The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

THE OLD EAST INDIAMEN

BOOKS OF TRAVEL

Demy 8vo. Cloth Bindings. All fully Illustrated

THROUGH UNKNOWN NIGERIA
By John R. Raphael. 15s. net.

A WOMAN IN CHINA
By Mary Gaunt. 15s. net.

LIFE IN AN INDIAN OUTPOST
By Major Casserly. 12s. 6d. net.

CHINA REVOLUTIONISED
By J. S. Thompson. 12s. 6d. net.

NEW ZEALAND
By Dr Max Herz. 12s. 6d. net.

THE DIARY OF A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE
By Stanley Portal Hyatt. 12s. 6d. net.

OFF THE MAIN TRACK
By Stanley Portal Hyatt. 12s. 6d. net.

WITH THE LOST LEGION IN NEW ZEALAND
By Colonel G. Hamilton-Browne (“Maori Browne”). 12s. 6d. net.

A LOST LEGIONARY IN SOUTH AFRICA
By Colonel G. Hamilton-Browne (“Maori Browne”). 12s. 6d. net.

SIAM
By Pierre Loti. 7s. 6d. net.

THE EAST INDIAMAN “THOMAS COUTTS,” AS SHE APPEARED IN THE YEAR 1826.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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THE OLD EAST
INDIAMEN

BY
E. KEBLE CHATTERTON
Lieutenant R.N.V.R.

Author of “Sailing-Ships and their Story,”
“Down Channel in the ‘Vivette,’”
“Through Holland in the ‘Vivette,’”
“Ships and Ways of Other Days,” etc.

ILLUSTRATED

LONDON
T. WERNER LAURIE LTD.
8 ESSEX STREET, STRAND

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PREFACE

The author desires to acknowledge the courtesy of Messrs T. H. Parker Brothers of Whitcomb Street, W.C., for allowing him to reproduce the illustrations mentioned on many of the pages of this book; as also the P. & O. Steam Navigation Company for permission to reproduce the old painting of the Swallow.

Owing to the fact that the author is now away at sea serving under the White Ensign, it is hoped that this may be deemed a sufficient apology for any errata which may have been allowed to creep into the text.

THE OLD EAST INDIAMEN
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

In this volume I have to invite the reader to consider a special epoch of the world’s progress, in which the sailing ship not only revolutionised British trade but laid the foundations of, and almost completed, that imposing structure which is to-day represented by the Indian Empire. It is a period brimful of romance, of adventures, travel and the exciting pursuit after wealth. It is a theme which, for all its deeply human aspect, is one for ever dominated by a grandeur and irresistible destiny.

With all its failings, the East India Company still remains in history as the most amazingly powerful trading concern which the world has ever seen. Like many other big propositions it began in a small way: but it acquired for us that vast continent which is the envy of all the great powers of the world to-day. And it is important and necessary to remember always that we owe this in the first place to the consummate courage, patience, skill and long-suffering of that race of beings, the intrepid seamen, who have never yet received their due from the landsmen whom they have made rich and comfortable.

Among the Harleian MSS. there is a delightful phrase written by a seventeenth-century writer, in which, treating of matters that are not immediately concerned with the present subject, he remarks very quaintly that “the first article of an Englishman’s Politicall Creed must be that he believeth in ye Sea etc. Without that there needeth no general Council to pronounce him uncapable of Salvation.” This somewhat sweeping statement none the less aptly sums up the whole matter of our colonisation and overseas development. The entire glamour of the Elizabethan period, marked as it unfortunately is with many deplorable errors, is derived from the sea. With the appreciation of what could be attained by a combination of stout ships, sturdy seamen, navigation, seamanship, gunnery and high hopes that refused persistently to be daunted, the most farsighted began to see that success was for them. Honours, wealth, the founding of families that should treasure their names in future generations, the acquisition of fine estates and the building of large houses with luxuries that exceeded the Tudor pattern—these were the pictures which were conjured up in the imaginations of those who vested their fortunes and often their lives in these ocean voyages. The call of the sea had in England fallen mostly on deaf ears until the late sixteenth century. It is only because there were some who listened to it, obeyed, and presently led others to do as they had done, that the British Empire has been built up at all.

Our task, however, is to treat of one particular way in which that call has influenced the minds and activities of men. We are to see how that, if it summoned some across the Atlantic to the Spanish Main, it sent others out to the Orient, yet always with the same object of acquiring wealth, establishing trade with strange peoples, and incidentally affording a fine opportunity for those of an adventurous spirit who were unable any longer to endure the cramped and confined limitations of the neighbourhood in which they had been born and bred. And though, as we proceed with our story, we shall be compelled to watch the gradual growth and the vicissitudes of the East Indian companies, yet our object is to obtain a clear knowledge not so much of the latter as of the ships which they employed, the manner in which they were built, sailed, navigated and fought. When we speak of the “Old East Indiamen” we mean of course the ships which used to carry the trade between India and Europe. And inasmuch as this trade was, till well on into the nineteenth century, the valuable and exclusive monopoly of the East India Company, carefully guarded against any interlopers, our consideration is practically that of the Company’s ships. After the Company lost their monopoly to India, their ships still possessed the monopoly of trading with China until the year 1833. After that date the Company sold the last of their fleet which had made them famous as a great commercial and political concern. In their place a number of new private firms sprang up, who bought the old ships from the East India Company, and even built new ones for the trade. These were very fine craft and acted as links between England and the East for a few years longer, reaching their greatest success between the years 1850 and 1870. But the opening of the Suez Canal and the enterprise of steamships sealed their fate, so that instead of the wealth which was obtained during those few years by carrying cargoes of rich merchandise between the East and the West, and transporting army officers, troops and private passengers, there was little or no money to be made by going round the Cape. Thus the last of the Indiamen sailing ships passed away—became coal-hulks, were broken up; or, changing their name and nationality, sailed under a Scandinavian flag.

The East India Company rose from being a private venture of a few enterprising merchants to become a gigantic corporation of immense political power, with its own governors, its own cavalry, artillery and infantry, its own navy, and yet with its trade-monopoly and its unsurpassed “regular service” of merchantmen. The latter were the largest, the best built, and the most powerfully armed vessels in the world, with the exception only of some warships. They were, so to speak, the crack liners of the day, but they were a great deal more besides. Their officers were the finest navigators afloat, their seamen were at times as able as any of the crews in the Royal Navy, and in time of war the Government showed how much it coveted them by impressing them into its service, to the great chagrin and inconvenience of the East India Company, as we shall see later on in our story.

THE EAST INDIA HOUSE.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

From being at first a small trading concern with a handful of factors and an occasional factory planted in the East in solitary places, the Company progressed till it had its own civil service with its training college in England for the cadets aspiring to be sent out to the East. It is due to the Company not only that India is now under the British flag, but that the wealth of our country has been largely increased and a new outlet was found for our manufactures. The factors who went out in the first Indiamen sailing ships sowed the seed which to-day we now reap. The commanders of these vessels made their “plots” (charts) and obtained by bitter experience the details which provided the first sailing directions. They were at once explorers, traders, fighters, surveyors. The conditions under which they voyaged were hard enough, as we shall see: and the loss of human life was a high price at which all this material trade-success was obtained. Notwithstanding all the quarrels, the jealousies, the murders, the deceits, the misrule and corruption, the bribery and extortion which stain the activities of the East India Company, yet during its existence it raised the condition of the natives from the lowest disorder and degradation: and if the Company found it not easy to separate its commercial from its political aspirations, yet the British Government in turn found it very convenient on occasions when this corporation’s funds could be squeezed, its men impressed; or even its ships employed for guarding the coasts of England or transporting troops out to India.

It is difficult to realise all that the East India Company stood for. It comprised under its head a large shipping line with many of the essential attributes of a ruling nation, and its merchant ships not only opened up to our traders India, but Japan and China as well. And bear in mind that the old East Indiamen set forth on their voyages not with the same light hearts that their modern successors, the steamships of the P. & O. line, begin their journey. Before the East India Company’s ships got to their destination, they had to sail right away round the Cape of Good Hope and then across the Indian Ocean, having no telegraphic communication with the world, and with none of the comforts of a modern liner—no preserved foods, no iced drinks or anything of that sort. Any moment they were liable to be plunged into an engagement: if not with the French or Dutch men-of-war, then with roving privateers or well-armed pirate ships manned by some of the most redoubtable rascals of the time, who stopped at no slaughter or brutality. There were the perils, too, of storms, and of other forms of shipwreck, and the almost monotonous safety of the modern liner was a thing that did not exist. Later on we shall see in what difficulties some of these ships became involved. It was because they were ever expectant of a fight that they were run practically naval fashion. They were heavily armed with guns, they had their special code of signals for day and night, they carried their gunners, who were well drilled and always prepared to fight: and we shall see more than one instance where these merchant ships were far too much for a French admiral and his squadron.

These East Indiamen sailing ships were really wonderful for what they did, the millions of miles over which they sailed, the millions of pounds’ worth of goods which they carried out and home: and this not merely for one generation, but for two and a half centuries. It is really surprising that such a unique monopoly should have been enjoyed for all this time, and that other ships should have been (with the exceptions we shall presently note) kept out of this benefit. The result was that an East Indiaman was spoken of with just as much respect as a man-of-war. She was built regardless of cost and kept in the best of conditions; and all the other merchantmen in the seven seas could not rival her for strength, beauty and equipment. It was a golden age, a glorious age: an epoch in which British seamanhood, British shipbuilding in wood, were capable of being improved upon only by the clipper ships that followed for a brief interval. They earned handsome dividends for the Company, they were always full of passengers, troops and valuable freight; and, although they were not as fine-lined as the clipper ships, yet they made some astounding passages. They carried crews that in number and quality would make the heart of a modern Scandinavian skipper break with envy. The result was that they were excellently handled and could carry on in a breeze till the last minute, when sail could be taken in smartly with the minimum of warning.

