they told them about two moons ago, pointing to the moon and to two
fingers; and that their great king had two hundred prisoners now,
which he had taken in his war, and they were feeding them to make
them fat for the next feast. The Englishmen seemed mighty desirous
of seeing those prisoners; but the others mistaking them, thought
they were desirous to have some of them to carry away for their own
eating. So they beckoned to them, pointing to the setting of the
sun, and then to the rising; which was to signify that the next
morning at sunrising they would bring some for them; and
accordingly the next morning they brought down five women and
eleven men, and gave them to the Englishmen to carry with them on
their voyage, just as we would bring so many cows and oxen down to
a seaport town to victual a ship.
As brutish and barbarous as these fellows were at home, their
stomachs turned at this sight, and they did not know what to do.
To refuse the prisoners would have been the highest affront to the
savage gentry that could be offered them, and what to do with them
they knew not. However, after some debate, they resolved to accept
of them: and, in return, they gave the savages that brought them
one of their hatchets, an old key, a knife, and six or seven of
their bullets; which, though they did not understand their use,
they seemed particularly pleased with; and then tying the poor
creatures’ hands behind them, they dragged the prisoners into the
boat for our men.
The Englishmen were obliged to come away as soon as they had them,
or else they that gave them this noble present would certainly have
expected that they should have gone to work with them, have killed
two or three of them the next morning, and perhaps have invited the
donors to dinner. But having taken their leave, with all the
respect and thanks that could well pass between people, where on
either side they understood not one word they could say, they put
off with their boat, and came back towards the first island; where,
when they arrived, they set eight of their prisoners at liberty,
there being too many of them for their occasion. In their voyage
they endeavoured to have some communication with their prisoners;
but it was impossible to make them understand anything. Nothing
they could say to them, or give them, or do for them, but was
looked upon as going to murder them. They first of all unbound
them; but the poor creatures screamed at that, especially the
women, as if they had just felt the knife at their throats; for
they immediately concluded they were unbound on purpose to be
killed. If they gave them thing to eat, it was the same thing;
they then concluded it was for fear they should sink in flesh, and
so not be fat enough to kill. If they looked at one of them more
particularly, the party presently concluded it was to see whether
he or she was fattest, and fittest to kill first; nay, after they
had brought them quite over, and began to use them kindly, and
treat them well, still they expected every day to make a dinner or
supper for their new masters.
When the three wanderers had give this unaccountable history or
journal of their voyage, the Spaniard asked them where their new
family was; and being told that they had brought them on shore, and
put them into one of their huts, and were come up to beg some
victuals for them, they (the Spaniards) and the other two
Englishmen, that is to say, the whole colony, resolved to go all
down to the place and see them; and did so, and Friday’s father
with them. When they came into the hut, there they sat, all bound;
for when they had brought them on shore they bound their hands that
they might not take the boat and make their escape; there, I say,
they sat, all of them stark naked. First, there were three comely
fellows, well shaped, with straight limbs, about thirty to thirty-