
South America and up the Atlantic to the Antilles. For, despite losses,
desertions and all, Sharp and the remaining buccaneers were determined
to carry out their original plans. They had now been in the Pacific for
over a year, carrying terror far and wide, swooping upon every town or
village they could find, capturing vessels and ever managing to escape
in their shot-torn, dingy old galleon, and now Sharp planned to make
her as staunch and seaworthy as possible with the materials and labor
at his command. With almost superhuman efforts the deck was taken up
and relaid, new planking was put in her shattered sides, the masts were
all shortened and the ship was rerigged and refitted from truck to
water line. Then Sharp graciously thanked his captive carpenters and
presented them with a vessel he had captured as a reward for their
services. Then, freeing all the prisoners and most of the slaves they
had taken, the buccaneers set sail for the Gulf of Dulce, where the
ship was careened and cleaned, it having been impossible to do this at
Nicoya. The condition that the craft was in can be imagined as she had
not been cleaned, either outside or in, since she had fallen into the
buccaneers’ hands—and the Lord only knows when before that. Ringrose
states that, ‘when we came to cleanse her hold both myself and several
others were struck blind with the filth and nastiness of it.’

“But at last it was done and the Trinity sailed forth from the Gulf of
Dulce and started on her long deferred voyage to the distant Caribbean.
And as they sailed, many a rich prize fell to those upon the one-time
galleon. Within ten days after starting, a ship was taken with over
forty thousand pieces of eight and, by a strange coincidence, this
proved to be the same ship from which they had won so much treasure and
wine in Panama harbor over a year before. Ship after ship they took,
but ever freeing all prisoners and turning them loose in the vessels
after they had been looted, for Sharp had no mind to burden himself
with hungry mouths which were of no use to him. Down the coast they
sailed, avoiding conflicts ashore,—although, truth to tell, there was
little to be got after having raided the coast twice within the
twelvemonth,—until finally, leaving the last settlements and inhabited
lands astern, they bore through cold and stormy seas towards the tip of
the continent. They stopped in at Tierra del Fuego, found and mapped
uncharted, storm-lashed isles, hunted penguins and seals, and battered
by mountainous waves, buffeted by ice-laden gales, crept ever farther
south, searching for the entrance to the Strait of Magellan.

“And remember that they had only the crudest instruments with which to
navigate, only a rough quadrant for finding their latitude, and no
means whatever, save dead reckoning, for determining their longitude.
Their ship, despite their efforts to put it in seaworthy shape, was
leaky, strained and filled with patched shot holes, and they were in
one of the stormiest parts of the world in the wildest season of the
year. Often their sails were torn to ribbons or carried away, the ship
was sheathed in ice, and after tedious beating through storm and sleet
for days they would be driven back in a night farther than they had
gained in a week. Let me quote a few passages from Ringrose’s log and
you will get a better idea of what that handful of grim buccaneers in
the Blessed Trinity underwent. Here, for example, under date of
November 10th, he says, ‘Day being come the wind increased and at noon
blew our mainsail to pieces. Hereupon we were forced to lower the yard
and unbend the sail, lying under mizzen. But that too gave way and all
the rest of the day we lay a hull in dark weather, foggy and windy,
with a huge sea that oftentime rolled over us.’ The next day he
reports, ‘All last night we had furious weather with seas higher and
higher.’ On November 16th the fore shrouds gave way; for several days
hereafter it was ‘so foggy we could not see the stem from the stern’;
they narrowly escaped running into icebergs and, to make matters worse,
their provisions had run low and the men were on the most scanty
rations. Several of the crew were frostbitten; others were so benumbed
with the intense cold they could not stand, and at last they realized
that they could not find the sought-for Straits and that there was
nothing for it but to stand on to the eastward through uncharted polar
seas in the hopes of rounding Cape Horn.

“Day after day they kept on, bending on new sails as fast as they were
carried away; splicing and repairing rigging as it parted; half
starved, numb with cold, often unable to secure a sight to learn where
they were, but ever grimly heading east and north and blindly plunging
into the long, green, storm-swept seas.

“And at last they found they were making northing, the tempests were
less severe, the weather was appreciably warmer, and they realized,
with heartfelt joy, that they had rounded the Cape and actually were in
the Atlantic. By the 7th of December they were well north of Cape
Horn—off the mouth of Rio de la Plata, in fact—but they had sighted no
land since leaving Tierra del Fuego and had not the least idea how many
scores or hundreds of miles they might be from either the South
American or the African coast.

“Now the awful struggles the ship had undergone began to tell, and she
sprang more leaks, until the men, on less than quarter rations, were
compelled to toil day and night at the pumps. Yet they were cheered,
for the weather was constantly becoming warmer and fairer, and though
several men died from the result of frost bites and exposure, the
others took heart. But it was maddening for them to see porpoises,
dolphins, bonitos and sea birds about their ship and yet be unable to
obtain them to eke out their perilously low supply of food. The fish
would not take the hook, the birds gave them no chance to shoot, and
the haggard, dull-eyed, tattered men watched with hungry eyes the
bountiful supply of food quite beyond their reach.

“Since leaving the tropics in the Pacific not a mouthful of meat, save
a few oily penguins and a seal or two, had passed their lips. The only
meat upon the ship was a sow which had been taken aboard as a suckling
pig in the far-off Gulf of Nicoya, and on Christmas Day this was
slaughtered for the men’s dinner. Starvation was staring them in the
face, but on January 5th they captured a hundred-and-twenty-pound
albicore and great was the rejoicing. Two days later they took an even
larger one, and now they discovered that their water casks had sprung
leaks and that only a few pannikins of the precious liquid remained.
Only a quart a day was allowed to a man, and sweltering under the
equatorial sun, baffled with light winds and calms, the men’s plight
was pitiable. In order to keep afloat they toiled ceaselessly at the
pumps, falling exhausted on the sizzling decks, cursing and moaning,
crying for water, and several dying raving mad.

“But now they were well north of the equator. Somewhere ahead, Ringrose
felt sure, were the Caribbean isles they longed to see, and Captain
Sharp offered a reward to the first man to sight land.

“On the 28th of January the glad cry came ringing from the masthead
and, straining their eyes, the half dead men saw the faint and hazy
outline of land upon the horizon. Then cheer after cheer rose from
those thirst-cracked throats, the men forgot their troubles, their
hunger, their ceaseless toil, for all recognized the welcome bit of
earth as the island of Barbados.

“Marvelous indeed had been Ringrose’s navigation. Had he been equipped
with a modern sextant, with the latest nautical almanacs and the most
perfect chronometer, he could not have done better. By sheer dead
reckoning for his longitude, and by his crude instruments to find his
latitude, he had won within ten miles of the goal for which he had
made—truly an almost incredible piece of seamanship.

“Weather-beaten, patched, her rigging frayed and spliced; her masts
awry, her sails mended and discolored, with gaping holes in her
bulwarks, with the charred marks of fire still upon her hacked-off poop
and with her crew more like ghosts than living men, the Blessed Trinity
headed for Bridgetown with the frayed and faded British ensign at her
peak and Sharp’s red banner with its green and white ribbons at her
masthead.

“But the homesick, sea-weary buccaneers were not to set foot upon the
green shores of Barbados, for within the bay lay a British frigate.
Sharp realized that, in the eyes of the law, he and his men were
pirates, and so, with clanging pumps, the Trinity swept by the island,
while the wondering folk ashore gazed in amazement at this strange
ship, this vision that, gaunt and gray and battered, slipped by like a
wraith, and to their superstitious minds savored of the Flying
Dutchman. But the buccaneers’ ‘most dangerous voyage’ was almost at an
end. At Antigua, two days later, Ringrose and thirteen of the men went
ashore and secured passage on the Lisbon Merchant for England, while
Sharp and the others sailed to Nevis. There the ‘great sea artist and
admirable captain,’ as Ringrose calls him, presented his men with the
ship and sailed for Bristol.

“Thus ended that most memorable voyage, that venture which had taken
the buccaneers across Darien, up and down the length of South America
twice, and around Cape Horn and back to the Antilles in a captured
Spanish galleon. Two years had passed since they had plunged into the
jungles of Darien; two years without sight of fellow countrymen or news
of home; two years in enemies’ seas and enemies’ country, and welcome
indeed was the sight of the verdant British islands and of Englishmen
once more.”

“What became of Captain Sharp and Ringrose?” asked Jack. “Gosh, that
was a wonderful voyage. It ought to be more famous than Morgan’s.”

“Sharp and a number of his men were tried for piracy when they arrived
in England,” replied Mr. Bickford. “But they were acquitted. The
specific charge brought against them was the taking of the San Rosario
and the killing of her captain, but it was proved that the Spaniards
fired the first shot and the men were freed on a plea of self-defense.
Their fellows, who after Sharp’s departure made their way to Jamaica,
were less fortunate. Two of the three were acquitted, but the third
pleaded guilty and was hanged. Ringrose himself settled down for a
well-earned, quiet life, but the love of the sea and the call of
adventure was too great. In 1683 he joined with his old comrades Wafer,
Dampier and Swan and went back to the Pacific, piloting the ship Cygnet
around Cape Horn. He was killed a few years later in a battle with the
Dons on the west coast of Central America, but that is another story.”

“But, Dad, you didn’t tell us how much loot they got in all that time,”
complained Jack.

“It’s not recorded,” replied his father. “Owing to the long voyage the
treasure was divided up after every raid or prize. But the greatest
treasure they took they threw away.”

“How on earth was that?” asked Fred.

His uncle chuckled. “I often think what a bitter pill it must have been
for Sharp and the others to swallow,” replied Mr. Bickford. “The San
Rosario—the ship for the taking of which the men were tried—had very
little treasure aboard her, apparently. She was laden with huge ingots
of what the buccaneers supposed was tin and this was thrown overboard,
one of the buccaneers retaining a single ingot as a keepsake. Imagine
the chagrin of the men when, during their trial, they learned that the
supposed tin was solid silver! They had cast into the sea, as
worthless, more riches than they had won on their entire venture!”








CHAPTER X

THE LAST OF THE BUCCANEERS


“Gosh, that was a good joke on the buccaneers,” laughed Jack. “Now do
tell us more about Ringrose, Dad. He must have been a fine fellow. Just
as soon as you get through I’m going to borrow that log of his and read
it from beginning to end.”

“Me, too,” cried Fred with enthusiasm. “And I’m going to read
Esquemeling.”