The country fully appreciated how invaluable was this East India service, and certainly no merchantmen were ever so regulated and controlled by Acts of Parliament. To-day you never hear of any merchant skipper buying or selling his command, nor retiring after a very few voyages with a nice little fortune for the rest of his life. But these things occurred in the old East Indiamen, when commanders received even knighthoods and a good income settled on them, for life, as a reward of their gallantry. Those were indeed the palmy days of the merchant service, and many an ill-paid mercantile officer to-day, wearied of receiving owners’ complaints and no thanks, must regret that his lot was not to be serving with the East India Company.

When we consider the two important centuries and a half, during which the East Indiamen ships were making history and trade for our country, helping in the most important manner to build up our Indian Empire, fighting the Portuguese, the Dutch and the French, privateers and pirates, and generally opening up the countries of the East, it is to me perfectly extraordinary that the history of these ships has never yet been written. I have searched in vain in our great national libraries—in the British Museum, the India Office, the Admiralty and elsewhere—but I have not been able to find one volume dealing exclusively with these craft. In an age that sees no end to the making of books there is therefore need for a volume that should long since have been written. Many of the story-books of our boyhood begin with the hero leaving England in an East Indiaman: but they say little or nothing as to how she was rigged, how she was manned, and what uniforms her officers wore.

I feel, then, that I may with confidence ask the reader who loves ships for themselves, or is fascinated by history, or is specially interested in the rise of our Indian Empire, to follow me in the following pages while the story of these old East Indiamen is narrated. In a little while we shall have passed entirely from the last of all surviving ocean-going sailing ships, but during the whole of their period none have left their mark so significantly on past and present affairs as the old East Indiamen. I can guarantee that while pursuing this story the reader will find much that will interest and even surprise him: but above all will be seen triumphant the true grit and pluck which have ever been the attributes of our national sailormen—the determination to carry out, in spite of all costs and hardships, the serious task imposed on them of getting the ship safely to port with all her valuable lives, and her rich cargoes, regardless of weather, pirates, privateers and the enemies of the nation whose flag they flew. And this fine spirit will be found to be confined to no special century nor to any particular ship: but rather to pervade the whole of the East India Company’s merchant service. The days of such a monopoly as this corporation’s trade and shipping are much more distant even than they seem in actual years: but happily it is our proud boast, as year after year demonstrates, that those qualities, which composed the magnificent seamanhood of the crews of these vessels, are no less existent and flourishing to-day in the other ships under the British flag that venture north, south, east and west. The only main difference is this:—Yesterday the sailor had a hundred chances, for every one opportunity which is afforded to-day to the sons of the sea, of showing that the grand, undying desire to do the right thing in the time of crisis is one of the greatest assets of our nation.

CHAPTER II
THE MAGNETIC EAST

Within human experience it is a safe maxim, that if you keep on continuously thinking and longing for a certain object you are almost sure, eventually, to obtain that which you desire.

There is scarcely any better instance of this on a large scale than the longing to find a route to India by sea, and the attainment of this only after long years and years. As a study of perseverance it is remarkable: but the inspiration of the whole project was to get at the world’s great treasure-house, to find the way thereto and then unlock its doors. For centuries there had been trade routes between Europe and India overland. But the establishment of the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth century placed a barrier across these routes. This suggested that there might possibly be—there was most probably—a route via the sea, and this would have the advantage of an easier method of transportation. It is very curious how throughout the ages a vague tradition survives and lingers on from century to century, finally to decide men’s minds on some momentous matter. It is not quite a literal inspiration, for often enough these ancient traditions had a modicum of truth therein contained.

In my last book, “Ships and Ways of Other Days,” I gave an instance of this which was remarkable enough to bear repeating. A reproduction was given of a fourteenth-century portolano, or chart, in which the shape of Southern Africa was seen to be extraordinarily accurate: and this, notwithstanding that it was sketched one hundred and thirty-five years before the Cape of Good Hope had been doubled. Some might suppose this knowledge to have been the result of second-sight, but my suggestion is that it was the result of an ancient tradition that the lower part of the African continent was shaped as depicted. For there is a well-founded belief that about the beginning of the sixth century B.C. the Phœnicians were sent by Neco, an Egyptian king, down the Red Sea; and that after circumnavigating the African continent they entered the Mediterranean from the westward.

The dim recollection of this voyage over a portion of the Indian Ocean, coupled with other knowledge derived from the Arabian seamen, doubtless left little hesitation in the minds of the seafaring peoples of the Mediterranean that the sea route to India existed if indeed it could be found. The various fruitless attempts, beginning with Vivaldi’s voyage from Genoa in 1281, are all evidence that this belief never died. For years nothing more successful was obtained than to get to Madeira or a little lower down the west coast of Africa, yet almost every effort was pushing on nearer the goal; even though that goal was still a very long way distant. The East was exercising a magnetic influence on the minds of men: India was bound to be discovered sooner or later, if they did not weary of the attempt.

Then comes on to the scene the famous Prince Henry the Navigator, who built the first observatory of Portugal, established a naval arsenal, gathered together at his Sagres headquarters the greatest pilots and navigators which could be collected, founded a school of navigation and chart-making, and then sent his trained, picked men forth to sail the seas, explore the unknown south with the hope ultimately of reaching the rich land of India. I have discussed this matter with such detail in the volume already alluded to that it will be enough if I here remark briefly that though Prince Henry died in the year 1460 without any of his ships or men attaining India, yet less than forty years were to elapse ere this was attained, and his was the influence which really brought this about. We must never forget that on the historical road to India through the long ages from the earliest times down to the fifteenth century the name of Prince Henry the Navigator represents one of the most important milestones.

THE HONOURABLE EAST INDIA COMPANY’S SHIP “GENERAL GODDARD,” COMMANDED BY WM. TAYLOR MONEY, WITH HIS MAJESTY’S SHIP “SCEPTRE” AND “SWALLOW,” PACKET, CAPTURING SEVEN DUTCH EAST INDIAMEN OFF ST. HELENA, ON 14th JUNE, 1795.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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You know so well how that thereafter, in the year 1486, the King of Portugal sent forth two expeditions with the desire to find an eastern route to India, and that one of these proceeded through Egypt, then down the Red Sea, across the Arabian Sea, and finally after some hardships reached Calicut, in the south-west of India. The other expedition consisted of a little squadron under Bartholomew Diaz, and although it did not get as far as India, yet it passed the Cape of Torments without knowing it—far out to sea—and even sighted Algoa Bay. The Cape of Torments he had called that promontory on his way back, remembering the bad weather which he here found: but the Cape of Good Hope his master, King John II., renamed it when Diaz reached home in safety. And then, finally, the last of these efforts was fraught with success when Vasco da Gama, in the year 1497, not only doubled the Cape of Good Hope, but discovered Mozambique, Melinda (a little north of Mombasa), and thence with the help of an Indian pilot crossed the ocean and reached Calicut by sea in twenty-three days—an absolutely unprecedented achievement for one who had sailed all the way from the Tagus.

This was the beginning of an entirely new era in the progress of the world, and till the crack of doom it will remain a memorable voyage, not merely for the fact that da Gama was able to succeed where so many others had failed, but because it unlocked the door of the East, first to the Portuguese, and subsequently to other nations of Europe. The twin arts of seamanship and navigation had made this possible, and it was only because the Portuguese, most especially Prince Henry, had believed “in ye sea” that the key had been found. As Columbus, by believing in the sea, was enabled in looking for India to open up the Western world, so was da Gama privileged to unlock the East. And since the sea connotes the ship we arrive at the standpoint that it is this long-suffering creature, fashioned by the hand of man, which has done more for the civilisation of the world than any other of those wonderful creations which the human mind has evolved from the things of the earth.

The first cargo which da Gama brought home was, so to speak, merely a small sample of those goods which were to be obtained by the ships that came after for generation after generation till the present day. It showed how great and priceless were the riches of the East—spices and perfumes, pearls and rubies, diamonds and cinnamon. The safe arrival of these, when da Gama got back home, made a profound impression. But it was no mere sentimental wonder, for the receipt of all these goods repaid the cost of the entire expedition sixty-fold. From this time forth the Portuguese were busily engaged in extracting wealth as men get it out from a gold mine. Their ships went backwards and forwards in their long voyages, sometimes narrowly escaping the attentions of the Moslem pirates anxious to relieve them of their valuable cargoes. Some Portuguese settled in India, and gradually there came into existence a fringe of Portuguese nationality extending from the Malabar coast right away to the Persian Gulf. Even as far as Japan was the East explored, and the vast fortunes which were brought back ever astonished the merchants of Europe. The first Portuguese factory was established at Calicut in the year 1500. For about a hundred years they were able to benefit, unrivalled, by their newly found treasure-house and to use their best endeavours, unfettered, to empty it.

