Finished The Buccaneers of America by John Esquemeling, from 1684.

This translation is probably the wildest one, translated from the Spanish version that freely added unsourced new material, but since "history" and "truth" and even "publishing" were very flexible words at the time, I figured this was as good a way to get a pirate's-eye view of the infamous Henry Morgan and Pirates of the Caribbean.

The writing is completely different than our method of writing today, and takes a little time to get used to. But there is a poetry and flow that becomes infectious, because it pays so little heed to what we nowadays deem important.

The narrative is not slavishly tied to being a sequential a blow by blow timeline of battles... rather, it flows around as the author's mind recalls details they want to insert into the story. Sometimes he will jump back or forward in the story, or wander off on a complete pages-long tangent, just to illustrate a detail in the current storyline.

It's fascinating, a fun read, and has some real gems in it.

And at the same time, leaves huge frustrating holes that our modern minds think, "How could he have left that bit of information out?!?" So you get glimpses and insights into the real life of a pirate on a sailing ship in the Caribbean (Spoiler Alert: They spent a lot of time on land.), interspersed with stories of amazing cunning and sneaky pirate tricks, and always winding up with the pirates on some desolate shore, under-provisioned, desperate for food and water, and then happening into riches of food and gold, and immediately using them all up.

It's hilarious and fascinating as a story, and also a really interesting experience to see how language has developed over the last 400 years. Definitely worth the time!