ent. Determined to bear this disgrace no
longer, Pierre Lafitte was seized in the streets of New Orleans, and
with one of his captains, named Dominique Yon, was locked up in the
calaboosa.

This step was followed by a proclamation from Governor Claiborne,
offering five hundred dollars for the arrest of Jean Lafitte, the acting
pirate chief. Lafitte insolently retorted by offering five thousand
dollars for the head of the governor. This impudent defiance aroused
Claiborne to more decisive action. A force of militia was called out and
sent overland to Barataria, with orders to capture and destroy the
settlement of the buccaneers and seize all the pirates they could lay
hands on.

The governor did not know the men with whom he had to deal. Their spies
kept them fully informed of all his movements. Southward trudged the
citizen soldiers, tracking their oozy way through the water-soaked land.
All was silent and seemingly deserted. They were near their goal, and
not a man had been seen. But suddenly a boatswain's whistle sounded, and
from a dozen secret passages armed men swarmed out upon them, and in a
few minutes had them surrounded and under their guns. Resistance was
hopeless, and they were obliged to surrender at discretion. The grim
pirates stood ready to slaughter them all if a hand were raised in
self-defence, and Lafitte, stepping forward, invited them to join his
men, promising them an easy life and excellent pay. Their captain
sturdily refused.

"Very well," said Lafitte, with disdainful generosity. "You can go or
stay as you please. Yonder is the road you came by. You are free to
follow it back. But if you are wise you will in future keep out of reach
of the Jolly Rovers of the Gulf."

We are not sure if these were Lafitte's exact words, but at any rate the
captain and his men were set free and trudged back again, glad enough to
get off with whole skins. Soon after that the war, which had lingered so
long in the North, showed signs of making its way to the South. A
British fleet appeared in the Gulf in the early autumn of 1814, and made
an attack on Mobile. In September a war-vessel from this fleet appeared
off Barataria Bay, fired on one of the pirate craft, and dropped anchor
some six miles out. Soon a pinnace, bearing a white flag, put off from
its side and was rowed shoreward. It was met by a vessel which had put
off from Grande Terre.

"I am Captain Lockyer, of the 'Sophia,'" said the British officer. "