As he grew worse and worse, an old friend of his father’s persuaded him to seek employment upon the seas, and purchased him a berth as midshipman on a trading-craft bound from Liverpool to the West Indies. A few months of sea discipline shattered young Howard’s patience, and upon his arrival at Jamaica he promptly deserted his ship. He had still a few pounds left of his fortune, and with these he purchased admittance to the society of a gang of ruffians who frequented the beaches. One night, with some of these, he stole a canoe and went to the Grand Camanas to join a party of others of their ilk who lurked thereabouts with the design of going “on the account.” They soon fell in with those whom they sought, and, as the party now numbered twenty, they deemed themselves strong enough to set to their work, and accordingly began their preparations. At a council held the night when this decision was reached, the question of the election of officers came up; the men seemed about evenly divided in their choice of a captain between Howard and a tall islander named James. The latter was finally elected by a vote of ten to eight, while Howard was chosen quartermaster. Their first need was a boat; in the offing at anchor lay a turtle-sloop with two small swivels mounted fore and aft. She was the very craft for their purpose, but how were they to get her? Close inshore on the other side of an estuary a mile wide Howard remembered seeing a large canoe moored in the light of a patrol’s camp-fire. He and two others swam over to her, cut her line with their sheath-knives, and brought her away without discovery. The robbers then boarded her, and, with two men forward and two aft handling the paddles, the rest concealed behind the high bulwarks, stole out silently towards the turtle-vessel. The nature of their craft was not perceived until they were alongside their victim, when, with a yell, they burst from their concealment and made their capture without losing a man. They then started out for booty, but for a long time their only prizes were turtlers, which supplied them with men without increasing their wealth. After about two weeks they met an Irish brigantine with provisions and servants for the Governor of Jamaica. They laid her aboard, captured her without resistance, forced her men, and made off with her, leaving her master the old turtle-sloop and five men to bring him to port. Not long after this they surprised a sloop of six guns, and finding her larger, faster, and sounder than the brigantine, they shifted to her with their belongings. This was the third time within two months that they had changed their vessel, but still the game of “Progressive Piracy” went on. Off the coast of Virginia they fell in with a large New England brigantine laden with provisions and bound for Barbadoes. They made a prize of her, and shifting their own guns aboard of her, found themselves in a fine vessel of ten guns well equipped for a long voyage.