he dark from them, that
they might not see what kind of a governor they had, and called the
captain to me; when I called, at a good distance, one of the men was
ordered to speak again, and say to the captain, "Captain, the commander
calls for you;" and presently the captain replied, "Tell his excellency I
am just coming." This more perfectly amazed them, and they all believed
that the commander was just by, with his fifty men. Upon the captain
coming to me, I told him my project for seizing the ship, which he liked
wonderfully well, and resolved to put it in execution the next morning.
But, in order to execute it with more art, and to be secure of success, I
told him we must divide the prisoners, and that he should go and take
Atkins, and two more of the worst of them, and send them pinioned to the
cave where the others lay. This was committed to Friday and the two men
who came on shore with the captain. They conveyed them to the cave as to
a prison: and it was, indeed, a dismal place, especially to men in their
condition. The others I ordered to my bower, as I called it, of which I
have given a full description: and as it was fenced in, and they
pinioned, the place was secure enough, considering they were upon their
behaviour.

To these in the morning I sent the captain, who was to enter into a
parley with them; in a word, to try them, and tell me whether he thought
they might be trusted or not to go on board and surprise the ship. He
talked to them of the injury done him, of the condition they were brought
to, and that though the governor had given them quarter for their lives
as to the present action, yet that if they were sent to England they
would all be hanged in chains; but that if they would join in so just an
attempt as to recover the ship, he would have the governor's engagement
for their pardon.

Any one may guess how readily such a proposal would be accepted by men in
their condition; they fell down on their knees to the captain, and
promised, with the deepest imprecations, that they would be faithful to
him to the last drop, and that they should owe their lives to him, and
would go with him all over the world; that they would own him as a father
to them as long as they lived. "Well," says the captain, "I must go and
tell the governor what you say, and see what I can do to bring him to
consent to it." So he brought me an account of the temper he found them
in, and that he verily believed they would