trious for the genius
and virtues of a Hannibal and the profound philosophy of St. Augustine,
there grew up some of the most terrible despotisms ever known to the
world. The things done daily by the robber sovereigns were such as to
make a civilized imagination recoil with horror. One of these cheerful
creatures, who reigned in the middle of the eighteenth century, and was
called Muley Abdallah, especially prided himself on his peculiar skill
in mounting a horse. Resting his left hand upon the horse's neck, as he
sprang into the saddle he simultaneously swung the sharp scimiter in his
right hand so deftly as to cut off the head of the groom who held the
bridle. From his behaviour in these sportive moods one may judge what he
was capable of on serious occasions. He was a fair sample of the Barbary
monarchs. The foreign policy of these wretches was summed up in piracy
and blackmail. Their corsairs swept the Mediterranean and ventured far
out upon the ocean, capturing merchant vessels, and murdering or
enslaving their crews. Of the rich booty, a fixed proportion was paid
over to the robber sovereign, and the rest was divided among the gang.
So lucrative was this business that it attracted hardy ruffians from
all parts of Europe, and the misery they inflicted upon mankind during
four centuries was beyond calculation. One of their favourite practices
was the kidnapping of eminent or wealthy persons, in the hope of
extorting ransom. Cervantes and Vincent de Paul were among the
celebrated men who thus tasted the horrors of Moorish slavery; but it
was a calamity that might fall to the lot of any man, or woman, and it
was but rarely that the victims ever regained their freedom.

[Sidenote: American citizens kidnapped.]

Against these pirates the governments of Europe contended in vain. Swift
cruisers frequently captured their ships, and from the days of Joan of
Arc down to the days of Napoleon their skeletons swung from long rows of
gibbets on all the coasts of Europe, as a terror and a warning. But
their losses were easily repaired, and sometimes they cruised in fleets
of seventy or eighty sail, defying the navies of England and France. It
was not until after England, in Nelson's time, had acquired supremacy in
the Mediterranean that this dreadful scourge was destroyed. Americans,
however, have just ground for pride in recollecting that their
government was foremost in chastising these pirates in their own
harbours. The exploi