In 1503 they erected their first fortress and strengthened their position. In their hands was the monopoly: theirs were the great and invaluable secrets of this amazing trade. And considering everything—the enterprise and training of Prince Henry, the far-sighted prudence in believing in the sea, the years and years of distressful voyages, the final attainment of the treasure-land only after many vicissitudes and the loss of ships and men—we cannot marvel that the Portuguese preserved these secrets, and held on to their monopoly, to the annoyance of the rest of civilised Europe. The fact was that Portugal was then the sovereign of the seas: she was far too strong afloat for any other country to think of wresting from her by force what she had obtained only by much study, skill and perseverance. What she had obtained she was going to hold. Those who wanted these Eastern goods must come to Lisbon, where the mart was held: and come they did, but they went back home envious that Portugal should enjoy this secret monopoly, and wondering all the time how India could be reached by a new route.

Curiosity and envy combined have been the means of the unravelling of many a secret. It was so now. Let us not fail to realise how greatly these human feelings influenced many of the voyages during the next hundred years. We justly admire the great daring of the Elizabethan seamen, but though the spirit of adventure and the hatred of Spain had a great deal to do with the cause of their setting forth to cross the ocean, yet there was another reason: and this explains much that is not otherwise quite clear. It is always fair to assume that men do not act except at the instigation of some clear motive. They do not persuade merchants to expend the whole of their small wealth in buying or building ships, victualling them and providing all the necessary inventories, without some rational cause. In the Elizabethan times, when wealth was much rarer than it is to-day, the prime motive of these expeditions was the pursuit of greater wealth.

But as England was not yet as expert at sea as the Portuguese, she could not hope to obtain the treasures of distant lands. Before she was ready there was, however, still Spain: and the latter was determined to do her best to obtain on her own what Portugal was enjoying. In a word, then, many of the sixteenth-century voyages which we have attributed, rashly, solely to a hope for adventurous exploration were in fact animated by the desire to find some new route to India. To this inspiration must be attributed many of those long sea journeys to the north, the north-east and the north-west. Men did not endeavour to find north-east or north-west passages merely for fun, but in order to discover a road to India. No one knew that it was impossible: if the Portuguese had been able to go one way, why should not they themselves go by another route? Remembering this, you must think of Spain sending Magellan to the west; of England sending Davis to the north-west; and of Holland sending Barentsz to the north-east to find a passage to the treasure-land of India or China.

The Spaniards discovered a way to India through the straits which are called after Magellan, and henceforth did their utmost to keep the ships of other countries out of their newly found waters, until the increase of English sea-power and the daring of our more experienced seamen showed that this Spanish sovereignty on sea could not be maintained by force. But still the English seamen had not yet reached India. We must turn for a moment to the Dutch, who were destined to become a great naval power. In the year 1580 the Spanish and Portuguese dominions had become united under the Spanish crown, and the Dutch were excluded from trading with Lisbon, their ships confiscated and their owners thrown into prison. Now, one of these captains while undergoing his imprisonment obtained from some Portuguese sailors a good deal of information concerning the Indian Seas, so that when he reached the Netherlands again he told the most wonderful accounts to his countrymen. The latter were so impressed by what was related that they decided to send an expedition to find the Indies themselves.

Presently, then, we shall see the Dutch not merely casting longing eyes towards India, but actually getting a footing therein, building up a very lucrative trade and employing great, well-built craft: but before we come to that stage we must note the gradual and persistent way in which the countries outside the Iberian Peninsula felt their way to this land of spices and precious stones, and after groping some time in the dark found that which they had been searching for during generations.

CHAPTER III
THE LURE OF NATIONS

When once it was realised how wonderful was Portugal’s good fortune in the East, the nations of Europe one and all desired to enjoy some of these riches for themselves.

Even during the time of Henry VIII. one Master Robert Thorne, a London merchant, who had lived for a long time in Seville and had observed with envy the enterprise of the Portuguese, declared to his English sovereign a secret “which hitherto, as I suppose, hath beene hid”—viz. that “with a small number of ships there may bee discovered divers New lands and kingdoms ... to which places there is left one way to discover, which is into the North.... For out of Spaine they have discovered all the Indies and Seas Occidentall, and out of Portingall all the Indies and Seas Orientall.” His idea, then, was to seek a way to India via the north. The same Robert Thorne, writing in the year 1527 to Dr Ley, “Lord ambassadour for king Henry the eight,” concerning “the new trade of spicery” of the East, pointed out the wealth of the Moluccas (Malay Archipelago) abounding “with golde, Rubies, Diamondes, Balasses, Granates, Jacincts, and other stones and pearles, as all other lands, that are under and neere the Equinoctiall”; for just as “our mettalls be Lead, Tinne, and iron, so theirs be gold, silver and copper.”

Now Master Thorne was a very shrewd investor. “In a fleete of three shippes and a caravel,” he says, “that went from this citie armed by the marchants of it, which departed in Aprill last past, I and my partener have one thousand foure hundred duckets that we employed in the sayd fleete, principally for that two English men, friends of mine, which are somewhat learned in Cosmographie, should go in the same shippes, to bring me certaine relation of the situation of the countrey, and to be expert in the navigation of those seas, and there to have informations of many other things, and advise that I desire to know especially.” His idea was that our seamen should obtain some of the Portuguese “cardes” (i.e. charts) “by which they saile,” “learne how they understand them,” and thus, in plain language, crib some of the Portuguese secrets.

Thorne shows that he was no mean student of geography himself. Already he possessed “a little Mappe or Carde of the world” and pointed out that from Cape Verde “the coast goeth Southward to a Cape called Capo de buona speransa” (the Portuguese name for the Cape of Good Hope). “And by this Cape go the Portingals to their Spicerie. For from this Cape toward the Orient, is the land of Calicut.” “The coastes of the Sea throughout all the world I have coloured with yellow, for that it may appeare that all is within the line coloured yellow is to be imagined to be maine land or islands: and all without the line so coloured to bee Sea: whereby it is easie and light to know it.” Now Thorne had obtained this “carde” somehow by stealth: by rights he should not have possessed it, for the Portuguese, as already mentioned, were most anxious that their Indian secrets should not be divulged. He therefore begs his friend not to show anyone this chart else “it may be a cause of paine to the maker: as well for that none may make these cardes, but certaine appointed and allowed for masters, as for that peradventure it would not sound well to them, that a stranger should know or discover their secretes: and would appeare worst of all, if they understand that I write touching the short way to the spicerie by our Seas.”

We see, then, the determined desire to obtain the required information about a route to India obtained from the study of the very charts which the Portuguese made after some of their voyages, and by sending Englishmen out in their ships sufficiently expert in cosmography to learn all that could be known. It must not be forgotten, at the same time, that there were also land-travellers who journeyed to India and brought back alluring accounts of India. Cæsar Frederick, for instance, a Venetian merchant, set forth in the year 1563 with some merchandise bound for the East. From Venice he sailed in a vessel as far as Cyprus: from there he took passage in a smaller craft and landed in Syria, and then journeying to Aleppo got in touch with some Armenian and Moorish merchants whom he accompanied to Ormuz (on the Persian Gulf), where he found that the Portuguese had already established a factory and strengthened it, as the English East India Company’s servants were afterwards wont, with a fort. From Ormuz he went on to Goa and other places in India. Already, he pointed out, the Portuguese had a fleet or “Armada” of warships to guard their merchant craft in these parts from attack by pirates. Proceeding thence to Cochin, at the south-west of India, he found that the natives called all Christians coming from the West Portuguese, whether they were Italians, Frenchmen or whatever else: so powerful a hold had the first settlers from the Iberian Peninsula gained on the Indians. We need not follow this traveller on his way to Sumatra, to the Ganges and elsewhere, but it is enough to state that the accounts which he gave to his fellow-Europeans naturally whetted still more the appetites of the merchant traders anxious to get in touch with India by sea. He told them how rich the East was in pepper and ginger, nutmegs and sandalwood, aloes, pearls, rubies, sapphires, diamonds. It was a magnificent opportunity for an honest merchant to find wealth. “Now to finish that which I have begunne to write, I say that those parts of the Indies are very good, because that a man that hath little shall make a very great deale thereof: alwayes they must governe themselves that they be taken for honest men.”

When Magellan set forth from Seville to find a new route to India he had gone via the straits which now bear his name, and then striking north-west across the wide Pacific had arrived at the Philippine Islands, where he was killed. But his ships proceeded thence to the Moluccas, and one of his little squadron of five actually arrived back at Seville, having thus encircled the globe. Englishmen, however, were so determined that there was a nearer route than this that, in the year 1582, the Indian frenzy which enthralled our countrymen culminated in the voyage of Edward Fenton that set forth bound for Asia. This expedition consisted of four ships. It was customary in those days to speak of the Commodore or Admiral of the expedition as the “Generall,” thus indicating, by the way, that not yet had the English navy got away from the influence of the land army. The flagship was spoken of as the “Admirall.” These four ships, then, consisted, firstly, of the Leicester, the “Admirall” of the squadron. She was a vessel of 400 tons, her “generall” being Captain Edward Fenton, with William Hawkins (the younger) as “Lieutenant General,” or second in command of the expedition, the master of the ship being Christopher Hall. The second ship was the Edward Bonaventure, a well-known sixteenth-century craft of 300 tons, which was commanded by Captain Luke Ward, and the master was Thomas Perrie. The third ship was the Francis, a little craft of only 40 tons, whose captain was John Drake and her master was William Markham. The fourth was the Elizabeth, of 50 tons; captain, Thomas Skevington, and master, Ralph Crane.