“You’ll find both Esquemeling’s and Ringrose’s log most interesting,”
said Mr. Bickford, “and you’ll be amused at the map. See here—this is
the chart by which Ringrose steered the Trinity. See how the Amazon and
the Rio de la Plata are pictured as one huge estuary of the sea, making
part of Brazil and all of Uruguay and Paraguay into a great island.
Very little was known of South America in those days, although, as you
will notice, the West Indies and Central America were accurately
shown.”

“Golly, I don’t see how they ever did get around,” declared Fred, as
the two boys studied the ancient chart. “Hadn’t any one else ever
sailed around the Horn before?”

“Yes,” replied his uncle. “Vasco da Gama had done so, and Drake and
Magellan had gone through the Straits, but no buccaneer had ever
attempted it and none had sailed from the Pacific around into the
Atlantic. But the success of Sharp’s voyage and Ringrose’s experiences
led the way for many a later buccaneer raid into the South Sea, as they
called the Pacific. Buccaneering was no longer a safe profession in the
Caribbean, for any buccaneers caught were tried and hanged as pirates,
but the South Seas were out of England’s jurisdiction and offered a
fine field. It is unnecessary to go into details of all the
buccaneering, or perhaps I might say pirating, cruises that were made
to the Pacific, but it is well to learn a little of the more noteworthy
ones, especially as our old friends Dampier, Wafer and Ringrose took
prominent parts in them.

“The first buccaneers to sail for the ‘South Sea’ after Sharp’s
exploits became known, set forth from Chesapeake Bay in August, 1683.
Their ship was the Revenge, of eighteen guns and seventy men, in charge
of Captain John Davis, who had won considerable fame as a pirate by
sacking St. Augustine, Florida. With Davis went Cook, who had
accompanied Sharp, as well as Wafer, the surgeon, who had received such
unappreciated honors at the hands of the Darien Indians. Off the coast
of Sierra Leone they seized a Danish ship of thirty-six guns and,
finding her a much better vessel than their own, at once transferred
their belongings to the prize and scuttled the Revenge. Then, renaming
their new ship the Bachelors’ Delight, the corsairs headed for Cape
Horn and reached Juan Fernandez without mishap. Here they fell in with
another buccaneer ship, the Nicholas, and together the two cruised
northward to the Gulf of Nicoya, taking many prizes and attacking, with
considerable success, the smaller towns on the South America coast. In
the Gulf of Nicoya Cook died and Davis was left as sole
commander-in-chief. Those on the Nicholas, however, were bent on
pirating through the East Indies and shortly after Cook’s death parted
from the Bachelors’ Delight and set off on their own account, leaving a
grewsome trail through the South Seas and along the African coast on
their way to England. Davis and his company confined their activities
to the American coast until they met the Cygnet at the Island of La
Plata. The latter, which had been fitted out as a trader in London, had
soon abandoned peaceable pursuits and had become a full-fledged pirate
with our old friend Ringrose as navigator or pilot and Dampier, the
naturalist-author, as quarter-master, with an old buccaneer named Swan
in command. The two ships at once agreed to keep together and we may be
sure there were wildly hilarious times when Dampier, Ringrose, Wafer
and the others once more met, here in this out-of-the-world spot in the
Pacific. Remembering the rich pickings they had had under Sharp, the
veterans urged attacks on Paita, Guayaquil, Panama and other towns as
they had done in the Trinity. But the Dons had grown wise; corsairs
were no longer rare or unexpected upon the Pacific, and a warm
reception met the buccaneers at every town they visited. They took many
prizes nevertheless, and we may be quite sure that no more cargoes of
‘tin’ were cast into the sea.

“For several weeks they blockaded Panama, and while off this port they
were reënforced by Captains Grogniet and L’Escayer, French buccaneers,
who with two hundred Frenchmen and one hundred and eighty English had
crossed the Isthmus. Shortly after, Captain Townley with one hundred
and eighty buccaneers arrived by the same route, and a little later two
hundred and sixty more French appeared. With a total force of nine
hundred and sixty men, which Davis divided among ten captured ships,
the buccaneers felt they were strong enough to withstand anything and
impatiently awaited the arrival of the plate fleet from Lima.

“But when, on May 28, 1685, the long-expected treasure fleet hove in
sight the buccaneers’ hearts fell. For the Dons had been warned and
instead of helpless galleons carrying the vast fortune in gold and
bullion, the pirates saw, to their consternation, that the plate was
convoyed by six great Spanish warships, six smaller sloops of war and
two fire ships. The buccaneers had no mind to commit suicide and after
firing a few defiant-shots at long range they very wisely pulled up
anchors and sailed away, leaving the triumphant Dons to discharge their
precious cargo in peace.

“Arriving at the Island of Quibo, the buccaneers met still another
party of pirates and almost at once dissensions arose between the
French and British corsairs. As a result, Davis and his men sailed
north, plundered Leon and Rio Lexa in Nicaragua, and, learning that a
plate ship was due from Manila, they cruised along the coasts of Mexico
and Central America awaiting its arrival. But they were not content to
wait patiently and must needs raid the coastal towns, with the result
that over sixty of Swan’s men were cut off and completely wiped out by
a Spanish ambuscade. This was the most severe blow the pirates had ever
received on the South Sea, and among the killed were several officers
and the pilot, Basil Ringrose.

“Disappointed at missing the galleon and furious at the loss of his
men, Swan accused Davis of negligence and a severe quarrel arose among
the buccaneers. This ended in Swan setting sail for the Philippines,
where his men mutinied and the unfortunate captain and thirty-six
others were marooned, the Cygnet sailing on without them. Among the
mutineers was Dampier, still, no doubt, keeping his journal in his
‘joyente of bamboo,’ and very interestingly he wrote of the Celebes,
Timor, New Holland and Australia. At the Nicobar Islands Dampier had
had enough of pirating, and with a few companions, deserted the Cygnet
and by hook or crook managed to reach England in safety, where he
devoted the rest of his life to publishing his journals and his
‘special draughts’ for the edification of his less adventurous
countrymen.

“It was lucky he did so, for the ship, thoroughly unseaworthy, barely
succeeded in reaching Madagascar before she foundered. Here some of the
men settled down and took service with the native chiefs while others,
in time, reached home.

“In the meantime, Townley had also left Swan and had set out to rejoin
his erstwhile French allies, with whom he took vast treasure at Quibo,
Grenada and Lavelia, although Townley lost his life at the last place.

“The Bachelors’ Delight continued to cruise up and down the coast of
Peru for the next two years, sacking many towns, seizing innumerable
ships and accumulating vast plunder, which Davis is reputed to have
hidden on the Galápagos Islands.

“But the Dons were becoming heartily sick of the nuisance of the
English pirates, and early in 1687, sent a powerful fleet to destroy
them. A terrific battle resulted, a running fight being kept up for
seven days, and, though many of the pirates were killed, the ship
managed to escape. The buccaneers, however, had had a wholesome lesson,
and when, a few days later, they again met Townley’s men they decided
to revenge themselves for their loss by one last raid. This fell on
Guayaquil, which was taken and sacked, and then, realizing even the
South Sea was becoming too hot for them, the pirates refitted at the
Galápagos and sailed around Cape Horn to the Virgin Islands, where they
arrived in 1688, after five years of pirating in the Pacific.”

“Gosh, I never knew before that there were buccaneers in the
Philippines and Madagascar and all those places,” said Jack. “Say, they
went all over the world, didn’t they?”

“You forget,” his father reminded him, “that they were no longer
buccaneers in the true sense of the word. They had degenerated to
common pirates and attacked any ship they met, except British, and they
were not by any means overpunctilious in that respect. Early in the
eighteenth century,—soon after the Cygnet’s wreck, in fact?—Madagascar
became a favorite pirates’ lair and they even set up an independent
kingdom, or rather republic, there. Had they possessed a leader such as
Morgan, Mansvelt or Sharp, no doubt they would have maintained a colony
which might have established British dominion over a vast area, but
they were always quarreling among themselves and never succeeded in
anything for long.”

“But what became of them all?” asked Fred. “They never seemed to get
killed off or hung.”

“Some settled down in the West Indies, others in England or Europe and
others in the American colonies, and led respectable lives under
fictitious names among people who never suspected who they were. At
times, though, they were recognized, brought to trial or hung or
managed to slip away and find new homes. Many a well-to-do planter in
the West Indies; many a wealthy merchant and shipowner in the New
England colonies, made the beginnings of his fortune by pirating. And
many of them, of whom the world never hears, led most romantic and
adventurous lives. For example, there was Red Legs. He was a most
picturesque character—not a pirate by choice, but by force of
circumstances, and I’m happy to say that he eventually became a highly
respected and charitable man. Indeed, I have actually stopped in the
house he built and occupied after he gave up piracy.”

“Oh, do tell about him!” cried Jack. “Gee—that’s a great name—Red Legs!
I’ll bet he was a peach of a pirate.”

“He was,” asserted Mr. Bickford, with a smile. “But I must pass over
his career very briefly, for there were many other interesting
buccaneers and pirates I have not mentioned as yet.

“Red Legs was originally a slave—one of those unfortunates who were
taken during Cromwell’s time, and, because they wore kilts—being Irish
and Scotch, they were nicknamed ‘red-legs.’ At that time it was
customary to ship prisoners and malefactors as slaves to the West
Indies, where they were sold for fifteen hundred pounds of sugar each.
They were marked or branded like cattle, compelled to labor with the
blacks and were treated far more cruelly than the negro slaves. Many of
them were shipped to Barbados and their descendants may still be seen
there and are still called ‘red-legs.’ A few have become well-to-do,
but the majority are miserable, ragged, degenerate folk who have never
recovered from the effects of their ancestors’ servitude.

“The future pirate ‘Red Legs,’ however, fell into good hands—a planter
who secretly sympathized with the prisoners’ cause,—and he was well
educated and was practically adopted by his owner. When still a mere
lad, however, his owner died and he was sold to a cruel master who made
life miserable for him. As a result, he decided to stow away on some
ship bound for a Dutch island, but in the darkness, when swimming to
the vessel, he became confused and by chance clambered onto the deck of
a buccaneer ship. As a result, he was compelled to join the pirates and
took part in their raids. But he was no pirate at heart. He could never
bear the sight of tortures or brutality and resented the treatment of
captive women. Once, in a quarrel over a female prisoner whom the
captain was maltreating, the ex-slave killed his commander and, to his
amazement, was elected captain himself. As a buccaneer chief he
performed some really amazing deeds. He took the Island of Margarita
and the vast fortune in pearls awaiting transportation to Spain. He
sacked Santa Ysobel in Mexico, and he became one of the most notorious
West Indian corsairs, although he was famed for the fact that he never
permitted cruelties or the butchering of prisoners. Eventually he tired
of the life and settled in Nevis with an old crony. Here he was
discovered and cast into prison, but was freed by the earthquake that
destroyed the town and, clinging to a floating bit of wreckage, escaped
the fate of thousands of the citizens. Eventually he made his way to
Dominica, settled down again and spent the remaining days of his life
in peace, a most worthy citizen. But ever he must have lived in deadly
fear of discovery or betrayal. His house was built like a fortress with
moats, heavy walls and underground vaults, while the balustrade to his
verandah was most fittingly fashioned from old musket barrels.”

