neutral
commerce."

They are sometimes manned and officered by foreigners, having no
permanent connection with the country, or interest in the cause. This
was a complaint made by the United States in 1819, in relation to
irregularities and atrocities committed by private armed vessels,
sailing under the flag of Buenos Ayres. Under the best regulations the
business tends strongly to blunt the sense of private right, and to
nourish a lawless and fierce spirit of rapacity.

Its abolition has generally been attempted by treaty. In the treaty of
Prussia and the United States, in 1785, stipulations against private
armed vessels were included. In 1675, a similar agreement was made
between Sweden and Holland, but the agreement was not performed.
France, soon after the breaking out of the war with Austria, in 1792,
passed a decree for the total suppression of privateering, but that
was a transitory act, and was soon swept away in the tempest of the
Revolution.

[Sidenote: Piratical Privateering.]

On these considerations naturally follows that of the classes of
Privateers that can be considered Pirates.

A Privateer differs from a Pirate, in that--first, the former is
provided with a Commission, or with Letters of Marque from a Sovran,
of which the Pirate is destitute. Secondly, the Privateer supposes a
state of war (or at least that of reprisals); the Pirate plunders in
the midst of peace, as well as in war. Thirdly, the Privateer is
obliged to observe the rules and instructions that have been given
him, and to attack by virtue of them only the enemy's ships, or those
neutral vessels which carry on an illicit commerce; the Pirate
plunders indiscriminately the ships of all nations, without observing
even the laws of war. But in this last point Privateers may become
Pirates when they transgress the limits prescribed to them; and this
is one of the reasons why we often see the former confounded with the
latter.[94]

Under these general definitions, we see that it is quite open to any
citizen of the world to become a privateer under a foreign Sovran; and
Martens goes on to say, that

"there is nothing that prevents the granting of Letters of
Marque, even to the subjects of neutral or allied powers who
are able to solicit them; but since it is contrary to
neutrality to suffer subjects to contribute by this means to
the reinforcement of one of the belligerent powers, and to
the annoyance