Before we proceed any further it may be as well to explain a point that might otherwise cause confusion. In the ships of that time the captain was in supreme command, but he was not necessarily a seaman or navigator. He was the leader of the ship or expedition, but he was not a specialist in the arts of the sea. As we know from Monson, Elizabethan captains “were gentlemen of worth and means, maintaining there diet at their own charge.” “The Captaines charge,” says the famous Elizabethan Captain John Smith, the first president of Virginia, “is to commaund all, and tell the Maister to what port he will go, or to what height” (i.e. latitude). In a fight he is “to giue direction for the managing thereof, and the Maister is to see to the cunning [of] the ship, and trimming the sailes.” The master is also, with his mate, “to direct the course, commaund all the saylors, for steering, trimming, and sayling the ship”: and the pilot is he who, “when they make land, doth take the charge of the ship till he bring her to harbour.” And, finally, not to weary the reader too much, there is just one other word which is often used in these expeditions that we may explain. The “cape-merchant” was the man who had shipped on board to look after the cargo of merchandise carried in the hold.

On the 1st of April 1582 the Edward Bonaventure started from Blackwall in the Thames, and on the nineteenth of the same month arrived off Netley, in Southampton Water, where the Leicester was found waiting. On 1st May the four weighed anchor, but did not get clear of the land till the end of the month, “partly of businesse, and partly of contrary windes.” The complement of these ships numbered a couple of hundred, including the gentlemen adventurers with their servants, the factors (who were to open up trade), and the chaplains. In selecting crews, as many seamen as possible were obtained, but by this time these were not at all numerous in England: and even then great care had to be taken to avoid shipping “any disordered or mutinous person.”

The instructions given to Captain Fenton are so illustrative of these rules then so essential for the good government of overseas expeditions that it will not be out of place to notice them with some detail. As for the “Generall,” “if it should please God to take him away,” a number of names were “secretly set down to succeede in his place one after the other.” These names were inscribed on parchment and then sealed up in balls of wax with the Queen’s signet. They were then placed in two coffers, which were locked with three separate locks, one key being kept in the custody of the captain of the Edward Bonaventure, the second in the care of the Leicester’s captain, and the third in the keeping of Master Maddox, the chaplain. If the general were to die, these coffers were to be opened and the party named therein to succeed him.

Fenton’s instructions were to use all possible diligence to leave Southampton with his ships before the end of April, and then make for the Cape of Good Hope and so to the Moluccas. After leaving the English coast the general was to have special regard “so to order your course, as that your ships and vessels lose not one another, but keep companie together.” But lest by tempest or other cause the squadron should get separated, the captains and masters were to be advised previously of rendezvous, “wherein you will stay certaine dayes.” And every ship which reached her rendezvous and then passed on without knowing what had become of the other ships, was to “leave upon every promontorie or cape a token to stand in sight, with a writing lapped in leade to declare the day of their passage.” They were not to take anything from the Queen’s friends or allies, or any Christians, without paying therefor: and in all transactions they were to deal like good and honest merchants, “ware for ware.”

THE “ESSEX,” EAST INDIAMAN, AS SHE APPEARED WHEN REFITTED AND AT ANCHOR IN BOMBAY HARBOUR.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

[Larger image]

With a view to inaugurating a future trade they were if possible to bring home one or two of the natives, leaving behind some Englishmen as pledges, and in order to learn the language of the country. No person was to keep for his private use any precious stone or metal: otherwise he was to lose “all the recompense he is to have for his service in this voyage by share or otherwise.” A just account was to be kept of the merchandise taken out from England and what was brought home subsequently. And there is a strict order given which shows how slavishly the Portuguese example of secrecy was being copied. “You shall give straight order to restraine, that none shall make any charts or descriptions of the sayd voyage, but such as shall bee deputed by you the Generall, which sayd charts and descriptions, wee thinke meete that you the Generall shall take into your hands at your returne to this our coast of England, leaving with them no copie, and to present them unto us at your returne: the like to be done if they finde any charts or maps in those countreys.”

At the conclusion of the expedition the ships were to make for the Thames, and no one was to land any goods until the Lords of the Council had been informed of the ships’ arrival. As to the routine on board, Fenton was instructed to set down in writing the rules to be kept by the crew, so that in no case could ignorance be pleaded as excuse for delinquency. “And to the end God may blesse this voyage with happie and prosperous successe, you shall have an especiall care to see that reverence and respect bee had to the Ministers appointed to accompanie you in this voyage, as appertaineth to their place and calling, and to see such good order as by them shall be set downe for reformation of life and maners, duely obeyed and perfourmed, by causing the transgressours and contemners of the same to be severely punished, and the Ministers to remoove sometime from one vessell to another.”

But notwithstanding all these precautions this voyage was not the success which had been hoped for. After reaching the west coast of Africa and then stretching across to Brazil, where they watered ships, did some caulking, “scraped off the wormes” from the hulls, and learnt that the Spanish fleet were in the neighbourhood of the Magellan Straits, they determined to return to England. This they accordingly did. Before leaving England they had been instructed not to pass by these straits either going or returning, “except upon great occasion incident” with the consent of at least four of Fenton’s assistants. But a conference had decided that it were best to make for Brazil. And then the news which they received there of the Spanish fleet convinced them that it were futile to attempt to get to India that way.

But as the Italian whom we mentioned just now got to India by the overland route, so an Englishman named Ralph Fitch, a London merchant, being desirous to see the Orient, reached Goa in India via Syria and Ormuz. He set sail from Gravesend on 13th February 1582, left Falmouth on 11th March, and then never put in anywhere till the ship landed him at Tripoli in Syria on the following 30th April. After being absent from home nine years, Fitch came back in an English ship to London in April 1591. The reports which he brought were similar to the Italian’s verdict. India was rich in pepper, ginger, cloves, nutmegs, sandalwood, camphor, amber, sapphires, rubies, diamonds, pearls, and so on. There was not the slightest doubt that it was the country to trade with. But, as yet, no English ship had found the way thither.

During the years 1585-1587 John Davis tried to find a way thither by the North-West Passage. Davis had a fine reputation as “a man very well grounded in the principles of the Arte of Navigation,” but none the less his efforts were unavailing. In 1588 the coming of the expected Armada turned the energies of the English seamen into another channel. But already, in the year 1586, Thomas Candish had set out from Plymouth with the Desire, 120 tons, the Content of 60 tons and the Hugh Gallant of 40 tons, victualled for two years and well found at his own expense. Journeying via Sierra Leone, Brazil and the Magellan Straits, he reached the Pacifice and China, and after touching at the Philippine Islands passed through the Straits of Java. From Java he crossed the ocean to the Cape of Good Hope, was able to correct the errors in the Portuguese sea “carts,” and in September 1588 reached Plymouth once more, having learnt from a Flemish craft bound from Lisbon that the Spanish Armada had been defeated, “to the singular rejoycing and comfort of us all.”[A]

The value of this voyage round the world was, from a navigator’s point of view, of inestimable advantage. For the benefit of those English navigators who were, a few years later, to begin the ceaseless voyages backwards and forwards round the Cape of Good Hope, between England and India, Candish made the most elaborate notes and sailing directions, giving the latitudes (or, as the Elizabethans called them, “the heights”) of most of the places passed or visited. Very elaborate soundings were taken and recorded, giving the depth in fathoms and the nature of the sea-bed, wherever they went round the world, if the depth was not too great. In addition, he gave the courses from place to place, the distances, where to anchor, what dangers to avoid, providing warning of any difficult straits or channels, the variation of the compass at different places, the direction of the wind from certain dates to certain dates, and so on. But this, valuable as it undoubtedly was in many ways, did not exhaust the utility of the voyage. From China, whither the ships of the East India Company some years later were to trade, “I have brought such intelligence,” he wrote on his return to the Lord Chamberlain, “as hath not bene heard of in these parts. The stateliness and riches of which countrey I feare to make report of, least I should not be credited: for if I had not knowen sufficiently the incomparable wealth of that countrey, I should have bene as incredulous thereof, as others will be that have not had the like experience.”

And he showed in still further detail the fine opportunity which existed in the East and awaited only the coming of the English merchant. “I sailed along the Ilands of the Malucos, where among some of the heathen people I was well intreated, where our countrey men may have trade as freely as the Portugals if they will themselves.”

It is not therefore surprising that in the following year the English merchants began to stir themselves afresh. The East was calling loudly: and with the information brought back by Candish and some other knowledge, gained in a totally different manner, the time was now ripe for an expedition to succeed. For in the year 1587 Drake had left Plymouth, sailed across the Bay of Biscay, arrived at Cadiz Roads, where he did considerable harm to Spanish shipping, spoiled Philip’s plans for invading England that year, and then set a course for the Azores. It was not long before he sighted a big, tall ship, which was none other than the great carack, San Felipe, belonging to the King of Spain himself, whose name in fact she bore. This vessel was now homeward-bound from the East Indies and full of a rich cargo. Drake made it his duty to capture her in spite of her size, and very soon she was his and on her way to Plymouth.

Now the most wonderful feature of this incident was, historically, not the daring of Drake nor the value of the ship and cargo. The latter combined were found to be worth £114,000 in Elizabethan money, or in modern coinage about a million pounds sterling. But the most valuable of all were the ship’s papers found aboard, which disclosed the long-kept secrets of the East Indian trade. Therefore, this fact, taken in conjunction with the arrival of Candish the year following, and the wonderful incentive to English sea-daring given by the victory over the Spanish Armada—the fleet of the very nation whose ships had kept the English out of India—will prepare the reader for the memorial which the English merchants made to Queen Elizabeth, setting forth the great benefits which would arise through a direct trade with India. They therefore prayed for a royal licence to send three ships thither. But Elizabeth was a procrastinating, uncertain woman. She had in that expedition of Drake in 1587 first given her permission and then had sent a messenger post haste all the way to Plymouth countermanding these orders. Luckily for the country, Drake had already got so far out to sea that it was impossible to deliver the message: and it was a good thing there was no such thing as wireless telegraphy in Elizabeth’s time.

