272 OUR HERITAGE THE SEA 



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until they in their turn were displaced by the French, 

 with just as much right or excuse as they themselves had 

 when they invaded the great island centuries before. 



In the far north of the Indian Ocean we find that, 

 from those far-away times when Sesostris sailed down 

 the Bed Sea and invaded India, there has always been 

 carried on a desultory warfare. We know that both 

 the Persians and the Greeks sailed those torrid seas, 

 doubtless by the aid of the Arab seamen, who saw 

 dynasty after dynasty rise and fall while they held on 

 their own simple direct way of old-fashioned piracy. 

 Sometimes, as under the caliphs, who spread their rule 

 at the sword's point over so large a portion of the 

 known world, these Arab seafarers congregated in such 

 numbers as to be dignified by the name of a navy or 

 navies ; but concerted operations never found great 

 favour with them. They much preferred acting inde- 

 pendently, each vessel acknowledging no rule beyond 

 that of her naldioda, or captain, and having but one 

 object in view, the conversion or destruction of the 

 infidel, and, incidentally, their own enrichment by the 

 appropriation of the infidel's goods and the bodies 

 of the infidels themselves to be sold as slaves. But, 

 whether acting singly or in concert, they never failed 

 to find the highest religious sanction and encourage- 

 ment for their bloodiest deeds ; and when overpowered 

 and destroyed themselves, they went blithely to their 

 death beneath the bloodstained sea in absolute cer- 

 tainty of an eternal reward for their heroic efforts 

 to spread the worship of Allah and his prophet. Nor 

 can we cast too many stones at them, since much of 

 our own sea warfare in early days was conducted on 

 the same comfortable principle. 



