{"product_id":"2940013684614","title":"Tales of Pirates and Blue Water","description":"When the great wars of the Spanish Succession had been brought to an end\u003cbr\u003eby the Treaty of Utrecht, the vast number of privateers which had been\u003cbr\u003efitted out by the contending parties found their occupation gone. Some\u003cbr\u003etook to the more peaceful but less lucrative ways of ordinary commerce,\u003cbr\u003eothers were absorbed into the fishing-fleets, and a few of the more\u003cbr\u003ereckless hoisted the Jolly Roger at the mizzen and the bloody flag at\u003cbr\u003ethe main, declaring a private war upon their own account against the\u003cbr\u003ewhole human race.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith mixed crews, recruited from every nation, they scoured the seas,\u003cbr\u003edisappearing occasionally to careen in some lonely inlet, or putting in\u003cbr\u003efor a debauch at some outlying port, where they dazzled the inhabitants\u003cbr\u003eby their lavishness and horrified them by their brutalities.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn the Coromandel Coast, at Madagascar, in the African waters, and above\u003cbr\u003eall in the West Indian and American seas, the pirates were a constant\u003cbr\u003emenace; With an insolent luxury they would regulate their depredations\u003cbr\u003eby the comfort of the seasons, harrying New England in the summer and\u003cbr\u003edropping south again to the tropical islands in the winter.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey were the more to be dreaded because they had none of that\u003cbr\u003ediscipline and restraint which made their predecessors, the Buccaneers,\u003cbr\u003eboth formidable and respectable. These Ishmaels of the sea rendered an\u003cbr\u003eaccount to no man, and treated their prisoners according to the drunken\u003cbr\u003ewhim of the moment. Flashes of grotesque generosity alternated with\u003cbr\u003elonger stretches of inconceivable ferocity, and the skipper who fell\u003cbr\u003einto their hands might find himself dismissed with his cargo, after\u003cbr\u003eserving as boon companion in some hideous debauch, or might sit at his\u003cbr\u003ecabin table with his own nose and his lips served up with pepper and\u003cbr\u003esalt in front of him. It took a stout seaman in those days to ply his\u003cbr\u003ecalling in the Caribbean Gulf.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSuch a man was Captain John Scarrow, of the ship _Morning Star_, and yet\u003cbr\u003ehe breathed a long sigh of relief when he heard the splash of the\u003cbr\u003efalling anchor and swung at his moorings within a hundred yards of the\u003cbr\u003eguns of the citadel of Basseterre. St. Kitt's was his final port of\u003cbr\u003ecall, and early next morning his bowsprit would be pointed for Old\u003cbr\u003eEngland. He had had enough of those robber-haunted seas. Ever since he\u003cbr\u003ehad left Maracaibo upon the Main, with his full lading of sugar and red\u003cbr\u003epepper, he had winced at every topsail which glimmered over the violet\u003cbr\u003eedge of the tropical sea. He had coasted up the Windward Islands,\u003cbr\u003etouching here and there, and assailed continually by stories of villainy\u003cbr\u003eand outrage.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCaptain Sharkey, of the 20-gun pirate barque, _Happy Delivery_, had passed\u003cbr\u003edown the coast, and had littered it with gutted vessels and with\u003cbr\u003emurdered men. Dreadful anecdotes were current of his grim pleasantries\u003cbr\u003eand of his inflexible ferocity. From the Bahamas to the Main his\u003cbr\u003ecoal-black barque, with the ambiguous name, had been freighted with\u003cbr\u003edeath and many things which are worse than death. So nervous was Captain\u003cbr\u003eScarrow, with his new full-rigged ship and her full and valuable lading,\u003cbr\u003ethat he struck out to the west as far as Bird's Island to be out of the\u003cbr\u003eusual track of commerce. And yet even in those solitary waters he had\u003cbr\u003ebeen unable to shake off sinister traces of Captain Sharkey.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOne morning they had raised a single skiff adrift upon the face of the\u003cbr\u003eocean. Its only occupant was a delirious seaman, who yelled hoarsely as\u003cbr\u003ethey hoisted him aboard, and showed a dried-up tongue like a black and\u003cbr\u003ewrinkled fungus at the back of his mouth. Water and nursing soon\u003cbr\u003etransformed him into the strongest and smartest sailor on the ship. He\u003cbr\u003ewas from Marblehead, in New England, it seemed, and was the sole\u003cbr\u003esurvivor of a schooner which had been scuttled by the dreadful Sharkey.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor a week Hiram Evanson, for that was his name, had been adrift beneath\u003cbr\u003ea tropical sun. Sharkey had ordered the mangled remains of his late\u003cbr\u003ecaptain to be thrown into the boat, \"as provisions for the voyage,\" but\u003cbr\u003ethe seaman had at once committed them to the deep, lest the temptation\u003cbr\u003eshould be more than he could bear. He had lived upon his own huge frame,\u003cbr\u003euntil, at the last moment, the _Morning Star_ had found him in that\u003cbr\u003emadness which is the precursor of such a death. It was no bad find for\u003cbr\u003eCaptain Scarrow, for, with a short-handed crew, such a seaman as this\u003cbr\u003ebig New Englander was a prize worth having. He vowed that he was the\u003cbr\u003eonly man whom Captain Sharkey had ever placed under an obligation.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNow that they lay under the guns of Basseterre, all danger from the\u003cbr\u003epirate was at an end, and yet the thought of him lay heavily upon the\u003cbr\u003eseaman's mind as he watched the agent's boat shooting out from the\u003cbr\u003ecustom-house quay.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47070199906544,"sku":"2940013684614","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013684614_p0.jpg?v=1763583932","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013684614","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}