As soon as the _Merchant_ braced back, Kidd sent a boat from his ship to her with orders to bring the captain to him. The boat came back with an old Frenchman grumbling and puzzled in the stern. The skipper of the _Merchant_ naturally thought a Frenchman should represent them to a French ship of unknown but threatening attitude. This old man, however, had not been long in talk with the pirate chief before he confessed that he was not the master of the _Quedagh Merchant_, but her gunner. Whereupon Kidd sent the boat off again for the real commander. One begins to see the value of the ruse of sailing under French colors. Many of the ships on that particular beat evidently had French clearance papers. British trade was probably almost entirely through traffic around the Cape to England; the coastwise business was Moorish, by which was generally meant Arabian, Dutch, French and Armenian. Hence to approach the ordinary coaster, the French colors at his mast, avoided the delay and difficulty of a protracted pursuit, as well as served to disarm them when overtaken. Whenever they had French passes, instead of showing force to a seemingly French ship, the easiest and most natural thing for them to do was to expose their papers, and so proceed peacefully on their way. Such a ship as this which Kidd was now taking could no doubt have put up some measure of resistance had she been forewarned. Still again, Kidd artfully induced them to show a French pass and then revealed himself as an Englishman commissioned to take just that sort of craft, and thus despoil many victims without discovering his real traffic. The French pass idea struck Kidd as so good that he worked it not only in the waters of the Indies but in the courts of his outraged Majesty, King William, as he entered the valley of death’s shadow. This time the boat came back carrying a swearing Englishman, one Wright, indubitable skipper of the _Quedagh Merchant_. When he set foot on the pirate’s deck Kidd brusquely informed him he was a prisoner being off a French ship, as witness the embassage of the old French gunner. While Wright, who had formerly been a tavern keeper at Surat, bleated about the decks, Kidd sent a crew over to take possession of the _Quedagh Merchant_. Here they found a couple of Dutchmen, probably the ship’s mates, a Frenchman--the old gunner--and a crew of Moors. Another group of considerable importance to the story was that of the charterers of the ship--certain Armenians under the headship of one Cogi Baba. In a little while Kidd joined his merry men.