The True Story Book. Various

and necessaries being what they wanted. The sight of this much grieved me, but I was obliged in prudence to be silent.

      That afternoon there came on board to see me Captain Henry Glynn, with whom I was acquainted, who resided at Sierra Leone, but though an honest, generous person, was on good terms with the pirates. He brought with him the captains of the two other pirate ships, and Captain Davis generously said he was ashamed to hear how I had been used, for their reasons for going a-pirating were to revenge themselves on base merchants and cruel commanders, but none of my people gave me the least ill character; and, indeed, it was plain that they loved me.

      This was by no means relished by Cochlyn; however, he put a good face on it.

      That night the boatswain came down into the steerage, where he had seen me sitting with the ship's carpenter, but since we happened to have changed places, and it had grown so dark he could not distinguish our faces, he, thinking I sat where he had seen me before, presented a pistol and drew the trigger, swearing he would blow my brains out. By good fortune the pistol did not go off, but only flashed in the pan; by the light of which the carpenter, observing that he should have been shot instead of me, it so provoked him that he ran in the dark to the boatswain, and having wrenched the pistol out of his hand, he beat him to such a degree that he almost killed him. The noise of the fray being heard on board the pirate ship that lay close to us, a boat was sent from her, and they being told the truth of the matter, the officer in her carried away this wicked villain, who had three times tried to murder me.

      I had one bundle of my own things left to me, in which was a black suit of clothes. But a pirate, who was tolerably sober, came in and said he would see what was in it. He then took out my black suit, a good hat and wig, and some other things. Whereon I told him I hoped he would not deprive me of them, for they would be of no service to him in so hot a country, but would be of great use to me, as I hoped soon to return to England.

      I had hardly done speaking, when he lifted up his broadsword and gave me a blow on the shoulder with the flat side of it, whispering in my ear at the same time:

      'I give you this caution, never to dispute the will of a pirate; for, supposing I had cleft your skull asunder for your impudence, what would you have got by it but destruction?'

      I gave him thanks for his warning, and soon after he put on the clothes, which in less than half an hour after I saw him take off and throw overboard, for some of the pirates, seeing him dressed in that manner, had thrown several buckets of claret upon him. This person's true name was Francis Kennedy.

      The next day, understanding that the three pirate captains were on shore at my friend Captain Glynn's, I asked leave to go to them, which was granted, and next day I went on board in company with them. Captain Davis desired Cochlyn to order all his people on the quarter-deck, and made a speech to them on my behalf, which they falling in with, it was resolved to give me the ship they designed to leave to go into mine, with the remains of my cargo, and further, the goods remaining in the other prizes, worth, with my own, several thousand pounds. Then one of the leading pirates proposed that I should go along with them down the coast of Guinea, where I might exchange the goods for gold, and that, no doubt, as they went they should take some French and Portuguese vessels, and then they might give me as many of their best slaves as would fill the ship; that then he would advise me to go to the island of St. Thomas and sell them there, and after rewarding my people in a handsome manner, I might return with a large sum of money to London and bid the merchants defiance.

This proposal was approved of, but it struck me with a sudden damp. So I began to say it would not be proper for me to accept of such a quantity of other people's goods as they had so generously voted for me. On which I was interrupted by several, who began to be very angry.