r to St. Mary's. While most of the pirates were on shore,
the prisoners overpowered the few left to guard them, and carried off the
ship. We get a last glimpse of the _Cassandra_ in a private letter written
to the Directors in May, 1723, from Jamaica, in which it is stated that
the _Cassandra_ was lying at Portobello, while Taylor was engaged in
negotiating with the captain of an English man-of-war for a pardon. The
negotiations apparently fell through, as Taylor was eventually given a
commission by the Spaniards. The letter relates how the crew boasted that
they had, each man, twelve hundred pounds in gold and silver, besides a
great store of diamonds and many rich goods. Of the sharing of these
diamonds, Johnson tells a story how one man, being given for his share one
big diamond instead of a number of small ones, broke it up with a hammer,
so that he might have as many 'sparks' as the others.

Macrae's defence of the _Cassandra_, and the boldness and ability he
displayed in his dealings with the pirates, brought him into prominent
notice. The son of a poor Ayrshire cottager, he had worked himself up,
from before the mast, to the command of a ship. Soon after his return to
England, the Directors appointed him to be their supervisor on the west
coast of Sumatra, and, before he sailed, a provisional commission was
given him to succeed to the Presidentship of Madras, on a vacancy
occurring. Eighteen months later, he took his seat as Governor at Fort St.
George. His six years of office were distinguished by his efforts to put
an end to many abuses that had grown up in the Company's affairs. He left
India with a fortune of L100,000, made by private trade, and settled down
near his birthplace, which he had not revisited since he left it as a boy.
He died in 1746.

NOTE.--The account of England's cruise in the _Cassandra_, given in
Johnson's "History of the Pirates," is evidently taken from Lazenby's
narrative to the E.I.C. Directors. Macrae's account of the capture of
the _Cassandra_, given by Johnson, appears also to have been part of a
similar report to the Directors, but the report itself has disappeared.
Additional information is to be found in the logs of the _Greenwich_
and _London_.

[1] Proclamation issued at Goa, 19th July, 1720 (Danvers).

[2] This was Oliver Levasseur, otherwise La Buze of Calais, a noted French
pirate. By the English he was called La Bouche, and, in one ship's log