the coast of Cartagena, killed the Dutch
captain and several of his men, and landed the negroes, about 150 in
number, in a remote bay of Jamaica. Lord Vaughan sent a frigate which
seized about 100 of the negroes, and when Browne and his crew fell into
the governor's hands he had them all tried and condemned for piracy.
Browne was ordered to be executed, but his men, eight in number, were
pardoned. The captain petitioned the assembly to have the benefit of the
Act of Privateers, and the House twice sent a committee to the governor
to endeavour to obtain a reprieve. Lord Vaughan, however, refused to
listen and gave orders for immediate execution. Half an hour after the
hanging, the provost-marshal appeared with an order signed by the
speaker to observe the Chief-Justice's writ of Habeas Corpus, whereupon
Vaughan, resenting the action, immediately dissolved the Assembly.[392]

The French colony on Hispaniola was an object of concern to the
Jamaicans, not only because it served as a refuge for privateers from
Port Royal, but also because it threatened soon to overwhelm the old
Spanish colony and absorb the whole island. Under the conciliatory,
opportunist regime of M. d'Ogeron, the French settlements in the west of
the island had grown steadily in number and size;[393] while the old
Spanish towns seemed every year to become weaker and more open to
attack. D'Ogeron, who died in France in 1675, had kept always before him
the project of capturing the Spanish capital, San Domingo; but he was
too weak to accomplish so great a design without aid from home, and this
was never vouchsafed him. His policy, however, was continued by his
nephew and successor, M. de Pouancay, and every defection from Jamaica
seemed so much assistance to the French to accomplish their ambition.
Yet it was manifestly to the English interest in the West Indies not to
permit the French to obtain a pre-eminence there. The Spanish colonies
were large in area, thinly populated, and ill-supported by the home
government, so that they were not likely to be a serious menace to the
English islands. With their great wealth and resources, moreover, they
had few manufactures and offered a tempting field for exploitation by
English merchants. The French colonies, on the other hand, were easily
supplied with merchandise from France, and in event of a war would prove
more dangerous as neighbours than the Spaniards. To allow the French to
become lords of San Domingo would