[Footnote 1: Public Record Office, C.O. 5:860, no. 62; _Commons Journal_, XIII, 18-19. Endorsed as received and read Aug. 31. Richard Coote (1636-1701), earl of Bellomont in the peerage of Ireland, was designated as governor of Massachusetts in June, 1695, and as governor of New York in July, three months before his agreement with Livingston and Kidd, but was not commissioned till June 18, 1697. He arrived in New York Apr. 2, 1698, and first came to Boston May 26, 1699. The part he had taken in sending out Kidd to capture pirates made Kidd's piracy a matter of special indignation and embarrassment to him, particularly when the affair was used in Parliament, in the session of 1700, as a means of attack on the Lord Chancellor Somers (see doc. no. 71, note 1). The agreement with Kidd was an unwise arrangement, but there is no doubt that Bellomont was an honest and zealous official.] BOSTON, 8th July, 99. _My Lords_, I have the Misfortune to be ill of the Gout at a time when I have a great deal of business to exercise both my head and my hand. It will not be unwellcome News to your Lordships to tell you that I secured Captain Kidd last Thursday in the Gaol of this Town with five or six of his men. He had been hovering on the Coast towards New-York for more than a fortnight, and sent to one Mr. Emot to come from New-York to him at a place called Oyster-Bay in Nassau Island[2] not far from New-York. He brought Emot from thence to Rhoad Island and there landed him, sending him hither to me with an Offer of his comeing into this port provided I would pardon him. I was a litle pussiled how to manage a treaty of that kind with Emot, a cunning Jacobite, a fast Friend of Fletcher's and my avowed enimie. When he proposed my pardoning Kid, I told him It was true the King had allowed me a power to pardon Pyrates; But that I was so tender of useing it (because I would bring no Staine on my Reputation), that I had set myselfe a Rule never to pardon Pyracy without the King's expresse leave and Command. Emot told me that Kid had left the great Moorish Ship he took in India (which Ship I have since found went by the Name of the _Quidah-Marchant_), in a Creek on the Coast of Hispaniola, with Goods to the Value of thirty Thousand pounds: That he had bought a Sloop, in which he was come before to make his termes: that he had brought in the Sloop with him severall Bailes of East India goods, threescore pound weight of gold in Dust and in Ingotts, about a hundred weight of Silver and several other things which he beleived would sell for about Ten Thousand pounds. Emot also told me that Kid was very innocent and would make it appear that his men forced him, locking him up in the Cabin of the _Adventure Galley_ while they robbed two or three Ships, and he could prove this by many witnesses. I answered Emot that if Kid could make that appear he might safely come into this Port and I would undertake to get him the King's Pardon.