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It is certain that the British soldiers were no match for Cudjoe the dwarf. Retreating warily before them, he drew them into many an ambush in the wild defiles of the mountains, where they were cut down like sheep, the waters of the “Pot” being often reddened with their blood. From many of the expeditions sent against him only a few weary and wounded survivors returned, and it became difficult to induce the soldiers to venture into that den of death.

At length a British officer succeeded in dragging two mountain howitzers up the cliffs to a position from which Nanny Town, the inaccessible Maroon stronghold, could be shelled. When the shells, hurled from the distant cannon, began to burst among them, the Maroons were at first so filled with terror that some of them threw themselves over the cliffs, but the bulk of them merely scattered and let the howitzers do their work among empty walls.

Cudjoe was astonished at the bursting shells, but he was too old a bird to be frightened. “Dis a new way de buckra man got to fight,” he said. “He fire big ball arter you, and den de big ball fire little ones arter you. Dat’s berry cunnin’, but ole Cudjoe know somethin’ better un dat.”

Leading his men through the woods with the stealthy tread and noiseless skill of the American Indians, the dwarf and his Maroons suddenly burst upon the unwary soldiers from the rear while they were busy about their guns, delivering a telling volley and then rushing upon them with blade and axe. Few of the whites escaped this ferocious onset, and the shell-delivering howitzers remained in Cudjoe’s hands.

Despairing of conquering the forest-born Maroons by the arts of civilized warfare, the British were driven to try a new method. In 1737 they brought from the Mosquito coast a number of Indians, who were fully the equal of the negroes in bush fighting. These were launched upon the track of the Maroons and soon ran them down in their mountain fastnesses. From Nanny Town the seat of war shifted to another quarter of the island, but at length the Maroons, finding their new foes fully their match in their own methods, consented to sign a treaty of peace with the whites, though only on the terms that they should retain their full freedom.

The treaty was made in 1738 at Trelawney Town, the Maroons being represented by Captains Cudjoe, Accompong, Johnny, Cuffee, and Quaco, and a number of their followers, “who have been in a state of war and hostility for several years past against our sovereign lord the king and the inhabitants of this island.”

By the terms of the treaty the Maroons were to retain their liberty forever, to be granted a large tract of land in the mountains, and to enjoy full freedom of trade with the whites. On their part they agreed to keep peace with the whites, to return all runaway slaves who should come among them, and to aid the whites in putting down the rebellion and in fighting any foreign invader.

In 1760 their promise to aid the whites against local outbreaks was put to the test when the fierce Koromantyn negroes broke out in rebellion and committed fearful atrocities. A party of Maroons joined the whites and seemed very zealous in their cause, ranging the woods and bringing in a large number of ears, which they said they had cut from the heads of rebels killed by them. It afterwards was found that the ears had been obtained from the negroes who had been slain by the troops and left where they fell.

The Maroons remained unmolested until 1795, not without outbreaks on their part and depredations on the settlements. In the year named two of them were caught stealing pigs, and were sent to the workhouse and given thirty-nine lashes on the bare back. When set free they went home in a fury, and told a pitiful tale of the disgrace they had suffered, being whipped by the black driver of the workhouse in the presence of felon slaves. The story roused the blood of all their fellows, who felt that they had been outraged by this insult to two of their kindred, and a revolt broke out that spread rapidly throughout the mountains.