38 THE SEA. 



with all their goods, at last resolved for Gibraltar, as Lolonois had done before. With 

 this -design he equipped his fleet, providing 1 it sufficiently with all necessaries. He put 

 likewise on board all the prisoners, and weighing anchor, set sail with resolution to hazard 

 a battle. They had sent before some prisoners to Gibraltar to require the inhabitants to 

 surrender, otherwise Captain Morgan would put them all to the sword without any quarter. 

 Ai-riving before Gibraltar, the inhabitants received him with continued shooting of great 

 cannon bullets; but the pirates, instead of fainting hereat, ceased not to encourage one 

 another, saying '"We must make one meal upon bitter things before we come to taste 

 the sweetness of the sugar this place affords/ y 



Next day, early in the morning, they landed all their men, and being guided by the 

 Frenchman beforenamed, they marched towards the town, not by the ordinary way, but 

 crossing through woods, which way the Spaniards did not expect they would have come, for at 

 the beginning of their journey they pretended to march the next and open way to the town, 

 hereby to deceive the Spaniards ; " but these remembering full well what Lolonois had done 

 but two years before, thought it not safe to expect a second brunt, and hereupon all fled 

 out of the town as fast as they could, carrying all their goods and riches, as also all their 

 powder, and having nailed all the great guns; so as the pirates found not one person in 

 the whole city but one poor innocent man who was born a fool. This man they asked 

 whither the inhabitants had fled, and where they had hid their goods. To all which 

 questions and the like he constantly answered ( I know nothing, I know nothing ! ' but 

 they presently put him to the rack, and tortured him with cords, which torments forced 

 him to cry out f Do not torture me any more, but come with me and I will show you 

 my goods and my riches ! ' They were persuaded, it seems, he was some rich person dis- 

 guised under those clothes so poor and that innocent tongue; so they went along with 

 him, and he conducted them to a poor miserable cottage, wherein he had a few earthen 

 dishes and other things of no value, and three pieces of eight, concealed with some other 

 trumpery under ground. Then they asked him his name, and he readily answered, ' My 

 name is Don Sebastian Sanchez, and I am brother unto the Governor of Maracaibo/ This 

 foolish answer, it must be conceived, these inhuman wretches took for truth; for no 

 sooner had they heard it but they put him again upon the rack, lifting him up on high 

 with cords, and tying large weights to his feet and neck. Besides which they burnt him 

 alive, applying palm-leaves burning to his face/' They sent out parties, and captured some 

 prisoners, several of whom were tortured or killed. Among others there was a Portuguese, 

 who was falsely reported by a negro to be very rich. This man was commanded to produce 

 his riches. His answer was that he had no more than 100 pieces of eight in the world, 

 and these had been stolen from him two days before by his servant. The pirates would 

 not believe him, but dragged him to a rack without any regard to his age of sixty years, 

 and stretched him with cords, breaking both his arms behind his shoulders. " This cruelty 

 went not alone, for he not beig able or willing to make any other declaration, they put 

 him to another sort of torment more barbarous; they tied him with small cords by his 

 two thumbs and great toes to four stakes fixed in the ground at a convenient distance, 

 the whole weight of his body hanging by these cords. Not satisfied yet with their cruel 

 torture, they took a stone of above 200 pounds and laid it on his belly, as if they intended 



