Having checked the riot among his army, Morgan sent a company of 150 men back to the garrison at the mouth of the Chagres with news of his success. Two other companies, of the same strength, he sent into the woods, "being all very stout soldiers and well-armed," giving them orders to bring in prisoners to hold to ransom. A third company was sent to sea under a Captain Searles to capture a Spanish galleon which had left the port, laden with gold and silver and the jewels of the churches, a day or two before. The rest of his men camped out of doors, in the green fields without the city, ready for any attack the Spaniards might make upon them. Search parties rummaged all day among the burning ruins, "especially in wells and cisterns," which yielded up many jewels and fine gold plates. The warehouses were sacked, and many pirates made themselves coats of silk and velvet to replace the rags they came in. It is probable that they committed many excesses in the heat of the first taking of the town, but one who was there has testified to the comparative gentleness of their comportment when "the heat of the blood" had cooled. "As to their women," he writes, "I know [not] or ever heard of anything offered beyond their wills; something I know was cruelly executed by Captain Collier [commander of one of the ships and one of the chief officers of the army] in killing a Frier in the field after quarter given; but for the Admiral he was noble enough to the vanquished enemy." In fact, the
"Want of rest and victual
Had made them chaste—they ravished very little"
—which matter must be laid to their credit.
A day or two was passed by the pirates in rummaging among the ruins, eating and drinking, and watching the Spaniards as they moved in the savannahs. Troops of Spaniards prowled there under arms, looking at their burning houses and the grey smoke ever going upward. They did not attack the pirates; they did not even fire at them from a distance. They were broken men without a leader, only thankful to be allowed to watch their blazing city. A number of them submitted to the armed men sent out to bring in prisoners. A number lingered in the near-by forests in great misery, living on grass and alligator eggs, the latter tasting "like half-rotten musk"—a poor diet after "pheasants" and Peruvian wine.
Morgan soon received word from Chagres castle that all was very well with the garrison. Captain Norman, who had remained in charge, under oath to keep the "bloody flag," or red pirates' banner, flying, "had sent forth to sea two boats, to exercise piracy." These had hoisted Spanish colours, and set to sea, meeting with a fine Spanish merchantman that very same day. They chased this ship into the Chagres River, where "the poor Spaniards" were caught in a snare under the guns of the fort. Her cargo "consisted in victuals and provisions, that were all eatable things," unlike the victuals given usually to sailors. Such a prize came very opportunely, for the castle stores were running out, while the ship's crew proved useful in the bitter work of earth carrying then going on daily on the ramparts for the repairing of the palisado. Hearing that the Chagres garrison was in such good case, and so well able to exercise piracy without further help, Admiral Morgan resolved to make a longer stay in the ruins of old Panama. He arranged "to send forth daily parties of two hundred men" to roam the countryside, beating the thickets for prisoners, and the prisoners for gold. These parties ranged the country very thoroughly, gathering "in a short time, a huge quantity of riches, and no less number of prisoners." These poor creatures were shut up under a guard, to be brought out one by one for examination. If they would not confess where they had hidden their gold, nor where the gold of their neighbours lay, the pirates used them as they had used their prisoners at Porto Bello. "Woolding," burning with palm leaves, and racking out the arm-joints, seem to have been the most popular tortures. Many who had no gold were brutally ill treated, and then thrust through with a lance.
Among these diversions Admiral Morgan fell in love with a beautiful Spanish lady, who appears to have been something of a paragon. The story is not worth repeating, nor does it read quite sincerely, but it is very probably true. John Exquemeling, who had no great love for Morgan, declares that he was an eye-witness of the love-making, "and could never have judged such constancy of mind and virtuous chastity to be found in the world." The fiery Welshman did not win the lady, but we gather from the evidence that he could have had the satisfaction of Matthew Arnold's American, who consoled himself, in similar circumstances, with saying: "Well, I guess I lowered her moral tone some."
