This story, though it may seem somewhat out of place when told at such length in a history of the Royal Navy, has appeared to me to be worth repeating. One concrete example will do more than any number of general statements to show what the condition of a country was. All through the reign of Elizabeth and the first two Stuarts piracy was common on the coast of Great Britain and Ireland. Sir William Monson's experiences show why it could flourish. The number of ships kept in regular commission by the king was small, and much of their time was taken up in carrying princes and ambassadors between England and the Continent. In outlying districts there were always persons of the stamp of Mr. Cormac and his "hackney daughters," who were prepared to give the pirates a friendly welcome in consideration of a share of the booty. Traders were ready to buy their stolen goods. And it is even obvious, from Monson's casual mention of members of his crew who had been pirates, that nobody thought very much the worse of a man for having followed the trade once in a way. The sea was still very lawless, and the Royal Navy had hardly yet taken its police duties firmly in hand. The improvement in shipbuilding which took place in this reign was mainly the work of the most able member of a remarkable family of shipwrights, sea-captains, and navy officials who are found engaged in and about the royal dockyards from the reign of Edward VI. to close on the end of the reign of Charles II. Phineas Pett, who was born in 1570 and died in 1647, was the son of Peter Pett, master shipwright at Deptford in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. He received a better education than had probably been given to any previous member of his family. After preliminary schooling at Rochester and Greenwich, he entered the famous Puritan college, the "House of Pure Emanuel," at Cambridge in 1586. The death of his father, in 1589, left him destitute, and Phineas was for some years compelled to pick up a precarious livelihood in the dockyards or in sea voyages. In 1597 he entered the service of Lord Howard, which no doubt means his service as Lord High Admiral, but not in any domestic capacity. His foot being now well down, Pett kept his place, and very considerably bettered it before long. Having been employed by Howard to build a miniature ship for Henry, eldest son of James I., he attracted the favourable notice of the prince, who in his short life certainly proved that he possessed a remarkable eye for men of brains and character. Pett's favour drew upon him a great deal of jealousy in the dockyard, and he was at last openly accused by his rivals of incompetence. But he stood his ground stoutly, and finally justified himself in an inquiry held before the king at Woolwich. James, like all the house of Stuart, had a taste for clever scientific men. He was mainly a scholar and a theologian, as his son Charles I. was a judge of pictures and of literature, and as his grandson Charles II.