“Well, he was really a good pirate,” declared Jack. “Were there any
others like him?”

“Not exactly,” replied his father. “But men often took to piracy for
most peculiar reasons. For example, there was Major Stede Bonnet, also
a native of Barbados. But unlike Red Legs, Major Bonnet, far from being
a slave, was a most honored and well-to-do member of the colony. He was
a gentleman by birth, well educated, possessed a large fortune and was
an army officer. However, there was one fly in the gallant Major’s
ointment. He had a nagging, scolding wife. But not until in 1716, when
the Major began acting most strangely, did tongues begin to wag over
him or his household. At that date Major Bonnet suddenly purchased a
sloop, fitted her with ten guns and engaged a crew of seventy men.
Then, indeed, did speculation become rife. To all inquiries the Major
replied ‘wait’ and the mystery deepened as the shipwrights rigged the
craft, and upon its stern appeared the name ‘Revenge.’ Then one dark
night, the Revenge slipped out of the harbor and disappeared, but in a
few months came tidings of her that were a nine days’ wonder in
Barbados. Major Stede had turned pirate! The Revenge was cruising off
the American coast, taking prizes right and left; she had become the
terror of Philadelphia, Salem, Norfolk and other coast towns, and the
Major, to add insult to injury had made Gardiner’s Island in Long
Island Sound his headquarters. Evidently pirating had appealed to the
Major as a peaceful life beside the nagging tongue of Mrs. Bonnet.

“But the poor, hen-pecked Major’s career did not last long. He fell in
with Teach, otherwise known as Blackbeard, who pretended to be an ally
and then ruthlessly robbed the amateur pirate, and, a little later, the
Major was captured off the Carolina coast. He managed to escape in a
canoe, but the reward of seventy pounds sterling offered for him, dead
or alive, soon brought results. He was retaken, tried at Charleston and
hanged. After the long-winded lecture and flowery-worded harangue that
the presiding judge inflicted upon the poor condemned man the Major
must have really welcomed hanging, and as he did not even plead the
‘discomforts to be found in the married state’ as extenuating
circumstances for his misdeeds the execution was carried out at once.”

“That would have been funny if the poor Major hadn’t been hanged,” said
Jack. “But please tell us about Blackbeard. Was he a buccaneer?”

“I’ll tell you of him presently,” replied Mr. Bickford, “but let us
follow up the history of the buccaneers in its proper sequence first.
As I have said, the buccaneers, as such, were practically destroyed
when Morgan was made Lieutenant-Governor of Jamaica and waged a
relentless war on his former associates. But to drive the corsairs from
all their lairs in the Islands and about the Spanish Main was too big a
job even for Morgan and the British king. To be sure they were driven
from Jamaica, but the French still held Tortuga; there was a fortified
island where they foregathered in Samaná Bay in Santo Domingo, and on
many a small outlying bay and islet they were comparatively safe. Then
there were the Dutch Islands and the Virgins. These last were
particular favorites of the buccaneers. They belonged to France,
Sweden, Denmark, Holland and England and always they had been neutral
ground for the freebooters. Here in these tiny out-of-the-way spots
they could careen and refit, could carouse ashore and were safe from
pursuit. The people looked upon them as friends; they spent money
freely, and in return for the privileges and security afforded them,
they never molested the inhabitants or their property. Many a buccaneer
has swung to his own yardarm for an insult to some Virgin Islander;
many a man was pistoled by his captain for attempting to make free with
Virgin Islander’s property, and in the Virgin Island ports—in St.
Martin, St. Barts, St. John, Anegada and even in St. Thomas the
remnants of the Brethren of the Main found snug lairs.

“Many of the little islands were surrounded with dangerous reefs, where
large ships could not enter, but whose secret channels were known to
the buccaneers, and at almost all of them the corsairs erected forts
and mounted guns. Montbars, the ‘Exterminator,’ as he was called, made
his headquarters at Saint Bartholomew or St. Barts as it is more
commonly called, others selected St. Martin, others Virgin Gorda and
still more Anegada. All about here are names redolent of the
buccaneers, such as Norman Island, Dead Man’s Chest, Rum Island,
Dutchman’s Cap, Broken Jerusalem, while we also find such places as Sir
Francis Drake’s Bay, Rendezvous Bay, Privateers’ Bay, Gallows Bay,
Doubloon Cove, etc.

“Most of the freebooters at Anegada were destroyed or driven off by
expeditions sent from Jamaica by Morgan, for Anegada, like Virgin Gorda
and Tortola, were British; but the buccaneers, who, you must remember,
were now out-and-out pirates and had been declared so by England and
France, were still comparatively safe in the Dutch and Danish isles.
Indeed, the Danish officials were quite openly in league with the
pirates, and one governor of St. Thomas, Adolf Esmit—who, by the way,
had been a buccaneer himself—was closely identified with a most
notorious pirate, Jean Hamlin.

“It was in 1682—about the time Sharp returned from his ‘dangerous
voyage’—that Hamlin took as a prize the French ship, La Trompeuse,
refitted her as a corsair and made a swift and successful piratical
cruise through the Caribbean. Despite all protests of the British,
Hamlin made his headquarters at St. Thomas, where he was entertained by
the governor—with whom, no doubt, he shared his loot—and was afforded
every courtesy and aid in fitting for another raid. For over a year
Hamlin wrought havoc with British, French, Spanish and Dutch shipping
with equal impartiality, finally culminating in a wholesale capture of
seventeen Dutch and British ships off the coast of Africa.

“Returning from this foray the pirates were loudly welcomed in St.
Thomas; the merchants bid for the loot brought ashore, and Hamlin made
merry with his good friend, the governor. But word of the corsair’s
whereabouts had been carried to the neighboring British Islands.
Governor Stapelton, of Antigua, despatched the H.M.S. Francis under
stout old Captain Carlisle to St. Thomas, and three days after Hamlin’s
triumphant arrival at the island the British frigate sailed into the
harbor.

“It was useless for the pirates to attempt to escape or to resist.
Their ship was under the guns of the frigate scarcely a pistol shot
away and, hastily scrambling into their boats and firing a few guns to
‘save their faces,’ the pirate captain and his men rowed for shore and
sought protection under the wings of the governor. Carlisle wasted no
time in formalities and, despite the fact that he was in the waters of
Denmark, promptly fired the pirate ship and blew her to bits.

“Of course Governor Esmit protested, claiming he had already seized the
Trompeuse in the name of the Danish king, but Captain Carlisle snapped
his fingers—figuratively speaking—in the Danes’ faces, asked them what
they were going to do about it and sailed away, well satisfied with a
good deed well done. In the meantime, Esmit provided the pirates with a
new vessel, but realizing that complications might arise, he suggested,
in a friendly way, that henceforth some more isolated, out-of-the-way
spot would be better adapted to piratical uses.”








CHAPTER XI

KIDD, THE PIRATE WHO WASN’T A PIRATE


“Whew, I didn’t know they had pirates and buccaneers right up here
around home!” exclaimed Fred. “Think of pirates in Long Island Sound!”

“Of course there were,” declared Jack. “If there weren’t, how do you
suppose Captain Kidd could have buried his treasure up here?”

“That’s so,” admitted his cousin. “But I always thought he pirated down
in the West Indies and just brought his treasure up here to hide it. Do
you suppose he really did bury anything up this way, Uncle Henry?”

Mr. Bickford laughed. “No, most of those stories are purely
imagination,” he replied. “There isn’t a stretch of coast from Canada
to South America that hasn’t got its tale of buried pirate treasure. If
they all were true there’d be more valuables hidden by the pirates than
all the corsairs ever took.”

“Didn’t the buccaneers and pirates really bury treasure, then?” asked
Jack. “You said that Davis was supposed to have hidden his loot on the
Galápagos Islands.”

“Undoubtedly they did,” his father assured him. “The buccaneer leaders
were far more thrifty than their men, and as there were no banking
facilities in the haunts of the pirates and no safe hiding places in
the towns, I have not the least doubt that they did bury vast
quantities of their booty. But, also, I have no doubt but that they
eventually dug most of it up again. The majority of the buccaneer and
pirate captains retired from the profession and settled down to a life
of peace and plenty, as I have said, and there is no reason why they
should have left their treasure hidden away. Of course those who were
suddenly killed might have had money and valuables secreted at the time
of their death, but there were far greater fortunes hidden by the
Spaniards than by the pirates. No doubt thousands and thousands of
dollars’ worth of money, plate and jewels were buried or hidden by the
Dons to prevent their falling into the buccaneers’ hands and were never
recovered. Very often the owners were killed or made prisoners and the
secret of the treasure died with them, or they died a natural death
without digging up their buried riches.

“Of course a great deal of hidden treasure has been found of which the
world never hears. In most countries the government claims a large
share of such finds and naturally the finder, having no desire to share
his unexpected fortune, keeps mum when he discovers it. There are
countless cases of poor negroes and others in the West Indies suddenly
becoming well-to-do without apparent reason. From time to time ancient
coins appear at money changers and now and then we hear of treasure
being found. But as a rule, the sums discovered are not large and are
found by accident.

“And with few exceptions there is every reason to believe that the
valuables were hidden by their lawful owners or were lost or
accidentally buried. For example, there was the man Gayney, who was
drowned in Darien and who had three hundred pieces of eight on his
person. Any one might find that and think it was buried treasure and
never imagine it was the loot carried on a man’s back. At other times,
boats loaded with valuables were wrecked or sunk and the treasure lost.
Then, years later, it is found in the sand of the shore and the finders
think of it as buried treasure. Moreover, wherever the pirates
foregathered they naturally lost more or less money and if, by chance,
some one picks up a few doubloons or pieces of eight in such places it
always starts a tale of buried loot. At Anegada, St. John, St. Martin
and, in fact, every other buccaneers’ old haunt, pieces of money are
picked up from time to time and from these finds the tales of buried
treasure have originated. In all the reliable histories and chronicles
of the buccaneers and pirates I have never found any statement or hint
that would lead one to think that it was customary for the corsairs to
bury or hide their loot. All the tales of pirate captains burying
treasure at dead of night and shooting the men who dug the holes are
pure fiction with no fact on which to base them.

