People were so eager to invest their money that they swallowed almost any bait thrown to them. Hundreds of bubble companies hovered on the outskirts of the parent, among them one for settling the barren islands of Blanco and Sal Tortugas, another to colonise Santa Cruz, and a third to fit out vessels for the suppression of piracy. But perhaps the most absurd was "a company for carrying on an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is." Near their highest point the South Sea Shares were sold at £890, but so many wanted to sell at that price that they soon fell to £640. This put the directors again upon their mettle, and they set to work with fresh rumours and pushed them up to £1,000, from which they suddenly went down, with a few fluctuations, until utterly worthless. The treasurer of the Company ran away to France when the blow fell, but the directors were arrested and their estates ultimately confiscated. Thousands of people were ruined, and the public credit received a blow from which it took many years to recover. Meanwhile the South Sea Company had not been altogether idle. Besides the slave vessels they were entitled to send _one_ ship annually to the Carthagena and Porto Bello fairs, this being called the _Navio de permisso_. It was not to be larger than five hundred tons, yet the Company picked out the biggest they could find and filled it with goods, to the exclusion of food and water, which were carried in small store vessels that waited outside the harbour. This caused a great deal of dissatisfaction, as the English brought so much that they could under-sell the Spanish merchants in their own market. In 1715 the _Bedford_, nominally of six hundred tons, was seized at Carthagena on the ground that her burden was excessive. By the Spanish measurements the cargo was said to have amounted to 2,117-1/2 tons, and the excess was confiscated and ordered to be sold. However, the English protested, at the same time passing over some valuable presents to the authorities, with the result that a remeasurement was ordered, which made the amount only 460 tons.