191 
Chap. XI.—B. S.] REBUILDING OF PANAMA. 
of the Admiralty Court in Jamaica, and Deputy Go¬ 
vernor of that island. The elevation of the ruffian to 
these high posts has been censured, and called an 
unwise act. It was far from being so. England, 
at that period, began to perceive the full danger of her 
policy towards the buccaneers, and became sensible 
that it was high time to put a stop to their proceedings. 
Their suppression, however, was attended with great 
difficulties. An association so deeply rooted was not 
so easily disbanded, and, though Jamaica and the 
other English colonies in the "West Indies were suffered 
to he no longer the resting-place of villains and rovers, 
no ordinary authority could act effectually towards its 
dispersion. It became, therefore, absolutely necessary 
to select a person of their own caste—a kind of Vidocq 
—who was thoroughly acquainted with every detail 
of the association, and possessed a perfect knowledge 
of the entire ramifications of the piratical system. No 
man was better qualified for this service than Henry 
Morgan, once their notorious chief, and that those who 
availed themselves of this instrument had not miscal¬ 
culated was sufficiently proved by subsequent events. 
Morgan exercised the utmost severity towards his 
former associates, and was one of the most effectual 
checks to their future operations. 
The destruction of the city of Panama had been so 
complete that the authorities availed themselves of the 
opportunity of shifting the settlement from its low 
and unhealthy position to the little peninsula six miles 
westward, which communicating only on one side with 
the mainland, and being unapproachable from the sea 
