] And that with the said two
Prizes sailed for the Port of St. Maries, in Madagascar; and sailing
thither the said Gally was so leaky that they feared she would have
sunk every hour, and it required eight men, every two Glasses[10] to
keep her free, and was forced to woold[11] her round with Cables to
keep her together, and with much ado carried her into the said Port of
St. Maries, where they arrived about the First Day of April 1698, and
about the 6th day of May the lesser Prize was haled into the Careening
Island or Key, the other not being arrived, and ransacked and sunk by
the mutinous men, who threatened the Narrator and the men that would
not join with them, to burn and sink the other, that they might not go
home and tell the news.

[Footnote 9: The French pass of this ship, the _Cara Merchant_ or
_Quedah Merchant_ (Kedah, in the Malay Peninsula) is in the _Commons
Journal_, XIII. 21, signed by Francois Martin, the founder of
Pondicherry and of the French empire in India. It is dated Jan. 14,
1698, at Hugli (Chandernagore). It names Armenians as commanders and
owner, though the evidence given at Kidd's trials in London (Hargrave,
_State Trials_, V. 287-338) constantly states an Englishman named
Wright to have been commander. It should be remembered, in respect to
these two captures, of vessels ostensibly French, in November, 1697,
and February, 1698, that though the peace of Ryswyk was signed Sept.
20, 1697, the news of its signing did not reach the Indian Ocean till
April, 1698; and by its terms (art. X.) captures made "beyond the
Line" (Equator) within six months from the signing of the treaty were
not illegal.]

[Footnote 10: _I.e._, an hour by the sand-glass.]

[Footnote 11: Wind.]

And that when he arrived in the said Port there was a Pyrate Ship,
called the _Moca_ Frigat,[12] at an Anchor, Robert Culliford Commander
thereof, who with his men left the same at his coming in, and ran into
the Woods, And the Narrator proposed to his Men to take the same,
having sufficient power and authority so to do,[13] but the mutinous
Crew told him, if he offered the same, they would rather fire two Guns
into him than one into the other, and thereupon 97 deserted, and went
into the _Moca_ Frigat, and sent into the Woods for the said Pyrates
and brought the said Culliford and his men on board again; and all the
time she staid in the said Port, which was for the Space of 4 or 5
Dayes, the said Deserters, sometimes in gre