, just off the
Isle of Pines; but the deed was none the less daring for all that.

Another notable no less famous than these two worthies was Roch
Braziliano, the truculent Dutchman who came up from the coast of
Brazil to the Spanish Main with a name ready-made for him. Upon the
very first adventure which he undertook he captured a plate ship of
fabulous value, and brought her safely into Jamaica; and when at last
captured by the Spaniards, he fairly frightened them into letting him
go by truculent threats of vengeance from his followers.

Such were three of the pirate buccaneers who infested the Spanish
Main. There were hundreds no less desperate, no less reckless, no less
insatiate in their lust for plunder, than they.

The effects of this freebooting soon became apparent. The risks to be
assumed by the owners of vessels and the shippers of merchandise
became so enormous that Spanish commerce was practically swept away
from these waters. No vessel dared to venture out of port excepting
under escort of powerful men-of-war, and even then they were not
always secure from molestation. Exports from Central and South America
were sent to Europe by way of the Strait of Magellan, and little or
none went through the passes between the Bahamas and the Caribbees.

So at last "buccaneering," as it had come to be generically called,
ceased to pay the vast dividends that it had done at first. The cream
was skimmed off, and only very thin milk was left in the dish.
Fabulous fortunes were no longer earned in a ten days' cruise, but
what money was won hardly paid for the risks of the winning. There
must be a new departure, or buccaneering would cease to exist.

Then arose one who showed the buccaneers a new way to squeeze money
out of the Spaniards. This man was an Englishman--Lewis Scot.

The stoppage of commerce on the Spanish Main had naturally tended to
accumulate all the wealth gathered and produced into the chief
fortified cities and towns of the West Indies. As there no longer
existed prizes upon the sea, they must be gained upon the land, if
they were to be gained at all. Lewis Scot was the first to appreciate
this fact.

Gathering together a large and powerful body of men as hungry for
plunder and as desperate as himself, he descended upon the town of
Campeche, which he captured and sacked, stripping it of everything
that could possibly be carried away.

When the town was cleared to the bare walls Scot threatened to