Leonard Lindsay ;

Next morning Nicky asked me to accompany him, with two others to guide them to the spot where their comrades had suffered, in order that they might bury the bodies; we accordingly set off in the canoe, our companions being one Jonas, as he was called, an Englishman, and Pierre le Noir, or Black Peter, a Frenchman from the coast of Normandy. Jonas was so called, owing to the great ill-luck which he had met with in cruising, having been twice taken, and once very nearly hanged by the Spaniards on the coast of Porto Rico; while once upon the Mosquito coast, in the expedition in which l’Olonnais, a famous French Buccaneer, was killed, he had been left for some months in a small quay or island near the Mosquito shore, eating what wild fruit he could get, and what birds he could catch with his hands. We landed in the same creek in which I found the canoe, and after less troublous walking than I expected, my comrades knowing the country, found the bodies still hanging, but already defaced by the hideous vultures, so as to present a horrid spectacle. Nevertheless, having brought shovels and pickaxes with us, we performed our task, and over the grave, for they all three were laid in one, we put a rude cross made of withies, or willow wands, and so left them to take their long sleep in the wilderness.

Being returned to the opposite side, I rambled through the village, for such it was, to note the appearance of the place, and its inhabitants.

The huts were built upon a green bank, rising pleasantly from the sea, the little headland of which I spoke sheltering it. Behind some lofty ridges, partly covered with luxuriant wood, which here and there had been cleared, certain small fields were marked out, these last being planted with a brown herb, like overgrown rhubarb, which they told me was tobacco. At the water’s edge was a rude wharf, made of wood called shingles—and several canoes and European-built boats lay there. While I was sauntering about, one of the former put off, navigated by two Indians, who spoke both French and English reasonably well. These Indians were better and more neatly attired than the whites; they were of a sallow-brown hue, had long, lank black hair, and very bright eyes. In person they were tall, raw-boned, and muscular. In the canoe they carried an assortment, as it were, of spears, called fizgigs and harpoons, for striking fish; at which exercise they are inconceivably expert, often killing in a forenoon what will form a good dinner for a hundred men. The Mosquito men, for so are these Indians called, are therefore very highly prized by the whites, who give them good wages to go on board their ships, or to stay at their settlements on shore, to provide turtle or manatee for the company. While I was looking at them, Nicky came up to me, and we walked through the village together, he bringing me into many of the cabins, all of which were similar to his own. Those of the men who were not in the mountains or savannahs hunting, were attending to their boucans, or fires, for the drying of the meat, and I thought as I saw them, working like butchers and cooks, that I would rather take the huntsman’s part of the business. All around lay the quarters of slaughtered beeves and hogs, while the Buccaneers, armed with long knives, cut the flesh from the bones. These lumps were then carefully salted in open sheds used for that purpose, and after being well steeped in brine, were placed on the boucan—that is to say, upon the grille of wood above a slow fire, which gradually dried and cooked the meat, giving it at the same time a sort of smoky taste, which however is not without an aroma to the palate. This method of preserving meat may be called national in these islands, for so did the original Charibs dress their food, whether fish or flesh. These savages were so fond of this cookery, and of such endurance, that an Indian returning from the chase, fatigued and hungry, would often wait patiently by the boucan, or as they called it, the barbecu, the best part of a day, until a fish or slice of hog, or beeve, was well cooked, the morsel being suspended almost two feet above a little and slow fire. The Charibs, being cannibals, were often in use to treat their prisoners just as they treated their game, and I know many who, visiting some of the smaller windward islands, and also the Brazilian coast, saw great flitches of human flesh, smoked and barbecued, hanging in the huts. The meat, when sufficiently preserved in the manner which I have described, the Buccaneers placed in storehouses, built so that both land and sea winds may play well around them. The hides are also prepared in a rude fashion, and the tallow, the whole being periodically sold, either for money or goods, to the captains of privateers for their crews, or to certain planters in those islands in which cattle do not abound. The latter are the best customers, making regular contracts with the Buccaneers for the supply of a certain quantity of meat and hides for a fixed sum, the stipulations on both sides being honourably adhered to. Many of the Buccaneers have servants and hired assistants, who are chiefly employed in conveying the cattle from the spot where they are killed to the boucan, and afterwards in helping to stow away the food. Although this appeared to be a regular settlement, its inhabitants led but a roving life. Many of them intended to go to sea for a change at the first opportunity, and others, conceiving that there were more cattle and fewer hunters to the eastward, spoke of shifting their quarters. This I heard while wandering about with Nicky, from boucan to boucan, and hut to hut. The scene indeed was a new one to me. Such groups of wild-looking blood-stained men; such slashing and cutting of meat, as though one were in the shambles; such shouting and singing in different tongues, mixed with the clamour of dogs and the screams of parrots, and other birds from the neighbouring groves; such quaffing of bumpers of brandy and constant smoking of tobacco; such an appearance indeed of rude plenty and coarse health and enjoyment—all this made a curious impression on me, and I returned to the hut pondering on it.

