The Harlowton news., 1912-07-19

These Fiends Terrorized the Sea
For Five Centuries.
.DEFIED THE ENTIRE WORLD.

willy 5sF5SE
They Held at ons Time Forty Thou
sand captivss % Slaves, Among
Whom Was csrvantes Can
I mons Mouth For ! French Envoy.
Those pests Of the sea, the Barbary
pirates, who defied the civilized world
for 500 years, had at one time 10000
Christian slaves in bondage In Algeria.
The methods by which they were OBJ
tained and how treated are described
by Sir Henry Norman IN Scribner's
Magazine:
"Ships were seized IN all European
waters, even Off the coast Of Ireland.
and their crews taken into slavery.
So were the crews OF vessels which
came to trade. When any state at
tempted punishment the consul Of that
country was sent to the galleys. and
Sir Lambert Playfair. British consul
general and erudite author Of Mur-
rays Handbook, tells us that in one
instance on the approach Of French
deet their representative was blown
toward them from mortar. Ger
vantes himself was slave there In
1855.
"In the seventeenth century the
Algerine pirates held prizes worth 90
100000 francs. Again and again the
Christian powers OF that and the next
century failed to intlict a lasting de-
feat upon this 'scourge Of Christen
DOM The British parliament passed
an act to undertake the Christian
work Of the redemption Of the cap
tives from the cruel thralldom they
lay under but its intention exceeded
its power, for not long afterward $50
English ships We're captured and 5000
English slaves brought into Algiers In
the space Of seven years. and when
after five years war between England
and the pirate state peace was Sign
ed the dey refused to surrender sin
gle English slave, and the treaty had
clause to the effect that the king OF
Great Britain shall not be obliged by
virtue Of this treaty to redeem any Of
his subjects now in slavery probably
the most degrading treaty, as Sir Lam
bert Playfair remarks. ever signed be-
tween England and foreign power.
"At one time 10000 Christian slaves
were in bondage in Algeria, Of all the
nations of Europe, many Of them men
of rank. learning and piety and all OF
them suffering daily the most cruel
hardships. starvation and torture. One
would have expected the Christian ma
tions to Join forces for one object at
least and wipe this puny pirate state
off the earth. yet for 500 years Bar
barry held them at bay.
AJust as the old sailors chantry about
the coast of the wild Barbaree' took
its origin in the terrors of that coast,
so the religious order Of the Fathers Of
the Redemption was originally founded
to collect aims for the ransom Of the
Algerian slaves. and many Of its mem
bers, with perhaps the noblest Chris,
tian charity on record, voluntarily
shared the lot Of the captiyes for the
comfort they could give and the sery-
ices they could render In negotiations
of ransom.
zone ghost Of all these unhappy thou
sands takes literally concrete shape.
An Arab Christian named Geroni-
mo, taken as a baby by Spanish sol
diers and educated by the vicar gen
eral, was captured by the pirates dur
ing raid. AS a renegade he was, Of
course, the subject Of the utmost per-
secution, and when no inducement or
suffering could make him apostatize
he was at length offered by the dey
the choice Of being thrown alive into
a mold Of concrete which formed part
of the foundation Of new bastion or
Of embracing Islam. He chose the
martyrdom and was flung into the
mold with his hands tied behind him
and the concrete poured over him. This
was In 1869.
I'm 1912 a Spanish Benedictine IA.
ther wrote a history OF Algiers in the
course Of which he narrated at length
the 1nartyrdom Of Geronimo and de-
scribed particularly the situation of the
bastion in which his body lay. In 1847
translation Of this passage was pub
lished in an Algerian newspaper, and
in 1853. when the old fortress was de-
stroyed, search was made. Exactly as
had been described the skeleton was
discovered, and on plaster Of paris
being poured into the impression in
the cement the figure Of the martyr
emerged. the hands tied behind it.,
much as he had been three centuries
before. This plaster cast is today in
the Bibliotheque musee."