And how does Captain Cobb describe this gigantic episode? As if he were making an entry in a ship’s log. “Before I left the country; I saw Robertspeirs head taken off, by the same Machine--But to return to my induvidual, and embarised affairs….” This was characteristic of the New England breed of seafarers. They are exasperating at times. They saw so much and told so little. The wonders of the world left them unmoved. The pen was an awkward tool to handle and they were as thrifty with words as with pence. You will find Captain Cobb waxing loquacious, however, when it comes to the intricate and difficult business of due bills and foreign exchange or smuggling gold out of France. All this is of value to the modern reader as showing how extremely competent were these master mariners as bankers and merchants. It helps to explain why they became the leaders in their communities when they retired from the quarter-deck, and why they were so successful, as a class, in commercial pursuits ashore. They were literally the first American captains of industry, men accustomed to large responsibilities and the tests of critical emergencies. It throws a curious slant on the moral code of the time to find Elijah Cobb so profoundly pious and yet so ready to bribe and smuggle with a clear conscience. In a way, this point of view was inherited from the American Revolution. The harsh restrictions laid by the mother country on the commerce of her colonies had led to smuggling as an easy road to wealth. In almost every town prominent characters were named who, under British rule, had stowed in their attics and cellars goods that were not for the officers of the King’s Customs to see. To these harbors came vessels built for speed and laden with contraband wares gathered in the colonies of France and Spain. And reputable merchants were always ready to run the stuff ashore. Thus, on the very day when the farmers of Middlesex drove the British out of Lexington, John Hancock was to have stood trial for defrauding the Customs. And so Elijah Cobb, pillar of the Universalist church in his later years, is not in the least ashamed to admit that he did a very pretty job of running rum to a crew of skilled smugglers between the Cove of Cork and the Scilly Islands. It was adroit intelligence and knowledge of the world that enabled him to escape from the trap of the British Orders in Council that ruined hundreds of American shipmasters and owners. These high-handed measures aimed against Napoleon, together with his Milan Decree launched in retaliation, made American vessels liable to confiscation in almost every foreign port to which they traded. It was not a proud era in our national history. The time was not far distant when the cry of “Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights” was to sound the note of the Second War with England.