In consequence Admiral don Fernando de Toledo, whom the court of Madrid had placed at the head of a powerful fleet, sent in 1630 to Brazil to fight the Dutch, received orders to destroy in passing, the viper's nest formed by the filibusters at St. Kitts. The sudden apparition of this immense force off the island filled the inhabitants with stupor. The united resources of the English and French adventurers and their desperate courage were not sufficient to avert the danger that menaced them, and repulse so formidable an attack. After a desperate fight, in which a great number of filibusters, especially Frenchmen, were killed, the others got into their light canoes and fled to the adjacent isles of St. Bartholomew, Antigua, St. Martin, and Montserrat, or to any place in short where they hoped to find a temporary refuge. The English, we are unfortunately compelled to state, shamefully fled at the beginning of the action, and eventually asked leave to capitulate. One half of them were sent to England on board Spanish ships, while the rest engaged to evacuate the island as soon as possible,--a promise which was forgotten immediately after the departure of the Spanish fleet. This expedition was the only one that Spain seriously attempted against the filibusters. The French soon left the islands where they had sought refuge, and returned to St. Kitts, where they re-established themselves, though not without a quarrel with the English, who had taken advantage of the opportunity to seize their land, but whom they forced again beyond their old borders. It is a singular fact, which proves that the filibusters were not bandits and nameless men, as attempts have been made to brand them, that the inhabitants of St. Kitts were remarkable beyond all the other colonists for the gentleness and urbanity of their manners; the traditions of politeness left by the first Frenchmen who settled there, have been maintained even to the present day; in the eighteenth century it was called the Gentle Island, and there is a proverb in the Antilles to the effect, that "the nobility were at St. Kitts, the citizens at Guadeloupe, the soldiers at Martinique, and the peasants at Grenada." Things remained for a long time in the state we have just described; the filibusters, growing bolder and bolder through the Spanish cowardice, enlarged the scene of their exploits, and retaining a bitter memory of the sack of their island, felt a double hatred for the Spaniards, who had branded them with the name of Ladrones (robbers). They no longer displayed any moderation, and seated in the light canoes that composed their entire fleet, they watched for the rich transports from Mexico, dashed boldly aboard them, carried them, and returned to St. Kitts loaded with plunder. The colony prospered, the land was well cultivated, and the plantations were carefully made.