So Columbus does not stand alone as a grand master of piracy. The famous
Sir Francis Drake, who became vice-admiral of the fleet which defeated
the Spanish Armada, was a worthy companion of the great Genoese.

These notable instances have been mentioned because it would be unjust
to take up the history of those resolute traders who sailed from
England, France, and Holland, to the distant waters of the western world
for the purpose of legitimate enterprise and commerce, and who
afterwards became thorough-going pirates, without trying to make it
clear that they had shining examples for their notable careers.




Chapter III

Pupils in Piracy


After the discoveries of Columbus, the Spanish mind seems to have been
filled with the idea that the whole undiscovered world, wherever it
might be, belonged to Spain, and that no other nation had any right
whatever to discover anything on the other side of the Atlantic, or to
make any use whatever of lands which had been discovered. In fact, the
natives of the new countries, and the inhabitants of all old countries
except her own, were considered by Spain as possessing no rights
whatever. If the natives refused to pay tribute, or to spend their days
toiling for gold for their masters, or if vessels from England or France
touched at one of their settlements for purposes of trade, it was all