PIRATES. 



349 



went away their good-natured neighbours spoke of 

 them as los pobres, who had good reason to be si- 

 lent. All spoke with kindness and good feeling of 

 the leaders, and particularly of one Don Juan, the 

 captain, a dashing, generous fellow, whose death was 

 a great public loss. Individuals were named, then 

 living in the p/ace, and the principal men, who had 

 been notoriously pirates ; one had been several years 

 in prison and under sentence of death, and a canoa 

 was pointed out, lying in front of our door, which 

 had been often used in pirate service. 



Our house had been the headquarters of the buc- 

 aniers. It was the house of Molas, to whose un- 

 happy end I have before referred. He had been 

 sent by the government as commandant to put down 

 these pirates, but, as it was said, entered into collu- 

 sion with them, received their plunder, and con- 

 veyed it to the interior. At night they had revelled 

 together in this house. It was so far from the cap- 

 ital that tidings of his misdoings were slow of trans- 

 mission thither, and, when they were received, he 

 persuaded the government that these reports pro- 

 ceeded from the malice of his enemies. At length, 

 for his own security, he found it necessary to proceed 

 against the pirates ; he knew all their haunts, came 

 upon them by stealth, and killed or drove away the 

 whole band. Don Juan, the captain, was brought in 

 wounded, and placed at night in a room partitioned 

 off at the end of our sala. Molas feared that, if 



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