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Although he had nothing whatever to do with the American Navy, or the crews of privateers captured by the British, yet he exerted himself in every way open to him to endeavor to obtain their exchange, or, at least, a mitigation of their sufferings, and this in spite of the immense weight of cares and anxieties that devolved upon him in his conduct of the war.
Tattersall's, therefore, is not without its privateers. Many persons of rank and character patronize sporting, from a patriotic but mistaken notion, that it is to the turf alone the excellence of the English horse is attributable.
My Dear General, The number of small frigates and privateers that are in the bay, made it impossible for me to carry the detachment farther down than Annapolis, and I have requested the Governor of Maryland as well as the principal officers of the detachment, to give out that we are going to join General Greene; but the object of the expedition is so perfectly well known every where, that our sole dependence to keep Arnold must be upon the apprehension he has of a French fleet being cruizing off the capes.
To France it became a haven for privateers, the bane of England's commerce in the Channel and the North Sea. As the French sea power waned, England in treaty after treaty exacted the dismantling of the works of Dunkirk, which it may be said in passing was the home port of the celebrated Jean Bart and other great French privateersmen.
Near this there was formerly a pretty town with a handsome church, but it has been mostly destroyed by the privateers. There is good anchorage opposite this town a mile from the shore, in sixteen to eighteen fathoms on soft ooze. At the N.N.W. end is a small town called Tabogilla, and on the N.E. of this another small town or village without a name.
After commenting on this act of the British Parliament, he quotes the words of Blackstone, who, after stating the nature of these smuggling policies, and dwelling upon their immorality and pernicious tendency, refers to the law above mentioned, which enacts "that they shall be totally null and void, except as to policies on privateers in the Spanish and Portuguese trade, for reasons sufficiently obvious."
Extraordinary as were the successes of the Yankee privateers, it was a game of give-and-take, a weapon which cut both ways, and the temptation is to extol their audacious achievements while glossing over the heavy losses which their own merchant marine suffered.
Privateers had not troubled the peace of the Caribbean Sea, or dangerous heretics menaced the Catholic faith there. Inquisitors might have been suspicious, but the Inquisition had not yet been established beyond the Atlantic. The Queen of England was his sovereign's sister-in-law, and the Governor saw no reason why he should construe his general instructions too literally.
The difference was made up by the "situados," or remittances in cash from Mexico, which began early in the seventeenth century, when the repeated attacks on the island by French and English privateers forced the Spanish Government to choose between losing the island or fortifying it.
The boats had boarded from the shore side. Two of them lay alongside each of the privateers, and the crews could be seen climbing up by the chains and leaping down upon the decks. "They deserve to be taken," the captain said. "They have not even triced up their boarding nets."
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