In some respects this plan worked very well,
although when the buccaneers did happen to pounce upon one of these
richly laden vessels, in such numbers and with such swift ferocity, that
they were able to capture it, they rejoiced over a prize far more
valuable than anything the pirate soul had ever dreamed of before. But
it was not often that one of these great ships was taken, and for a time
the results of Spanish robbery and cruelty were safely carried to Spain.
But it was very hard to get the better of the buccaneers; their lives
and their fortunes depended upon this boom, and if in one way they could
not get the gold out of the Spaniards, which the latter got out of the
natives, they would try another. When the miners in the gold fields find
they can no longer wash out with their pans a paying quantity of the
precious metal, they go to work on the rocks and break them into pieces
and crush them into dust; so, when the buccaneers found it did not pay
to devote themselves to capturing Spanish gold on its transit across the
ocean, many of them changed their methods of operation and boldly
planned to seize the treasures of their enemy before it was put upon the
ships.
Consequently, the buccaneers formed themselves into larger bodies
commanded by noted leaders, and made attacks upon the Spanish
settlements and towns.
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