“But there is no question that vast amounts of treasure lie at the
bottom of the sea in the Caribbean and elsewhere. Port Royal, Jamaica,
slipped bodily into the sea with all its treasure—and there was
undoubtedly vast sums in money and jewels in the place—and not a cent
has ever been salvaged. Jamestown, in Nevis, was also submerged by an
earthquake and all the riches it contained still lie at the bottom of
the sea. Countless ships, attacked by the buccaneers, sank before the
pirates could loot them and went to the bottom with their valuables,
and many a buccaneers’ and pirates’ vessel was lost with thousands of
dollars worth of treasure. The floor of the Caribbean is dotted with
such wrecks. In some cases the men escaped and told of the loss, and
the places where the ships went down are known, but in many cases the
vessels with all their treasure and crew merely disappeared and no one
knows their fate. It was thus with Grammont, a famous French buccaneer,
who, in 1686, plundered and burnt Campeche and secured a vast treasure.
But he and his ship were never heard from and beyond a doubt the
immense fortune in gold, silver and precious stones lies somewhere
among the rotted timbers of his ship at the bottom of the Caribbean.”

“Well, it doesn’t sound as if treasure hunting would be very
profitable,” remarked Jack.

“Far more money has been spent in searching for treasure than ever was
lost,” declared Mr. Bickford. “There was the Peruvian treasure supposed
to have been hidden on Cocos Island—a vast fortune in church plate,
holy vessels and coin which was taken away to prevent it falling into
the hands of the enemy. Innumerable expeditions have set out to find it
but none have succeeded, although many have claimed to possess maps of
the spot. But during the years that have passed, the island has
altered, there have been landslides, and, if we are to believe the most
reliable reports, the treasure lies buried under thousands of tons of
rock and earth that has fallen from the mountainside. And as far as
known the treasures that were lost when the Dons hurriedly sent it away
from Old Panama to prevent it falling into Morgan’s hands has never
been found. Some day some one may stumble upon it, but the chances are
that it will remain lost to the world forever.”

“Then all these stories about Captain Kidd’s treasure are just yarns,”
said Fred regretfully. “And you said he wasn’t even a pirate.”

“If Captain Kidd had possessed one-hundredth of the treasure he is
supposed to have buried he would have been the most successful pirate
who ever lived,” declared Mr. Bickford. “There is nothing to prove that
Captain Kidd ever had any considerable treasure and the little he had
was secreted on Gardiner’s Island and recovered by the men who employed
Kidd and for whom it was intended. No, your old hero Kidd was not a
pirate nor a buccaneer. On the contrary, he was a much maligned man, a
weak, rather cowardly chap, who was the tool of unscrupulous
adventurers and paid the penalty for crimes that never were proved
against him. And yet, strangely enough, he became noted as the most
famous of all pirates and his name is a household word and the epitome
of piracy. It is one of the most astounding examples of unwarranted
fame and misconception on record, and so firmly fixed in the mind of
the public is the erroneous idea that Kidd was the most notorious of
pirates that not one person in a thousand will listen to reason or pay
the least heed to documentary evidence or historical records proving he
was no pirate at all.

“It is the hardest thing in the world to down tradition and oddly
enough the more false tradition is the harder it seems to be to correct
it. Despite everything, Kidd will, no doubt, continue to remain the
favorite pirate of romance and story, and to the end of time Kidd’s
treasure will still, in imagination, be buried here, there and
everywhere along the coasts.

“We scarcely ever hear of ‘Blackbeard’s treasure,’ of ‘Morgan’s
treasure’ or of ‘Bonnet’s treasure,’ although each and every one of
those rascals was a pirate and took vast sums and may have buried their
loot for all we know. But always it is Kidd’s treasure, although the
poor fellow never had any to bury.

“As a matter of fact, Captain William Kidd was a respectable and honest
sea captain, a native of Greenock, and was so highly respected for his
integrity that he was given a commission to suppress piracy by King
William the Third of England. The commission was addressed to ‘our
trusty and well-beloved Captain William Kidd of the ship Adventure,
galley’ and was dated 1695. The royal warrant went on to authorize Kidd
to destroy and hunt down ‘divers wicked and ill-disposed persons who
were committing many and great pyraces to the great danger and hurt of
our loving subjects.’

“Kidd, being impecunious, was backed by several rich and influential
persons in Massachusetts and New York, among them Lord Belmont, the
governor of Barbados, who saw in the capture of pirates and the taking
of their ill-gotten loot a chance for large profits.

“The Adventure set forth on her mission in May, 1696, with a crew of
one hundred and fifty-five men and cruised here, there and everywhere
searching for piratical prey. Unfortunately pirates seemed very scarce,
Kidd’s crew became mutinous and clamored for excitement, and the next
thing that was known, word came to the authorities that the Adventure
had attacked and taken a Moorish ship called the Queda Merchant.
Furthermore, reports had it that Kidd had taken possession of the
prize, had transferred his men, guns and other possessions to the Queda
and, having sunk the Adventure, had gone a-pirating in the Moorish
ship. At once he was branded as a pirate and a price put upon his head.
All unwittingly Kidd sailed into Santo Domingo in his prize and there
learned that he was looked upon as a pirate and was wanted by the
authorities.

“Without hesitation, Kidd purchased a sloop, left the Queda in port and
sailed as fast as possible to Boston to explain matters. He was, of
course, rather doubtful of his reception and before throwing himself on
the mercies of the authorities he secreted the few valuables he had on
Gardiner’s Island, sent word to his sponsors, and after a consultation
in which they agreed to stand by him and clear him of the charge of
piracy, he gave himself up.

“Kidd’s explanation was frank and simple. He claimed his crew, a gang
of thugs and cut-throats, had mutinied, had made him prisoner and of
their own volition had captured the prize, and that the Adventure,
being rendered unseaworthy in the action, had been abandoned, and the
men and their belongings transferred to the Moorish ship. He also
testified that his men had threatened to shoot him if he did not accede
to their wishes and that during the time of the capture of the ship he
had been locked in his cabin. He was questioned as to what became of
the valuables, supposedly worth seventy thousand pounds sterling, which
were on the Queda and in reply swore that the men had taken it and made
away with it. In the end, to make a long story short, the trial
simmered down to a charge against the unfortunate Captain of having
killed a gunner named Moore, who was a member of the Adventure’s crew.
Kidd frankly admitted he had killed the fellow by striking him over the
head with a bucket, as Moore had been mutinous and had led the men in
their scheme to turn pirates. Throughout these preliminary hearings,
Kidd’s wealthy sponsors had deserted him. They saw that they would
become involved; and poor Kidd found himself without friends or money
and even deprived of the rights to produce documentary evidence of his
statements. Heavily manacled, he was sent to England and tried on the
charge of piracy and murder at Old Bailey in May, 1701.

“The trial was a rank travesty of justice from the beginning. Papers
and letters favorable to Kidd were refused as evidence; his erstwhile
friends perjured themselves to save their own names; counsel was denied
him and only his faithful wife stood by him. In addition to Kidd, nine
of his crew were also charged with piracy, these being the men who had
remained faithful to their captain, and although all testified in
Kidd’s behalf and substantiated his story, Kidd and six of the men were
condemned to be hanged in chains. At Execution Dock the maligned,
helpless captain and his fellows were strung up without mercy on May
23rd, and their dead bodies suspended in chains along the river side,
where, for years, the bones swayed and rattled in the winds as a grim
warning to all pirates.

“But the execution was a bungling and awful thing. Kidd, standing with
the noose about his neck, was pestered, browbeaten and cajoled to
confess, but stoutly maintained his innocence. As he was swung off, the
rope broke and the poor, tortured, groaning man was again hoisted to
the scaffold where, despite his suffering, a minister and others
exhorted him to confess his crimes and reveal the hiding places of his
treasure. But between pitiful groans and pleas for a speedy death, Kidd
still maintained that he had no treasure and had told only the truth.
Finally, despairing of wringing a confession from one who had nothing
to confess, he was hanged until dead. His entire estate, consisting of
less than seven thousand pounds, was confiscated and presented to the
Greenwich Hospital, where, by all that was right and just, it should
have proved a curse rather than a blessing.

“No one ever knew what became of the Queda or her treasure, but, no
doubt, as Kidd claimed, she was scuttled by the mutinous crew and the
loot divided between them was scattered to the four winds. Upon that
slender mystery of the disappearance of the valuables of the Queda were
built all the tales of Captain Kidd’s buried treasure, and upon the
farce of a trial and the conviction of the unfortunate seaman for
killing a mutinous gunner in self-defense, was reared the undying fame
of Captain Kidd.”

“Gee, that was a shame!” declared Jack. “I feel really sorry for poor
old Captain Kidd. Think of Morgan being knighted and honored after all
he did and Kidd being hung for nothing.”

“You must bear in mind that times had changed since Morgan’s day,” said
Mr. Bickford. “The romantic, picturesque buccaneers were a thing of the
past, and England and her colonies were waging a relentless war on
pirates. In a way we must not be too hard on the authorities for their
treatment of Kidd. They were intent on discouraging piracy and
doubtless felt that, even if there was a question of Kidd’s guilt, his
death would be a wholesome warning to any seamen who felt inclined to
turn pirates. But it certainly is a wonderful example of the irony of
fate to think of Kidd winning undying fame as a bold and ruthless
pirate when—even if he were guilty—he could not have been charged with
taking more than one ship, while others, who destroyed hundreds and
ravaged the seas for years, have been totally forgotten. There was not
even anything romantic, daring or appealing to the imagination in
Kidd’s career. In contrast, consider the most romantic corsair who ever
pirated in the Caribbean, a veritable knight errant of the seas, a
scion of royalty, known as Prince Rupert of the Rhine.”

“Why, I never ever heard of him!” exclaimed Fred. “What did he do?”

