he pirates, it was published through the fleet that any captain and
crew who ventured on, and took, a Spanish ship should receive a tenth
part of her value as a reward to themselves for their bravery. When the
contracts had been signed Morgan asked his captains which town they
should attempt. They had thirty-seven ships, carrying at least 500
cannon. They had 2000 musketeers, "besides mariners and boys," while
they possessed "great quantity of ammunition, and fire balls, with other
inventions of powder." With such an armament, he said, they could attack
the proudest of the Spanish cities. They could sack La Vera Cruz, where
the gold from Manila was put aboard the galleons, as they lay alongside
the quays moored to the iron ring-bolts; or they could go eastward to
the town of Cartagena to pillage our Lady's golden altar in the church
there; or they could row up the Chagres River, and keep the promise
Morgan had made to the Governor of Panama. The captains pronounced for
Panama, but they added, as a rider, that it would be well to go to Santa
Katalina to obtain guides. The Santa Katalina fort was still in the
possession of the Spaniards, who now used it as a convict settlement,
sending thither all the outlaws of the "Terra Firma." It would be well,
they said, to visit Santa Katalina to select a few choice cut-throats to
guide them over the isthmus. With this resolution they set sail for
Santa Katalina, where they anchored on the fourth day, "before sunrise,"
in a bay called the Aguada Grande.

Some of the buccaneers had been there under Mansvelt, and these now
acted as guides to the men who went ashore in the fighting party. A day
of hard fighting followed, rather to the advantage of the Spaniards, for
the pirates won none of the batteries, and had to sleep in the open,
very wet and hungry. The next day Morgan threatened the garrison with
death if they did not yield "within few hours." The Governor was not a
very gallant man, like the Governor at Porto Bello. Perhaps he was
afraid of his soldiers, the convicts from the "Terra Firma." At anyrate
he consented to surrender, but he asked that the pirates would have the
kindness to pretend to attack him, "for the saving of his honesty."
Morgan agreed very gladly to this proposition, for he saw little chance
of taking the fort by storm. When the night fell, he followed the
Governor's direction, and began a furious bombardment, "but without
bullets, or at least into the air." The