Now Haines's remark that Captain Drummond, as he
heard, had turned pirate, looks very like a 'hedge' to be used in case
the 'Worcester' was proved to have attacked the 'Speedy Return.'
There was a great deal of preliminary sparring between the advocates
as to the propriety of the indictment. The jury of fifteen contained
five local skippers. Most of the others were traders. One of them,
William Blackwood, was of a family that had been very active in the
Darien affair. Captain Green had no better chance with these men than
James Stewart of the Glens in face of a jury of Campbells. The first
witness, Ferdinando, the black sea cook, deponed that he saw Green's
sloop take a ship under English colours, and that Green, his mate,
Madder, and others, killed the crew of the captured vessel with
hatchets. Ferdinando's coat was part of the spoil, and was said to be
of Scottish cloth. Charles May, surgeon of the 'Worcester,' being on
shore, heard firing at sea, and, later, dressed a wound, a gunshot he
believed, on the arm of the black cook; dressed wounds, also, of two
sailors, of the 'Worcester,' Mackay and Cuming--Scots obviously, by
their names.
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