Pirate tales from the lawHarris, Arthur M. (Arthur Merton)
History
Pirate tales from the law
Harris, Arthur M. (Arthur Merton)
Pirates
He and the remnant of his crew flocked openly about the old town.
Governor Bellamont was off in Boston. And now Kidd began to get the
full blast of his unsought notoriety. He was told that the mother
country and the colonies, yea, even the seven seas were vibrant with
the name of Kidd; that, in the language of that day, he was everywhere
“published a pirate”, for whom there was no day of grace or pardon.
Quite in the spirit of New York pirates, ancient and modern, he
sought out an adroit lawyer, one Emmott, a man then at the head of
his profession, as the saying is, though that did not mean, any more
than it does now, that he shone by the purity of his principles, the
breadth of his learning, or the transparent propriety of his manners.
Pirates can’t use that kind of lawyer. Seriously, we do not reflect
on Mr. Emmott individually; we know nothing of his morals, and he
was indisputably a leader of his bar, appearing in the most important
litigation of his time. Whatever his character, he engaged himself to
assist the projects of Captain Kidd.
X
Boston was having a hot summer. The noble governor was taking the
air, such as there was, with his wig laid off for coolness, and his
decorated coat carelessly open. No doubt he gazed at the dusty road,
the blistered frame buildings and longed for the temperate downs of
Ireland and the fresh, green lawns of his ancestral mansion. How
afflicting that a noble earl should be subjected to heat and cold just
like a wretched porter!
The entrance of a negro servitor to announce a visitor did not refresh
the excellency. Just then the last man he wanted to see was he whose
name had been brought in. The governor and lawyer Emmott did not get
along together very well. It is not hard to understand the tribulation
of a ruler whose technical knowledge of the art of government was
probably weak, at the hands of a turbulent, sharp and well-informed
colonial attorney,--the intelligent, persistent and irritating
mouthpiece of the perpetual discontent of the colony.
Whether he would or no, it was Emmott who was without, soliciting
audience. He was ordered admitted. One simply can not turn the Emmotts
away, especially when one is a governor; somehow such fellows seem
to have an impish art of getting the gubernatorial attention whenever
their cheekiness suggests it to them.
Imagination may perhaps reconstruct the interesting interview.
Enters Lawyer Emmott, his bright eye appraising at once the mood of
the man in the seat of authority. But Emmott is not half-saucy now; in
this matter he is not backed by the sturdy burghers and supported by a
law whose exact application he thoroughly knows, while as thoroughly
knowing the glazed ignorance of his opponent. He is now after a private
fee in the service of a private client. His tune, therefore, is
somewhat different.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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