head, resolving to throw themselves into the sea rather than be mangled with knives and murdered as the captain and mate, etc., had been.  Those who were below, not knowing what to do, or whose turn it should be next, lay still in their hammocks expecting death every moment, and not daring to stir lest the villains should think they did it in order to make resistance, which however they were in no way capable of doing, having no concert one with another, not knowing anything in particular of one another, as who was alive or who was dead.  Had the captain, who was himself a bold and stout man, been in his great cabin with three or four men with him, and his fire-arms, as he intended to have had, those eight fellows had never been able to have done their work.  But every man was taken unprovided, and in the utmost surprise, so that the murderers met with no resistance; and as for those what were left, they were less able to make resistance than the other, so that, as has been said, they were in the utmost terror and amazement, expecting every minute to be murdered as the rest had been.

But the villains had done.  The persons who had any command were dispatched, so they cooled a little as to blood.  The first thing they did afterwards, was to call up all the eight upon the quarter deck, where they congratulated one another, and shook hands together, engaging to proceed by joint consent in their resolved design, that is, of turning pirates.  In older to which, they unanimously chose Gow to command the ship, promising all subjection and obedience to his orders, so that we must now call him Captain Gow, and he, by the same consent of the rest, named Williams his lieutenant.  Other officers they appointed afterwards.

The first orders they issued was to let all the rest of the men know that if they continued quiet and offered not to meddle with any of their affairs, they should receive no hurt, but chiefly forbade any man to set a foot abaft the main mast, except they were called to the helm, upon pain of being immediately cut to pieces, keeping for that purpose one man at the steerage door, and one upon the quarter deck with drawn cutlasses in their hands.  But there was no need for it, for the men were so terrified with the bloody doings they had seen, that they never offered to come in sight until they were called.

Their next work was to throw overboard the three dead bodies of the mate, the surgeon, and the super-cargo, which they said lay in their way; that was soon done, their pockets being first searched and rifled.  From thence they went to work with the great cabin and with all the lockers, chests, boxes and trunks.  These they broke open and rifled, that is, such of them as belonged to the murdered persons, and whatever they found there they shared among themselves.  When they had done this, they called for liquor, and sat down to drinking until morning, leaving the men, as above, to keep guard, and particularly to guard the arms, but relieved them from time to time as they saw occasion.