for that she could not possibly have come out but they must have seen her. The Monday morning following, that is, on the 15th of March, the cutters were again dispatched to their old station, and our hopes were once more indulged in as sanguine prepossessions as before; but in a week's time our eagerness was greatly abated, and a general dejection and despondency took place in its room. It is true, there were some few amongst us who still kept up their spirits, and were very ingenious in finding out reasons to satisfy themselves that the disappointment we had hitherto met with had only been occasioned by a casual delay of the galeon, which a few days would remove, and not by a total suspension of her departure {234} for the whole season. But these speculations were not adopted by the generality of our people, for they were persuaded that the enemy had, by some accident, discovered our being upon the coast, and had therefore laid an embargo on the galeon till next year. And indeed this persuasion was but too well founded, for we afterwards learnt that our barge, when sent on the discovery of the port of Acapulco, had been seen from the shore, and that this circumstance (no embarkations but canoes ever frequenting that coast) was to them a sufficient proof of the neighbourhood of our squadron; on which they stopped the galeon till the succeeding year. The commodore himself, though he declared not his opinion, was yet in his own thoughts apprehensive that we were discovered, and that the departure of the galeon was put off; and he had, in consequence of this opinion, formed a plan for possessing himself of Acapulco, because he had no doubt but the treasure as yet remained in the town, even though the orders for dispatching of the galeon were countermanded. Indeed the place was too well defended to be carried by an open attempt, since, besides the garrison and the crew of the galeon, there were in it at least a thousand men well armed, who had marched thither as guards to the treasure, when it was brought down from the city of Mexico, for the roads thereabouts are so much infested either by independent Indians or fugitives that the Spaniards never trust the silver without an armed force to protect it. Besides, had the strength of the place been less considerable, and such as might not have appeared superior to the efforts of our squadron, yet a declared attack would have prevented us receiving any advantages from its success, for upon the first discovery of our squadron, all the treasure would have been ordered into the country, and in a few hours would have been out of our reach, so that our conquest would have been only a desolate town, where we should have found nothing that could in the least have countervailed the fatigue and hazard of the undertaking.