Indian
corn and potatoes. Another chief set his mark to a treaty of peace and
alliance with the colony. A third consented to become a vassal of the
Company, received with great delight a commission embellished with
gold thread and flowered riband, and swallowed to the health of his new
masters not a few bumpers of their own brandy.

Meanwhile the internal government of the colony was organised according
to a plan devised by the directors at Edinburgh. The settlers were
divided into bands of fifty or sixty; each band chose a representative;
and thus was formed an assembly which took the magnificent name of
Parliament. This Parliament speedily framed a curious code. The first
article provided that the precepts, instructions, examples, commands and
prohibitions expressed and contained in the Holy Scriptures should have
the full force and effect of laws in New Caledonia, an enactment which
proves that those who drew it up either did not know what the Holy
Scriptures contained or did not know what a law meant. There is another
provision which shows not less clearly how far these legislators were
from understanding the first principles of legislation. "Benefits
received and good services done shall always be generously and
thankfully compensated, whether a prior bargain hath been made or not;
and, if it shall happen to be otherwise, and the Benefactor obliged
justly to complain of the ingratitude, the Ungrateful shall in such case
be obliged to give threefold satisfaction at the least." An article much
more creditable to the little Parliament, and much needed in a community
which was likely to be constantly at war, prohibits, on pain of death,
the violation of female captives.

By this time all the Antilles and all the shores of the Gulf of Mexico
were in a ferment. The new colony was the object of universal hatred.
The Spaniards began to fit out armaments. The chiefs of the French
dependencies in the West Indies eagerly offered assistance to
the Spaniards. The governors of the English settlements put forth
proclamations interdicting all communication with this nest of
buccaneers. Just at this time, the Dolphin, a vessel of fourteen guns,
which was the property of the Scotch Company, was driven on shore by
stress of weather under the walls of Carthagena. The ship and cargo were
confiscated, the crew imprisoned and put in irons. Some of the sailors
were treated as slaves, and compelled to sweep the streets and to work
on the