ndeavored to persuade the ladies who fell in his way that sooner than
eat a woman he would entirely abstain from food.

On one occasion, when politely conducting a young lady to a place of
confinement, where in company with other women of good family she was to
be shut up until their relatives could pay handsome ransoms for their
release, he was very much surprised when she suddenly turned to him with
tears in her eyes, and besought him not to devour her. This astonishing
speech so wounded the feelings of the gallant Frenchman that for a
moment he could not reply, and when he asked her what had put such an
unreasonable fear in her mind, she could only answer that she thought he
looked hungry, and that perhaps he would not be willing to wait
until--And there she stopped, for she could not bring her mind to
say--until she was properly prepared for the table.

"What!" exclaimed the high-minded pirate. "Do you suppose that I would
eat you in the street?" And as the poor girl, who was now crying, would
make him no answer, he fell into a sombre silence which continued until
they had reached their destination.

The cruel aspersions which were cast upon his character by the women of
the country were very galling to the chivalrous soul of this gentleman
of France, and in every way possible he endeavored to show the Spanish
ladies that their opinions of him were entirely incorrect, and even if
his men were rather a hard lot of fellows, they were not cannibals.

The high-minded pirate had now two principal objects before him. One was
to lay his hand upon all the treasure he could find, and the other was
to show the people of the country, especially the ladies, that he was a
gentleman of agreeable manners and a pious turn of mind.

It is highly probable that for some time the hero of this story did not
succeed in his first object as well as he would have liked. A great deal
of treasure was secured, but some of it consisted of property which
could not be easily turned into cash or carried away, and he had with
him a body of rapacious and conscienceless scoundrels who were
continually clamoring for as large a share of the available
spoils--such as jewels, money, and small articles of value--as they
could induce their commander to allow them, and, in consequence of this
greediness of his own men, his share of the plunder was not always as
large as it ought to be.

But in his other object he was very much more successful, and, in