The New Piracy.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 18 September 1914, Page 8

The New Piracy.

The old-fashioned pirate captain, with a brace of pistols tucked under his belt, and a coloured handkerchief tied round his head, who buried his treasure, and made his captives walk the plank, must retire into the background nowadays before the pirate 'with modern ideas and an aptitude for commercial enterprise, says the "Sketch." A pirate captain flourishes at the present time in the Red Sea, who commands a large dhow. He captures other dhows carrying merchandise, stores the captured gcods somewhere out of the reach of Turkish sailors or soldiers, and then enters into negotiations with the merchants to whom the goods were consigned, offering to sell them their own goods at a very reduced price. This modern pirate has just made a fine haul, having captured a cargo worth twenty thousand rupees which was consigned to merchants at Aden. He unloaded this, set the captured dhow free, and at once wrote to the merchants at Aden notifying the sums for which their goods would be sent on to them. There is a touch of humour in his management of this his latest capture, for he knew' that the merchants' dhow was carrying a large quantity of contraband tobacco, and that its captain would therefore delay a complaint before the Turkish Government.