Lolonnois then sent his boats up the river to secure a small patache, which they knew lay near at hand, laden with plate, indigo, and cochineal. But the inhabitants, alarmed at the capture of the larger vessel, swept away from under their very eyes, saved the patache by preventing her departure.
The booty of the prize was much less than was expected, the vessel being already almost entirely unladen. Its cargo consisted of iron and paper, and it still contained 20,000 reams of paper, and 100 tons of iron bars, which had served as ballast. The few bales of merchandise were nothing but linens, serges, and cloth, thread, and a few jars of wine. In the return cargo there would have been at least a million in specie. These heterogeneous articles were of no use to men who wanted nothing but coin or jewels, lead or powder. Dividing the paper, they used it for napkins, and other useless trifles, and several jars of almond and olive-oil were wasted in the same reckless manner.
Having now accomplished their purpose, without much return for their three months' patience, Lolonnois called a general council of the fleet, and declared his intention of going to Guatimala. Upon this announcement a division arose in the assembly, and the hoarse murmurs of a coming tempest were heard around the speaker. Many of the adventurers, new to the trade, could no longer conceal their weariness and their disappointment. They had set sail from Tortuga with the feeling with which a country boy comes to London. They had believed that pieces of eight grew on the trees like pears, and had overlooked the dragons that guarded the Hesperian trees. Having seen their predecessors return home laden with the plunder of Maracaibo, many had overlooked the toil and dangers by which it was won, in the sight of the joy and prodigality with which it was lavished; they had seen only the rich pearls, and forgotten the stormy seas from which they had been gathered. They were weary of the hardships, and mutinous for want of food. The mere seeker for gold could not endure what was submitted to by those who were desirous of earning distinction. The older hands laughed at their pinings, derided their complaints, and swore that they would rather die and starve there, than return home with empty purses, to be the scorn and laughing-stock of all Hispaniola. The majority of the experienced men, foreseeing that the voyage to Nicaragua would not succeed, and was "little to their purpose," separated from Lolonnois, and set sail secretly in the swift sailing vessel that Moses Vauclin had captured in the port of Cavallo, and which he now commanded, boasting, with reason, that it was the swiftest sailing vessel that had been seen in the West Indies for fifty years. With Moses Vauclin went Pierre le Picard, who, seeing others desert Lolonnois, resolved to do the same.
Steering homewards, the fugitives coasted along the whole continent till they came to Costa Rica, where they landed a good party, marched up to Veraguas, and burnt the town, pillaging the Spaniards, who made a stout resistance, carrying off a few prisoners, and obtaining a scanty booty of some seven or eight pounds' worth of gold, which their slaves washed from the mud of the rivers. Alarmed at the multitude of Spaniards that began to gather round them, the marauders abandoned their design of attacking the town of Nata, on the south sea-coast, although many rich merchants lived there, whose slaves worked in the gold-washings of Veraguas. Returning to Tortuga, these undisciplined men, impatient of poverty, united themselves under the flag of a noble adventurer, the Chevalier du Plessis, who had just arrived in the Indies, poor and proud, and prepared to cruise against the Spaniard in those seas. Vauclin being an experienced pilot, well acquainted with the turtle islands, and every key and reef the surf washed from California to Cape Horn, was taken into favour by the titled privateersman, who promised him the first prize he captured, if he would sail in his company. But a serious difficulty arose in the execution of this liberal promise, for the Chevalier was soon after shot through the head while grappling with a Spanish ship of thirty-six guns, and Moses was elected captain in his stead. In his first cruise, the brave deserter was fortunate enough to take a cocoa vessel from the Havannah, with a cargo valued at 150,000 livres.
