re
also bond-servants who were treated most cruelly.

Sometimes they made incursions on the Spanish settlements, which led to
stronger efforts for their extermination that at last considerably
reduced their numbers. In fact, had it not been for the continual
accessions they would soon have died out, or have given up their trade
and settled down as planters. Hispaniola became at last almost
untenable, for the Spaniards, unable to find any other way of putting
them down, organised several hunting parties with the view to utterly
destroy the wild cattle and thus deprive them of their means of living.
Not that this was easily done, for it took many years, during which the
hunting parties from both sides fought and killed each other, committing
enormities which made the quarrel all the more bitter.

About the year 1632 a party of buccaneers captured the island of Tortuga
from the Spaniards, the garrison of twenty-five men surrendering without
a blow. Here was now the grand rendezvous of the French, for which it
was perfectly suitable from its proximity to the food supply and the
track of the Spanish vessels. It was situated on the north of the
western portion of Hispaniola, and not very well suited for plantations,
although good tobacco was grown there. There were, however, plenty of
sea fowl and turtle to be had, as well as their eggs, which formed a
large portion of the diet of the inhabitants.

This island became a veritable pandemonium--the sink of the West Indies.
It was the place of call for rovers of all nations, the market for their
booty, and the storehouse for everything in the way of supplies. The
merchants pandered to the tastes of their customers, and drinking and
gambling went on continually. But in 1638 it was surprised by the
Spaniards, who began to be alarmed at this nest of pirates at their very
doors. They chose a time when most of the rovers were away on a cruise,
and the buccaneers gone hunting in Hispaniola. All they captured were
killed--even those who surrendered being hanged as pirates. Only a few
escaped by hiding among the rocks and bushes to come forth after the
enemy had left, which they did without leaving a garrison.

A grand attempt to expel the hunters from the main island was now
organised, in which a corps of five hundred lancers ranged the island in
bands of fifties. Many of the buccaneers were killed, but the remainder
combined together under an Englishman named Willis and again took