the old log
structures, and land brings at least twenty times as much per acre as
then. Who can argue against that?

THE BUCCANEERS

During the seventeenth century there were a great number of pirates who
committed serious ravages upon the settlements in the West Indies and
upon the mainland adjacent, and whose expeditions extended even to the
coasts of Chili and Peru. These men were called buccaneers; and the
meaning of the word gives some intimation of the origin of the
buccaneers themselves.

At an earlier day, many of the settlers in the island of Hispaniola, or
Hayti, made their living by hunting cattle and preserving the meat by
the _boucan_ process. These hunters used to form parties of five or six
in number, and arming themselves with musket, bullet bag, powderhorn and
knife, they took their way on foot through the tangled forests of the
country. When they killed one of the wild cattle, its flesh was cut into
long strips and laid upon gratings, constructed of green sticks, where
it was exposed to the smoke of a wood fire, which was fed by the fat and
waste parts of the animals. The grating upon which the meat was laid was
called a _boucan_, and the hunters were called _boucaniers_. Later these
hunters were driven from Hayti by the Spaniards and took refuge in some
of the neighboring islands, where they revenged themselves for some of
the ill-treatment by preying upon the possessions of their oppressors
wherever they could find them.

At the same time affairs in Europe brought France and England on the one
hand, and Spain on the other, into collision; and as a result, the
Spanish possessions in America became the object of French and English
attacks. Accordingly, those two nations were inclined to look with a
lenient eye upon the depredations committed by the buccaneers, so long
as the property of the English and French was respected. As a natural
consequence, many of the disreputable and daring characters of both
nations joined themselves with the original buccaneers, whom they soon
made as corrupt as themselves. Eventually these pirates increased so in
number, and grew so daring in their operations that it was necessary for
all nations to unite in putting them down; and by that time, the word
_buccaneer_ had come to mean _pirate_ in its worst sense.

From time to time there arose among the buccaneers leaders whose success
brought a large following from men of other companies, and in one or two
in