‘Well,’ says Nicky, ‘will you stay with us, and be my comrade, in lieu of poor Benjamin? Here is his stock in trade,’ pointing to two good guns and a little assortment of household stuff. ‘By the rules of the coast, as you know, we all work in couples. Each man has his comrade, with whom he shares all: and when one dies, the survivor is entitled to his partner’s wealth and implements—the last of which I will very willingly bestow upon you, should you deem it meet to join me.’

We talked for some time about the matter. My own mind was naturally buoyant, and my spirits easily fitted themselves to circumstances; and so, concluding that I would lead an adventurous life, and see much well worthy of being beheld, we in the end concluded a bargain; and then putting on a doublet which had belonged to poor Benjamin, and which being almost new, was but slightly smirched with blood, my partner summoned in several of the chief men to the hut; and they being accommodated with great goblets of brandy, admitted me by acclamation into the body of the brave Huntsmen and Buccaneers, and the ancient order of Brethren of the Coast, baptizing me in brandy, with various mummeries, by the nick-name of Will Thistle, as showing my Scottish nativity. Then Jonas, who was there, would fain have had a carouse, but they persuaded him not, saying that there was ample work to do, and little time to do it in, before the ships would arrive from Jamaica and Nevis for boucan.

Behold me now, therefore, a Buccaneer on the coast of Hispaniola! I let my beard and moustache grow, and they and my hair, which was naturally luxuriant, mingling, I speedily looked as grim and grisly as any of them. My comrade, Nicky, was a good man and true; he had really felt the death of Benjamin his partner, and so had been at first more grave and more reserved than usual. But as this natural feeling wore away, he became truly a merry madcap, with a jest, sometimes of the coarsest, or a lusty sea-song, or a tale of brave privateersmen, ever in his mouth. Under his tuition, I soon became a good shot, and learned to break up a bull or cow most scientifically with the knife. Also I became acquainted with the various trees and shrubs, birds and beasts of the coast. I knew how to fell the mountain cabbage, and to roast the savoury plantain in the hot cinders. I could bake the mealy cassava cake, and I knew how to bore the Frank palm for the luscious sap which flows from the wounded bark. Besides, these great forests and fair beaches teem with infinite food. We turned the lazy turtles which we found upon the shore, or hunted for their eggs in the hot sand. We intercepted and roasted the land-crab in his annual journey from the mountains; we shot the guano or yellow lizard, as he whimpered in the boughs, and prejudice being set aside, found his flesh like that of a barn-door fowl; while the racoon and the monkey both formed good roasts when we tired of pork and beef. Then on every pond bred flocks of fat ducks, and, in the season, the delicious ortolan fed amid the guinea grass. Great hosts of pigeons built in the high trees and the rocks, and the bright-coloured woodpeckers afforded us many a savoury dish. For the sea, the Mosquito men kept us well supplied. Standing in the bows of the canoe, with their barbed spears poised and ready, and their keen eyes fixed upon the water beneath, there was hardly a fish at which they darted their harpoons which the next moment lay not quivering and bleeding in the bottom of the boat.