ing signifies his dislike of all such undertakings, and commands that
no such be pursued for the future, but that they unitedly apply
themselves to the improvement of the plantation and keeping the force in
proper condition."[180] The original draft of the letter was much milder
in tone, and betrays the real attitude of Charles II. toward these
half-piratical enterprises: "His Majesty has heard of the success of the
undertaking upon Cuba, in which he cannot choose but please himself in
the vigour and resolution wherein it was performed ... but because His
Majesty cannot foresee any utility likely to arise thereby ... he has
thought fit hereby to command him to give no encouragement to such
undertakings unless they may be performed by the frigates or men-of-war
attending that place without any addition from the soldiers or
inhabitants."[181] Other letters were subsequently sent to Jamaica,
which made it clear that the war of the privateers was not intended to
be called off by the king's instructions; and Sir Charles Lyttleton,
therefore, did not recall their commissions. Nevertheless, in the early
part of 1664, the assembly in Jamaica passed an act prohibiting public
levies of men upon foreign designs, and forbidding any person to leave
the island on any such design without first obtaining leave from the
governor, council and assembly.[182]

When the instructions of the authorities at home were so ambiguous, and
the incentives to corsairing so alluring, it was natural that this game
of baiting the Spaniards should suffer little interruption. English
freebooters who had formerly made Hispaniola and Tortuga their
headquarters now resorted to Jamaica, where they found a cordial welcome
and a better market for their plunder. Thus in June 1663 a certain
Captain Barnard sailed from Port Royal to the Orinoco, took and
plundered the town of Santo Tomas and returned in the following
March.[183] On 19th October another privateer named Captain Cooper
brought into Port Royal two Spanish prizes, the larger of which, the
"Maria" of Seville, was a royal azogue and carried 1000 quintals of
quicksilver for the King of Spain's mines in Mexico, besides oil, wine
and olives.[184] Cooper in his fight with the smaller vessel so disabled
his own ship that he was forced to abandon it and enter the prize; and
it was while cruising off Hispaniola in this prize that he fell in with
the "Maria," and captured her after a four hours' combat. There wer