the customs,
and maintained that it was brought into Port Royal "in lawful ships by
lawful men."]

[Footnote 408: Sloane MSS., 2752, f. 29; S.P. Spain, vol. 65, f. 121.
According to the latter account, which seems to be derived from a
Spanish source, the loss suffered by the city amounted to about 100,000
pieces of eight, over half of which was plunder carried away by the
freebooters. Thirteen of the inhabitants were killed and four wounded,
and of the buccaneers thirty were killed.

Dampier writes concerning this first irruption of the buccaneers into
the Pacific:--"Before my first going over into the South Seas with
Captain Sharp ... I being then on Board Captain Coxon, in company with 3
or 4 more Privateers, about 4 leagues to the East of Portobel, we took
the Pacquets bound thither from Cartagena. We open'd a great quantity of
the Merchants Letters, and found ... the Merchants of several parts of
Old Spain thereby informing their Correspondents of Panama and elsewhere
of a certain Prophecy that went about Spain that year, the Tenour of
which was, That there would be English Privateers that Year in the West
Indies, who would ... open a Door into the South Seas; which they
supposed was fastest shut: and the Letters were accordingly full of
Cautions to their Friends to be very watchful and careful of their
Coasts.

"This Door they spake of we all concluded must be the Passage over Land
through the Country of the Indians of Darien, who were a little before
this become our Friends, and had lately fallen out with the Spaniards,
... and upon calling to mind the frequent Invitations we had from these
Indians a little before this time, to pass through their Country, and
fall upon the Spaniards in the South Seas, we from henceforward began to
entertain such thoughts in earnest, and soon came to a Resolution to
make those Attempts which we afterwards did, ... so that the taking
these Letters gave the first life to those bold undertakings: and we
took the advantage of the fears the Spaniards were in from that Prophecy
... for we sealed up most of the Letters again, and sent them ashore to
Portobel."--_Ed._ 1906, I. pp. 200-201.]

[Footnote 410: C.S.P. Colon., 1677-80, No. 1199.]

[Footnote 411: Ibid., No. 1188.]

[Footnote 412: Sloane MSS., 2572, f. 29.]

[Footnote 413: C.S.P. Colon., 1677-80, Nos. 1344, 1370.]

[Footnote 414: Ibid., No. 1516.]

[Footnote 415: _Cf._ Archives Coloniales--Correspondance generale de St