The word _Flibustier_ is derived from the Dutch _Vlieboot_, fly-boat, swift boat, a kind of small craft whose sailing qualities were superior to those of the other vessels then in vogue. It is possible that the English made freebooter[9] out of the French adaptation. The fly-boat was originally only a long, light pinnace[10] or cutter with oars, fitted also to carry sail; we often find the word used by the French writers to designate vessels which brought important intelligence. They were favorite craft with the _Flibustiers_, not from their swiftness alone, but from their ease of management, and capacity to run up the creeks and river-openings, and to lie concealed. From these they boarded the larger vessels, to plunder or to use them for prolonged freebooting expeditions. The _Flibustier_, then, was a sea-hunter or pirate, as the Buccaneer was a land-hunter, but ready also for pillaging expeditions, in which they cooeperated. And their pursuits were interchangeable: the Buccaneer sometimes went to sea, and the _Flibustier_, in times of marine scarcity, would don the hog-skin breeches, and run down cows or hunt fugitive negroes with packs of dogs. The Buccaneers, however, slowly acquired a tendency to settle, while the _Flibustiers_ preferred to keep the seas, till Europe began to look them up too sharply; so that the former became, eventually, the agricultural nucleus of the western part of San Domingo, when the supply of wild cattle began to fail. This failure happened partly in consequence of their own extravagant hunting-habits, and partly through the agency of the Spaniards of the eastern colony, who thought that by slaughtering the cattle their French neighbors would be driven, for lack of employment, from the soil.