The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton

had brought the sloop to an anchor, he came aboard of my ship,and there he gave us an account how he began to trade by the help of aPortuguese planter, who lived near the seaside; how he went on shore andwent up to the first house he could see, and asked the man of the houseto sell him some hogs, pretending at first he only stood in upon thecoast to take in fresh water and buy some provisions; and the man notonly sold him seven fat hogs, but invited him in, and gave him, and fivemen he had with him, a very good dinner; and he invited the planter onboard his ship, and, in return for his kindness, gave him a negro girlfor his wife.

  This so obliged the planter that the next morning he sent him on board,in a great luggage-boat, a cow and two sheep, with a chest of sweetmeatsand some sugar, and a great bag of tobacco, and invited Captain Williamon shore again; that, after this, they grew from one kindness toanother; that they began to talk about trading for some negroes; andWilliam, pretending it was to do him service, consented to sell himthirty negroes for his private use in his plantation, for which he gaveWilliam ready money in gold, at the rate of five-and-thirty moidores perhead; but the planter was obliged to use great caution in the bringingthem on shore; for which purpose he made William weigh and stand outto sea, and put in again, about fifty miles farther north, where at alittle creek he took the negroes on shore at another plantation, being afriend's of his, whom, it seems, he could trust.

  This remove brought William into a further intimacy, not only with thefirst planter, but also with his friends, who desired to have some ofthe negroes also; so that, from one to another, they bought so many,till one overgrown planter took 100 negroes, which was all Williamhad left, and sharing them with another planter, that other planterchaffered with William for ship and all, giving him in exchange a veryclean, large, well-built sloop of near sixty tons, very well furnished,carrying six guns; but we made her afterwards carry twelve guns. Williamhad 300 moidores of gold, besides the sloop, in payment for the ship;and with this money he stored the sloop as full as she could hold withprovisions, especially bread, some pork, and about sixty hogs alive;among the rest, William got eighty barrels of good gunpowder, whichwas very much for our purpose; and all the provisions which were in theFrench ship he took out also.

  This was a very agreeable account to us, especially when we saw thatWilliam had received in gold coined, or by weight, and some Spanishsilver, 60,000 pieces of eight, besides a new sloop, and a vast quantityof provisions.

  We were very glad of the sloop in particular, and began to consult whatwe should do, whether we had not best turn off our great Portugueseship, and stick to our first ship and the sloop, seeing we had scarcemen enough for all three, and that the biggest ship was thought toobig for our business. However, another dispute, which was now decided,brought the first to a conclusion. The first dispute was, whither weshould go. My comrade, as I called him now, that is to say, he that wasmy captain before we took this Portuguese man-of-war, was for going tothe South Seas, and coasting up the west side of America, where we couldnot fail of making several good prizes upon the Spaniards; and thatthen, if occasion required it, we might come home by the South Seas tothe East Indies, and so go round the globe, as others had done beforeus.

  But my head lay another way. I had been in the East Indies, and hadentertained a notion ever since that, if we went thither, we could notfail of making good work of it, and that we might have a safe retreat,and good beef to victual our ship, among my old friends the natives ofZanzibar, on the coast of Mozambique, or the island of St Lawrence. Isay, my thoughts lay this way; and I read so many lectures to them allof the advantages they would certainly make of their strength by theprizes they would take in the Gulf of Mocha, or the Red Sea, and on thecoast of Malabar, or the Bay of Bengal, that I amazed them.

  With these arguments I prevailed on them, and we all resolved tosteer away S.E. for the Cape of Good Hope; and, in consequence of thisresolution, we concluded to keep the sloop, and sail with all three, notdoubting, as I assured them, but we should find men there to make upthe number wanting, and if not, we might cast any of them off when wepleased.

  We could do no less than make our friend William captain of the sloopwhich, with such good management, he had brought us. He told us, thoughwith much good manners, he would not command her as a frigate; but, ifwe would give her to him for his share of the Guinea ship, which wecame very honestly by, he would keep us company as a victualler, ifwe commanded him, as long as he was under the same force that took himaway.

