186 
PORTER’S JOURNAL. 
generous than they either deserved or expected, and this haughty 
Englishman, who would wish to have terrified us with the name 
of a Briton, and this renegado, who would have sacrificed the in¬ 
terests of his country, were now so humbled by a sense of their 
own conduct, and of what they merited, that they would have 
licked the dust from my feet had it been required of them to do 
so. 
The whole of the next day was occupied in arranging the 
crews of our new prizes, and getting the baggage of the priso¬ 
ners out of them ; and it afforded me no small degree of pleasure 
to discover, that the Atlantic had on board about one hundred 
tons of water, an article of more value to us than any thing else 
she could have had; for we scarcely had water remaining on 
board our own ship, to take us even to the island of Cocos, and 
some of our prizes were very far short of the necessary supply ; 
and none others having more than sufficient to answer their pur¬ 
pose ; it was also a consolation to find, that by these two last ves¬ 
sels we had obtained the most abundant supply of provisions of 
every description, and naval stores, such as cordage, canvas, 
paints, tar, &c. &c., more than we required ; also seamen’s cloth¬ 
ing in considerable quantities, and of a superior quality, for our 
people; and as these vessels had been only a few days from 
James’ island, we found on board them 800 tortoises of a very 
large size, and sufficient to furnish all the ships with fresh pro¬ 
visions for one month. 
Our fleet now consisted of six sail of vessels, without includ¬ 
ing the Georgiana. On board of the last captured vessels I put 
a sufficient number of men to fight their guns, giving lieutenant 
M 4 Knight charge of the Atlantic, and, for want of sea-officers, I put 
lieutenant Gamble of the marines in charge of the Greenwich. I 
had much confidence in the discretion of this gentleman ; and, to 
make up for his want of nautical knowledge, I put two expert 
seamen with him as mates, one of whom was a good navigator. 
Volunteers continued to offer from the captured vessels, and 
my whole effective force in those seas now consisted of 
