“For it’s fourteen men on a dead man’s chest,
Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of rum.”
—Stevenson.
LAFITTE
PRIVATEER, PIRATE, AND TERROR OF THE GULF OF MEXICO
(1780-1826)
“He was the mildest mannered man,
That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat;
With such true breeding of a gentleman,
That you could ne’er discern his proper thought.
Pity he loved an adventurous life’s variety,
He was so great a loss to good society.”
—Old Ballad.—1810.
CAPTAIN, we can’t live much longer unless we have food. We’ve got enough to last us for two weeks’ time, and then—if we do not get fresh provisions—we’ll have to eat the sails.”
The fellow who spoke was a rough-looking sea-dog, with a yellow face—parched and wrinkled by many years of exposure—a square figure; a red handkerchief tied about his black hair; a sash about his waist in which was stuck a brace of evil-barrelled pistols. He looked grimly at the big-boned man before him.
“Yes. You are right, as usual, Gascon. We’ve got to strike a foreign sail before the week is out, and capture her. And I, Lafitte, must turn from privateer to pirate. May my good mother at St. Malo have mercy on my soul.”