  We understood him, so gave him the sloop, but upon condition thathe should not go from us, and should be entirely under our command.However, William was not so easy as before; and, indeed, as weafterwards wanted the sloop to cruise for purchase, and a rightthorough-paced pirate in her, so I was in such pain for William that Icould not be without him, for he was my privy counsellor and companionupon all occasions; so I put a Scotsman, a bold, enterprising, gallantfellow, into her, named Gordon, and made her carry twelve guns and fourpetereroes, though, indeed, we wanted men, for we were none of us mannedin proportion to our force.

  We sailed away for the Cape of Good Hope the beginning of October 1706,and passed by, in sight of the Cape, the 12th of November following,having met with a great deal of bad weather. We saw severalmerchant-ships in the roads there, as well English as Dutch, whetheroutward bound or homeward we could not tell; be it what it would, we didnot think fit to come to an anchor, not knowing what they might be,or what they might attempt against us, when they knew what we were.However, as we wanted fresh water, we sent the two boats belonging tothe Portuguese man-of-war, with all Portuguese seamen or negroes inthem, to the watering-place, to take in water; and in the meantime wehung out a Portuguese ancient at sea, and lay by all that night. Theyknew not what we were, but it seems we passed for anything but reallywhat we was.

  Our boats returning the third time loaden, about five o'clock nextmorning, we thought ourselves sufficiently watered, and stood awayto the eastward; but, before our men returned the last time, the windblowing an easy gale at west, we perceived a boat in the grey of themorning under sail, crowding to come up with us, as if they were afraidwe should be gone. We soon found it was an English long-boat, and thatit was pretty full of men. We could not imagine what the meaning of itshould be; but, as it was but a boat, we thought there could be no greatharm in it to let them come on board; and if it appeared they cameonly to inquire who we were, we would give them a full account of ourbusiness, by taking them along with us, seeing we wanted men as much asanything. But they saved us the labour of being in doubt how to disposeof them; for it seems our Portuguese seamen, who went for water, hadnot been so silent at the watering-places as we thought they would havebeen. But the case, in short, was this: Captain ---- (I forbear hisname at present, for a particular reason), captain of an East Indiamerchant-ship, bound afterwards for China, had found some reason to bevery severe with his men, and had handled some of them very roughly atSt Helena; insomuch, that they threatened among themselves to leave theship the first opportunity, and had long wished for that opportunity.Some of these men, it seems, had met with our boat at thewatering-place, and inquiring of one another who we were, and upon whataccount, whether the Portuguese seamen, by faltering in their account,made them suspect that we were out upon the cruise, or whether theytold it in plain English or no (for they all spoke English enough tobe understood), but so it was, that as soon as ever the men carried thenews on board, that the ships which lay by to the eastward were English,and that they were going upon the _account_, which, by they way, was asea term for a pirate; I say, as soon as ever they heard it, they wentto work, and getting all things ready in the night, their chests andclothes, and whatever else they could, they came away before it was day,and came up with us about seven o'clock.

  When they came by the ship's side which I commanded we hailed themin the usual manner, to know what and who they were, and what theirbusiness. They answered they were Englishmen, and desired to come onboard. We told them they might lay the ship on boar
d, but ordered theyshould let only one man enter the ship till the captain knew theirbusiness, and that he should come without any arms. They said, Ay, withall their hearts.

  We presently found their business, and that they desired to go with us;and as for their arms, they desired we would send men on board the boat,and that they would deliver them all to us, which was done. The fellowthat came up to me told me how they had been used by their captain, howhe had starved the men, and used them like dogs, and that, if the restof the men knew they should be admitted, he was satisfied two-thirdsof them would leave the ship. We found the fellows were very hearty intheir resolution, and jolly brisk sailors they were; so I told them Iwould do nothing without our admiral, that was the captain of the othership; so I sent my pinnace on board Captain Wilmot, to desire him tocome on board. But he was indisposed, and being to leeward, excused hiscoming, but left it all to me; but before my boat was returned, CaptainWilmot called to