Page:Greece from the Coming of the Hellenes to AD. 14.djvu/346

316 anything to suppress it. The fleets of the kings of Pergamus, of Syria, the ships maintained by a sort of island confederation which was renewed in Delos after the death of Alexander, and those of Rhodes and her allies, all did something to abate this nuisance. But the fatal weakening of all these naval powers by the Roman policy after B.C. 146 had allowed piracy to break out again in an aggravated form. The number of the piratical ships constituted a formidable fleet, which swept round the coasts unhindered. Their chief haunts were, in the West, the islands fringing the Illyrian coast and the Balearic Islands; in the East, Crete and the coast of Cilicia. As years went on, and poverty in Greece became more marked, it seems that many Greeks who in earlier and better times would have been in the active service of their state drifted into this way of life. In spite of the mischief and loss which they caused, the profession was regarded with a curious tolerance as something hardly in itself dishonourable, and the various sovereigns were at times glad to avail themselves of the services of the pirates. It was not until well into the first century B.C. that the Romans seemed to wake to their responsibilities in regard to them, and to see that having practically taken over Greece in Europe and Asia it was their interest as well as their duty to put down this lawless trade. In the West, indeed, they had done something; the war with Queen Teuta and other princes (B.C. 229) had stopped for a time the Illyrian pirates; and in B.C. 123 the Balearic Islands were annexed on the ground of their giving shelter