ONE melancholy event in human history too frequently gives place to another still more appalling. The frontier war begun during the administration of Leisler, continued its ravages for a number of years after his death. Governor Fletcher wisely formed an alliance with the Iroquois Indians, who proved a valuable defence against these hostile inroads. It was clearly the design of the French Government to harass and cripple the frontier settlements, until such times as it could overwhelm the cities, and so wipe out the English authority from the country. During these perilous years, great losses and calamities were inflicted on the colonies, and the people sighed for security and rest. But another evil, equally disastrous to the development of the city, had long preyed upon its commerce. The slave trade had been considered legitimate since the founding of the colony, and the Dutch have the unenviable honor of introducing this iniquitous system. During the continuance of the Dutch dynasty, however, this trade appears to have been carried on by transient Dutch traders, who obtained the blacks from the African kings, on the coasts of Guinea, and to have formed no part of the regular business of the shipping merchants of Manhattan. This continued policy of legalized theft and brutality necessarily corrupted the men of the sea, and fitted them for any undertaking of treachery and daring. It is difficult inculcating theft and honesty in the same lesson. During the continuance of the war between France and England, many privateers had also been fitted out from England and New York, to prey upon the French merchantmen, which greatly encouraged the licentious tendencies of the sailors. It is said that many of these, failing to seize the legitimate objects of their pursuit, to prevent failure to the expedition, fell upon friendly vessels, which they plundered and sunk, returning in triumph with their booty. So difficult is it for adventurous men, long trained in these schools of vice, and feasted with ill-gotten gain, to return to the walks of common industry, that at the close of the war the seas literally swarmed with armed pirates. Many merchants suspended business in consequence of these incessant perils; and it is even hinted that not a few of them, as well as higher functionaries, including Governor Fletcher himself, became abettors and partners in these piratical enterprises. The American seas, with a thinly populated coast of two thousand miles, indented with numerous harbors, rivers, and inroads, and with a poorly organized government, furnished perhaps the safest retreat for these wandering corsairs. Their merchandise was largely disposed of through the Spanish merchants, who had been so deeply demoralized by their Central American plunders that they cared little whence they received their goods, provided they yielded a satisfactory profit. It is probable that New York merchants, also, were not guiltless. Before the conclusion of the war, these depredations became so alarming that many New York merchants besought the English ministry to institute measures to suppress piracy. Governor Fletcher, who had been accused on every side of complicity with these malefactors, was removed, and Lord Bellamont appointed in his stead, with instruction to extirpate piracy from the American seas. As every English vessel was at that time engaged in the war with France, Bellamont formed a stock-company, in which the King, Chancellor Somers, the Earl of Romney, the Duke of Shrewsbury, the Earl of Oxford, Bellamont, and Robert Livingston, became shareholders. A written agreement was made, consisting of several articles, which recited, in substance, that Bellamont should furnish £5,000, this sum being four-fifths of the outlay in the undertaking, and that the remaining fifth should be supplied by Livingston, and the captain of the expedition. Livingston, at the opening of the negotiations, had introduced Captain William Kidd (sometimes called Robert Kidd), with whom he had just crossed the Atlantic, as a man well qualified for such an undertaking.