Page:Life, strange voyages, and uncommon adventures of Ambrose Gwinett.pdf/17

Rh only staying to take leave of one or two of the family, made what haste I could to the quay; and when I arrived, I found the boat had already put off, leaving word, that I should overtake them at little bay, beyond the town. The dusk was coming on. I ran along the shore, and, as I imagined soon had a sight of the boat, to which I bailowed as loud as I was able; they answered, and immediately put about to take me in: but we had scarce got fifty yards from land, when, on looking about for my friend Mr. Collins, I missed him; and then it was I found I had made a mistake; and, instead of getting on board my own boat, which I now saw a-head, I had got into a boat belonging to some of the pirates. I attempted to leap overboard, and should easily have swam ashore; but I was prevented by one of the crew, who gave me a stroke on the head, which immediately laid me senseless; and I found afterwards they mistook me for one of their own men, whom they had sent to purchase something in the town.

A more infernal crew than these pirates breathed, not upon the face of the earth. Their whole lives were a scene of rapine and murder, which, when they had not an opportunity of committing upon wretches that fell into their clutches, during their piratical pursuits, they committed upon one another. During the time that I remained with them, which was upwards of three years and three quarters, there was no less than eleven assassinations among themselves. There was an uninhabited island, about twelve leagues well of the Gulph of Mexico, which those villains called Swallow island, from the great number of those birds which harboured upon it. Here they had a fortification; and the place being rendered almost inaccessible by rocks, except at one little inlet, just large