xliv 



AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP 



not cut out for rough or hazardous undertakings. 

 Our adventurers had better staid at home. The 

 Spaniard bore down upon their schooner, and im- 

 mediately took possession of her. 



As these gentlemen had gone out to battle on the 

 high seas without a commission from government, 

 their friends in Demerara had serious apprehensions, 

 and not without reason, that they ran a risk of being 

 tucked up for pirates on their reaching the Spanish 

 settlements in the Orinoco. 



Being the only person in Demerara acquainted 

 with the Spanish language, I volunteered my ser- 

 vices to go in quest of the unfortunates. Their 

 friends accepted the offer with abundant thanks ; 

 and, having engaged a vessel for me, I sailed with a 

 Mr. Charles Gordon (a relative of one of the prison- 

 ers), for Barbadoes, to receive letters and instruc- 

 tions from Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane. My 

 instructions from Colonel Nicholson, the governor 

 of Demerara, bear date October 24. 1807. 



A little before this (that is, on the 1 1th of Sep- 

 tember in the same year), I had received from 

 Colonel Nicholson my commission of lieutenant in 

 the 2d regiment of militia. As no declaration had 

 been previously required from me against transub- 

 stantiation, nor any promise that I would support 

 the nine and thirty articles of faith by law esta- 

 blished, nor any inuendos thrown out touching the 

 " devil, the Pope, and the Pretender," I was free 

 in conscience to accept of this commission. It was 

 the first commission that any one of the name of 

 Waterton had received from Queen Mary's days. 



