The ship was of 200 tons,
twenty guns, thirty-six men, and the value of the cargo was but
1,000_l._ Really, things do not look very well for the enterprise of
Captain Green! There was also found a suspicious letter to one of the
crew, Reynolds, from his sister-in-law, advising him to confess, and
referring to a letter of his own in which he said that some of the
crew 'had basely confessed.' The lady's letter and a copy of
Reynolds's, admitted by him to be correct, were before the Court.
Again, James Wilkie, tailor, had tried at Bruntisland to 'pump' Haines
about Captain Drummond; Haines swore profane, but later said that he
heard Drummond had turned pirate, and that off the coast of Malabar
they had manned their sloop, lest Drummond, whom they believed to be
on that coast, should attack them. Other witnesses corroborated
Wilkie, and had heard Haines say that it was a wonder the ground did
not open and swallow them for the wickedness 'that had been committed
during the last voyage on board of that old [I omit a nautical term of
endearment] _Bess_.' Some one telling Haines that the mate's uncle
had been 'burned in oil' for trying to burn Dutch ships at Amsterdam,
'the said George Haines did tell the deponent that if what Captain
Madder [the mate] had done during his last voyage were known, he
deserved as much as his uncle had met with.
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