But there is this to be said of that great buccaneer: that if he
undertook enterprises so desperate as this, he yet laid his plans so
well that they never went altogether amiss. Moreover, the very
desperation of his successes was of such a nature that no man could
suspect that he would dare to undertake such things, and accordingly
his enemies were never prepared to guard against his attacks. Aye, had
he but worn the King's colors and served under the rules of honest war,
he might have become as great and as renowned as Admiral Blake himself!

But all that is neither here nor there; what I have to tell you now is
that Captain Morgan in this open boat with his twenty mates reached the
Cape of Salmedina towards the fall of day. Arriving within view of the
harbor they discovered the plate fleet at anchor, with two men-of-war
and an armed galley riding as a guard at the mouth of the harbor,
scarce half a league distant from the other ships. Having spied the
fleet in this posture, the pirates presently pulled down their sails
and rowed along the coast, feigning to be a Spanish vessel from Nombre
de Dios. So hugging the shore, they came boldly within the harbor, upon
the opposite side of which you might see the fortress a considerable
distance away.

Being now come so near to the consummation of their adventure, Captain
Morgan required every man to make an oath to stand by him to the last,
whereunto our hero swore as heartily as any man aboard, although his
heart, I must needs confess, was beating at a great rate at the
approach of what was to happen. Having thus received the oaths of all
his followers, Captain Morgan commanded the surgeon of the expedition
that, when the order was given, he, the medico, was to bore six holes
in the boat, so that, it sinking under them, they might all be
compelled to push forward, with no chance of retreat. And such was the
ascendency of this man over his followers, and such was their awe of
him, that not one of them uttered even so much as a murmur, though what
he had commanded the surgeon to do pledged them either to victory or to
death, with no chance to choose between. Nor did the surgeon question
the orders he had received, much less did he dream of disobeying them.

By now it had fallen pretty dusk, whereupon, spying two fishermen in a
canoe at a little distance, Captain Morgan demanded of them in Spanish
which vessel of those at anchor in the harbor was the vice-admiral, for
that