I am anxious to emphasise the fact that piracy is nearly as old as the ship herself. It is extremely improbable that the Egyptians were ever pirates, for the reason that, excepting the expedition to Punt, they confined their navigation practically to the Nile only. But as soon as men built sea-going vessels, then the instinct to rob and pillage on sea became as irresistible as on land. Might was right, and the weakest went to the bottom. Bearing this in mind, and remembering that there was always a good deal of trade from the Continent up the Thames to London, especially in corn, and that there was considerable traffic between Gaul and Britain across the English Channel, it was but natural that the sea-rovers of the north should exist no less than in the south. After Rome had occupied Britain she established a navy which she called the “Classis Britannica,” and it cannot have failed to be effective in policing the narrow seas and protecting commerce from wandering corsairs. We know very well that after Rome had evacuated Britain, and there was no navy to protect our shores, came the Angles and Saxons and Jutes. We may permissibly regard these Northmen, who pillaged and plundered till the time of William the Conqueror and after, as pirates. In the sense that a pirate is one who not merely commits robbery on the high seas but also makes descents on the coast for the purpose of pillage, we may call the Viking seamen pirates. But, strictly speaking, they were a great deal more than this, and the object of this book is concerned rather with the incidents of the sea than the incursions into the land. Although the Vikings did certainly commit piracy both in their own waters and off the coasts of Britain, yet their depredations in this respect, even if we could obtain adequate information thereof, would sink into insignificance before their greater conquests. For a race of men who first swoop down on to a strange coast, vanquish the inhabitants and then settle down to live among them, are rather different from a body of men who lie in wait to capture ships as they proceed on their voyages.