^38 JAMAICA, 



tending to illuftrate the utility, and even necefiity, of adoptiiig 

 {bis meadir?, 



SECT. IV, 

 M A R O N S[/j. 



WHEN the Spaniards retreated before the army under com-i 

 ^na^d pf Venables, they had with them about one thoufand fivQ- 

 hundred Negroes and Mulattos, many of whom were (laves. Some 

 jidhered to their maflers ; while otbers diiperfed^ thirty or forty in 

 ^ gang, ^o different parts of the mountains, chuling their own 

 leaders ; from whence they made frequent excurfions, to harrafi 

 ^he Englifli foldiers, who had been reprefsnted to them as blood- 

 ^hlrfty heretics, that gave no quarter. They frequently killed (kag-, 

 glcrs nea,r th? head-quarters •, and one night grew fo bold, as to fire 

 \\ houfe in the very town. Major-general Sedgewick prophefied, 

 ii> his letter to Thurloe (1656), that thefe Blacks would prove 

 |hor^\s in our fides j tiving as they did in the woods and mountains, 

 3 kind of life ng-tural and agreeabl6 to them. He adds, that they 

 gave no quarter to hh men^ but deftroyed them whenever they 

 found opportunity, fcarce a week pafling without their flaying one 

 or two i and, as the foldiers gre\Y more fecure a,nd carelefs, they 

 became more euterprifing and bloo.dy. *' Having no moral fenfe"' 

 continyes he, " nor underftanding what the ^awa and cufloms of"; 

 «' civil nations mean, we neither know how to capitulate ordif- 

 *• (jourfe with, nor how to take, any of them,. 3utj be affu,red, they 

 <.' muft either be deftroyed, or brought in upon fome terms or- 

 i' other; or elfe they wiH prove a great difcouragement to the fet-. 

 *< tling of people here.'' What he foretold actually ca-nje to pafa. 

 At the latter en4 of the fa^me year (1656)4 the army gained fome 

 trifling fuccefs againfl them ; but this was foon afterwards feverelj 

 letaliated by the (laughter of forty foldi,ers.j cut off as, they wece 

 carelefsly rambling near their quarters. A party was immediately 

 lent ip. quefl pf the enemy, came up with, a,nd killed feveii, or eight; 



[.'] Pfobubly deriyed from the Spanifti Marrano, a porker, or hog of one year old. The nara^?- 

 ^as firlj given to. the hunters ot wild hogs, to dillinguifh them from the bucaniers, or hunter* o^ 

 Hiidcattte .".nd h5)rfes, 



of 



