interests of Great Britain. Of all
the nations of Europe the Spaniards were those who profited least from
their American possessions. It was the English, the French and the Dutch
who carried their merchandize to Cadiz and freighted the
Spanish-American fleets, and who at the return of these fleets from
Porto Bello and Vera Cruz appropriated the greater part of the gold,
silver and precious stuffs which composed their cargoes. And when the
buccaneers cut off a Spanish galleon, or wrecked the Spanish cities on
the Main, it was not so much the Spaniards who suffered as the foreign
merchants interested in the trade between Spain and her colonies. If the
policy of the English and French Governments toward the buccaneers
gradually changed from one of connivance or encouragement to one of
hostility and suppression, it was because they came to realise that it
was easier and more profitable to absorb the trade and riches of Spanish
America through the peaceful agencies of treaty and concession, than by
endeavouring to enforce a trade in the old-fashioned way inaugurated by
Drake and his Elizabethan contemporaries.

The pirate successors of the buccaneers were distinguished from their
predecessors mainly by the fact that they preyed on the commerce of all
flags indiscriminately, and were outlawed and hunted down by all nations
alike. They, moreover, widely extended their field of operations. No
longer content with the West Indies and the shores of the Caribbean Sea,
they sailed east to the coast of Guinea and around Africa to the Indian
Ocean. They haunted the shores of Madagascar, the Red Sea and the
Persian Gulf, and ventured even as far as the Malabar Coast,
intercepting the rich trade with the East, the great ships from Bengal
and the Islands of Spice. And not only did the outlaws of all nations
from America and the West Indies flock to these regions, but sailors
from England were fired by reports of the rich spoils obtained to
imitate their example. One of the most remarkable instances was that of
Captain Henry Avery, _alias_ Bridgman. In May 1694 Avery was on an
English merchantman, the "Charles II.," lying near Corunna. He persuaded
the crew to mutiny, set the captain on shore, re-christened the ship the
"Fancy," and sailed to the East Indies. Among other prizes he captured,
in September 1695, a large vessel called the "Gunsway," belonging to the
Great Mogul--an exploit which led to reprisals and the seizure of the
English