factories in India. On application of the East India Company,
proclamations were issued on 17th July, 10th and 21st August 1696, by
the Lords Justices of England, declaring Avery and his crew pirates and
offering a reward for their apprehension.[531] Five of the crew were
seized on their return to England in the autumn of the same year, were
tried at the Old Bailey and hanged, and several of their companions were
arrested later.[532]

In the North American colonies these new pirates still continued to find
encouragement and protection. Carolina had long had an evil reputation
as a hot-bed of piracy, and deservedly so. The proprietors had removed
one governor after another for harbouring the freebooters, but with
little result. In the Bahamas, which belonged to the same proprietors,
the evil was even more flagrant. Governor Markham of the Quaker colony
of Pennsylvania allowed the pirates to dispose of their goods and to
refit upon the banks of the Delaware, and William Penn, the proprietor,
showed little disposition to reprimand or remove him. Governor Fletcher
of New York was in open alliance with the outlaws, accepted their gifts
and allowed them to parade the streets in broad daylight. The merchants
of New York, as well as those of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, who
were prevented by the Navigation Laws from engaging in legitimate trade
with other nations, welcomed the appearance of the pirate ships laden
with goods from the East, provided a ready market for their cargoes, and
encouraged them to repeat their voyages.

In 1699 an Act was passed through Parliament of such severity as to
drive many of the outlaws from American waters. It was largely a revival
of the Act of 28, Henry VIII., was in force for seven years, and was
twice renewed. The war of the Spanish Succession, moreover, gave many
men of piratical inclinations an opportunity of sailing under lawful
commissions as privateers against the French and Spaniards. In this long
war, too, the French filibusters were especially numerous and active. In
1706 there were 1200 or 1300 who made their headquarters in Martinique
alone.[533] While keeping the French islands supplied with provisions
and merchandise captured in their prizes, they were a serious
discouragement to English commerce in those regions, especially to the
trade with the North American colonies. Occasionally they threatened the
coasts of Virginia and New England, and some combined with their West
In