The Government Manual for New Pirates

Some time aback, just when me crew was about to board a fat Spanish galleon, a-drippin' with rubies and doubloons, up speaks Jonesy the cabin boy--a green lad, barely tall enough for his head to reach his hat. "Dibs on the booty," says he.

"Dibs," says he!

A billion blisterin' barnacles on a drowned man's beard! There be no "dibs" in piratin'. Booty be divided among the crew, from the lowest deckswabber to the highest masthand. So says the Pirate Code, and so says I, and I'll run through any scurvy dog what says different.

So after I finished runnin' Jonesy through, I set me to thinkin'. What with the land bein' so crowded, and the sea bein' so free, there's more joinin' the sweet trade than the Brotherhood can teach. "May be," says I, "we need a book what can teach the young 'uns how to pirate like men. May be," says I, "we need a manual."

So if ye aspire to the liberty of the seas--if the smell of salt water be to ye like the finest perfume, and the taste of rum sweeter than the finest China cinammon--then get ye to your nearest bookshop, pull out your cutlass, and demand ye a copy of The Government Manual for New Pirates. I'm told ye can also be buyin' it at Amazon.com, whate'er that may be.

--Calico Jack, King of the Pirates

(from his remarks at the London Book Fair)