ll
the particulars, only that in general they threatened them hard for
taking the two Englishmen's part. Whither they went, or how they
bestowed their time that evening, the Spaniards said they did not know;
but it seems they wandered about the country part of the night, and them
lying down in the place which I used to call my bower, they were weary
and overslept themselves. The case was this: they had resolved to stay
till midnight, and so take the two poor men when they were asleep, and as
they acknowledged afterwards, intended to set fire to their huts while
they were in them, and either burn them there or murder them as they came
out. As malice seldom sleeps very sound, it was very strange they should
not have been kept awake. However, as the two men had also a design upon
them, as I have said, though a much fairer one than that of burning and
murdering, it happened, and very luckily for them all, that they were up
and gone abroad before the bloody-minded rogues came to their huts.

When they came there, and found the men gone, Atkins, who it seems was
the forwardest man, called out to his comrade, "Ha, Jack, here's the
nest, but the birds are flown." They mused a while, to think what should
be the occasion of their being gone abroad so soon, and suggested
presently that the Spaniards had given them notice of it; and with that
they shook hands, and swore to one another that they would be revenged of
the Spaniards. As soon as they had made this bloody bargain they fell to
work with the poor men's habitation; they did not set fire, indeed, to
anything, but they pulled down both their houses, and left not the least
stick standing, or scarce any sign on the ground where they stood; they
tore all their household stuff in pieces, and threw everything about in
such a manner, that the poor men afterwards found some of their things a
mile off. When they had done this, they pulled up all the young trees
which the poor men had planted; broke down an enclosure they had made to
secure their cattle and their corn; and, in a word, sacked and plundered
everything as completely as a horde of Tartars would have done.

The two men were at this juncture gone to find them out, and had resolved
to fight them wherever they had been, though they were but two to three;
so that, had they met, there certainly would have been blood shed among
them, for they were all very stout, resolute fellows, to give them their
due.

But Providence