It was now resolved to go between the islands of Porto Rico and St. Domingo for Cape Francois, therefore we lay-to that night.  In the morning, we made sail along shore; and about ten o’clock, as I was walking the quarter-deck, Captain Cheap came out of the cabin, and told me he had just seen a beef-barrel go by the ship, that he was sure it had but lately been thrown overboard, and that he would venture any wager we saw an English cruizer before long.  In about half an hour after, we saw two sail to leeward from, off the quarter-deck, for they kept no look-out from the mast-head, and we presently observed they were in chace of us.  The French and Spaniards on board now began to grow a good deal alarmed, when it fell stark calm, but not before the ships had neared us so much, that we plainly discerned them to be English men of war, the one a two-decker, the other a twenty-gun ship.  The French had now thoughts, when a breeze should spring up, of running the ship on shore upon Porto Rico; but when they came to consider what a set of banditti inhabited that island, and that in all probability they would have their throats cut for the sake of plundering the wreck, they were resolved to take their chance, and stand to the northward between the two islands.

In the evening, a fresh breeze sprung up, and we shaped a course accordingly.  The two ships had it presently afterwards, and neared us amazingly fast.  Now every body on board gave themselves up; the officers were busy in their cabins filling their pockets with what was most valuable; the men put on their best clothes, and many of them came to me with little lumps of gold, desiring I would take them, as they said they had much rather I should benefit by them, whom they were acquainted with, than those that chaced them.  I told them there was time enough, though I thought they were as surely taken as if the English had been already on board.  A fine moonlight night came on, and we expected every moment to see the ships alongside of us; but we saw nothing of them in the night, and to our great astonishment in the morning no ships were to be seen even from the mast-head.  Thus did these two cruizers lose one of the richest prizes by not chasing an hour or two longer.  There were near two millions of dollars on board, besides a valuable cargo.

On the eighth, at six in the morning, we were off Cape La Grange; and, what is very remarkable, the French at Cape Francois told us afterwards that was the only day they ever remembered since the war, that the cape had been without one or two English privateers cruising off it; and but the evening before two of them had taken two outward-bound St Domingo-men, and had gone with them for Jamaica, so that this ship might be justly esteemed a most lucky one.  In the afternoon we came to an anchor in Cape Francois harbour.

In this long run we had not buried a single man, nor do I remember that there was one sick the whole passage, but at this place many were taken ill, and three or four died, for there is no part of the West Indies more unhealthy than this; yet the country is beautiful, and extremely well cultivated.  After being here some time, the governor ordered us to wait upon him, which we did, when he took no more notice of us than if we had been his slaves, never asking us even to sit down.