“Of course you never heard of him,” said Mr. Bickford. “That is why I
mentioned him, just as an example of how a man who should have been
famous remains unknown and forgotten and a man like Kidd, with no claim
to fame, lives on forever. Prince Rupert was a most romantic and
fascinating character, a real Don Quixote, ever getting into one scrape
after another, living a series of incredible adventures that would have
put the famous D’Artagnan to shame; a dashing, impetuous gallant young
prince who, according to historians, was ‘very sparkish in his dress’
and ‘like a perpetual motion.’ Young, handsome, a dashing cavalier, as
ready with his sword as with his purse, he championed every romantic or
hopeless cause, threw himself into any wild scheme or fray where a lady
was concerned or some one was in distress, and was no sooner out of one
trouble than he was head over heels into another. But he was ever
resourceful, ever light hearted and ever a great favorite with the
ladies. In his youth, he was cast into prison in Linz, but, despite his
plight, he managed to learn drawing, made love to the governor’s
daughter and so won her heart that his escape was made easy.

“Later, he decided that the land held too few opportunities for his
restless, romantic spirit, and with a handful of choice companions he
took to sea in command of a fleet of three ships. These were the
Swallow, his own vessel, the Defiance, under command of his brother,
Prince Maurice, and the Honest Seaman.

“Gay with pennants and bunting, the little argosy set sail from Ireland
in 1648, and with the gallant young Prince, dressed in his gayest
silks, satins and laces, upon the high poop of the Swallow, the three
tiny vessels set off on their voyage to do their bit towards
championing the cause of their king in the far-off Caribbean.

“For five years they sailed. Battling right nobly with the Dons,
escaping annihilation a thousand times, beset by tempest and storm and
meeting enough adventures at every turn to satisfy even the Prince’s
ardent soul. A book might be written on the romantic, harebrained,
reckless deeds performed by that hot-blooded young scion of royalty,
but in the end, in a terrific hurricane, Prince Rupert’s fleet was
driven on the treacherous reefs off Anegada. Prince Maurice in the
Defiance was lost, the Honest Seaman was battered to pieces and her few
survivors reached the low, desolate land more dead than alive, but the
Swallow, by chance or Providence, managed to escape by driving through
a narrow entrance in the jagged reef to the sheltered water within.
Battered and leaking, badly crippled, the poor Swallow was far from
seaworthy when the storm was over and the gay Prince, saddened and
sorrowful at the loss of his brother and his men, sailed dolefully for
England. He was a changed man thereafter and settled down to a very
quiet life in a little house at Spring Gardens. All his brave deeds
were forgotten, even his name passed into oblivion and in 1682 he died,
almost unknown, in his English home.”








CHAPTER XII

PICTURESQUE PIRATES


“I’d like to read all about him,” said Jack. “I’ll bet he had an
exciting life. I’ll never hear of Captain Kidd without thinking of
Prince Rupert by contrast.”

“You’ll find the whole story in this book,” said his father. “But
you’ll always find these old volumes dry reading in a way. They pass
over the most exciting events very casually, as if they were matters of
course, but you’ll be amused at the quaint language and naïve remarks.”

“Weren’t there any other old buccaneers who were as romantic and
gallant as Prince Rupert?” asked Fred.

“He was not strictly a buccaneer,” his uncle corrected him. “Nor was he
really a pirate. His deeds took place before the buccaneers were really
organized, and ostensibly he was more of a privateer than a pirate. In
a way he was in the same category as Drake and Hawkins, and the same is
true of another most romantic figure who ravaged the Caribbean and was
a thorn in the side of the Spaniards. Perhaps he should not be included
among stories of buccaneers, but he was such a picturesque figure that
a brief account of him may interest you boys.”

“Yes, do tell us about him,” cried Jack. “Even if he wasn’t really a
buccaneer.”

“He was also a member of the British nobility,” continued Mr. Bickford.
“The Earl of Cumberland, a graduate of Oxford with the degree of M.A.,
a wealthy peer, romantic, picturesque, a courtier, a noted gambler and
a man of tremendous personal strength and courage. In his youth he had
taken part in the attack on the Spanish Armada under Drake and had been
made a Knight of the Garter and was a great favorite with Queen
Elizabeth. In fact, through some favor, the queen had presented the
Earl with one of her gloves—a claret-colored, diamond-studded thing
which the dashing adventurer invariably wore tucked through the band of
his broad-brimmed plumed hat. It became his crest, his badge, and far
and wide, to friends and enemies alike, he became famed as ‘the man
with the glove in his hat.’

“Like Prince Rupert, Lord Cumberland found too few opportunities for
his love of adventure ashore and so turned to the sea and the Indies
for excitement. No doubt he found it in plenty, for he became a terror
to the Dons, took many prizes, accumulated vast wealth and seemed to
bear a charmed life. Again and again he returned to England to settle
down, but ever the life of the sea rover appealed too strongly to him,
and donning his hat with its jeweled glove, he would up and away to
some new daredevil adventure.

“Finally, in March, 1598, he set sail from Plymouth harbor with twenty
ships, all his own, for the greatest attack on the Dons in the
Caribbean that had ever been organized. His flagship bore the curious
name of The Scourge of Malice, and the Earl’s bold scheme was to attack
the supposedly impregnable port of San Juan, Puerto Rico. Drake and
Hawkins had tried it, but had been driven off, and the reckless
devil-may-care ‘man with the glove in his hat’ saw, in a raid on Puerto
Rico a fine chance for adventure such as his heart craved.

“Having captured a few prizes in mid-ocean, the fleet arrived at
Dominica in May, and the Earl allowed his men shore liberty and a good
rest before continuing on his daredevil foray. Being totally unexpected
by the Dons, the Earl’s ship approached unseen at dead of night, and
six hundred men were silently landed about two miles to the east of
Morro Castle. Dividing his force into two parties and following the
road, Cumberland led his men close to the city walls and at break of
day rushed the sleepy sentries and the gates. Shouting and yelling,
brandishing cutlasses, firing pistols, the wild horde of Englishmen
appeared to the frightened, surprised Spaniards like fiends suddenly
sprung from the earth. Terrorized, they retreated to the inmost
fastnesses of the town before they rallied and, realizing the dreaded
British were upon them, turned to face their foes. But it was too late.
The English were in the streets, and although the Dons fought manfully
and many fell on both sides, the Earl’s men were victorious, and within
two hours the city was in their hands.

“And mightily well pleased was My Lord as, with his own men in charge
of the walls and grim old fortress, he strutted about the city
appraising the valuables, the rich merchandise, the ships in the
harbor, which were his to pick and choose from. Never before had San
Juan fallen to an enemy, and the Earl had every reason to be filled
with pride at his great deed. The city was rich and prosperous, the
Morro was one of the strongest fortifications in the New World, and the
‘man with the glove in his hat’ felt that he had mightily added to
England’s power by securing this stronghold as a fortified base from
which to harass the hated Dons. But he had counted without an enemy
that lurked unseen and unsuspected near at hand. He had subdued the
Dons, but there was another foe ready to attack him that no bravery, no
arms could subdue. The dreaded Yellow Fever crept stealthily among the
British, and ere Cumberland realized what had occurred his men were
dying by scores daily. Here was an enemy he could not fight, a foe
invisible and more deadly than the Spaniards, and in almost no time
Cumberland’s force was more than half destroyed. Filled with terror at
this dread death stalking among his men, realizing that to remain meant
destruction for all, the Earl hurriedly embarked the few remaining
Englishmen aboard his ships, and beaten, discouraged and disheartened,
sailed away from the town he had so gloriously won. He had not gone
empty-handed, however. The city had been thoroughly pillaged, much of
it had been burnt, the ships in the harbor had been destroyed and
Cumberland’s fortune had been increased tremendously. But he had had
enough of the corsair’s life. He settled down to pass the remaining
years of his life in peace; but we may feel sure that often, as he
glanced at the flopping, white-plumed hat with its little red glove, he
breathed a sigh of regret that his days of a sea rover were over; that
never again would he leap over a galleon’s side with cutlass in one
hand and pistol in the other, while men shouted for St. George and San
Iago and blood flowed and cannons roared and blade clashed on blade and
pistols flashed as Don and Briton battled.”

“Seems to me those old fellows were a lot more picturesque than the
real buccaneers,” said Fred. “Why don’t people write more stories about
them, Dad? I never read of Prince Rupert or the Earl of Cumberland in
any story; but books are full of Morgan and those fellows.”

“Probably because less is known about them,” replied his father. “And
partly, too, as they lived and fought before the West Indies and the
Spanish Main became as well known as in Morgan’s day. You must remember
that we hear very little of L’Ollonois, Brasiliano, Portugues, or the
earlier buccaneers. New England, you know, was not settled until 1638,
and most of the famous buccaneers were those whose deeds were committed
after the American colonies were trading extensively with the West
Indies. Morgan, you remember, sent to merchants of New England for help
in fitting out his fleet, and Davis and his fellows sailed for the
South Sea from the Chesapeake. To the inhabitants of New England and
Virginia the buccaneers seemed comparative neighbors, and hence the
tales of their careers came fresh and vividly to them, whereas it took
weeks or months for stories to reach England.

“But don’t imagine that it was only the older pirates who were
picturesque. Perhaps the most picturesque and fascinatingly wicked
pirate who ever lived—although he hadn’t a redeeming feature—was among
the last of the really famous corsairs of the Caribbean. If ever there
was a dime-novel, story-book pirate it was he—Blackbeard.”

“Hurrah! I was hoping you’d tell us about him!” cried Jack. “Was he
really as bad as the stories make out?”

“A great deal worse,” Mr. Bickford assured him. “No imagination could
invent anything to equal Blackbeard’s innate deviltry.

“He combined all the worst traits of every buccaneer and pirate who
ever lived. He was a double-dyed, out-and-out rascal; a ruffian, a thug
and a brutal, inhuman bully. The most despicable buccaneer who ever
raided a Spanish town or boarded a galleon would have despised him, for
he held no shred of honor or principle; he cheated his friends and his
own men and was a veritable monster in human form. Nevertheless, it
cannot be denied that he was courageous; that he never shirked danger;
that he never asked or expected his men to go where he would not lead,
and, moreover, he was a most striking and picturesque rascal.”

“I saw somewhere that he had a castle in St. Thomas,” said Fred, as Mr.
Bickford paused to refresh his memory with data from a book on the
table. “Did he live there, Uncle Henry?”

“Not as far as known,” replied Mr. Bickford. “It is true that there is
an ancient tower-like building above the town of Charlotte Amalia at
St. Thomas, and which is called ‘Blackbeard’s Castle,’ and that the
natives claim it was once the home of the noted pirate. But there is
also a similar edifice known as ‘Bluebeard’s Castle’ on a neighboring
hilltop. It’s just about as probable that old Bluebeard lived in one as
that Blackbeard dwelt in the other. No doubt Blackbeard visited St.
Thomas, but there is not a bit of historical data to prove he ever
lived there. It’s a shame to destroy the island’s claim to association
with the notorious old pirate, but as a matter of record his so-called
castle was built by Charles Baggaert, a Dane, about 1660. To be sure,
that would not have prevented it from being used by Blackbeard, for he
lived at a much later date, but Blackbeard’s favorite haunts were the
Bahamas and the coasts of the Carolinas, and he would have had no
earthly reason for stopping ashore at St. Thomas. However, whatever the
truth of his ‘castle’ may be, the rest of Blackbeard’s life story is
well known and is substantiated by historical records.

