“A rival expedition sailed at the same time and for the same purpose from the Thames, under David Cartel, to whom the Queen had also given a ship. Cartel had three vessels, the _Minion_, Elizabeth’s present; the _John the Baptist_, and the _Merlin_. The _Merlin_ had bad luck; she had the powder on board for the nigger hunt, fire got into the magazine, and she was blown to pieces. Cartel, therefore, for a time attached himself with his two remaining ships to Hawkins, and the six vessels ran south together. Passing Teneriffe on the 29th of November, they touched first at the Cape Verde Islands, where the natives being very gentle and loving, and more civil than any other, it was proposed to take in a store of them. But the two commanders could not agree; Hawkins claimed the lion’s share of the spoil, and when they quarrelled, the _Minion’s_ men, being jealous, gave the islanders to understand what was intended to be done with them, so that they avoided the snares laid for them.”[130] [Sidenote: They differ, and separate.] [Sidenote: 1565, Hawkins reaches the West Indies with four hundred slaves, whom he sells to much advantage,] Hawkins and Cartel then parted company, the former shaping his course for the coast beyond the Rio Grande, and filling up, as he proceeded, the hold of his ship with negroes, whom he had entrapped among the rivers and islands. Between purchases from the Portuguese, who were the first to establish factories and barracoons on these coasts, and the spoils made by his own desperate crews, Hawkins in a few weeks had collected on board of his ships no less than four hundred slaves, with whom he shaped his course for the West Indies, and came to an anchor close to the tower of Barbaratto. Finding that the interdict had arrived from the king of Spain forbidding the colonists, under pain of death, to admit any foreign vessels at any of the Spanish possessions, or have any dealings with them, Hawkins was entreated to leave. But he was not the man to be thwarted in his object whenever he felt that he had power to enforce it. Under the pretence that his ship was in distress and required refitting, he intimated that if he was refused the necessary supplies he should be obliged to send his men on shore to take them. The menace produced its effect by affording the governor a pretext for yielding and allowing the inhabitants to purchase the negroes, for whose services there was a rapidly increasing demand. In a few days half the cargo was disposed of, when Hawkins proceeded with the rest to the Rio de la Hacha, where he disposed of them to great advantage, in defiance of the king’s interdict, and the remonstrances of the governor. [Sidenote: and sails for England.]