.

Born 1682. Died 1722.

If a pirate is to be reckoned by the amount of damage he does and the
number of ships he takes there can be no doubt that Captain Roberts should
be placed at the very head of his profession, for he is said to have taken
over 400 vessels. The only man who can be said to rival him is Sir Henry
Morgan, but Morgan, although in some ways an unmitigated blackguard, was a
man of much greater breadth of outlook than Roberts ever was, and,
moreover, was a buccaneer rather than a pirate.

Roberts, like many other successful pirates, was born in Wales, not far
from Haverfordwest. He is described as being "a tall black man," and was
about 40 years of age at the time of his death. He was remarkable, even
among his remarkable companions, for several things. First of all, he only
drank tea--thus being the only total abstainer known to the fraternity.
Also he was a strict disciplinarian, and on board his ships all lights had
to be extinguished by 8 p.m., any of the crew who wished to continue
drinking after that hour had to do so on the open deck. But try as he
would this ardent apostle of abstemiousness was unable to put down
drinking. If Roberts had lived to-day, no doubt he would have been on the
council of the local vigilance committee. He would allow no women aboard
his ships, in fact he made it a law that any man who brought a woman on
board disguised as a man was to suffer death. Roberts allowed no games at
cards or dice to be played for money, as he strongly disapproved of
gambling. He was a strict Sabbatarian, and allowed the musicians to have a
rest on the seventh day. This was as well, for the post of musician on a
pirate ship was no sinecure, as every pirate had the right to demand a
tune at any hour of the day or night. He used to place a guard to protect
all his women prisoners, and it is sadly suspicious that there was always
the greatest competition amongst the worst characters in the ship to be
appointed sentinel over a good-looking woman prisoner. All quarrels had to
be settled on shore, pirate fashion, the duellists standing back to back
armed with pistol and cutlass. Roberts would have no fighting among the
crew on board his ship.

Bartholomew must have looked the very part of a pirate when dressed for
action. A tall, dark man, he used to wear a rich damask waistcoat and
breeches, a red feather in his cap, a gold chain round his neck with a
large diamond cross dangling from it, a sword i