During this time, Lolonnois and his men remained alone and deserted in the gulf of Honduras. He was now in some distress, short of provisions, and in a vessel too "great to get out at the reflux of those seas." His 300 men had no food but that which they contrived to kill daily on shore, living chiefly on the flesh of parrots and monkeys. By day they generally fished or hunted, by night, taking advantage of the land breeze, they sailed painfully on till they rounded Cape Gracios à Dios, and slowly the Pearl Islands hove in sight. Staunch and inexorable, Lolonnois, amid all the tedium of this enervating idleness, still nourished the project of making a swoop down upon Nicaragua, intending to leave his cumbrous vessel behind, and row up the river St. John in canoes, until he reached the lake. But the same reason that made his vessel lag behind those of his companions, now drove it ashore in a shallow near Cape Gracias, where it drew too much water to be extricated. In vain he unloaded his guns and iron, and used every means that experience and ingenuity could suggest to lighten the ship, and float her again into deep water. Always firm and resolute, Lolonnois at once determined to break her to pieces on the sand-shoal, and with her planks and nails to construct a boat.
His men, with perfect sang froid, not even impatient at the loss, much less afraid of danger, escaping to land, began to build Indian ajoupas, or huts. Lolonnois, accustomed to such reverses, concealed his chagrin, if he even felt any. Regardless of himself, he adjured his men to lose no courage, for he knew of a means of escape, and, what was more, a way to make their fortune yet, before they returned to Tortuga. Prepared for every emergency, and even for the longest delay, part of the crew were at once employed in planting peas and other vegetables, the remainder in fishing and hunting, all but the few who worked busily at the boat in which Nicaragua was to be visited. In spite of desertion, failure, wreck, and famine, Lolonnois held on to the plan of the expedition, which he deemed cowardly and shameful to abandon. The men, confident in the sagacity and courage of their leader, surrendered themselves like children to his guidance.
The Indians of the Perlas Islands, on which they had struck, were a fierce and untamable race, strong and agile, swift as horses, hardy divers, brave but cruel, warlike, and man-eaters. Their wooden clubs were jagged with crocodiles' teeth; they had no bows or arrows, but used lances a fathom and a-half long. They built no huts, and lived on fruits grown in plantations cleared from the forest. Fishers and swimmers, they were so dexterous as to be able to bring up with a rope an anchor of 600 cwt. from a rock, a feat which Esquemeling himself saw a few of them perform. The seamen in vain attempted to propitiate these wild freemen, to serve them as guides or hunters. At last, finding a great number together, and pursuing the fugitives, they tracked five men and four women to a cave, and took much pains to propitiate them. The captives remaining obstinately silent, as if from fear, in spite of the food that was given them, were dismissed with presents of knives and beads. They left, promising to return; "but soon forgot their benefactors," says Esquemeling, disgustfully. The sailors believed that at night all the Indians swam to a neighbouring island, as they never saw either boat or Indian again.
Some time before this the Frenchmen's terror had been excited by the discovery that these Indians were cannibals. Two Buccaneers, a Frenchman and a Spaniard, had straggled into the woods in search of game. Pursued by a troop of savages, the latter, after a desperate struggle, was captured, and heard of no more; the former, the swifter footed of the two, escaped. A few days after, an armed party of a dozen Flibustiers, led by this survivor, went into the same part of the forest to see if they could find any traces of the Indian encampment. Near the place where the Spaniard had fallen into the ambush they discovered the ashes of a fire, still warm, and among the embers some human bones, well scraped, and a white man's hand with two fingers half roasted, but still unconsumed.
For six months, till the long-boat was completed, the Buccaneers lived on Spanish wheat, bananas, and on the fruits and green crops which they had sown on landing. Their bread they baked in portable ovens saved from the wreck.
Lolonnois now once more prepared to carry out his unabandoned project. With part of his crew he resolved to row up the river of Nicaragua, to capture some canoes, and return to fetch away those whom the new boat would not hold. The men cast lots for the choice of sailing with him. He took about one-half of the shipwrecked crew with him, part in the long-boat and part in a skiff which had been saved when the larger vessel drove on the bank. They arrived in a few days at Desaguadera, near Nicaragua, but attacked on the beach by an overpowering number of Spaniards and Indians, they were driven back to their boats, with the loss of many men, and escaped with difficulty, beaten and desponding.