So, in regard to these petitioning merchants, first she would and then she wouldn’t, and she kept the matter hanging indecisively until a few months before April 1591. By that time the necessary capital had been raised and the final preparations made, so that on the tenth of that month “three tall ships,” named respectively the Penelope (which was the “Admirall”), the Marchant Royall (which was the “Vice-Admirall”) and the Edward Bonaventure “Rear-Admirall”) were able to let loose their canvas and sailed out of Plymouth Sound.

CHAPTER IV
THE ROUTE TO THE EAST

I want in this chapter to call your attention to a very gallant English captain named James Lancaster, whose grit and endurance in the time of hard things, whose self-effacing loyalty to duty, show that there were giants afloat in those days in the ships which were to voyage to the East.

The account of the first of these voyages I have taken from Hakluyt, who in turn had obtained it by word of mouth from a man named Edmund Barker, of Ipswich. Hakluyt was known for his love of associating with seamen and obtaining from them first-hand accounts of their experiences afloat. And inasmuch as Barker is described as Lancaster’s lieutenant on the voyage, and the account was witnessed by James Lancaster’s signature, we may rely on the facts being true. Hakluyt was of course very closely connected with the subject of our inquiry. When the East India Company was started he was appointed its first historiographer, a post for which he was eminently fitted. He lectured on the subject of voyaging to the Orient, he made the maps and journals which came back in these ships useful to subsequent navigators and of the greatest interest to merchants and others. And when he died his work was in part carried on by Samuel Purchas of Pilgrimes fame. The second of these voyages, in which Lancaster again triumphs over what many would call sheer bad luck, has been taken from a letter which was sent to the East India Company by one of its servants, and is preserved in the archives of the India Office and will be dealt with in the following chapter. But for the present we will confine our attention to the voyage of those three ships mentioned at the end of the last chapter.

After leaving Devonshire the Penelope, Marchant Royall and Edward Bonaventure arrived at the Canary Isles in a fortnight, having the advantage of a fair north-east wind. Before reaching the Equator they were able to capture a Portuguese caravel bound from Lisbon for Brazil with a cargo of Portuguese merchandise consisting of 60 tuns of wine, 1200 jars of oil, about 100 jars of olives and other produce. This came as a veritable good fortune to the English ships, for the latter’s crews had already begun to be afflicted with bad health. “We had two men died before wee passed the line, and divers sicke, which tooke their sicknesse in those hote climates: for they be wonderful unholesome from 8 degrees of Northerly latitude unto the line, at that time of the yeere: for we had nothing but Ternados, with such thunder, lightning, and raine, that we could not keep our men drie 3 houres together, which was an occasion of the infection among them, and their eating of salt victuals, with lacke of clothes to shift them.” After crossing the Equator they had for a long time an east-south-east wind, which carried them to within a hundred leagues of the coast of Brazil, and then getting a northerly wind they were able to make for the Cape of Good Hope, which they sighted on 28th July. For three days they stood off and on with a contrary wind, unable to weather it. They had had a long voyage, and the health of the crew in those leaky, stinking ships had become bad. They therefore made for Table Bay, or, as it was then called, Saldanha, where they anchored on 1st August.

The men were able to go ashore and obtain exercise after being cramped for so many weeks afloat, and found the land inhabited by black savages, “very brutish.” They obtained fresh food by shooting fowl, though “there was no fish but muskles and other shel-fish, which we gathered on the rockes.” Later on a number of seals and penguins were killed and taken on board, and eventually, thanks to negro assistance, cattle and sheep were obtained by bartering. But when the time came to start off for the rest of the voyage it was very clear that the squadron, owing to the loss by sickness, was deficient in able-bodied men. It was therefore “thought good rather to proceed with two ships wel manned, then with three evill manned: for here wee had of sound and whole men but 198.” It was deemed best to send home the Marchant Royall with fifty men, many of whom were pretty well recovered from the devastating disease of scurvy. The extraordinary feature of the voyage was that the sailors suffered from this disease more than the soldiers. “Our souldiers which have not bene used to the Sea, have best held out, but our mariners dropt away, which (in my judgement) proceedeth of their evill diet at home.”

So the other two ships proceeded on their way towards India: but not long after rounding the Cape of Good Hope they encountered “a mighty storme and extreeme gusts of wind” off Cape Corrientes, during which the Edward Bonaventure lost sight of the Penelope. The latter, in fact, was never seen again, and there is no doubt that she foundered with all hands. The Edward, however, pluckily kept on, though four days later “we had a terrible clap of thunder, which slew foure of our men outright, their necks being wrung in sonder without speaking any word, and of 94 men there was not one untouched, whereof some were stricken blind, others were bruised in their legs and armes, and others in their brests, so that they voided blood two days after, others were drawn out at length as though they had bene racked. But (God be thanked) they all recovered saving onely the foure which were slaine out right.” The same electric storm had wrecked the mainmast “from the head to the decke” and “some of the spikes that were ten inches into the timber were melted with the extreme heate thereof.” Truly Lancaster’s command was a very trying one. What with a scurvy crew, an unhandy ship, now partially disabled, and both hurricanes and electric storms, there was all the trouble to break the spirit of many a man. Still, he held determinedly on his way whither he was bound.

But his troubles were now very nearly ended in one big disaster. After having proceeded along the south-east coast of Africa, and steering in a north-easterly direction, the ship was wallowing along her course over the sea when a dramatic incident occurred. It was night, and while some were below sleeping, one of the men on deck, peering through the moonlight, saw ahead what he took for breakers. He called the attention of his companions and inquired what it was, and they readily answered that it was the sea breaking on the shoals. It was the “Iland of S. Laurence.” “Whereupon in very good time we cast about to avoyd the danger which we were like to have incurred.” But it had been a close shave, and though Lancaster was to endure many other grievous hardships before his days were ended, yet but for the light of the kindly moon his ship, his crew and his own life would almost certainly have been lost that night.

But this was presently to be succeeded by the luck of falling in with three or four Arab craft, which were taken, their cargo of ducks and hens being very acceptable. They watered the ship at the Comoro Islands; a Portuguese boy, whom they had taken when the Arab craft were captured, being a useful acquisition as interpreter. But the master of the Edward Bonaventure, having gone ashore with thirty of his men to obtain a still further amount of fresh water, was treacherously taken and sixteen of his company slain. It was just one further source of discomfort for Lancaster now to have lost his ship’s master and more of his crew. So thence, “with heavie hearts,” the Edward sailed for Zanzibar, where they learnt that the Portuguese had already warned the natives of the character of Englishmen, in making out that the latter were “cruell people and men-eaters, and willed them if they loved safetie in no case to come neere us. Which they did onely to cut us off from all knowledge of the state and traffique of the countrey.”

The jealousy of the Portuguese was certainly very great: they were annoyed, and only naturally, that another nation should presume to burst into the seas which they had been the first of Europeans to open. Off this coast, from Melinda to Mozambique, a Portuguese admiral was cruising in a small “frigate”—that is to say, a big galley-type of craft propelled by sails and oars. And had this “frigate” been strong enough she would certainly have assailed Lancaster’s ship, for she came into Zanzibar to “view and to betray our boat if he could have taken at any time advantage.”

It was whilst riding at anchor here that another electric storm sprung the Edward’s foremast, which had to be repaired—“fished,” as sailors call it—with timber from the shore. And, to add still more to Lancaster’s bad luck, the ship’s surgeon, whilst ashore with the newly appointed master of the ship, looking for oxen, got a sunstroke and died. But the sojourn in that anchorage came to an end on 15th February. The progress of this voyage had been slow, but it had been sure. Relying on what charts he possessed, and then, after rounding the Cape of Good Hope, practically coasting up the African shore until reaching Zanzibar, he had wisely remained here some time. For this was the port whence the dhows traded backwards and forwards across the Indian Ocean and the East, and it must be remembered that the Arabs were skilled navigators and very fine seamen, who had been making these ocean voyages for centuries, whilst Englishmen were doing little more than coasting passages. Zanzibar was clearly the place where Lancaster could pick up a good deal of valuable knowledge regarding the voyage to India, and, incidentally, he took away from here a certain negro who had come from the East Indies and was possessed of knowledge of the country.

From Goa to Zanzibar the Arabian ships were wont to bring cargoes of pepper, and it was now Lancaster’s intention to cut straight across the Indian Ocean and make Cape Comorin—the southernmost point of the Indian peninsula—as his land-fall. He then meant to hang about this promontory, because it was to the traffic of the East what such places as Ushant and Dungeness to-day are to the shipping of the West. He knew that there was plenty of shipping bound from Bengal, the Malay Straits, from China and from Japan which would come round this cape well laden with all sorts of Eastern riches. He would therefore lie in wait off this headland and, attacking a suitable craft, would relieve her of her wealth. But the intention did not have the opportunity of being fulfilled as he had wished it. “In our course,” says Lancaster, “we were very much deceived by the currents that set into the Gulfe of the Red Sea along the coast of Melinde”—that is to say, from Zanzibar along the coast known to-day as British East Africa and Somaliland. “And the windes shortening upon us to the North-east and Easterly, kept us that we could not get off, and so with the putting in of the currents from the Westward, set us in further unto the Northward within fourescore leagues of” Socotra, which was “farre from our determined course and expectation.”

