nything to do with their ruffianly captors, had been
forced to walk the plank as an example to the rest should they prove
recalcitrant. Partly through terror, partly through discontent, partly
on account of promises of the great reward awaiting them, speciously
urged by Morgan himself, for he could talk as well as he could fight,
and, most of all, because even at that date it was considered a
meritorious act to attack a Spaniard or a Papist under any circumstances
or conditions, especially by persons as ignorant as the class in
question, some seventy cast in their lot with the rest.

Among the two hundred and twenty members of the heterogeneous crew so
constituted, were to be found natives of almost every race under the
sun, even including one or two Spanish renegados, and it would be safe
to say that the lowest and meanest representatives of the several races
were assembled on that very ship. The officers and men who had been
recruited from Isla La Vaca, as well as the older original members of
the crew of the _Mary Rose_, together with a select few of the
remainder, were men of approved courage. The officers, indeed, bore
reputations for hardihood and daring not to be surpassed. Most of the
rest, however, were arrant cowards. As a body the band could not
compare, except in leadership, with the former bands of buccaneers who
had made themselves and their names a terror to Latin civilization in
the New World.

Morgan himself, however, almost made up for all deficiencies. Age had
not quenched his ardor, diminished his courage, or deprived him of that
magnetic quality which had made him an unquestioned leader of men. His
eye was as keen, his hand as steady, his soul as reckless, and his
skill as high as when he had led the greatest buccaneer fleet that had
ever assembled, on the famous Panama expedition. Everybody on the ship
hated him except young Teach and the faithful Black Dog; the old
buccaneers because he had betrayed them, the soldiers and sailors of the
crew because he had captured their ship and forced them to become his
allies, the mean and lowly body of rascals because he kept them
ruthlessly under hand. But they all feared him as much as they hated him
and they admired him as much as they feared him.

So far as he was concerned discipline was absolute. He still seemed to
fancy himself the Vice-Governor and the representative of that King
against whom he had taken up arms. He demanded to be treated
according