In spite of the ease with which Willoughby established his authority, the Barbadians were not undivided. There was a Parliamentary party among them. Some of the leaders of this section of the inhabitants thought it more prudent to desert the island on the arrival of Lord Willoughby. They had taken refuge in England, and had promised the Parliament support if it could send out a force for the conquest of the island. Several of them accompanied Ayscue. Sir George did not proceed at once to the West Indies, but began his campaign by a cruise on the coasts of Spain and Portugal. It was hoped that before crossing the Atlantic he might do something towards the final suppression of Prince Rupert. But Rupert had by this time given up even the appearance of struggling with the Parliament's navy, and had gone farther to the south. After searching in vain for an enemy who eluded him, Ayscue went on to discharge the second part of his mission. It is possible that he did not wish to reach the West Indies during the hurricane months of July, August, and September. In October that danger is considered to be over. On the 16th of October he appeared off Carlisle Bay, on the western side of Barbadoes. There were several Dutch and some English ships at anchor, and these Ayscue seized, on the ground that they were trading with the enemies of the Parliament. Then he summoned Lord Willoughby to surrender. The Royalist governor made a stout answer, and the planters appeared for a time to be ready to support him. But in truth, as the result showed, they were not prepared to risk much for the cause. Ayscue established a blockade of the island, and put an entire stop to its trade. This threatened the planters with ruin, and a large party among them were soon converted to a conviction of the necessity of bringing Lord Willoughby to reason. A very active leader of this section of the inhabitants was a certain Thomas Modyford, colonel of one of the regiments of colonial militia, a man who had a very strange and varied career to run in the West Indies before he died. He had fought for the king in England, and was a new-comer in Barbadoes, where he had landed only in 1647, but he had brought with him the means of buying a plantation, and now he was not inclined to risk his possessions in the apparently desperate cause of his master's son. He therefore made his peace with Ayscue, and gave the Parliamentary leader assurances of support. Ayscue had but few soldiers with him, and would probably not have risked the landing unless he had been sure of help. In December, two months after his arrival, he received what he had the art to represent as a reinforcement. The West Indian Islands were commonly supplied with food for themselves and their slaves from Virginia. The ships bringing these stores arrived in the month of December. Trading fleets at that time, when the New World swarmed with pirates, preferred to sail together, for the sake of mutual protection.