“Blackbeard’s real name was Edward Teach and, like many another pirate
and sea rover, he was a native of Bristol, England. Had Teach been born
a few years earlier no doubt he would have become a famous buccaneer
and a dangerous rival of Morgan and his fellows, but Master Teach came
into the world after buccaneering as a profession had fallen into
disrepute. Hence it fell to his lot to become an ordinary seaman on
honest merchant ships, which was far from satisfactory to the ambitions
of young Teach. As a result, when his ship dropped anchor in Jamaica,
one day in 1716, Teach promptly deserted and, falling in with a number
of questionable characters, joined their company in a pirating venture.

“Evidently the embryo pirate believed thoroughly in the old adage that
‘what’s worth doing at all is worth doing well,’ and he threw himself
heart and soul into his chosen profession. Efficiency seemed to be his
middle name, to use a slang expression, and within two years from the
time he deserted the merchant service he had risen to the very highest
pinnacle as a pirate chieftain. In fact, I might go further and,
without exaggeration or question, say that within that short period
Teach had become the world’s greatest pirate, a pirate never equaled or
excelled for pure devilish bloodthirstiness and villainy, and, if the
facts were known, most of the lurid stories and the romances of piracy
have been founded on the deeds of Blackbeard. Even the popular
conception of much-maligned Kidd is based on Blackbeard, for he was the
culmination of piratical scoundrelism, the ideal pirate of
blood-and-thunder fiction, the most highly depraved cutthroat who ever
walked a ship’s decks.

“And he was a thorough believer in keeping up his reputation and well
knew the effect of appearances upon the public. Naturally a most
repulsive-looking man,—a huge, long-armed, broad-shouldered, brutal
creature,—he added to his ugliness by cultivating an enormous
coal-black beard and allowing his hair to grow until it covered his
shoulders like a mane. His beard he braided into innumerable little
pigtails, twisting in bits of bright-hued ribbons, and when attacking a
prize or boarding a ship he added to his wild and savage aspect by
tucking burning slow matches into the mass of black hair and beard that
framed his villainous, leering face.

“But his actual deeds would have been sufficient to inspire horror and
dread without the theatrical accessories of black whiskers and slow
matches. He was a past master in the art of devilish cruelty; he gave
no quarter; he took ships of any nation that happened to come his way,
and when prizes were scarce he varied the monotony of life by robbing
and murdering his own men and his fellow pirates. Had Teach drifted
into other and more peaceful walks of life he might have become a great
inventor, for he had an inordinate bump of curiosity and was forever
carrying out experiments which, while most interesting to him, were
most unpleasant to others. Once he marooned seventeen of his crew upon
a tiny barren islet, to learn, so he declared, how long human beings
could survive without food or water; but unfortunately for his
curiosity, and most opportunely for the marooned subjects of his test,
Major Stede Bonnet—of whom I have already told you—chanced to sail that
way and rescued the unfortunate seventeen from their desert isle.

“He possessed a weird and grewsome sense of humor too, and we may be
very sure that life was never dull or monotonous aboard his ship. On
one occasion, when for days no prize had been sighted and the pirate
craft rolled with slatting sails upon an oily sea under the blazing
tropic sun, Teach, hatless and shoeless, appeared on deck and announced
with a roar and an oath that he had devised a scheme for killing time
and amusing themselves. It was, indeed, a novel idea, and one quite in
keeping with Blackbeard’s character, for it was nothing less than, to
quote his words, ‘to make a little hell of our own and see who is best
fitted for our hereafter.’ It was useless for the men to protest, for
any artificial inferno that Teach could devise would, they knew, be
mild in comparison to that which they would bring upon themselves
should they refuse to follow out their captain’s wishes.

“Urging the fellows into the hold by no gentle means, Teach leaped in
with them, and then, setting fire to several pots of brimstone, pitch
and other inflammable things, the pirate chief drew the hatches shut.
There in the close, unventilated hold they sat upon the ballast,
choking, coughing, suffocating in the noxious fumes until,
half-roasted, nauseated, almost asphyxiated, the men could endure no
longer and, rushing to the hatch, threw it open and crawled on deck.
Not until all the others had gained the open air did Blackbeard emerge
triumphant, and throughout his life he was never tired of boasting of
his endurance, and took the greatest pride in recalling that his men
declared that, when he came forth, he had looked like a half-hanged
man.

“In fact, this remark by a thoughtless member of his crew set Teach to
thinking and, his curiosity being aroused, he suggested that another
and even more interesting test should be made to see who could come the
nearest to being hung without dying. But at this his men drew the line;
they had no desire to choke and kick while dangling with a noose about
their necks, even to satisfy their captain’s curiosity. In vain Teach
pointed out that sooner or later they’d be hung, most probably, and
that they might as well become accustomed to the sensation at once.
Without avail he argued that by so doing they might become so inured to
hanging that it would hold no terrors for them. One and all refused
point-blank, and Teach, realizing that to be suspended from his yardarm
alone would prove nothing and that his men might try his endurance a
bit too far, and also realizing that he could not string up his entire
crew by himself, reluctantly gave up the idea and, cursing the men
fluently as cowards, busied his mind thinking up other amusements.

“Such pleasantries were of almost daily occurrence, and his crew and
his friends thought themselves lucky indeed if they got off with
nothing more serious than his brimstone test. One night, for example,
he was entertaining two cronies, one his sailing master and the other
the pilot who had just brought the ship into port. All were in the best
of spirits, smoking, drinking, spinning yarns of the sea in the tiny,
stuffy cabin, when Blackbeard, without the least warning, suddenly
whipped out a brace of pistols, cocked them, crossed his hands, and
before his amazed guests knew what he was about, he blew out the candle
and fired his weapons in the direction of the astounded and terrified
men. The sailing master was shot through the knee—although, as you will
learn later, it was a most fortunate thing for him—and lamed for life,
and indignantly the pilot and sailing master demanded of Teach what he
meant by such behavior.

“Having cursed them fluently for several minutes, Blackbeard roared
with boisterous laughter, and replied good-naturedly that ‘if I didn’t
kill one of you now and then you’d forget who I was.’

“And yet, despite his brutality, his murderous ways, his utter
depravity, Teach apparently was a great favorite with the ladies. At
any rate, he was married fourteen times—although history fails to
mention divorces—his last wife being, according to those who knew, ‘a
beautiful young creature of sixteen.’ It certainly would be interesting
to know by what manner of courtship the villainous old wretch could win
the hearts of innocent young girls, but perchance in his love-making he
was as gentle and as ardent as he was brutal and devilish in his
piracy.

“For two years Teach ravaged the Caribbean and the coast of the
Atlantic states, sailing as far north as Massachusetts and the coast of
Maine, and making his headquarters either in the Bahamas or in the
waters of Pamlico Sound, North Carolina. Indeed, there was more than
good reason to suspect that the governor of Carolina was hand and glove
with Teach, and that the pirate paid a goodly tribute to the executive
in return for freedom from molestation while in the Carolina waters.

“But at last Blackbeard’s activities became too great to be borne
longer by the long-suffering mariners and merchants of the colonies.
They rose and demanded his apprehension or destruction, and the
Governor of Virginia thereupon offered a reward of one hundred pounds
sterling ‘for one Edward Teach, otherwise known as Blackbeard, pirate,’
dead or alive, and forty pounds for each and every other pirate. One
hundred pounds in those days was a fortune, and Teach, reading a copy
of the proclamation, swelled with pride to think that his fame and
notoriety were such as to bring forth such an offer. But he had no fear
whatever of any one claiming it. His mere name was enough to drive
every one scurrying to safety, he had perfect confidence in his ability
to look out for himself, and he took the whole matter as a bit of a
joke.

“Indeed, he thought so lightly of it that he boldly sailed into Pamlico
Sound, came to anchor in a little cove at Ocracoke Inlet, and there
fell in with an old friend, a merchant skipper, with whom he spent the
night drinking and swapping yarns of old days before Teach had gone
a-pirating.”








CHAPTER XIII

THE END OF BLACKBEARD


“As is often the case, Teach, just when he felt himself safest, was in
the most imminent peril. The munificent reward offered for his death or
capture had proved a tempting bait, and a brave young naval officer,
Lieutenant Maynard of H.M.S. Pearl, had made up his mind to pocket that
one hundred pounds and several of the forty pound rewards as well.
Gathering together a few brave and tried friends and old shipmates,
Maynard manned a small sloop, loaded it with a plentiful supply of arms
and ammunition and, having learned of Blackbeard’s whereabouts, set
sail for Ocracoke. Long before the gallant lieutenant came within sight
of the pirates’ lair, however, Teach had word of his coming, but this
only amused the black-whiskered corsair. It would serve to enliven a
dull day, and he and his men looked forward with pleasurable
anticipation to Maynard’s arrival.

“But the villainous pirate little knew the manner of man who was coming
to attack him. As the day dawned, those on the pirate ship saw the
sloop approaching, and, realizing that his situation in the exposed
anchorage was not well adapted to defensive tactics, Blackbeard cut his
cable, hoisted the black flag and allowed his vessel to drift upon the
mudflats with the tide. This was a tactful move, for Maynard’s craft
drew too much water to come to grips with the pirate, and as neither
vessel carried cannon, the battle would have to be a hand-to-hand
combat, and the pirates would have every advantage, as their enemies
would be compelled to board them. But the lieutenant had no intention
of giving the pirates any advantage he could avoid. He was out to get
Blackbeard, dead or alive, and he meant to succeed. Throwing over his
ballast, together with anchors, fittings, water casks and spare spars,
Maynard lightened his sloop until she could pass over the flats, and
then, hoisting sail, he bore down upon the stranded pirate craft.

“Blackbeard, with lighted fuses glowing in his hair and beard, drawn
cutlass and pistols in hand, leaped upon the rail, ‘hailed him in a
rude manner and cursed most horribly,’ as the old accounts tell us, and
then, in a bit of bravado, raised a glass of grog and in full view of
his enemies drank to ‘the damnation of the attackers.’

