209 A VOYAGE TO Book VIIL 



housesj which are so many mas^azines for rt;oods. It 

 was notloni]^ before they met with a quantity of brandy 

 and wine, of which, like men whose appetites are 

 not to be governed at the sight of plenty after long 

 distress, they made a very licentious use, and became 

 so greatly inebriated, that the mulattoci» and negro 

 slaves, seeing their condition, abandoned their fears, 

 and became so familiar with the English sailors, as to 

 drink with them, whilst others carried off hampers 

 filled with the goods of their masters, together with 

 considerable quantities of gold, which they biiried in 

 the sand. The long-boat, however, returned on- 

 board the ship, but her chief spoils consisted of pro- 

 visions ; and the men employed in that service, regaled 

 themselves with a degree of intemperance equal to 

 those who guarded the fort. 



The inhabitants of Paita, who still timorously 

 continued on the mountain, though in want of every 

 thing, dispatched an expreí;s to Don Juan de Vinatea 

 J Torres, the corregidor of Puna, and a native of 

 the Canaries, who, agreeably to his known cha- 

 racter of prudence and intrepidity, immediately as- 

 sembled ail the militia of that city and its depend- 

 encies, and hastened by forced marches through a 

 troublesome sandy road of fourteen leagues to Paita. 

 The English had been three days masters of Paita, 

 when discovering these succours, and being inform- 

 ed by the negroes and mulattoes, that the militia of 

 Piu/a, headed by a famous general, were coming to 

 dislodge them from the town, enraged at this, but 

 wanting courage to defend what they had gained, or 

 rather surprized, carried olf whatever they could, 

 and took their leave of the place by ungenerously 

 petting fire to the houses ; an action which could re- 

 f!ect but little honour on the arms of their nation: 

 but was rather a malicious transaction, to revenge 

 on the poor inhabitants the coining of the militia, 

 T^hom they did not dare to face. Nobody indeed 

 i i;::a<;inc4 



