ch a life as that of the
American colonies in the early part of the eighteenth century, when it
was possible for a pirate like Capt. Teach, known as Blackbeard, to
exist, and for the governor and the secretary of the province in which
he lived perhaps to share his plunder, and to shelter and to protect
him against the law.

At that time the American colonists were in general a rough, rugged
people, knowing nothing of the finer things of life. They lived mostly
in little settlements, separated by long distances from one another,
so that they could neither make nor enforce laws to protect
themselves. Each man or little group of men had to depend upon his or
their own strength to keep what belonged to them, and to prevent
fierce men or groups of men from seizing what did not belong to them.

It is the natural disposition of everyone to get all that he can.
Little children, for instance, always try to take away from others
that which they want, and to keep it for their own. It is only by
constant teaching that they learn that they must not do so; that they
must not take by force what does not belong to them. So it is only by
teaching and training that people learn to be honest and not to take
what is not theirs. When this teaching is not sufficient to make a man
learn to be honest, or when there is something in the man's nature
that makes him not able to learn, then he only lacks the opportunity
to seize upon the things he wants, just as he would do if he were a
little child.

In the colonies at that time, as was just said, men were too few and
scattered to protect themselves against those who had made up their
minds to take by force that which they wanted, and so it was that men
lived an unrestrained and lawless life, such as we of these times of
better government can hardly comprehend.

The usual means of commerce between province and province was by water
in coasting vessels. These coasting vessels were so defenseless, and
the different colonial governments were so ill able to protect them,
that those who chose to rob them could do it almost without danger to
themselves.

So it was that all the western world was, in those days, infested with
armed bands of cruising freebooters or pirates, who used to stop
merchant vessels and take from them what they chose.

Each province in those days was ruled over by a royal governor
appointed by the king. Each governor, at one time, was free to do
almost as he pleased in his