their terrible fate. galleys armed as cruisers and infested the Mediterranean, pillaging indiscriminately the ships and the coasts of Genoa as well as those of other nations. In one cruise alone they took booty estimated at three hundred thousand golden florins. Their success, however, proved the means of their destruction. Pursued by a squadron of Genoese ships of war as far as the Black Sea, they sought shelter in Sinope, then under a Turcoman ruler, who, quickly learning the wealth they had on board their vessels, took short and effective means to secure it for himself. Inviting the pirate chiefs with their crews to a banquet, he surrounded them in the height of their revelry with his troops and massacred nearly all of them. No fewer than fifteen hundred persons, among whom were forty nobles, perished by this one deed of treachery, and only three galleys succeeded in making good their escape.
Corsairs. The corsairs, on the other hand, were armed as privateers, if not with the express approbation, at least with the tacit acquiescence of the government, and professed to wage war only with the enemies of their own republic. The corsairs also performed the duties of the men-of-war of more modern times, by searching the vessels of neutral and friendly powers to ascertain if they had on board provisions, arms, or merchandise destined for the enemy. The booty thus acquired was divided among the commanders and cruisers, in conformity with the ancient maritime regulations preserved in the "Consulado de la Mer."[1]
The successful resistance of Genoa to the growing
- ↑ See Pardessus, vol. ii.
