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581 
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THE PIRACY AND SLAVE TRADE OF THE INDIAN 
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ARCHIPELAGO. 
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The object of the following notices is to bring together a number 
of facts, which will give our European readers a more practical 
knowledge of the nature and extent of this dreadful scourge of the 
Indian Archipelago than any general description can convey. 
They are mostly selected from those which have come under the 
notice of the English and Dutch during the last thirty years, and 
the sources from which they are chiefly drawn are the Singapore 
newspapers, and the Moniteur des Indes Orientates. 
Piracy is universal throughout the greater part of the Indian 
Archipelago, and there are very few of the native rulers, not. under 
European influence and control, who are not more or less participant 
in it. At the present time they are more cautious in allowing 
their connexion with piracy to be known, as the vigorous measures 
adopted the Dutch, Spanish, and English, have shown that 
these Governments are earnest in the determination to repress 
the evil, and that the power which they are able to bring into 
operation for that purpose is such that no native armament or 
means of defence can long successfully withstand it. Although 
piracy is less rampant at present than it was a few years ago, and the 
independent or quasi independent native states of the Archipelago 
have generally come into engagements with one or other oi tlie 
European powers to aid in its repression, and have therefore re¬ 
nounced all open intercourse with the pirates, it is by no means 
generally extirpated. At any temporary lull or cessation in the 
partial and unconnected measures of the Europeans against them, 
the pirates re-appear in their old haunts with undiminished 
boldness and force. Only recently the China sea lias at various 
points been the scene of extensive piratical proceedings by both 
Malay and Chinese pirates, the Borneo pirates have been 
active, and even in the direction of the Philippines, notwithstand¬ 
ing the severe and exterminating proceedings of the Spaniards in 
the Sulu seas last year, they have begun to renew their former depre¬ 
dations, It is only by a persevering, continued and combined 
action against piracy that the European powers iii the Archipelago 
can hope to keep it effectually down. Vigorous efforts followed by 
lengthened periods of inaction, have been proved over and over 
again to be inadequate, and it may be emphatically stated as the 
result of the experience of the European powers for more than a 
century that all measures and expedients against piracy have failed 
from the want of a properly organized system always in operation . 
Various means have been tried by the Dutch with the purpose 
of checking piracy. Thus so far back as the year 1/05 we find 
them regulating the numbers of the crews and passengers of native 
vessels, and the arms they were to carry. In 1751 they had 
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