270 THE SEA. 



as to the best course to adopt by the opinion of the majority. Two succeeding articles 

 related to wrecks and salvage. The fifth article provided that no sailor in port should 

 leave the vessel without the master's consent; if he did so, and any harm resulted to the 

 ship or cargo, he should be punished with a year's imprisonment, on bread and water. 

 He might also be flogged. If he deserted altogether and was retaken, he might be 

 branded on the face with a red-hot iron, although allowance was made for such as ran 

 away from their ships through ill-usage. Sailors could also be compensated for unjust 

 discharge without cause. Succeeding clauses refer to the moral conduct of the sailor, 

 forbidding drunkenness, fighting, &c. Article 1 provided thai if any mariner should 

 give the lie to another at a table where there was wine and bread, he should be fined 

 four deniers j and the master himself offending in the same way should be liable to a 

 double fine. If any sailor should impudently contradict the mate, he might be fined 

 eight deniers ; and if the master struck him with his fist or open hand he was required 

 to bear the stroke, but if struck more than once he was entitled to defend himself. If 

 the sailor committed the first assault he was to be fined 100 sous, or else his hand was 

 to be chopped off. The master was required by another rule not to give his crew cause 

 for mutiny, nor call them names, nor wrong them, nor "keep anything from them that 

 is theirs, but to use them, well, and pay them honestly what is their due." Another 

 clause provided that the sailor might always have the option of going on shares or wages, 

 and the master was to put the matter fairly before them. The 17th clause related to 

 food. The hardy sailors of Brittany were to have only one meal a day from the kitchen, 

 while the lucky ones of Normandy were to have two. When the ship arrived at a 

 wine country the master was bound to provide the crew with wine. Sailors were else- 

 where forbidden to take "royal" fish, such as the sturgeon, salmon, turbot, and sea-barbel, 

 or to take on their own account fish which yield oil. These are a part only of the clauses ; 

 many others referring to matters connected with rigging, masts, anchorages, pilotage, and 

 other technical points. In bad pilotage the navigator who brought mishap on the ship 

 was liable to lose his head. The general tenor of the first code is excellent, and the rules 

 were laid down with an evident spirit of fairness alike to the owner and sailor. 



The subject of " Letters of Marque" might occupy an entire volume, and will recur 

 again in these pages. They were in reality nothing more than privileges granted for 

 purposes of retaliation legalised piracy. They were first issued by Edward I., and the 

 very first related to an outrage committed by Portuguese on an English subject. A 

 merchant of Bayonne, at the time a port belonging to England, in Gascony, had shipped 

 a cargo of fruit from Malaga, which, on its voyage along the coast of Portugal, was 

 seized and carried into Lisbon by an armed cruiser belonging to that country, then at 

 peace with England. The King of Portugal, who had received one-tenth part of the 

 cargo, declined to restore the ship or lading, whereupon the owner and his heirs received a 

 licence, to remain in force five years, to seize the property of the Portuguese, and especially 

 that of the inhabitants of Lisbon, to the extent of the loss sustained, the expenses of recovery 

 being allowed. How far the merchant of Bayonne recouped himself, history sayeth not. 



A little later a most important mercantile trade came into existence that in coal. 

 From archaeological remains and discoveries it is certain that the Romans excavated coal 



