Bigelow was very guarded in his answers; so much so, indeed, as to give great dissatisfaction to his interrogators.  About the Peak he assumed an air of great mystery, and said none but birds could get on it; thunder was sometimes heard coming out of its cliffs, but man could not get up to see what the place contained.  This account was received with marked interest, and to Bigelow’s surprise, it did not appear to awaken the distrust he had secretly apprehended it might.  On the contrary, he was asked to repeat his account, and all who heard it, though a good deal embellished this time, appeared disposed to believe what he said.  Encouraged by this success, the poor fellow undertook to mystify a little concerning the Reef; but here he soon found himself met with plump denials.  In order to convince him that deception would be of no use, he was now taken a short distance and confronted with Waally!

Bigelow no sooner saw the dark countenance of the chief than he knew he was in bad hands.  From that moment, he abandoned all attempts at concealment, the condition of the Peak excepted, and had recourse to an opposite policy.  He now exaggerated everything; the number and force of the vessels, giving a long list of names that were accurate enough, though the fact was concealed that they mostly belonged to boats; and swelling the force of the colony to something more than two thousand fighting men.  The piratical commander, who went by the name of ’the admiral’ among his followers, was a good deal startled by this information, appealing to Waally to know whether it might be relied on for truth.  Waally could not say yes or no to this question.  He had heard that the colonists were much more numerous than they were formerly; but how many fighting men they could now muster was more than he could say.  He knew that they were enormously rich, and among other articles of value, possessed materials sufficient for fitting out as many ships as they pleased.  It was this last information that had brought the strangers to the group; for they were greatly in want of naval stores of almost all sorts.

The admiral did not deem it necessary to push his inquiries any further at that moment; apparently, he did not expect to find much at Rancocus Island, Waally having, most probably, let him into the secret of its uses.  The houses and mills were visited and plundered; a few hogs and one steer were shot; but luckily, most of the animals had been driven into a retired valley.  The saw-mill was set on fire in pure wantonness, and it was burned to the ground.  A new grist-mill escaped, merely because its position was not known.  A great deal of injury was inflicted on the settlement merely for the love of mischief, and a brick-kiln was actually blown up in order to enjoy the fun of seeing the bricks scattered in the air.  In short, the place was almost destroyed in one sense, though no attempt was made to injure Bigelow.  On the contrary, he was scarcely watched, and it was no sooner dark than he collected a crew, got into his own whale-boat, and came to windward to report what was going on to the governor.