under which the trade was maintained, the losses that were suffered, and
the dangers that were run by the Company's servants from the moment they
left the English Channel. The privations and dangers of the voyage to
India were alone sufficient to deter all but the hardiest spirits, and
the debt we owe to those who, by painful effort, won a footing for our
Indian trade, is deserving of more recognition than it has received.
Scurvy, shortness of water, and mutinous crews were to be reckoned on in
every voyage; navigation was not a science but a matter of rule and thumb,
and shipwreck was frequent; while every coast was inhospitable. Thus, on
the 4th September, 1715, the _Nathaniel_, having sent a boat's crew on
shore near Aden, in search of water, the men allowed themselves to be
inveigled inland by treacherous natives, who fell upon them and murdered
twelve out of fourteen who had landed from the ship. Such an occurrence
now would be followed by a visit from a man-of-war to punish the
murderers. Two hundred years ago it was only an incident to set down in
the ship's log-book. But all such outrages and losses were small in
comparison with those to which traders were exposed at the hands of
pirates.

It is difficult to realize, in these days, what a terrible scourge piracy
was to the Indian trade, two hundred years ago. From the moment of losing
sight of the Lizard till the day of casting anchor in the port of
destination an East India ship was never safe from attack, with the
chance of slavery or a cruel death to crew and passengers, in case of
capture. From Finisterre to Cape Verd the Moorish pirates made the seas
unsafe, sometimes venturing into the mouth of the Channel to make a
capture. Farther south, every watering-place on the African coast was
infested by the English and French pirates who had their headquarters in
the West Indies. From the Cape of Good Hope to the head of the Persian
Gulf, from Cape Comorin to Sumatra, every coast was beset by English,