During the first week of their stay in Panama, the ship they had sent to sea returned with a booty of three small coast boats. Captain Searles had sailed her over Panama Bay to the beautiful island of Taboga, in order to fill fresh water and rob the inhabitants. Here they took "the boatswain and most of the crew"[17] of the Trinity, a Spanish galleon, "on board which were the Friers and Nuns, with all the old gentlemen and Matrons of the Town, to the number of 1500 souls, besides an immense Treasure in Silver and Gold." This galleon had seven small guns and ten or twelve muskets for her whole defence. She was without provisions, and desperately short of water, and she had "no more sails than the uppermost sails of the mainmast." Her captain was "an old and stout Spaniard, a native of Andalusia, in Spain, named Don Francisco de Peralta." She was "very richly laden with all the King's Plate and great quantity of riches of gold, pearl, jewels, and other most precious goods, of all the best and richest merchants of Panama. On board of this galleon were also the religious women, belonging to the nunnery of the said city, who had embarked with them all the ornaments of their church, consisting in great quantity of gold, plate, and other things of great value." This most royal prize was even then slowly dipping past Taboga, with her sea-sick holy folk praying heartily for the return of the water casks. She could have made no possible defence against the pirates had they gone at once in pursuit of her. But this the pirates did not do. In the village at Taboga there was a wealthy merchant's summer-house, with a cellar full of "several sorts of rich wines." A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, or as a bibulous wit once said to the present writer: "A bottle now is worth a bath of it to-morrow." Captain Searles and his men chose to drink a quiet bowl in the cabin rather than go sail the blue seas after the golden galleon. They made a rare brew of punch, of which they drank "logwood-cutters' measure," or a gallon and a half a man. After this they knocked out their tobacco pipes, and slept very pleasantly till the morning. They woke "repenting of their negligence" and "totally wearied of the vices and debaucheries aforesaid." With eyes red with drink they blinked at the empty punch-bowls. Then with savage "morning-tempers" they damned each other for a lot of lunkheads, and put to sea (in one of the Taboga prizes) "to pursue the said galleon" with all speed. However, by this time Don Peralta, a most gallant and resourceful captain, had brought the golden Trinity to a place of safety. Had she been taken, she would have yielded a spoil hardly smaller than that taken by Cavendish in the Madre de Dios or that which Anson won in the Manila galleon. Several waggon loads of golden chalices and candlesticks, with ropes of pearls, bags of emeralds and bezoars, and bar upon bar of silver in the crude, were thus bartered away for a sup of punch and a drunken chorus in the cabin. Poor Captain Searles never prospered after. He went logwood cutting a year or two later, and as a logwood cutter he arrived at the Rio Summasenta, where he careened his ship at a sandy key, since known as Searles Key. He was killed a few days afterwards, "in the western lagune" there, "by one of his Company as they were cutting Logwood together." That was the end of Captain Searles.
Morgan was very angry when he heard of the escape of the galleon. He at once remanned the four prizes, and sent them out, with orders to scour the seas till they found her. They cruised for more than a week, examining every creek and inlet, beating up many a sluggish river, under many leafy branches, but finding no trace of the Trinity. They gave up the chase at last, and rested at Taboga, where, perhaps, some "rich wines" were still in bin. They found a Payta ship at anchor at Taboga, "laden with cloth, soap, sugar and biscuit, with twenty thousand pieces of eight in ready money." She was "a reasonable good ship," but the cargo, saving the money, was not much to their taste. They took the best of it, and loaded it aboard her longboat, making the Taboga negroes act as stevedores. They then set the negroes aboard the prize, and carried her home to Panama, "some thing better satisfied of their voyage, yet withal much discontented they could not meet with the galleon." It was at Taboga, it seems, that the lady who so inflamed Sir Henry was made prisoner.
At the end of three weeks of "woolding" and rummaging, Admiral Morgan began to prepare for the journey home. He sent his men to look for mules and horses on which to carry the plunder to the hidden canoas in the river. He learned at this juncture that a number of the pirates intended to leave him "by taking a ship that was in the port," and going to "rob upon the South Sea." They had made all things ready, it seems, having hidden "great quantity of provisions," powder, bullets, and water casks, with which to store their ship. They had even packed the good brass guns of the city, "where with they designed not only to equip the said vessel but also to fortify themselves and raise batteries in some island or other, which might serve them for a place of refuge." The scheme was fascinating, and a very golden life they would have had of it, those lucky mutineers, had not some spoil-sport come sneaking privily to Morgan with a tale of what was toward. They might have seized Cocos Island or Juan Fernandez, or "some other island," such as one of the Enchanted, or Gallapagos, Islands, where the goddesses were thought to dwell. That would have been a happier life than cutting logwood, up to the knees in mud, in some drowned savannah of Campeachy.
However, just as the wine-bowl spoiled the project of the galleon, so did the treachery of a lickspittle, surely one of the meanest of created things, put an end to the mutiny. Morgan was not there to colonise Pacific Oceans, but to sack Panama. He had no intention of losing half his army for an imperial idea. He promptly discouraged the scheme by burning all the boats in the roads. The ship or chata, which would have been the flagship of the mutineers, was dismasted, and the masts and rigging were added to the general bonfire. All the brass cannon they had taken were nailed and spiked. Wooden bars were driven down their muzzles as firmly as possible, and the wood was then watered to make it swell. There was then no more talk of going a-cruising to found republics.