publicist.]

[Footnote 16: Thomas Gullock was the captain of the ship which Bradish
had run away with. Sir John Stanley was an official of the lord
chamberlain's office.]

[Your] Lordships will meet with a passe among the other papers, number
5, to Sion Arnold, one of the [pirat]es brought from Madagascar by
Shelley of New York, the said passe signed by Mr. Basse,[17]
[Go]vernor of East and West Jerzies, which is a bold step in Basse
after such positive orders as he received from [Govern]or[18] Vernon,
but I perceive plainly the meaning of it, he took severall Pirats at
Burlington [in West] Jerzey, and a good store of mony with them as it
is said, and I daresay he would be glad they [should] escape, for when
they are gone, who can witnesse what money he seized with them? I know
[the] man so well, that I verily believe that is his plot. John Carr
mentioned in some of the [papers to (?)] be in Rhode Island, No. 6,
was one of Hore's Crew. There are abundance of other Pyrats in that
[Is]land at this time, but they are out of my power. Mr. Brinley,[19]
Colonel Sanford, and Captain Coddington are honest men, and of the
best estates in the Island, and because they are heartily [wea]ry of
the male administrations of that Government, and because too I
commissioned them (by [virt]ue of the authority and power given me by
his Majesty's Commission and Instructions so to do) to [make] Inquiry
into the Irregularities of those people, they are become strangely
odious to them and [are o]ften affronted by them, neither will they
make them Justices of the peace; so that when they [w]ould commit
Pyrates to Goal, they are forced to go to the Governor for his
Warrant, and very ... ly the Pyrates get notice, and avoid the Warrant
for that time. You may please to o[bser]ve too that Gardiner the
Deputy Collector[20] is accused to have been once a Pyrat, in one of
the [paper]s. I doubt he will forswear himselfe rather than part with
Gillam's gold which is in his hands. [It is] impossible for me to
transmit to the Lords of the Treasury these proofs against Gardiner.
[I am] so jaded with writing, that I cannot write to them by this
Conveyance, but I could wish [your Lordships might be (?)] made
acquainted with Gardiner's Character, and that they would send over
honest In----t men to be Collectors of Rhode Island, Conecticut, and
New Hampshire; and that they [would h]asten Mr. Brenton[21] hither to
his post, or send some other Collector in his r