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engaged in it, were added a crowd of novices, more eager to participate in Morgan’s plunder than in his glory. Through the protection of the governor of Jamaica, he obtained a six-and-thirty gun ship. With this reinforcement, which equally added to his military strength and importance, he departed for Hispaniola in January, 1669.
    … Morgan, in the presence of all the free-booters, whose number was completed by the arrival of the other ships, disclosed his plan of sailing towards Savanna, and there to take the rich fleet which would arrive from Spain. The proposal was received with enthusiasm; cries of joy were mingled with discharges of artillery. The excesses of intoxication which covered this tumult, deprived these marauders of their reason, and lulled their vigilance to sleep.
    In the midst of their drunken revels, the ship blew up into the air, and three hundred and fifty Englishmen were buried at sea. Thirty only, including Morgan, were spared, who were in a large hut, and consequently at a distance from the centre of the explosion. A few others might have saved themselves, but they were so intoxicated as to be unable to make any efforts for that purpose. By this accident three hundred and twenty pirates were lost. The survivors exerted themselves very actively in fishing them up again, – not indeed from any pious regard for the mortal remains of their comrades, but to strip them of the gold rings which these corsairs commonly wore on their fingers.
    … The destruction of his principal ship was to him a very sensible loss; he had now only fifteen remaining, the largest of which carried only fourteen small cannons. He could still reckon, indeed, on board his fleet nine hundred freebooters; but he had not yet arrived at the height of his misfortunes. In one night, after various adventures, his fleet was so ill-treated by a tempest, that on the following day it was reduced to eight ships, and his little army to five hundred men. In case of a separation, it had been previously determined that they should resort to the bay of Ocos, as the point of re-union; and thither the commander-in-chief hastened, but not one of his ships appeared there.
    From that time he changed his plans of operations; and by the advice of the celebrated Peter the Picard, who had been with Olonois in the expedition to Maracäibo, he determined to pay a new visit to that Spanish possession. He fortunately arrived with his men on the borders of the lake of that name, where he found that the Spaniards had recently built a fort, the artillery of which commenced and kept up a most terrible fire upon his ships. With this unexpected reception the pirates were by no means daunted; they ventured to land. Intimidated by such audacity, which recalled to the mind the first attack of the free-booters, the Spaniards rapidly evacuated the fort, and placed a lighted match near the powder magazine, in order to blow up both the fort and the pirates themselves. The plot, however, was detected by Morgan at the very moment that the explosion was about to take place. He found in the fort thirty quintals of gunpowder, several fusees and pikes, an extensive military baggage, and seventeen large cannons. A few pieces only were spiked, the remainder being carried on board the ships. The fort was demolished as far as precipitation would allow them; for it was constructed in a peculiar manner, so that it could only be ascended by an iron ladder which was drawn up as soon as the person attained the top of the wall.
    But this conquest was not attended with any great utility to the free-booters. They were obliged to advance further, and they had many obstacles to surmount. The shallowness of the water compelled them to abandon their ships, and continue their navigation in canoes. But the terror with which the Spaniards were struck removed all difficulties. Their inconsiderable strength might have encouraged their enemies to make some resistance; this however was not the case.