CHAP, i.] WEST INDIES. . 149 



every thing valuable, received a considerable ransom 

 for sparing the houses. He then retreated to his ships, 

 and carried off his booty without interruption. 



From this period until the capture of the island by 

 the English in 1655, during the usurpation of Crom- 

 well, I know nothing of its concerns, nor perhaps 

 were they productive of any event deserving remem- 

 brance. I shall therefore proceed, in the next chap- 

 ter, to the consideration of the protector's motives for 

 attacking the territories of Spain at a time when trea- 

 ties of peace subsisted between the two nations ; which 

 I conceive have hitherto been greatly misunderstood, 

 or wilfully misrepresented by historians in general. 



'*#* In the preceding pages ( see MO of the present edi- 

 tion) I have assigned some reasons in support of the tradition- 

 al account of the destruction of New Seville, on the north- 

 ern side of Jamaica, by the ancient Indians; and I have 

 supposed that event to have happened in the year 1523. I 

 have since discovered that the reasons I have given were well 

 founded. Among Sir Hans Sloane's MSS. in the British 

 Museum, I have been shewn part of an unpublished history 

 of Jamaica, which was written the beginning of the present 

 century, by Doctor Henry Barbara, a very learned and re- 

 spectable physician of that island, wherein the circumstance 

 is related nearly in the manner I have suggested, and stated 

 to have occurred (as I had supposed) immediately after the 

 embarkation of the force under Garay ; which is known, from 

 Herrera, to have taken place in 1523. In the same work, the 

 Jettta from Christopher Columbus (vide p. 131, t* set].) is 

 pres^ved as a document of undoubted authenticity. 



