CHAPTER XVII.
Adventures on the Shores of Lake Maracaibo.
Preparations for the Defence of Gibraltar.—The Hidden Ships.—The Hiding-place of the Governor and the Women.—Disasters and Failure.—Capture of the Spanish Ships.—The Retreat Commenced.—Peril of the Pirates.—Singular Correspondence.—Strength of the Spanish Armament.—The Public Conference of the Pirates.—The Naval Battle.—The Fire-Ship.—Wonderful Achievement of the Pirates.
Before Morgan weighed anchor for his expedition to Gibraltar, he sent two Spanish prisoners to the city to say that if they made a peaceable surrender of the place, without attempting to conceal or carry off their valuables, their lives should be spared. But if any resistance were offered, the city should be laid in ashes and every individual put to the sword.
But ample time had been given to the citizens of Gibraltar to prepare for a vigorous defence. The garrison from Maracaibo had also fled to her forts. The troops were landed a mile and a half from the town, and marched through the woods to attack the foe in the rear. The Spaniards had anticipated this movement and were prepared to meet it. Still they were baffled by the strategy of Morgan. Instead of advancing by the regular route, he employed a large party of sappers and miners to cut a new path through the woods. Thus he approached the city without exposing his men to storm ramparts bristling with artillery and musketry.
The Spaniards had no time to throw up new intrenchments. It was evident, even to the most unintelligent soldier, that all was lost. Their hearts sank within them, and soldiers and citizens fled with the utmost precipitation. So general was the flight that the pirates, when they entered the streets of Gibraltar, found but one single man there, and he was a semi-idiot. Even that weak creature they tortured. The poor wretch cried out:
“Do not torture me any more, and I will show you my riches.”
The pirates thought, or pretended to think, that he was some rich person assuming the disguise of poverty and semi-insanity. He led them to a miserable hovel containing only a few earthern pots. He dug up, from under the hearth, three dollars which he had buried there. Still they affirmed that he was a grandee in disguise, and commenced torturing him anew. In his agony he cried out:
“In the name of Jesus; in the name of the Virgin Mary, what will you do with me, Englishmen? I am a poor man. I live on alms. I sleep in the hospital.”
He died under their hands. They dragged him aside and covered him with a few shovelfuls of earth. Some of the slaves, who had been inhumanly treated by their masters, now took revenge, and revealed their hiding-places to the pirates. A poor lame peasant, with his two daughters, was brought in. Appalled by the terrors of the rack, he promised to lead them through the woods to a retreat where several of the Spaniards were concealed. But the Spaniards, vigilantly on the watch, fled. The pirates, in the rage of their disappointment, hung the poor peasant. What became of his daughters we are not informed.