“No person, natural or corporate, can have an action for a _public nuisance_, or punish it,--but only the king, in his public capacity of supreme governor and _paterfamilias_ of the kingdom. Yet this rule admits of one exception: where a private person suffers some extraordinary damage beyond the rest of the king’s subjects.”[90] Applying this rule to the present case, the way is clear. Every British pirate was _a public nuisance_, involving the British Government, which must respond in damages, not only to the individuals who have suffered, but also to the National Government, acting as _paterfamilias_ for the common good of all the people. Thus by an analogy of the Common Law in the case of a Public Nuisance, also by the strict rule of the Roman Law, which enters so largely into International Law, and even by the rule of the Common Law relating to Damages, all losses, whether individual or national, are the just subject of claim. It is not I who say this; it is the Law. The colossal sum-total may be seen not only in the losses of individuals, but in those national losses caused by the destruction of our commerce, the prolongation of the war, and the expense of the blockade, all of which may be charged directly to England:-- “illud ab uno Corpore, et ex una pendebat origine bellum.”[91] Three times is this liability fixed: first, by the concession of ocean belligerency, opening to the Rebels ship-yards, foundries, and manufactories, and giving to them a flag on the ocean; secondly, by the organization of hostile expeditions, which, by admissions in Parliament, were nothing less than piratical war on the United States with England as the naval base; and, thirdly, by welcome, hospitality, and supplies extended to these pirate ships in ports of the British empire. Show either of these, and the liability of England is complete; show the three, and this power is bound by a triple cord. CONCLUSION.