to the utmost of their strength laboured
all that they might, till three in the afternoon." By that time the
_Pascha's_ men, helped by Drake himself, had taken turn about at the
pump brakes, and the pumping had been carried on for eight or nine hours
without ceasing. The pumping had freed her only about a foot and a half,
and the leak was still undiscovered. The men were tired out, for the
sun was now at his hottest, and Drake adds slyly that they "had now a
less liking of her than before, and greater content to hear of some
means for remedy." We gather from what follows, that when he asked them
what they wished to do, they left it all to him. He, therefore,
suggested that John Drake should go aboard the _Pascha_ as her captain.
He himself, he said, would shift into a pinnace; while the _Swan_ should
be set on fire, and abandoned as soon as her gear was taken out of her.
The pinnaces came aboard the sinking ship, and the men pillaged her of
all her stores. Powder, tar, and the like were scattered about her
decks; and she was then set on fire, and watched until she sank. Thus
"our Captain had his desire, and men enough for his pinnaces."

The next morning, the 16th August, the squadron bore away for the Gulf
of Darien, to find some secret harbour where they might leave the ship
at anchor, "not discoverable by the enemy," who thereby might imagine
them quite departed from the coast. Drake intended to take two of the
pinnaces along the Main as soon as they had hidden away the _Pascha_,
for he was minded to go a cruise up the Rio Grande, or Magdalena River.
In his absence John Drake was to take the third pinnace, with Diego, the
negro, as a guide, to open up communications with the Cimmeroons. By the
21st of August they arrived in the Gulf; and Drake sought out a secret
anchorage, far from any trade route, where the squadron might lie
quietly till the fame of their being on the coast might cease. They
found a place suited to their needs, and dropped their anchors in its
secret channels, in "a fit and convenient road," where a sailor might
take his ease over a rum bowl. Drake took his men ashore, and cleared a
large plot of ground "both of trees and brakes" as a site for a little
village, trimly thatched with palm leaves, which was built by Diego,
the negro, after the Indian fashion, for the "more comfort of the
company." The archers made themselves butts to shoot at, because they
had "many that delighted in that exercise and