INTERVIEWING CAPTAIN KIDD.

Mr. Editor:  The following, which I cut from the New York Herald of July 17, 1699 (accidentally in my possession), may interest some of your readers.  I was not before aware that the Herald’s files went back so far, but it was a greater surprise to discover that interviewing flourished at so early a date.

Yours, SARSFIELD YOUNG.

CAPTAIN KIDD!

THE PIRATE CHIEF IN A BOSTON JAIL!

BOUQUETS AND BAKED BEANS vs. PURITAN THEOLOGY!

CALUMNIATIONS OF THE PRESS!

DON’T CALL ME PET NAMES—­WILLIAM vs. ROBERT!

ALL A MISTAKE ABOUT THAT CHISEL!

SARAH’S MUGS AND PORRINGERS!

“HOW IS MY FRIEND, COL.  LIVINGSTONE?”

EAST INDIA RING vs. INNOCENCE!

CAN ADAMS AND CHOATE CLEAR HIM? etc. etc.

[From Herald Special Correspondent.]

BOSTON, 16th July, 1699.

Your correspondent arrived here last evening, and found (as already telegraphed) that the arrest and imprisonment of Captain Kidd, the champion pirate of the world, continues to form the all-absorbing topic of conversation.  Little Boston has got a sensation at last, and is determined to keep it.  Merchants and brokers talk Kidd on ’Change.  Groups at the hotels discuss the nautical hero.  Badly-executed pictures of him stare at you from the shop-windows.  Cotton Mather, the great gun of the clergy here, blazes away at this “child of iniquity” from the pulpit; and it is understood that a prominent publishing-house has already arranged to bring out The Autobiography of a Buccaneer. On dit, that certain parties are negotiating to have him appear next season as a lecturer in case he isn’t wanted on another platform.

The first paroxysm of excitement, which looked to nothing short of hanging him from the steeple of the Old South Church, has given place to a conviction that the law had better be suffered to take its course, inasmuch as the unfortunate captain will surely drift among the breakers when he is tossed about on the sea of criminal jurisprudence.

By the politeness of the colonial authorities, your correspondent obtained a permit to visit the noted son of Neptune at the Stone Prison.  Sending in his card, he was at once invited into the small but comfortable apartment where the “scourge of the seas” is confined.

Captain Kidd graciously extended his hand and bade your correspondent welcome.  He is a short, broad-shouldered, powerfully-built man, of perhaps forty-five or forty-seven years of age.  His hair, which is of dark chestnut and inclined to curl, was combed back from a medium forehead, and his face was sun-burnt into a rich mahogany hue.  His cold gray eyes were deep set under thick brows that arched and met.  His manner was courteous and dignified.  He was dressed in light gray trowsers of perfect cut, patent-leather boots and a red-and-black spotted shirt, which displayed in its front a set of superb diamond studs.  From under a Byron collar, parfaitement starched, peeped the ends of a pale lilac scarf.  A magnificent seal-ring decorated the third finger of his left hand.