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.The darkbrotherhood fiercely whipped themselves and dragged the heavy cross about forevery one to see.The broken walls went unmended; the rusty cannons were notreplaced.Don Juan heard mass after mass, spoke to the frenzied people, andsuggested a proces-sion of all the priests in the city.Horrible stories began to grow up how the buccaneers were not men at all, butanimal things with heads like crocodiles and lions claws.Grave men discussedsuch pos-sibilities in the streets. The blessing of the day, Don Pedro. The Virgin s blessing, Don Guierrmo. What is your thought of these robbers? Ah! horrible, Don Guierrmo; horrible.They are said to be demons! But do you think it possible, as I have heard, that Morgan himself has threearms and wields a sword in each? Who can say, my friend! The devil has even greater powers than these, surely.Who can tell the limit of the Power of Evil? It is sacrilegious to considerit..And later: You say you had it of Don Guierrmo? Surely he would not tell a questionablething a man of his wealth. I repeat only what he said that Morgan could fire bul-lets from hisfingertips that he breathed out sulphurous flames.Don Guierrmo was certain ofit. I must tell my wife of this, Don Pedro.So the tales grew until the people were half mad.Stories of cruelty in othercaptured cities were recalled, and the merchants who had shrugged before,turned pale on re-membering.They could not believe; and yet they mustbelieve, for the pirates were already on their way to Chagres, and theirstated purpose was the conquest and pillage of the Cup of Gold.At last, underpressure, Don Juan dragged himself from church long enough to send fivehundred soldiers for an ambush on the road across the isthmus.A young officercraved audience. Well, young man, the Governor began,  what is your wish? If we had bulls, sir if we had great numbers of wild bulls, the officercried excitedly. Get them! Have the whole country scoured for bulls! Let the men gather athousand of them! But what are we going to do with them? We should stampede them on the enemy, sir. Marvelous plan! Genius of an officer! Ah, my dear friend a thousand bulls? Athousand? I jested.Have them gather ten thousand of the wildest bulls.The Governor ordered out his soldiers two thousand of the King stroops reviewed them, and then returned to kneel in the Cathedral.Don Juanwas not afraid of fighting, but, like a prudent general, he was strengtheningsecondary defense.Besides, anything that cost as much as the masses he hadpaid for must have some effect.The first creeping rumor grew to a monster.Quaking citizens began to bury theplate from their houses.The churchmen threw chalices and candlesticks intothe cis-terns for safety, and walled up their more precious relics in passagesunderground.Page 55ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlBalboa would have strengthened the walls and flooded the approach.Pizarro sarmy would have been halfway across the isthmus, by this time, to meet theoncoming buc-caneers.But those brave times were past.The merchants of Panamathought only of their possessions, their lives, and their souls in the ordernamed.They never considered belting on swords or toiling at the disintegratedwalls.That was for the soldiers of the King, who were paid good money toprotect the citizens.The Governor must see to the de-fense.Don Juan had reviewed his troops; that, to his mind, was all any general coulddo.The uniforms were proof against criticism, and his soldiers would havecome with credit through any parade ground in Europe.Meanwhile, an-other masswould not hurt matters.IWhile the buccaneers were throwing away the savings of plundered Maracaibo,Henry Morgan plunged deeply into plans for his new conquest.It would requiremore fighting men than had ever before been assembled.The messengers ofCaptain Morgan went out to the four cor-ners of the Spanish Main.His wordsfound their way to Plymouth, and Nieuw Amsterdam.Even to the wooded islandswhere men lived like apes, went his invitation to the great pillage. Every man will be rich if we succeed ; so ran the mes-sage. This will be themost powerful blow ever struck by the Brotherhood.We will carry terror to theinmost heart of Spain.Our fleet gathers on the south side of Tortuga byOctober.And soon the ships and men poured to the place of rendezvous; enormous newvessels with white sails and carven prows, ships bristling with brass cannons,old rotting hulks, their bottoms so foul with weeds that they moved throughthe water like logs.There came sloops and long canoes and flatboats, forcedthrough the water with sweeps.Even rafts drew to the meeting place, underwoven palm sails.And the men all the blustering Brotherhood of Tor-tuga; the old, expertpirates of Goaves; Frenchmen, Netherlanders, English, and Portuguese theembattled outcasts of the world.Canoe loads of slaves who had escaped theSpaniards paddled in, drawn to this expedition by a thirst-ing for theirmaster s blood.The slaves were Caribs and Negroes and fevered whites.Littlegroups of hunters ap-peared on the beaches of jungle islands and took ship forthe south side of Tortuga.Among the major ships were tall frigates and galleons which had been capturedin old engagements.When the time came for departure, Captain Morgan hadthirty-seven ships under his hand, and two thousand fighting men in additionto the mariners and boys.In the crowd of shipping lay three slim, cleansloops from New England.They had not come to fight, but to trade powder forplunder, whisky for gold.Powder and whiskey were the two great weapons ofoffense.And besides, these Plymouth men would buy old, useless ships for theiron and cordage they contained.Captain Morgan had sent hunters into the woods to shoot cattle, and ships tothe mainland to steal grain.When all returned, there was food on hand for avoyage.No one save Coeur de Gris and Henry Morgan, of all this polyglot press of menwho had come at the call of conquest, knew where that conquest was to be.Noone dreamed where they would be sailing and whom fighting at the journey send.The army of brave thieves had trooped to the name of Morgan, thirstilyconfident in his prom-ise of unlimited plunder.Henry Morgan had not dared to tell his destination.Potent though his namewas, the buccaneers would have recoiled from such an impregnable objective.Ifthey were given time to think of Panama, they would run home out of dread, forstories of the power and protection of the Cup of Gold had been told in alltheir islands for over half a century.Panama was a cloud city, an eerie,half-unearthly place, and armed with lightnings.Of course, there were thosewho believed the streets paved with golden cobbles, and certain church windowscarved from single emeralds.These legends would draw them on, if only theyhad no time to think of the hazards as well.Page 56ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlWhen the ships had been careened and scraped, all the sails mended, thecannons scoured and tested, the holds filled with foodstuffs, then HenryMorgan called a meeting of his captains for the purpose of signing solemnarticles and dividing the fleet into commands.They gathered in the oaken cabin of the Admiral thirty captains who hadbrought ships to the mission.The frigate of Captain Morgan was a fine Spanishman o war.It had been commanded by a Duke before it fell into the pirateshands.The cabin resembled a large drawing-room, paneled in dark oak, itswalls drawing slightly inward at the top.Across the ceiling were heavy beamscarved with vines and delicate, slim leaves [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]