fresh governor was appointed at Callao. I wrote to him, and
he gave me substantially the same reply that the other had done. However,
I opened negotiations with a merchant there and got him to make inquiries.
He sent word that he had talked to some of the prison officials, and that
they told the same story as the governor had done; they said that you had,
in some extraordinary way, overpowered two prison officials and had made
your escape. Of course I did not believe this, and supposed that
instructions had been given to all the people connected with the prison to
tell the same story. So I sent again to the merchant, and told him to use
whatever means were necessary to get at the truth, as bribery will do
anything on that coast. He found that the new governor on taking the
command had found a book with a record as to the disposition of the
prisoners on leaving. Some were marked merely discharged, others as
returned to their regiments, many as having died in prison. There were
also a large number of official documents relating to these matters, and
among them the governor found an order for you to be handed over to the
Inquisition on the day following that on which you were said to have
escaped. As soon as I heard this, it seemed to me that there was no doubt
about your fate. You had been handed over, and this cock-and-bull story
was only intended to throw dust in my eyes if I captured Callao. I
therefore sent a demand to the Peruvian authorities for your release and
surrender, saying what I had learned; and in reply they declared that I
had been misinformed, for that you had escaped, and that the authorities
of the Inquisition denied positively that you had ever been handed over to
them.

"I wrote a strong letter in reply, saying that no one ever believed the
word of an inquisitor, and that if it should ever be my good fortune to
capture Callao I would burn their buildings to the ground, and hang every
official, priest, and layman belonging to it. There the matter dropped. Of
course I did not get the chance of carrying my threat into execution, but
if I had done so I should have certainly carried it out; and even if I had
found afterwards that I had been mistaken about you I should not have
regretted it, for they have deserved the fate a hundred times over. Well,
tell me about your escape; the story afterwards must keep. You know the
state the Chilian navy was in when I took the command; well, this is much
worse, and the