nd the Sloop Captain Kidd came in,
with Letters to the Lieutenant Governor of Antegoa, Colonel Yeomans,
to the Governors of St. Thomas's Island and Curacao, to seize and
secure what effects they can, that was late in the possession of Kidd,
and on board the _Quidah-Marchand_. There is one Burk, an Englishman,
that lives at St. Thomas, who has got a great Store of the goods and
mony for Kidd's account. St. Thomas belongs to the Danes, but I hope
to retrieve what Burt has in his Hands.[11] The sending this Sloop
will cost but about 300 L. if she be out Three moneths. I hope your
Lordships will take care, that immediate orders be sent to Antegoa to
secure Bolton, who must have plaid the Knave egregiously; for he could
not but know that Kidd came knavishly by that Ship and Goods. It is
reported That the Dutch of Curacao have loaded Three Sloops with those
Goods, and sent them to Holland; perhaps it were not amiss to send and
watch their Arrivall in Holland, if it be practicable to lay Claim to
them there.

[Footnote 10: Titus Oates, the scurrilous and perjured informer,
wonderfully successful with his "Popish Plot" in 1679 and 1680, thrown
into prison, under heavy irons, in 1684. He was still living in 1699.
His doctoral degree ("D.D. of Salamanca") was spurious.]

[Footnote 11: The reply of the governor of St. Thomas is doc. no. 83.]

Since my Committment of Kidd, I hear That upon his approach to this
port, his heart misgave him, and he proposed to his Men the putting to
Sea again and going to Caledonia,[12] the new Scotch Settlement near
Darien, but they refused.

[Footnote 12: Caledonia was the settlement on the isthmus of Panama to
which the Darien Company, amid so much enthusiasm on the part of the
Scottish nation (see Macaulay's twenty-fourth chapter), had sent out
its colony in 1698. The settlement had proved a disastrous failure and
had been abandoned, and the ships bringing away the wretched survivors
were already approaching New York, but neither Kidd nor Bellomont yet
knew this.]

I desire I may have orders what to do with Kidd, and all his and
Bradish's Crew; for, as the Law stands in this Country, if a pyrate
were Convict, yet he cannot suffer Death: And the Counsell here
refused the bill to punish Privateers and Pyrates which your Lordships
sent with me from England with a direction to recommend it at New York
and here, to be passed into a Law. I shall by next Conveyance acquaint
your Lordships what a pr