a flourishing place, containing seven hundred inhabitants, among
them many merchants from China, and also several Sanguelos, who were
partly Moors, or Malays probably, and partly heathen. The Sanguelos
were especially clever in inventing and making all manner, of things, so
that few or no Christians could surpass them. They excelled in drawing
and embroidering upon satin, silk or lawn, representing either beasts,
fowls, fish, or worms, in the most natural manner. They also worked in
silk, silver, gold, and pearl.

On the same night of their arrival at Capal the Portuguese Nicholas
Rodrigo, who had been taken out of the _Santa Anna_, desired to speak to
Cavendish in secret. His request being granted, he told the Admiral
that although he had hitherto appeared to be discontented, he was truly
grateful to him for the kindness he had received, and as a proof of this
he desired to put him on his guard against a treacherous plot which had
been devised by the pilot Ersola to deliver up his vessel to the
Spaniards. As a proof that what he said was true, a letter, he stated,
would be found in Ersola's chest. Search being made, the letter was
discovered, which Ersola had intended to send by some natives to
Manilla. It called on the authorities there forthwith to fit out an
expedition to capture the _Desire_, warning them that if she escaped,
the English would bring their countrymen down to attack the settlement.

A drum-head court martial was immediately held. The hapless pilot at
first denied all knowledge of the letter, but at length compelled to
confess his guilt, with a short shrift he was next morning hanged at the
yard-arm.

The _Desire_ remained nine days at Capal, during which Cavendish obliged
the chief cacique, as well as the caciques of a hundred other islands,
to pay tribute to him in hogs, hens, potatoes, and cocoas. The tribute
being received on board, he hoisted the flags and sounded the drums and
trumpets. Then telling them that the English were enemies to the
Spaniards, he paid them in money more than an equivalent for the
provisions they had brought. To show their pleasure, the caciques rowed
about the ship in their canoes at a great rate. The brave voyagers, who
never doubted the existence of Satan, firmly believed what they
stated,--that those people wholly worshipped the devil, and oftentimes
have conferences with him who "appeareth unto them in a most ugly and
monstrous shape."

Setting sail