out, if the inhabitants had not risen in force. In Cape Cod Bay he held up a Pennsylvania sloop that was such poor prey he let her go scot free; but off Falmouth he got a fine stock of provisions—which very likely was needed by now—from a New London boat. Then he lay-to for several days in Tarpaulin Cove where, at last, the merry cruise was to end. Boston was sending out another boat, under command of one Samuel Pease, with instructions to get the pirates but, again, “to prevent ye sheding of blood as much as may bee,” and with better luck this time for the avengers of the law. In Tarpaulin Cove they surprised the pirate, with the red flag at her peak. Shots were exchanged, and called upon to strike to the King of England, Pound answered in true pirate rodomontade. “Standing on the quarter-deck with his naked sword in his hand flourishing, said, come aboard, you Doggs, and I will strike you presently, or words to yt purpose.” Firing was renewed, and “after a little space we saw Pound was shot and gone off the deck.” Quarter was offered, and refused. “Ai yee dogs we will give you quarter,” yelled the pirates. Pease was also wounded, but his men boarded the pirate sloop, and “forced to knock them downe with the but end of our muskets at last we quelled them, killing foure, and wounding twelve, two remaining pretty well.” This ended the Homeric battle of Tarpaulin Cove. Pease, the king’s captain, died of his wounds, and offerings were made in church for his widow and orphans. The pirates were taken to Boston jail where they were visited for the good of their souls by Judge Sewall and Cotton Mather. In due process of law they were condemned to be hanged on indictments for piracy and murder. But the sequel proved that fashion and the elders, whether or not by reason of the claims of consanguinity, were interested for the scapegraces. Justice was appeased by the hanging of one lame man of humble origin, and Pound was taken to England, where later he was made captain in the navy and died, as we have seen, in the odor of respectability. Some say that his brief piratical career was induced by politics rather than a criminal taste. He and his men were royalists, it was said, and, siding with Andros in the colonial quarrels, meant to draw out of Boston Harbor for their pursuit the royal frigate Rose which the colonists were holding there. But if that were their game, it was spoiled by the sending out of the Province sloop under Captain Pease and the genuine fight at Wood’s Hole. In any case the Salem and New London boats they had looted were not disposed, probably, to distinguish them from pirates.