Therefore, as they had been brought so far to the northward of their course, Lancaster decided that it were best to run into Socotra or some port in the Red Sea for fresh supplies; but, luckily for him, the wind then came north-west, which was of course a fair wind from his present position to the south-west coast of India. Being a wise leader he of course now availed himself of this good fortune and sped over the Indian Ocean towards Cape Comorin, when the wind came southerly: but presently the wind came again more westerly, and so in the month of May 1592 the Cape was doubled, but without having sighted it, and then a course was laid for the Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal. But though they ran on for six days with a fair wind, and plenty of it, “these Ilands were missed through our masters default for want of due observation of the South starre.” It would be easy enough to criticise the lack of skill in the Elizabethan navigators, but it is much fairer to wonder rather that they were able to find their way as well as they did over strange seas, considering that until comparatively recently it was to them practically a new art. Excellent seamen they certainly had been for centuries: but it was not till long after Prince Henry the Navigator had taught his own countrymen, that this new sea-learning of navigation had reached England and “pilots-major” instructed our seamen in the higher branch of their profession. They were keen, they were adventurous, and they knew no fear: but these mariners were rude, unscientific men, who could not always be relied upon to make observations accurately. They did the best they could with their astrolabes and cross-staffs, but they lacked the perfection of the modern sextant. The most they could hope for was to make a land-fall not too distant from where they wanted to get, and then, having picked up the land, keep it aboard as far as possible. Thus they would approach their destined port, off which, by means of parleying with one of the native craft, they might persuade one of the crew to come aboard and so pilot them in.

As the Edward Bonaventure had missed the Nicobar Islands, it was decided to push on to the southward, which would bring them into the neighbourhood of Sumatra. There they lay two or three days, hoping for a pilot from Sumatra, which was only about six miles off. And subsequently, as the winter was approaching, they made for the Islands of Pulo Pinaou, which they reached in June, and there remained till the end of August. Many of the crew had again fallen sick, and though they put them ashore at this place, twenty-six more of them died. Nor were there many sources of supplies, but only oysters, shell-fish and the fish “which we tooke with our hookes.” But there was plenty of timber, and this came in very useful for repairing masts. When the winter passed and again they put to sea, the crew was now reduced to thirty-three men and one boy, but not more than twenty-two were fit for service, and of these not more than one-third were seamen: so the Edward was scarcely efficient.

But those which remained must have been of a resolute character, for in a little while they encountered a 60-ton ship, which they attacked and captured, and, shortly after, a second was also taken. Needless to say, the cargoes of pepper were discharged into the Edward, and even the sick men were soon reported as “being somewhat refreshed and lustie.” Lancaster had not by any means forgotten the fact that richly laden ships from China and Japan would pass through the Malacca Straits, and having arrived here he lay-to and waited. At the end of five days a Portuguese sail was descried, laden with rice, “and that night we tooke her being of 250 tunnes.” This was a big ship for those days, and so Lancaster determined to keep her as well as her cargo. He therefore put on board a prize crew of seven, under the command of Edmund Barker. The latter then came to anchor and hung out a riding-light so that the Edward could see her position. But the English ship was now so depleted of men that there were hardly enough men on board to handle her, and the prize had to send some of the men back to help her to make up the leeway. It was then decided to take out of the prize all that was worth having, and afterward, with the exception of the Portuguese pilot and four other men, she and her crew were allowed to go.

But it was not long before the Edward fell in with a much bigger ship, this time of 700 tons, which was on her way from India. She had left Goa with a most valuable cargo, and a smart engagement ended in her main-yard being shot through, whereupon she came to anchor and yielded, her people escaping ashore in the boats. Lancaster’s men found aboard her some brass guns, three hundred butts of wine, “as also all kind of Haberdasher wares, as hats, red caps knit of Spanish wooll, worsted stockings knit, shooes, velvets, taffataes, chamlets, and silkes, abundance of suckets, rice, Venice glasses,” playing-cards and much else. But trouble was brewing in the Edward, and a mutinous spirit was afoot. Lancaster’s men refused to obey his orders and bring the “excellent wines” into the Edward, so, after taking out of her all that he fancied, he then let the prize drift out to sea.

From there the Edward sailed to the Nicobar Islands, and afterwards proceeded to Punta del Galle (Point de Galle, Ceylon), where she anchored. Lancaster’s intention was again to lie in wait for shipping. He knew that more than one fleet of richly laden merchantmen would soon be due to pass that way. First of all he was expecting a fleet of seven or eight Bengal ships, and then two or three more from Pegu (to the north-west of Siam); and also there ought to be some Portuguese ships from Siam. These, he had learned, would pass that way in about a fortnight, bringing the produce of the country to Cochin (in the south-west of India), where the Portuguese caracks, or big merchantmen, would receive the goods and carry them home to Lisbon. It was a regular, yearly trade, the caracks being due to leave Cochin in the middle of January. A fine haul was certain, for these various fleets were bringing all sorts of commodities that were well worth having—cloth, rice, rubies, diamonds, wines and so on.

But Lancaster was again bound to bow to ill-luck. First of all, he had brought up where the bottom was foul, so he lost his anchor. He had on board two spare anchors, but they were unstocked and in the hold. This meant that a good deal of time was wasted, and meanwhile the ship was drifting about the whole night. In addition, to make matters worse, Lancaster himself fell ill. The current was carrying the ship to the southward, away from her required position, so in the morning the foresail was hoisted and preparations were being made to let loose the other sails, when the men mutinied and said they were determined they would remain there no longer but would take the ship to England direct. Lancaster, finding that persuasion was useless and that he could do nothing with them, had no other alternative but to give way to their demands: so on 8th December 1592 the Edward set sail for the Cape of Good Hope. On the way Lancaster recovered his health, and even amused himself fishing for bonitos. By February they had crossed the Indian Ocean and made the land by Algoa Bay, South Africa, where they had to remain a month owing to contrary winds. But in March they doubled the Cape of Good Hope once more, and on 3rd April reached St Helena. And here an extraordinary thing happened. When Edmund Barker went ashore he found an Englishman named Segar, like himself of Suffolk. He had been left here eighteen months before by the Marchant Royall, which you will remember had been sent home from Table Bay on the way out. On the way home he had fallen ill and would have died if he had remained on board, so it had been decided to put him ashore. When, however, the Edward’s men saw him this time, he was “as fresh in colour and in as good plight of body to our seeming as might be, but crazed in minde and halfe out of his wits, as afterward wee perceived: for whether he were put in fright of us, not knowing at first what we were, whether friends or foes, or of sudden joy when he understood we were his olde consorts and countreymen, hee became idel-headed, and for eight dayes space neither night nor day tooke any naturall rest, and so at length died for lacke of sleepe.”

THE EAST INDIAMAN “KENT,” 1,000 TONS.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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On 12th April 1593 the Edward left St Helena, and the mutinous spirit was not yet dead on board. Lancaster’s intention was to cross the Atlantic to Pernambuco, Brazil, but the sailors were infuriated and wished to go straight home. So, the next day, whilst they were being told by the captain to finish a foresail which they had in hand, some of them asserted determinedly that, unless the ship were taken straight home, they would do nothing: and to this Lancaster was compelled to agree. But when they were about eight degrees north of the Equator the ship made little progress for six weeks owing to calms and flukey winds. Meanwhile the men’s victuals were running short, and the mutinous spirit reasserted itself strongly. They knew that the officers of the ship had their own provisions locked away in private chests—this had been done as a measure of precaution—and the men now threatened to break open these chests. Lancaster therefore determined, on the advice of one of the ship’s company, to make for the Island of Trinidad in the West Indies, where he would be able to obtain supplies. But, being ignorant of the currents of the Gulf of Paria, he was carried out of his course and eventually anchored off the Isle of Mona after a few days more.

After refreshing the stores and stopping a big leak, the Edward next put to sea bound for Newfoundland, but a heavy gale sent them back to Porto Rico, the wind being so fierce that even the furled sails of the ship were carried away, and the ship was leaking badly, with six feet of water in the hold. The victuals had run out, so that they were compelled to eat hides. Small provisions were obtained at Porto Rico, and then five of the crew deserted. From there the ship went to Mona again, and whilst a party of nineteen were on shore, including Lancaster and Barker, to gather food, a gale of wind sprang up, which made such a heavy sea that the boat could not have taken them back to the Edward. It was therefore deemed wiser to wait till the next day: but during the night, about midnight, the carpenter cut the Edward’s cable, so that she drifted away to sea with only five men and a boy on board. At the end of twenty-nine days a French ship, afterwards found to be from Dieppe, was espied. In answer to a fire made on shore she dowsed her topsails, approached the land, hoisted out her ensign and came to anchor. Some of the Edward’s crew, including Barker and Lancaster, went aboard, but the rest of the party to the number of seven could not be found. Six more were taken on board another Dieppe ship and so reached San Domingo, where they traded with the people for hides. Here news reached them of their companions left in Mona. It was learnt that, of the seven men there left, two had broken their necks while chasing fowls on the cliffs, three were slain by Spaniards upon information given by the men who went away in the Edward, but the remaining two now joined Lancaster by a ship from another port.

Eventually Lancaster and his companions took passage aboard another Dieppe vessel, and arrived at the latter port after a voyage of forty-two days. They then crossed in a smaller craft to Rye, where they landed on 24th May 1594.

