The following anecdote shows what strange modifications of crime this species of slavery might occasionally produce. There was a rich inhabitant of Guadaloupe, whose father became so poor that he was obliged to sell himself as an _engagé_, and by a singular coincidence sold himself to a merchant who happened to be his son's agent. The poor fellow, finding himself his son's servant, thought himself well off, but soon found that he was treated as brutally as the rest. The son, finding the father was old and discontented, and therefore unable to do much work, and afraid to beat him for the sake of the scandal, sold him soon after to another planter, who treated him better, gave him more to eat, and eventually restored him to liberty. Of the ten thousand Scotch and Irish whom Cromwell sent to the West Indies, many became _engagés_, and finally Buccaneers. Many of the old Puritan soldiers, who had served in the same wars, were enrolled in the same ranks. The same principle of brotherhood applied to the planters as to the ordinary Buccaneers. They called each other _matelots_, and, before living together, signed a contract by which they agreed to share everything in common. Each had the power to dispose of his companion's money and goods, and an agreement signed by one bound the other also. If the one died, the survivor became the inheritor of the whole, in preference even to heirs who might come from Europe to claim the share or attempt to set up a claim. The engagement could be broken up whenever either wished it, and was often cancelled in a moment of petulance or of transitory vexation. A third person was sometimes admitted into the brotherhood on the same conditions. By this singular custom, friendships were formed as firm as those between a Highlander and his foster-brother, a Canadian trapper and his comerade, or an English sailor and his messmate.