Page:A general history of the pyrates, from their first rise and settlement in the Island of Providence, to the present time (1724).djvu/11

 in this Enquiry, I hall therefore quit it, and ay omething of the following Sheets, which the Author may venture to aure the Reader that they have one Thing to recommend them, which is Truth; thoe Facts which he himelf was not an Eye-Witnes of, he had from the authentick Relations of the Perons concern’d in taking the Pyrates, as well as from the Mouths of the Pyrates themelves, after they were taken, and he conceives no Man can produce better Tetimonies to upport the Credit of any Hitory.

It will be oberved, that the Account of the Actions of Roberts runs into a greater Length, than that of any other Pyrate, for which we can aign two Reaons, firt, becaue he ravaged the Seas longer than the rest, and of Conequence there must be a greater Scene of Buines in his Life: Secondly, being reolved not to weary the Reader, with tireome Repetition: When we found the Circumtances in Roberts’s Live, and other Pyrates, either as to pyratical Articles, or any Thing ele, to be the ame, we thought it best to give them but once, and choe Roberts’s Life for that Purpoe, he having made more Noie in the World, than ome others.

As to the Lives of our two female Pyrates, we must confes they may appear a little Extravagant, yet they are never the les true for eeming o, but as they were publickly try’d for their Pyracies, there are living Witnees enough to jutify what we have laid down concerning them; it is certain, we have produced ome Particulars which were not o publickly known, the Reaon is, we were more inquiitive into the Circumtances of their past Lives, than other People, who had no other Deign, than that of gratifying their own private Curioity: If there are ome Incidents and Turns in their Stories, which may give them a little the Air of a Novel, they are not invented or contrived for that Purpoe, it is a Kind of Reading this Author is but little acquainted with, but as he himelf was exceedingly diverted with them, when they were related to him, he thought they might have the ame Effect upon the Reader.

I preume we need make no Apology for giving the Name of a Hitory to the following Sheets, though they contain Rh