What good, then, had this expedition done? In spite of losing two out of the three ships, in spite of the losses of many men and the whole of the rich cargoes which had been obtained by capture, Lancaster and his companions had returned to England with something worth having. How had English trade with India been benefited? The answer is simple. If nothing tangible had been obtained, this expedition had been a great lesson. If it had brought back no spices or diamonds, it had brought much valuable information. Once again it showed to the English merchants that there was a fortune for all of them waiting in the Orient, and it showed by bitter experience the mistakes that must be avoided. The voyage had been begun at the wrong season of the year; it would have to be better thought out, and better provision would have to be taken to guard against scurvy. The route to India was now well understood, and it was no longer any Portuguese secret. England was just on the eve of sharing with the Portuguese their fortunate discovery, which eventually the latter were to lose utterly to the former.

CHAPTER V
THE FIRST EAST INDIA COMPANY

Although the expedition of those three tall ships related in the previous chapter had been commercially such a dismal failure, it had shown that James Lancaster was the kind of man to whom there should be entrusted the leadership, not only of a single ship, but of an entire expedition. With the greatest difficulty he had prevented his unruly crew from excesses, he had taken his ship most of the way round the world, he had shown that he could put up a good fight when needs be, and that he possessed a capacity for finding out information—a most valuable ability in these the first days of Indian voyaging. He had obtained information about winds, tides, currents, places, peoples and trade. He had got to know where the Portuguese ships were usually to be found, where they started from and at what times of the year. Clearly he was just the man for the big expedition which was shortly to start from England, after but a few years’ interval.

We mentioned on an earlier page the travels of Ralph Fitch to India, though even prior to his setting forth another Englishman named Thomas Stevens had been to the East. This was in the year 1579, and although he was the first of our countrymen to reach India, yet he went out in a Portuguese ship, and is therefore entirely indebted to the Portuguese for having reached there at all. He had first proceeded from England to Italy, and then made his way from that country to Portugal. Having arrived in Lisbon, he went aboard and started eight days later when the Portuguese East Indian fleet sailed out. This was towards the beginning of April, which was very late for their sailing, but important business had detained them. Five ships proceeded together, bound for Goa, with many mariners, soldiers, women and children, the starting off being a solemn and impressive occasion, accompanied by the blowing of trumpets and the booming of artillery. Proceeding on their way via the Canaries and Cape Verde, they rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and afterwards steered to the north-east. And then occurred just that very incident which afterwards we have seen was to happen to Lancaster. Not knowing the set of the currents they got much too far to the northward and found themselves close to Socotra (at the entrance to the Gulf of Aden), whereas they imagined they were near to India. But eventually, having sailed many miles, and noticed birds in the sky which they knew came from their desired country, and then having seen floating branches of palm-trees they realised that they were now not far from their destination, and so on 24th October they arrived at Goa.

Stevens had watched the Portuguese navigators closely, and he had marvelled that these ships could find their way over the trackless ocean. “You know,” he wrote to his father in England, telling him all about the voyage, “you know that it is hard to saile from East to West, or contrary, because there is no fixed point in all the skie, whereby they may direct their course, wherefore I shall tell you what helps God provide for these men. There is not a fowle that appereth or signe in the aire, or in the sea, which they have not written, which have made the voyages heretofore. Wherefore, partly by their owne experience, and pondering withall what space the ship was able to make with such a winde, and such direction, and partly by the experience of others, whose books and navigations they have, they gesse whereabouts they be, touching degrees of longitude, for of latitude they be alwayes sure.”

It was a real difficulty in those early Indian ships to ascertain their longitude with any correctness. Longitude was reckoned from the meridian of St Michael, one of the Azores, on the grounds that there was no variation of the compass there. It was not, in fact, till the chronometer was invented in the latter half of the eighteenth century that the difficulty could be overcome. But these early East Indiamen were by no means devoid of the instruments of navigation, which included an astrolabe and cross-staff, as already mentioned, a celestial globe, a terrestrial globe, a calendar, a universal horologe for finding the hour of the day in every latitude, a nocturne labe for telling the hour of the night, one or more compasses, a navigation chart corrected according to the last voyagers who had used it: and, a little later on, printed charts, as well as a general map.

But whilst Lancaster had been away from England on his voyage to the East, Englishmen at sea had fallen in with two of the Portuguese East Indian caracks—the Santa Cruz and the Madre de Dios—homeward-bound from Goa. The former had been burnt and the latter taken into Dartmouth. When she arrived in that port her immense size and wealth made a great sensation. Even in Elizabethan money the value was assessed at £15,000. She was of no less than 1600 tons and chock-full of Oriental treasures, with about six or seven hundred souls aboard, and armed with thirty-two brass guns. This wonderful East Indiaman had, besides a number of precious stones, a cargo consisting of spices, drugs, silks, calicoes, quilts, carpets, canopies, pearls, ivory, Chinese ware and hides. In fact when all this cargo was taken out of her in Dartmouth and sent by sea to London, it freighted ten coasters. As you can well imagine, these west-country seamen were careful to note all her details when once they had her in port. She was completely surveyed, and found to be 165 feet long, and 46 feet 10 inches wide, and drew 26 feet, though when she left India she was drawing 31 feet. She had seven decks at the stern, the length of the keel being 100 feet, the height of the mast 121 feet, and the length of the main-yard 106 feet.

The consternation caused by the sight of the wonderful goods which eventually arrived at Leadenhall, London, fired the imaginations of the London merchants afresh. When, in September 1592, they observed the vast quantities of pepper, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, incense, damasks, golden silks, and saw with their own eyes the very goods which had come all the way from that Eastern land of wealth, they marvelled greatly. One of the results of all this was that the Levant Company, which had been founded in 1581 to trade with Turkey and the eastern ports of the Mediterranean, now became expanded into a more ambitious venture. Realising full well the amazing riches of the East Indies, it succeeded in obtaining from Elizabeth, in 1593, a charter to trade now with India, but via the overland route.

In passing we may just say a word about the English trading companies, some of which were of great antiquity. The oldest was the Hamburg Company, which consisted of English merchants trading to Calais, Holland, Zealand, the Low Countries, the Baltic and the inhabitants of modern Prussia. It had been first incorporated by Edward I. in 1296, and enjoyed special privileges during successive reigns. There was also the Russian Company, which had been inaugurated at the end of the reign of Edward VI. and the beginning of the reign of Philip and Mary, though its charter was received from Queen Elizabeth. This company had arisen from the enterprise of a number of English merchants, who had sent three ships to find, if possible, a north-east passage into Asia and the East. So, also, the Turkey or Levant Company, mentioned just now, had been founded in 1581 with a view of trading to the part of the world designated. All these various companies were just so many societies of merchant-adventurers who were bound together with one common interest by the royal charter. But the greatest of all was to be the celebrated East India Company, founded in 1600, about which we shall speak presently, though we may sufficiently anticipate matters by asserting that it grew out of the Levant Company.

But England was by no means to have the whole field to herself. If the Portuguese power was in the descendant: if her precious secrets of this East Indian trade had been ruthlessly revealed: if her ships and her rich cargoes had been repeatedly taken with the same determination that the Armada had been defeated; yet she was still active in India, and the only European nation there established. However, not merely England, but Holland, too, had been growing strong in maritime ability. The Dutch people had always been by nature seamen for centuries, and were able to rival any English ability in the maritime arts. They were intrepid mariners, they were excellent shipbuilders, and they were careful students of all the sea-knowledge which had come forth from Portugal. The influence of Prince Henry’s cartographical school had spread northwards from Sagres, and Flemish printers had done much for map-making and thus made known this knowledge of the world far and wide. This was the final blow to the closely guarded Portuguese secrets of India. The first atlas ever printed was published by the Dutch at Leyden in the year 1585. The man to whom belongs the credit of this was named Wagenaer, and, according to the crude knowledge and the still more elementary buoyage, the Narrow Seas were well shown. The charts which Holland published were also brought out in English, together with little sketches of the various headlands, their latitude, distances, and so on, including sailing directions for entering various harbours. So also at Antwerp and at Bruges excellent schools of cartography grew up just as they had in Portugal and Spain: and fired with the amazing stories of the East, Holland was not merely anxious but well prepared for asserting herself in India and coming back with a series of rich cargoes for those prepared to venture.

Briefly, this was brought about as follows. We mentioned on an earlier page that though the Portuguese jealously guarded the secret of the India route, they were quite willing to dispose of these Indian goods. One of these marts, to which merchants came from other countries in order to purchase, was Lisbon. The second was Antwerp, which was convenient for the merchants of Northern Europe. England, by the way, had done a good deal of overseas trade between London and Antwerp for centuries, so this additional East Indian trade made the visits of our merchantmen even more important, and thus many first realised what India meant commercially, and could mean to them. And similarly the people of the Low Countries became equally impressed with what they learned. Thus very naturally we see in 1593—the actual year in which the Levant Company had obtained their extended charter—the first of a series of efforts made by Dutchmen to reach Asia by a north-east passage. And we must not omit to mention the very great influence which Jan Huygen von Linschoten, a native of Haarlem, had. The latter was a great student of geography, at a time when all knowledge of this kind was rare. For a while he was resident in Lisbon, where he amassed a large amount of invaluable data concerning the East—its harbours, configuration, trade-winds, and so on. Lisbon, in fact, was just the place in which all the East Indian information naturally collected itself. Later on Linschoten himself proceeded to India and dwelt at Goa, in the train of the Portuguese Archbishop, but in the year 1592 he returned to Europe, and the tales which this traveller told concerning India astonished the slow-reasoning minds of his fellow-countrymen. In the year 1596 he published a most valuable book dealing with the East, affording charts and maps and no end of information which would be priceless to any who might venture on a voyage to India. An English translation appeared two years later, and it certainly had a great influence on the founding of our first East India Company. So important was the book, indeed, that it was also translated and published in French, in Latin and German.

