On the other hand, Bristol, in 1574, had formally complained of St Malo in that ‘by common consent’ they had set forth seven vessels to prey upon Bristol commerce. The court of Admiralty had granted Bristol merchants permission to seize St Malo ships and goods, which perhaps explains the letter to Burghley just quoted.[810] In 1584 the French ambassador stated that in the preceding two years English pirates had plundered Frenchmen of merchandise to the value of 200,000 crowns; the only answer given was the general statement that Englishmen had lost more by French pirates. There is a list, 47 pages long, of piracies committed by the English on Portuguese subjects alone.

Between 1564 and 1586 Englishmen had spoiled the Scotch—who were said to ‘take it unkindly’—of goods valued at £20,717, and restitution had been made to the amount of £3483. But between 1581-5, the Scotch had plundered the English to the sum of £9268, and had restored only £140; from this proportion it may be concluded that the Scot was more successful than the Frenchman in adapting himself to the fashionable pursuit of the time.[811] Nor were the injured persons exposed only to the loss of their property. A Bayonne ship was captured by a Bristol privateer in 1591 and the owners came to England to obtain redress, but after vainly expending 500 crowns they were, ‘fain to leave off their suit and return to France and save their lives.’ But the Englishman did not fare better in France. In 1572 the Pelican of London, belonging to alderman Wm. Bond and others, was seized by French pirates, the master and crew, twenty-three in number, murdered, and goods valued at £4000 taken with her. The thieves and the receivers were both well known and the owners commenced a suit in the parliament of Brittany; but after fruitlessly expending £1000 prefer to ‘leave all in the hands of God rather than prosecute any more suits in France.’[812] Frequently there was little disguise about ownership. In 1580 three Hamburg merchants petition that their ships were despoiled by ‘one called the Henry Seckforde whereof is owner, Henry Seckforde, Esq., one of the gentlemen of your Majesty’s privy chamber.’[813] If business at sea was languishing, the pirate did not disdain to vary his methods; some Dunkirkers planned, and nearly succeeded in carrying out, the abduction of Sir John Spencer, known as ‘rich Spencer’ on his way to his country house at Islington.

Occasionally, but very rarely, the pirate changed his allegiance. Nicholas Franklin deposes:—[814]

‘A year ago was with Captain Elliott when they took a flyboat of which captain Elliot made a man-of-war: they went to Helford in Cornwall and brought in a Dieppe prize.... John Killigrew, captain of the castle there, warned them to be off as he was expecting the Crane one of the Queen’s ships; thereupon Elliott gave him nine bolts of Holland cloth and a chest and they sailed to Cork ... thence back to the Channel and took four Scotch and Irish ships, thence to the Isles of Bayonne.’[815]

Here they met some Spaniards, and his crew wanted to fight, but Elliot and his officers drew their swords and forced the men to surrender. Elliot was given the command of a Spanish galleon and, from another paper, it appears that he was afterwards the cause of some Englishmen being racked.

If letters of marque were given they only faintly veiled the real character of the proceedings. In 1586 letters of reprisal were granted to Diggory Piper in the Sweepstakes of London, an appropriate name for a privateer. He was authorised to attack Spanish and Portuguese ships; he commenced with some Flemings, continued with two French traders, and finished with a Dane having goods worth £3000 on board.[816] In view of the fact that at various times letters of reprisal to the amount of £140,000 were issued to only a few places,[817] the amount of unlicensed robbery done under cover of such letters can be imperfectly imagined. Sometimes the proceedings were straightforward enough and, as an illustration of their manner of dealing with Spanish ships and the privateersman’s contempt for odds, a relation of one of these encounters is given subsequently.[818]

Stores.

In 1579 the stores, such as canvas, cordage, masts, anchors, etc., at Deptford and on board the ships were valued at £8000, and it was only considered necessary to replenish the stock up to £14,000.[819] For some time whatever was used in any given year was replaced the following year; thus stores to £1662, 11s 8d and £831, 11s 1d were used in 1580 and 1581, and were ordered to be made good in 1581 and 1582. The heavy expenses caused by the war upset this arrangement, and in 1589 we find a payment of £8921, 8s 8d for the balance, still owing, of stores bought in 1587. In 1602 there were at Deptford, 551 cables and hawsers, 26 bolts of canvas, 45 masts and 660 spars, 31,220 ft. of timber, 36 barrels of pitch and tar, besides compasses, flags, etc. Chatham had only 10 cables but 54 bolts of canvas, 124 masts and 1076 spars; Woolwich had timber only.[820] Masts were obtained from the Baltic and varied in length from twelve to thirty-four yards, the latter size being twenty-eight hands in circumference at the partners, and eighteen and two-thirds at the top end. Anything under six hands at the partners was accounted a spar.[821] In 1588 masts of twenty-nine and thirty yards were £26, and £31. In the year of Elizabeth’s accession Dantzic cordage cost £13, 6s 8d a ton. Subsequently cables were chiefly purchased from the Russia Company and went up in price until in 1597 Russian cordage ‘of perfect good stuff’ was costing £23, 10s a ton.[822] For the heaviest anchors the rule was to give a half inch in the circumference of the cable for every foot of beam; a ship with thirty-eight feet of beam would therefore have some cables nineteen inches in circumference. The length was 100 fathoms, and the weight of one fourteen inches round was 34 cwt. 3 qrs. 14 lbs. in white, and 43 cwt. 35 lbs. tarred. A large number of cables, cablettes and hawsers were carried. Although in the preceding table on [p. 124] the Merhonour, like the other big ships, is allowed seven cables, there were ordered for her in 1589, two of 18 inches circumference weighing five tons; four of 17 inches weighing nine tons; two of 16 inches weighing four tons; and one of 12 inches weighing one ton and a quarter.[823]

Until about 1585 the custom of the principal Officers themselves to sell the Queen minor stores, such as canvas, tar, etc., if it excited comment or suspicion, does not seem to have been stopped; from Burghley’s notes on the subject it appears from that time to have been no longer allowed.[824] Nevertheless in 1589 Hawkyns and Borough were accused of still selling to the crown through third persons, but the force of the charge is vitiated by the usual proposal of the informer, that he should act as an inspector of canvas, of course with a salary.[825] The heaviest anchor made was of 30 cwt., but they were usually much smaller; the Merhonour had one of 25 cwt., four of 22 cwt., three of 20 cwt., and one of 12 cwt.[826] The price of these was £1 10s per cwt. as against £1 2s in the beginning of the reign. The following is an abstract of the prices of other stores but there were many different qualities in each article which explains large variations in the price:—

Canvas{ Polldavy(1558)40s a bolt
{ English Midrenex(1569)28s a bolt
{ British[827] do.(1569)33s 4d a bolt
{ British do.(1581)28s a bolt
{ English do.(1581)30s a bolt
{ Ipswich canvas(1590)29s a bolt
Timber{ Compass and straight }(1567)8s and 9s a ton
{ Oak and elm}
{ Oak(1587)18s a load
{ Elm(1594)18s a load
{ Oak knee(1594)20s a load
{ do.(1598)22s to 27s a load
Spanish Iron(1567)£13 a ton
English do.do.£10 a ton
Spanish do.(1572)£14 a ton
Rosin(1567)£8 a ton
do. (1590)£8 a ton
Tar(1567)£4 and £5 a last[828]
do.(1592)£6 a last
do.(1598)£8 a last
Train oil(1567)£11, 10s & £14 a ton
do.(1587)£20 a ton
do.(1590)£17 a ton
Tree-nails{ 12 inch(1571)1s per 100
{ 36 inch(1571)3s per 100
{ 36 inch(1590)4s 6d per 100