Among my first enquiries was into the condition of other English prisoners at this place. I learnt from Lieutenant Sergeantson and his men, who were here before us, that most of them had adopted the religion of the country, had been christened, and were dispersed among the convents of the city. The first of these I met had his catechism in one hand, and a large string of beads dangling in the other. I smiled, and asked him how he liked it? He said, very well; for having a religion to chuse, he thought theirs better than none, especially as it brought him good meat and drink, and a quiet life. Many of Shelvocke's men followed this example, and I may venture to say, that most of them had the same substantial reason for their conversion. It is here reckoned very meritorious to make a convert, and many arguments were used for that purpose, but no rigorous measures were used to bring any one over to their way of thinking. Those who consented to be baptized, generally had some of the merchants of Lima for their patrons and god-fathers, who never failed to give them a good suit of clothes, and some money to drink their healths. About this time four or five of Clipperton's men had leave from the convents where they resided, to meet together at a public-house kept by one John Bell, an Englishman, who had a negro wife, who had been made free for some service or other. The purpose of this meeting was merely to confirm their new baptism over a bowl of punch; but they all got drunk and quarrelled, and, forgetting they were true catholics, they demolished the image of some honest saint that stood in a corner, mistaking him for one of their companions. Missing them for a few days, I enquired at Bell what was become of them, when he told me they were all in the Inquisition; for the thing having taken air, he was obliged to go himself to complain of their behaviour, but he got them released a few days after, when they had time to repent and get sober in the dungeons of the holy office. Bell said, if these men had remained heretics, their drunken exploit had not come within the verge of the ecclesiastical power; but as they were novices, they were the easier pardoned, their outrages on the saint being attributed to the liquor, and not to any designed affront to the catholic faith, or a relapse into heresy.