“Even with the lightened sloop, Maynard found, however, that he could
not come to grips with Teach’s vessel, and so, piling his men into
small boats, the lieutenant headed for the stranded pirate, intending
to board her. But long before they could gain the vessel’s sides they
were met with such a galling musketry fire that they were compelled to
retreat with twenty-nine men killed and wounded.

“This was, indeed, a wretched beginning, but Maynard was a resourceful
man and, ordering his men below decks, so that only himself and the
helmsman remained in sight, he allowed his sails to flap and swing as
though he had no men able to handle the sloop and with the slowly
rising tide crept constantly closer to the pirates.

“Thinking they had won the day and that Maynard’s men were utterly done
for, Teach and his crew roared out boisterous songs and taunts and
prepared to leap onto the sloop’s decks and butcher the two remaining
men and any wounded who might be lying about. A moment later the two
vessels touched. With a terrible oath and a savage yell, Blackbeard
sprang through the smoke to the sloop’s decks with his shouting crew at
his heels, and with swirling, gleaming cutlasses they rushed towards
Maynard and his helmsman. Then, up from their hiding place in the hold,
poured the sloop’s crew, and instantly the battle raged fast and
furiously. The pirates, surprised, gave back a bit, the lieutenant’s
men fought like furies, and back and forth across the bloody decks the
battle surged. Teach had singled out Maynard and, whipping out pistols,
both fired at the same instant. Blackbeard’s shot missed, but the
bullet from the lieutenant’s pistol found its mark in the pirate’s
face. With blood streaming from the wound and dripping from the braided
ends of his long beard, eyes blazing with fury, and yelling with anger
and pain, the pirate threw aside his useless pistol and leaped at the
lieutenant with swinging cutlass. But Maynard was a splendid swordsman.
As Blackbeard, cursing and shouting that he would hack the other’s
heart from his body, leaped forward, the officer’s sword met his, steel
clanged on steel, and the pirate found himself balked, held off, driven
back.

“It was a terrible duel,—the struggle of enormous brute strength
against skill,—and with terrific slashing blows and savage lunges
Blackbeard strove to break down the other’s guard, to disarm him or to
snap his blade. Here and there across the decks they fought and swayed
and panted, stumbling over dead and wounded men, slipping in pools of
blood, bumping into fighting knots of pirates and seamen. Both were
bleeding from a dozen wounds, both were near exhaustion, both were
spent, and both knew that it was but a question of moments ere one
would fall. And then, with a tremendous blow, Blackbeard brought his
heavy cutlass swinging down, the lighter blade of the officer’s snapped
at the hilt, and with a blood-curdling, triumphant yell the pirate
swung his cutlass up, whirled it about his head and aimed a
death-dealing blow at Maynard’s head. Quick as a flash the lieutenant
leaped aside, the stroke fell short, and Maynard escaped with the loss
of three fingers lopped off by that terrible blow.

“Before the pirate could raise his weapon again one of Maynard’s men
had leaped forward, his cutlass fell upon the back of Blackbeard’s
neck, almost severing the head from the body, and with a crimson
fountain spouting from the awful gash the pirate turned and cut his
assailant to the chin with a single blow. But despite his ghastly wound
the pirate chieftain was still standing, still defiant, still fighting.
All about, the decks were a shambles, his men were lying dead and
wounded, half a dozen of Maynard’s men were attacking him. Kicking off
his shoes to get a better foot-hold on the bloody deck, bellowing like
a maddened bull, blood streaming from over twenty-five wounds, with his
half-severed head lolling hideously upon his chest, but still defiant,
Blackbeard backed against the bulwarks and slashed and lunged, keeping
his enemies at bay until, as his life blood poured over his chest and
beard and trickled to the decks, his muscles weakened and his blows
grew less. Then, suddenly whipping a pistol from his belt, he made one
last desperate effort to shoot down the lieutenant. But before he could
press the trigger, before a man could strike the weapon up, his knees
sagged, his eyelids closed, and with a gurgling, awful moan he sank
lifeless to the deck.

“Few of the pirates remained alive, none were unwounded. Those who had
the strength leaped overboard, attempting to escape, but all were
captured; Blackbeard and his men were wiped out and the only member of
the pirates who had escaped was the sailing master, Israel Hands.
Nursing the bullet wound in his knee, which had been so playfully
inflicted by Blackbeard, he was safe ashore. Doubtless he most heartily
gave thanks for his dead captain’s form of humor and blessed the wound
that gave him a stiff leg for life.

“Maynard’s losses, too, were tremendous; many of his men had been
killed, scarcely one had escaped without serious wounds, but they
forgot their hurts, for they were triumphant. Thirteen pirate prisoners
were safe in irons in the sloop’s hold, the grewsome, awful head of the
redoubtable Blackbeard was lashed to the tip of the bowsprit, and,
hoisting sail, Maynard set forth for Bath Town, North Carolina, to
claim his well-earned reward and exhibit his bloody trophy. There the
thirteen prisoners were promptly hanged, Teach’s black-whiskered,
blood-clotted head, with the burnt-out fuses still in the tangled hair,
was placed in the market square, and the promised rewards were duly
paid to the courageous lieutenant and his daring men.”

“Jiminy!” exclaimed Fred. “That must have been some fight! Was that the
end of the pirates?”

“Practically,” replied Mr. Bickford. “Teach was the last pirate of
note. There were a few who still lurked in the Caribbean, but the
Atlantic coasts and the West Indies were getting too hot for them. Such
rascals, as Low, England, Roberts and Avery, transferred their
activities to more out-of-the-way spots, to Africa, Madagascar and the
Indian Ocean, and the last of the West Indian pirates were dispersed
and destroyed by Lieutenant, afterwards Commodore, Porter, who also
wiped out the Tripolitan pirates.”

“But how about Lafitte and his pirates?” asked Jack. “I thought they
lived until the time of the war of 1812 and helped General Jackson at
the battle of New Orleans.”

“So they did,” replied his father. “But Lafitte and his brother were
not really pirates. That is, no real acts of piracy were ever proved
against them, although they were denounced as such. In reality the
Lafittes were smugglers, but their career was so picturesque and
romantic that their story may be quite fittingly included in that of
the buccaneers and pirates.

“The two brothers, Jean and Pierre Lafitte, were born in France, and
came to New Orleans in the spring of 1809. They were brilliant, witty,
well educated, attractive men, and spoke several languages fluently.
The two started a blacksmith shop, which they operated by slaves, and
from the first the brothers appeared to have plenty of money. At that
time there was a strip of territory, stretching for a distance of about
sixty miles from the mouth of the Mississippi to Bayou Lafourche, which
was in almost undisputed possession of a colony of smuggler-pirates
known as the ‘Baratarians,’ from the fact that their headquarters were
on the Bay of Barataria, a body of water with a narrow opening
protected from the Gulf by a low, narrow island about six miles long
known as Grande-Terre.

“Some of these Baratarians possessed letters of marque from France, as
well as from the Republic of New Grenada (now Colombia), authorizing
them to prey upon Spanish shipping, but like the pirates of old they
had the reputation of lacking discrimination and of attacking any
vessel that they could overpower. Whatever the truth of their piratical
tendencies may have been, there was no question that they were
smugglers on a large scale, and not long after the Lafittes arrived in
Louisiana they joined their lot with these Baratarians.

“Jean occupied a position as a sort of agent and banker for the
smugglers, but he was far too clever and ambitious to remain long in
such a subordinate capacity, and soon was the head and brains of the
whole organization. To this state he won both by superior intelligence
and force of arms, for both Lafittes were adept swordsmen and expert
pistol shots, and when a fellow called Grambo, a burly leader among the
Baratarians, had the temerity to question Jean Lafitte’s leadership the
latter promptly whipped out a pistol and shot him through the heart.

“Hitherto the Baratarians had been divided into factions, and there
were constant dissensions and quarrels among them, but under Lafitte’s
management all were united, and so daring and brazenly did they carry
on their operations that within three years from the time the Lafitte
brothers stepped ashore at New Orleans there was more commerce entering
and leaving Barataria Bay than the port of New Orleans. Great
warehouses rose above the low sand dunes of Grande-Terre; cargoes of
slaves were weekly auctioned in the big slave market; from far and near
merchants and dealers flocked to the smugglers’ stronghold to barter
and trade, and it was evidently but a question of time before the
Lafittes and their Baratarian friends would control all the import
trade of the Mississippi Valley.

“Becoming alarmed at the magnitude of operations, the federal
government decided to break up the smugglers, and revenue cutters were
dispatched to the bay. But the Baratarians’ spies were vigilant, word
of the raid was brought, and the discomfited government officers
returned empty-handed, without having accomplished anything worth
while. Indeed, it was a common rumor in New Orleans that even the
United States officials were in league with the Lafittes, and the
wealthy, charming Frenchmen came and went, spent their money freely in
New Orleans, drove about in splendid carriages and with magnificent
horses, maintained expensive establishments, and snapped their slender,
jeweled fingers at the authorities.

“It was the greatest, most flagrant smuggling enterprise ever carried
on in the history of the world, and at last Governor Claiborne of
Louisiana decided to take drastic measures to suppress it. The
penalties of the law for smuggling were evidently not severe enough to
meet the case, and so, in 1813, the governor issued a proclamation in
which he declared the Baratarians pirates, warned the citizens not to
deal with them, and threatened to hang every one he could lay hands on.

“But His Excellency might have saved his breath and his paper. Twirling
gold-headed canes, decked in valuable jewels, attired in the most
expensive and beautifully tailored clothes, the Lafitte brothers
strolled nonchalantly through the streets and, surrounded by admirers,
read with interest and amusement the official placards in which they
were denounced as pirates. Then, to add insult to injury, they tacked
up posters, advertising a slave auction to be held at Barataria,
alongside the irate governor’s proclamations!

“Beside himself with anger, but realizing he was unable to cope
single-handed with the situation; Governor Claiborne issued a
supplementary proclamation offering five hundred dollars reward for the
apprehension of either of the Lafitte brothers. Only one man, as far as
known, attempted to earn the reward, and instead of the five hundred
dollars he received a bullet through the lungs which promptly relieved
him of all desire or necessity for money or anything else of a worldly
nature.

“The governor was desperate. No one would raise a finger against the
so-called ‘pirates,’ they openly defied the state, and he asked the
Legislature for an appropriation to raise a company of volunteers to
attack the stronghold of the Lafittes. Unfortunately the increase of
the smugglers’ business had so depleted the state treasury that there
were no funds available; but at last the governor succeeded in
obtaining an indictment for piracy against the two Lafittes and the
Baratarian leaders. Armed with this, the governor managed to have
Pierre arrested.

