While establishing themselves in this island and strengthening its half-ruined defenses, the most profitable employment of the Knights was Privateering, or, more correctly, active piracy.
"The Story of Malta"
Maturin M. Ballou
Incorporated in 1621, it included various smaller companies already engaged in trade and Privateering, and was an immense corporation which finally owned more than eight hundred ships, and sent to Brazil alone more than seventy thousand troops.
"The South American Republics Part I of II"
Thomas C. Dawson
But on the other hand, the war had opened the way for Privateering, and out of the ports of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut the privateers swarmed like swallows from a chimney at dawn.
"American Merchant Ships and Sailors"
Willis J. Abbot