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Rh It is said that Courts give a tone to society. The following entry shows the fine flavour of Court life under Ribassa and his brother. "The King and I walked hand in hand ... with one hand he led me and in the other hand he held a bottle of Brandy, saying unto me as we walked 'See how all obey my word,' and when the work was done Prince Chemaniena came and licked his father's knees in testimony of his obedience, and helped us to drinke our bottle of Brandy." The brandy was shed unavailingly. Ribassa was a knave, and his brother's charity was interrupted by pirates (whether Misson's or Avery's men does not appear). Knox had done a little piracy in his time, as "this in all appearance seemed a ready way to raise my decayed fortune"; but being a pirate and being robbed by one do not leave the same flavour on the palate. He wisely set sail for far away Bencoulen, where "aboute 20 men all looking like Ghoasts" lived in Dampier's old fort on rotten rice and punch.

Knox lived to be about eighty years old. After twenty years' captivity, a long battering at sea, yellow fever, scurvy, malaria, Hurry Canes, and