So considerable an amount of alarm had been caused by piratical adventurers on the coasts of Scotland, that King James was in 1614 urgently requested to send some royal ships there. Sir William Monson and Sir Francis Howard were despatched at once, and after calling at Leith to obtain information and also the service of pilots, proceeded to the Orkney Islands. Touching at Sinclair Castle, the residence of the Earl of Caithness, situate on “the utmost promontory” of Britain, they learned that the accounts had been much exaggerated. There were only two known to the Earl, and indeed one of them whom Monson took could hardly be deemed such at all; he was a common sailor, and when he had found out the nature of the service to which he had been engaged, he had abandoned it as soon as possible. Clarke, the other adventurer, to whom the title of pirate more fairly belonged, had been ashore to the castle a day previously, and had been entertained in a friendly way, the fact being that the Earl and his tenants were a little afraid of him as an ugly customer. Hearing that Sir William was on the coast, he had fled: Monson, therefore, finding it useless and needless to remain at Caithness, sailed for Orkney, where he left Sir Francis Howard while he proceeded to explore the coasts in detail, putting into every inlet where it was likely Clarke or other pirates might be hidden. He was unsuccessful in his search, and at length decided to make for Broad Haven—a noted rendezvous for pirates—partly on account of its remoteness and inaccessibility, and partly because one Cormat dwelt there, who, with his daughters, entertained these thieving adventurers with great cordiality. On the voyage he encountered a terrible gale, “that it were fit only for a poet to describe.” One of his vessels was engulfed in the seas, and no traces of it or of its crew remained, while the others were dispersed and did not see each other again till all met in England. Monson had now alone to beard the lion in his den.