There
he led the life of a slave until he was of age, and then, being no
longer subject to ownership, he became one of the freest and most
independent persons who ever walked this earth.
He began his career on the island of Hispaniola, where he took up the
business of hunting and butchering cattle; but he very soon gave up this
life for that of a pirate, and enlisted as a common sailor on one of
their ships. Here he gave signs of such great ability as a brave and
unscrupulous scoundrel that one of the leading pirates on the island of
Tortuga gave him a ship and a crew, and set him up in business on his
own account. The piratical career of L'Olonnois was very much like that
of other buccaneers of the day, except that he was so abominably cruel
to the Spanish prisoners whom he captured that he gained a reputation
for vile humanity, surpassing that of any other rascal on the western
continent. When he captured a prisoner, it seemed to delight his soul as
much to torture and mutilate him before killing him as to take away
whatever valuables he possessed. His reputation for ingenious
wickedness spread all over the West Indies, so that the crews of Spanish
ships, attacked by this demon, would rather die on their decks or sink
to the bottom in their ships than be captured by L'Olonnois.
All the barbarities, the brutalities, and the fiendish ferocity which
have ever been attributed to the pirates of the world were united in the
character of this inhuman wretch, who does not appear to be so good an
example of the true pirate as Roc, the Brazilian.
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