The Spaniards urged that they could not tolerate that an asylum should be offered, to all who chose to desert from the plantations.

The boys saw the justice of this, and finally it was arranged that the case of every slave who made for the forest should be investigated; that the owners should, themselves, come to lay a formal complaint of their case; that the slave should reply; and each might produce witnesses.

The negro was to be given up, unless he could prove that he had been treated with gross cruelty, in which case he was to be allowed protection in the forest.
These preliminaries settled, a short document embodying them was drawn up, in duplicate, and these treaties were signed, by the three Spaniards who formed the deputation and by the governor on the one side, and by the four representatives of the forest men on the other.
Thus ended the first successful resistance, to Spanish power, among the islands of the western seas.
The governor and his son then left for the city, and the forest men retired to what was now their country.

Ned and Gerald impressed upon their allies the importance of observing, strictly, the conditions of peace; and at the same time of continuing their exercises in arms, and maintaining their discipline.

They pointed out to them that a treaty of this kind, extorted as it were from one, and that the strongest of the contracting powers, was certain not to have long duration.