“But the executive had forgotten that money talks. For a fee of $20,000
each, Jean Lafitte retained the two most prominent lawyers in the
state, Edward Livingston and John R. Grymes, the latter resigning as
District Attorney to defend the Lafittes. During the trial his
successor taunted him with this and as a result Grymes challenged him
and shot him through the hip, crippling him for life.

“There was no question of how the trial would result. Pierre was freed,
Jean was cleared and the indictment against him dismissed and the
triumphant lawyers were invited by the brothers to visit their
headquarters at Barataria and collect their fees. Livingston, a New
Yorker, declined, but Grymes, who was a Virginian, accepted, and the
tale is still told in New Orleans of the princely entertainment, the
magnificent feast and the whole-souled hospitality accorded the
attorney by the Lafittes and their outlaw friends. Finally he was sent
back to New Orleans in an almost regally appointed yawl laden with
boxes containing the two lawyers’ fees in Spanish doubloons and pieces
of eight.

“Meanwhile the war between England and the United States had been going
on for nearly two years. It had been felt but little on the shores of
the Gulf, however, and the Baratarians, and even the more law-abiding
citizens, scarcely knew that there was a conflict. But in September,
1814, the smuggler-pirate colony was started by the sudden appearance
of an armed British brig off their island haunt. Hastily ordering out
his private cutter, Jean Lafitte boarded the war vessel, invited the
officers ashore and feasted them right royally. Then, as the merry
party sat back and puffed at their fine Havanas the smuggler chieftain
was presented with a letter from the British commandant at Pensacola.
It was an offer of a high commission in the British army and a fee of
$30,000, provided Lafitte would use his forces in assisting the British
in their proposed invasion of Louisiana.

“The Frenchman hesitated, replied that it would take him some time to
decide upon such an important matter and asked for ten days in which to
consider it. This was willingly granted, the officers were escorted
back to their ship and, well satisfied with their progress, they
prepared to await Lafitte’s reply, which they felt convinced would be
favorable. But even before they had stepped upon their ship’s decks a
messenger had been despatched post-haste by Lafitte to the Louisiana
Legislature. Not only did the messenger carry a complete account of the
British plans of invasion as divulged by the officers, but he also
carried the letter from the English commandant and a letter from
Lafitte offering the services of himself and his men in the defense of
the state.

“Instantly Governor Claiborne called a council of the army, navy and
militia officers and showed them Lafitte’s communication. The officials
could not believe that Lafitte—outlaw and smuggler and so-called
pirate—could possess any sentiments of patriotism, and one and all
declared that, in their opinions, the papers were forgeries and that
Lafitte had submitted them in order to prevent the authorities from
interfering with his plans.

“As a result, an expedition was organized, and, under command of
Commodore Patterson and Colonel Ross, set out to attack the
Baratarians. Supposing, as was natural, that the approaching forces had
been sent to combine with them against the British, the smugglers were
taken completely by surprise; many were killed and captured and their
headquarters were destroyed. Only the two Lafittes and a few followers
escaped and a vast quantity of loot was seized by the victorious
troops. Among this booty was found the jewelry of a Creole lady who had
left New Orleans several years before and had never been heard from,
and this circumstantial evidence of piracy was the sole and only thing
ever produced to prove that the Lafittes or the Baratarians could be
considered pirates. Upon that one incident all the tales of piracy by
the Lafittes have been built up and, like Captain Kidd’s, their fame
has grown from nothing. Despite the scurvy treatment accorded Lafitte
by the governor, he still remained true to his adopted country and
instead of joining the British—and he could scarcely have been blamed
if he had—he remained with his brother and the other fugitives in
hiding until General Andrew Jackson arrived to take supreme command at
New Orleans. Then, risking life and liberty, he came forth again,
offered his services and those of his men to the nation and was
promptly accepted. General Jackson placed Lafitte in command of the
redoubts along the river with a part of his men and detailed the others
to the battery at New Orleans. Throughout that memorable battle the
Baratarians and the Lafittes fought with such furious and whole-hearted
bravery that they were lauded in the general orders issued after the
victory, and at General Jackson’s suggestion all were granted full
pardons.

“After the battle, a great ball was given by the army and naval
officers and great was the rejoicing, and at this brilliant function
Jean Lafitte appeared for the last time. Among the honored guests was
General Coffee, and the pompous General and the dandy Frenchman were
brought together for an introduction. At first, as the orderly
mentioned Lafitte’s name, the General hesitated and glanced
superciliously over the smiling stranger. Lafitte stepped forward, drew
himself up proudly and announced: ‘Lafitte, the pirate.’ Instantly the
General thrust out his hand and grasped the other’s cordially.

“Never again were the Lafittes seen in New Orleans or their old haunts.
Rumors came from time to time, wild tales were told of their doings,
but there was little to bear them out. It was, however, generally
accepted as a fact beyond dispute that they went to an island near
Galveston, secured commissions as privateers from a South American
Republic and preyed upon Spanish shipping to their own considerable
profit.

“About that time, too, a United States cruiser was attacked by unknown
corsairs in the Gulf and looted of an enormous sum in bullion and this
was laid to the Lafittes. As a result, the Galveston settlement was
attacked and destroyed, but no signs of the famous Lafittes were found.
Perhaps they had never been there, perhaps they managed to escape. They
completely disappeared and where they passed the remainder of their
lives, where they died has never been discovered. Once it was reported,
that they had sailed to the Argentine and had entered the service of
the Buenos Ayres government. Again it was stated that they had
established a pirate lair in Yucatan. There were stories of their
having settled on Ruatan Island off Honduras, where they conducted
wrecking and piratical undertakings, but definite news, actual proofs,
were never forthcoming.

“We can scarcely believe that men who had proved their patriotism and
their valor, men who had shown their honor and their loyalty as had the
Lafittes, would countenance an attack upon a United States ship. It
does not seem like them to have degenerated into rascally cut-throats
and wreckers. To my mind, it is far more probable that they returned to
their beloved France or settled down under new names in some quiet
tropical land and there passed the remainder of their lives like the
accomplished gentlemen they were. No one will ever know. We can only
surmise. But with the passing of these romantic, picturesque brothers
went the last of the more famous pirates. And—as I said before—there
was nothing to prove that they were pirates after all.”

“Golly, I never knew the buccaneers and pirates were so interesting,”
declared Fred, as Mr. Bickford ceased speaking. “I always loved to read
stories about them, but they’re a lot more interesting than the
stories.”

“Yes,” agreed his uncle. “It’s a splendid example of the truth of the
time-worn saying that ‘truth is stranger than fiction.’ And did you
ever stop to think, boys, that if it hadn’t been for the buccaneers
there might not—probably would not—have been any United States?”

“Why, no!” cried Jack.

“How could that be?” demanded Fred.

“Very few people realize that we owe the buccaneers a tremendous debt
of gratitude or that they played a most important part in the history
of America. They may have been ruthless, cruel, bloodthirsty,
unprincipled cut-throats, but if it had not been for the buccaneers the
chances are that what is now the United States would have been a colony
of Spain or a Spanish-American republic. It was very largely owing to
the buccaneers that England retained her supremacy in the West Indies.
She was far too busy with wars at home to look after her American
possessions; Spain controlled South and Central America, Florida and
the Southwest, and her sea power was tremendous. But the buccaneers
kept the Dons in check, they compelled Spain to devote all her energies
and her warships to protecting her cities and her plate ships, and,
with the sea rovers everywhere in the Caribbean, the Dons could not
expand their holdings and were hard put to it to hold what they had. It
is no exaggeration to say that the buccaneers had a greater effect on
maintaining England’s hold in America than all the British Crown’s
forces. And the British navy was not at all blind to the services of
the buccaneers. When the English attacked Jamaica and wrested it from
Spain the buccaneers took a most important part and in many another sea
battle, and land attack as well, the British navy and army were mighty
glad of the buccaneers’ help. Whatever their sins and their misdeeds
may have been, we cannot overlook the fact that they had a most
important place in the scheme of things, that they helped make history
and that they are entitled to a big niche in the hall of fame of
pioneers, colonizers and fighters of America. And there is no need to
fear that they will ever be forgotten. As long as there is red blood in
the veins of men and boys; as long as human beings have pulses that
will quicken to tales of heroism and bravery and mighty deeds, the
swashbuckling, daredevil, picturesque buccaneers, and even the pirates
who came after, will live on. The names of kings and queens may be
forgotten. Famous admirals and generals may have passed into oblivion.
Great battles and tremendous victories, treaties of peace and
declarations of war; the conquests of countries; the subjugation of
kingdoms may fade from memory, and yet, every schoolboy is familiar
with the names of Morgan, L’Ollonois, Montbars, Hawkins and the other
chieftains of the buccaneers. They were characters who can never die.”

“Gee, I’m kind of sorry they have all gone,” declared Jack, as his
father ceased speaking. “It would be great to see a real buccaneer or a
real pirate ship.”

Mr. Bickford smiled. “I’m afraid you’ll never see a buccaneer,” he
said. “But you might see a pirate ship.”

“Oh, do you really mean there are any pirates’ ships left?” cried Fred.

“I can’t say, positively,” replied his uncle. “But there was one a very
short time ago. She was doing duty as a packet between the Virgin
Islands and her name was the Vigilant. She was a trim, speedy little
schooner—the typical ‘low black craft with rakish masts’ of story and
fiction and had had a most adventurous and romantic career. She was
built at Baltimore and was originally intended as a privateer for use
in the Revolution. But the war was over before she was launched and she
served as a smuggler, a slaver and a pirate, changing hands frequently.
At that time she was rigged as a topsail schooner and was called the
Nonesuch, and at one time she was even a man-of-war. That happened when
Denmark and Spain were at war and a Spanish cruiser was harassing
Danish commerce, always escaping by fleeing to waters too shoal for the
Danish war vessels. The Vigilant was pressed into service, disguised as
a merchantman, and lured the Spaniard on until at close quarters, when
she suddenly showed her real character in true pirate fashion, and,
throwing grappling irons, the armed crew of the schooner swarmed over
the Spaniard’s side, killed the captain and officers, overpowered the
crew and captured the ship. It was the last engagement of the gallant
little schooner—a fitting end to her career—and ever since she has done
duty as an honest merchantman. I have seen her many times, have even
sailed on her, and, for all I know to the contrary, she may still be
plowing the blue Caribbean in the haunts of the buccaneers as staunch,
fast and seaworthy as when the Jolly Roger flew from many a masthead.”


                                THE END