432 TWO AGAINST FIFTY.

lived ; nor had he ever seen or heard the fire of any of their guns,
much less had they shown him any of their other retired places,
such as the cave in the valley, or the new retreat which the two
Englishmen had made, and the like.

The first testimony they had that this fellow had given intelli-
gence of them was, that about two months after this, six canoes of
savages, with about seven, or eight, or ten men in a canoe, came
rowing along the north side of the island, where they never used
to come before, and landed about an hour after sunrise, at a con-
venient place, about a mile from the habitation of the two Eng-
lishmen, where this escaped man had been kept. As the Spaniard
governor said, had they been all there, the damage would not
have been so much, for not a man of them would have escaped ;
but the case differed now very much, for two men to fifty was too
much odds. The two men had the happiness to discover them
about a league off, so that it was above an hour before they landed,
and as they landed a mile from their huts, it was some time before
they could come at them. Now, having great reason to believe
that they were betrayed, the first thing they did was to bind the
two slaves which were left, and cause two of the three men whom
they brought with the women, who, it seems, proved very faithful
to them, to lead them with their two wives, and whatever they
could carry away with them, to their retired place in the woods,
which I have spoken of above, and there to bind the two fellows
hand and foot until they heard further.

In the next place, seeing the savages were all come on shore,
and that they bent their course directly that way, they opened the
fences where the milch-goats were kept, and drove them all out,

‘leaving their goats to straggle into the woods whither they pleased,
that the savages might think they were all bred wild; but the
rogue who came with them was too cunning for that, and gave
them an account of it all, for they went directly to the place.

When the two poor frighted men had secured their wives and
goods, they sent the other slave they had of the three, who came
with the women, and who was at their place by accident, away to
the Spaniards with all speed to give them the alarm, and desire
speedy help; and in the meantime they took their arms and what