But the ordinary Kidd stories are very much the same, and depend a good deal upon the character of the coast and upon the imagination of the people who live in that region.  We will give one of them as a sample, and from this a number of very good pirate stories could be manufactured by ingenious persons.

It was a fine summer night late in the seventeenth century.  A young man named Abner Stout, in company with his wife Mary, went out for a walk upon the beach.  They lived in a little village near the coast of New Jersey.  Abner was a good carpenter, but a poor man; but he and his wife were very happy with each other, and as they walked toward the sea in the light of the full moon, no young lovers could have been more gay.

When they reached a little bluff covered with low shrubbery, which was the first spot from which they could have a full view of the ocean, Abner suddenly stopped, and pointed out to Mary an unusual sight.  There, as plainly in view as if it had been broad daylight, was a vessel lying at the entrance of the little bay.  The sails were furled, and it was apparently anchored.

For a minute Abner gazed in utter amazement at the sight of this vessel, for no ships, large or small, came to this little lonely bay.  There was a harbor two or three miles farther up the coast to which all trading craft repaired.  What could the strange ship want here?

This unusual visitor to the little bay was a very low and very long, black schooner, with tall masts which raked forward, and with something which looked very much like a black flag fluttering in its rigging.  Now the truth struck into the soul of Abner.  “Hide yourself, Mary,” he whispered.  “It is a pirate ship!” And almost at the same instant the young man and his wife laid themselves flat on the ground among the bushes, but they were very careful, each of them, to take a position which would allow them to peep out through the twigs and leaves upon the scene before them.

There seemed to be a good deal of commotion on board the black schooner, and very soon a large boat pushed off from her side, and the men in it began rowing rapidly toward the shore, apparently making for a spot on the beach, not far from the bluff on which Abner and Mary were concealed.  “Let us get up and run,” whispered Mary, trembling from head to toe.  “They are pirates, and they are coming here!”

“Lie still!  Lie still!” said Abner.  “If we get up and leave these bushes, we shall be seen, and then they will be after us!  Lie still, and do not move a finger!”

The trembling Mary obeyed her husband, and they both lay quite still, scarcely breathing, with eyes wide open.  The boat rapidly approached the shore.  Abner counted ten men rowing and one man sitting in the stern.  The boat seemed to be heavily loaded, and the oarsmen rowed hard.

Now the boat was run through the surf to the beach, and its eleven occupants jumped out.  There was no mistaking their character.  They were true pirates.  They had great cutlasses and pistols, and one of them was very tall and broad shouldered, and wore an old-fashioned cocked hat.