Page:A general history of the pyrates, from their first rise and settlement in the Island of Providence, to the present time (1724).djvu/26

18 of thee ort of Robbers; when either by the Troubles of particular Times, or the Neglect of Governments, they are not cruh’d before they gather Strength.

It has been the Cae heretofore, that when a ingle Pyrate has been uffered to range the Seas, as not being worth the Notice of a Government, he has by Degrees grown o powerful, as to put them to the Expence of a great deal of Blood and Treaure, before he was uppres’d. We hall not examine how it came to pas, that our Pyrates in the Wet-Indies have continually increaed till of late; this is an Enquiry which belongs to the Legilature, or Repreentatives of the People in Parliament, and to them we hall leave it.

Our Buines hall be briefly to hew, what from Beginnings, as inconiderable as thee, other Nations have uffered.

In the Times of Marius and Sylla, Rome was in her greatet Strength, yet he was o torn in Pieces by the Factions of thoe two great Men, that every Thing which concerned the publick Good was altogether neglected, when certain Pyrates broke out from CiciliaCilicia [sic], a Country of Aia Minor, ituate on the Coat of the MediteraneanMediterranean [sic], betwixt Syria on the Eat, from whence it is divided by Mount Tauris, and Armenia Minor on the Wet. This Beginning was mean and inconiderable, having but two or three Ships, and a few Men, with which they cruied about the Greek Ilands, taking uch Ships as were very ill arm’d or weakly defended; however, by the taking of many Prizes, they oon increaed in Wealth and Power: The firt Action of their’s which made a Noie, was the taking of Julius Cæar, who was as yet a Youth, and who being obliged to fly from the Cruelties of Sylla, who ought his Life, went into Bithinia, and ojourned 2a [sic] while with Nicomedes, King of that Country; in his Return back Rh