Epstein, Mordecai: The English Levant Company: its foundation and its history to 1640 (London: George Routledge & Sons Ltd, 1908)

THE LEVANT COMPANY 143
company was to watch the clerks of the
Custom House to see that there was no under-
hand dealing to the prejudice of the company.
He was to see also that no member of the
company lent his name to merchants who
were not freemen of the Company so that
these might get in their goods without having
to pay the duty.
But while the company could draw close
the net around its privileges, so that non-
members should not get in easily, they could
not protect themselves effectively against
pirates. Piracy had been the scourge of
Mediterranean trade from its earliest begin-
nings.4 The method adopted in the 17th
century to combat it was for all the trading
companies to combine in fitting out a fleet.
In this, of course, the Levant Company were
asked to participate. Such a request was
made in 1618,5 but they replied that their
means did not allow of their contributing
anything. Nor did they feel it their particu-
lar duty to participate in the venture, since
4 Cf. Cunningham : Growth of English Industry and
Commerce, II. p. 251 ; p. 188. Cf. also above, p. 6,
5 Min. January 25, 1618.