ABSTRACT
Wallace and his eighty buccaneers had scarcely settled in Belize, when news came to them that the original colony on Providence Island had been annihilated by the Spanish, as already related. Captain Bluefield’s settlements on the Mosquito Shore, however, remained intact, defended as well by the Indians as by such colonists as escaped thither from the Island. From the Spanish point of view, Jamaica more resembled a spider in the heart of its web, ready to dart out at the slightest quiver on the circumference. Port Royal indeed became a veritable nest of privateers, or licensed buccaneers armed with Letters of Marque commissioning them to rove the seas in the King’s name, and challenge the King’s enemies wherever they might be found. The age of the pirates begins—pirates who chased, fought, and looted friend and enemy alike, with no pretence at legality, no longer patriots but criminals, the lawless highwaymen of the sea.
