Here he arranged to make his crew a great
deal larger than had been thought necessary in England, and, by offering
a fair share of the property he might confiscate on piratical or French
ships, he induced a great many able seamen to enter his service, and
when the _Adventure_ left New York she carried a crew of one hundred and
fifty-five men.
With a fine ship and a strong crew, Kidd now sailed out of the harbor
with the ostensible purpose of putting down piracy in American waters,
but the methods of this legally appointed marine policeman were very
peculiar, and, instead of cruising up and down our coast, he gayly
sailed away to the island of Madeira, and then around the Cape of Good
Hope to Madagascar and the Red Sea, thus getting himself as far out of
his regular beat as any New York constable would have been had he
undertaken to patrol the dominions of the Khan of Tartary.
By the time Captain Kidd reached that part of the world he had been at
sea for nearly a year without putting down any pirates or capturing any
French ships. In fact, he had made no money whatever for himself or the
stockholders of the company which had sent him out. His men, of course,
must have been very much surprised at this unusual neglect of his own
and his employers' interests, but when he reached the Red Sea, he boldly
informed them that he had made a change in his business, and had decided
that he would be no longer a suppressor of piracy, but would become a
pirate himself; and, instead of taking prizes of French ships
only,--which he was legally empowered to do,--he would try to capture
any valuable ship he could find on the seas, no matter to what nation it
belonged.
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