When every thing was ready for their departure, Captain Betagh, whose turn it was to relieve the marine officer in the Mercury, being unwilling to go, went among our people with a terrified countenance, saying, that he and those with him in the Mercury were going to be sacrificed.  Hearing this, I addressed my ship’s company, telling them I could not conceive what this pestilent fellow meant by making such an uproar.  I appealed to them all, if it had not been customary to relieve the officers in this manner, ever since we had this vessel in company, and asked them if ever they knew me select any man for going upon an enterprise, and had not, on the contrary, left it always to their own choice to go on any particular service out of the ship.  I then desired to know who among them were of Betagh’s opinion?  Upon this, they all declared with one voice, that they had never entertained any such opinion; but, on the contrary, that I should always find them obedient to my commands.  In the next place, I ordered the Mercury along side, and acquainted her crew with the speech Betagh had made in the Speedwell, and desired to know if any of them were apprehensive of being sold or sacrificed.  At this they all set up a loud huzza, and requested they might go on the intended cruize in the Mercury.  Accordingly Hately and Betagh went on board that bark, and put off from us, giving us three cheers, and stood right in for the land.

It may be proper to take some notice of the proceedings of the Mercury after she left me, as I have been informed from some of themselves and some prisoners.  The very next day they took a small bark laden with rice, chocolate, wheat, flour, and the like; and the day following, another.  On the 4th day, they took a ship of near 200 tons, in which were 150,000 dollars.  Flushed with this success, Betagh prevailed upon Hately, and most of the people in the Mercury, not to rejoin me, saying, they had now enough to appear like gentlemen as long as they lived, but it would be a mere nothing when the owner’s part was taken out, and the rest divided into 500 shares.  He therefore thought, since fortune had been so kind to them, they ought to make the best of their way to India, as they had sufficient provisions and all other requisites for the voyage, and Captain.  Hately was well able to conduct them to some port in the East Indies.  This plan was accordingly resolved on, and they fell to leeward of the place of rendezvous.  But, weighing with himself the prodigious extent of the run, and its many hazards, and well knowing the treatment he might expect in India, if his treachery were discovered, Captain Hately became irresolute, and could not determine what was best to be done, so that he kept hovering on the coast.  In the mean time, some of his crew went away in his boat to surrender themselves to the enemy, rather than be concerned in such a piratical undertaking.  Betagh and his accomplices still kept Hately warm with liquor, and at length brought