concluded implacable Enemies. _And I do now,_ said he, _declare such
War, and, at the same time, recommend to you my Comrades a humane and
generous Behaviour towards your Prisoners; which will appear by so much
more the Effects of a noble Soul, as we are satisfied we should not meet
the same Treatment should our ill Fortune, or more properly our
Disunion, or want of Courage, give us up to their Mercy._

After this, he required a Muster should be made, and there were able
Hands two Hundred, and thirty five sick and wounded; as they were
muster'd they were sworn. After Affairs were thus settled, they shaped
their Course the _Spanish West-Indies,_ but resolved, in the Way, to
take a Week or ten Days Cruize in the Windward Passage from _Jamaica,_
because most Merchant Men, which were good Sailors and did not slay for
Convoy, took this as the shorter Cut for _England._

Off St. _Christophers_ they took an _English_ Sloop becalmed, with their
Boats; they took out of her a couple of Puncheons of Rum, and half a
dozen Hogsheads of Sugar (she was a _New England_ Sloop, bound for
_Boston_) and without offering the least Violence to the Men, or
stripping them, they let her go. The Master of the Sloop was _Thomas
Butler,_ who owned, he never met with so candid an Enemy as the _French_
Man of War, which took him the Day he left St. _Christophers;_ they met
with no other Booty in their Way, till they came upon their Station,
when after three Days, they saw a Sloop which had the Impudence to give
them Chace; Captain _Misson_ asked what could be the Meaning that the
Sloop stood for them? One of the Men, who was acquainted with the _West-
Indies,_ told him, it was a _Jamaica_ Privateer, and he should not
wonder, if he clapp'd him aboard. I am, said he, no Stranger to their
Way of working, and this despicable Fellow, as those who don't know a
_Jamaica_ Privateer may think him, it is ten to one will give you some