As for Holland, the tangible result was that four ships were fitted out, and under Cornelis Houtman were sent in 1595 to the countries situate the other side of the Cape of Good Hope, beyond the Indian Ocean. Houtman’s voyage had been a success, for in the year 1597 he returned, bringing with him a treaty made with the King of Bantam, which was the means of opening up to Holland the Indian Archipelago. This voyage convinced even the most sceptical, and a new era had begun, in which Holland was to grow rich and powerful, a great commercial country and of considerable strength at sea. The handsome seventeenth-century buildings which you still find standing in Holland to-day, and the brilliant seventeenth-century Dutch painters of portraits and shipping scenes, are surviving evidences of a wonderful prosperity derived for the most part from the East India trade of that time.

It came about, then, that England was to find a keen rival for the possessions of the East. There was going to be a very hard struggle as to which would win the race. One voyage succeeded another, so that actually the Dutch were wanting in big craft and had to come over to England to buy up some of our shipping. But this was the final straw which broke the back of Englishmen’s patience. They had looked on for some time with restraint at the progressive enterprise of the Dutch, and had become very jealous of their commercial prosperity. It was a condition to which the present Anglo-German rivalry is very similar in kind. But it was clear something must be done now. The London merchants who were interested in the Levant Company had found that their charter of extension granted in 1593 for overland trading with India availed them but little. Therefore, arising out of this company it happened that a number of merchants met together in London in the year 1599 and agreed to petition Elizabeth for permission to send a number of well-found ships to the East Indies, for which they prayed a monopoly, subscribing the sum of £30,133 for an East Indian voyage. It was certainly high time to be moving, for the Dutch were gaining all the foreign freight—they were nicknamed the “waggoners of the sea”—whilst English ships were rotting away in port, or doing little more than mere coasting.

DUTCH EAST INDIAMAN.
The vessel on the right shows the type of craft in the employment of the Dutch East India Company of about 1647.

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This petition was not approved by the Privy Council, but in the year 1609, and on the last day in that year, it received the Queen’s assent. More capital had been obtained, the exclusive privilege of this Indian trade had been granted for fifteen years, so there was nothing to do but obtain the necessary ships and men and hurry on the fitting-out. The Company was managed by twenty-four directors, under the governorship of Alderman James Smith, who was subsequently knighted, but altogether there were two hundred and eighteen of these merchants, aldermen, knights and esquires, who were made up by the title of “The Governors and Company of the Merchants trading unto the East Indies.” The countries prescribed by this charter showed a rather extended area, embracing all ports, islands and places in Asia, Africa, America, between the Cape of Good Hope and the Straits of Magellan. The Company were promised that neither the Queen nor her heirs would grant trading-licences within these limits to any person without the consent of the Company: and the Company was furthermore granted the privilege of making the first four voyages without export duty, and the permission was further granted to export annually the sum of £30,000 in bullion or coin.

This “privilege for fifteen yeeres” “to certaine Adventurers for the discoverie of the Trade for the East-Indies” was to be a spirited reply to the action of the Dutch, and marks the beginning of that series of English East India companies which were in effect the means of acquiring India for the British crown after the Indian Mutiny in the nineteenth century. From now onwards the East Indiamen ships have a standing and importance which were not previously possessed, and we shall find this culminating in the amazingly dignified manner of the Indian merchantmen in the early part of the nineteenth century.

Among those who had agreed together for this expedition “at their owne adventures, costs and charges as well for the honour of this Our Realme of England, as for the increase of Our Navigation, and advancement of trade,” was the Earl of Cumberland. He was one of those Elizabethan gentlemen who were wont to fit out a small squadron of ships for roving the seas and attacking the well-laden ships of the Spanish and Portuguese. It was a fine, adventurous game and there was a good chance of coming home with a fortune. Of those ships which the noble earl owned for this purpose one was a craft named the Red Dragon, and as she was built for fighting and ocean cruising she was just the ship for the first voyage of the East India Company, being of 600 tons. She was therefore purchased from her owner by this Company for the sum of £3700. Her name at one time had been the Mare Scourge (perhaps to suggest the terror of the sea which was thus exhibited), but at any rate in the year 1586 she was known as the Red Dragon.

Under their charter the Company were allowed to send “sixe good ships and sixe good pynnaces” and “five hundred Mariners, English-men, to guide and sayle.” But not more than four ships were sent actually, for it was a costly venture. These London merchants had “joyned together and made a stocke of seventie two thousand pounds, to bee employed in ships and merchandizes”; but the purchase of four ships, the expense of fitting them out, furnishing them with men, victuals and munitions for a period of twenty months had eaten up the sum of £45,000. This left £27,000, which amount was taken out in the ships, partly in merchandise (with which to trade in Asia) and partly in Spanish money, with which the natives would be familiar. Advance wages were paid to the crew before setting forth.

The “Generall of the Fleet” was that same James Lancaster whom we considered just now, and his flagship was to be the Red Dragon. There was no better leader for the job, and the reader will shortly see how well he conducted himself in conditions that were not less trying than in his previous voyage to the East. To him Elizabeth entrusted letters of commendation addressed to “divers Princes of India,” the vice-admiral being John Middleton; and the celebrated John Davis, of Arctic fame, was to go as pilot-major, or navigating expert—another excellent man for the undertaking. After a busy winter the four ships were ready and fitted out, so that on 13th February 1601 they were able to leave Woolwich, their crews amounting to 480. In addition to the Red Dragon there were the Hector, of 300 tons and 108 men; the Ascension, 260 tons and 82 men; the Susan (which had been bought from a London alderman for £1600), 240 tons and 88 men; and in addition they took a victualling ship called variously the Guift or Guest. The latter was a ship of 130 tons, but had cost only £300.

In their holds these ships carried such English products as were likely to be appreciated in the East. Such commodities were taken as iron, lead, tin, cloth; while the presents to be given to the Indian princes comprised a girdle, a case of pistols, plumes, looking-glasses, platters, spoons, glass toys, spectacles, drinking-glasses and a plain silver ewer. But the progress of this squadron was distinctly slow. From the Thames they had dropped down to the mouth and anchored in the Downs. Here they waited so long for a fair wind that already it was Easter Day before they reached Dartmouth, where they “spent five or sixe dayes in taking in their bread and certaine other provisions,” as one of the letters received by the East India Company has it. Leaving Dartmouth they “hoysed their anchors” and sped across the Bay of Biscay, and continued to the south. Off the coast of Guinea they fell in with a Portuguese vessel, which they captured, and from her they took much wine, oil and meal for the good of the squadron.

During the month of June they crossed the Equator, and in the following month discharged the Guest victualler—that is to say, they took out of her the masts, sails and yards and whatever else was worth keeping, and then broke down her “higher buildings for firewood, and so left her floting in the sea.” And now scurvy attacked many of the squadron’s crew, so that there were hardly men enough to handle the sails. Even the “merchants tooke their turnes at the Helme: and went into the top to take in the top-sayles, as the common Mariners did.” However, on the 9th of September 1601 they arrived at Saldanha (Table Bay), where they anchored and “hoysed out their boats.” (There were of course no such things as boat davits in those days, the boats being lifted out from the waist of the ship by blocks and ropes.) But so weak were the crews of three of the ships that Lancaster’s crew had to go aboard the other craft and do the work of getting these boats into the sea.

How was it, then, that the flagship’s crew had kept so free from scurvy and were in better health than the other men? The answer is that Lancaster had learnt a lesson from the terrible death-roll which this disease had caused in his previous voyage already noted. “The reason,” runs the document, “why the Generals men stood better in health then the men of other Ships was this: he brought to sea with him certaine Bottles of the Juice of Limons, which hee gave to each one, as long as it would last, three spoonfuls every morning fasting: not suffering them to eate any thing after it till noone. This Juice worketh much better, if the partie keepe a short Dyet, and wholly refrains salt meate, which salt meate, and long being at the sea is the only cause of the breeding of this Disease. By this meanes the Generall cured many of his men, and preserved the rest.” Considering this practical proof of the value of lime juice as an anti-scorbutic, it is surprising that it was not till many years later lime juice was, as it is to-day, always carried in English ships and given out to the men, especially in wind-jammers.

After allowing the men shore leave and laying in very necessary provisions, the squadron got under way and left again on 29th October, doubling the Cape of Good Hope on the 1st of November, “having the wind West North-west a great gale.” Madagascar was reached on 17th December, and they remained there until 6th March. Actually they did not even sight India, but held on across the Indian Ocean until they reached those Nicobar Islands visited in the previous voyage. A short stay was made and then they pushed on to the southward till they came to Acheen, which is at the north-west extremity of Sumatra, arriving there on the 5th of June 1602. Here Lancaster was entertained hospitably by some of the Dutch factors who had already established themselves, and also obtained a concession from the King of Acheen granting freedom of trade and immunity from paying customs. Thus a beginning was made, if not actually with India, at any rate with a part of the East Indies. Trade between England and the Orient was established, only to be developed in the years that were to follow.

In order to proceed with their trade, Lancaster put ashore two of the factors who had come out with him from England, these employing their time now in getting together a cargo of pepper against the date of Lancaster’s return. Meanwhile the squadron sailed from Acheen on 11th September 1602, and then engaged in that favourite occupation of roving about till some well-filled merchantman fell into his hands, relieving her then of her valuable cargo. Strictly speaking, as the reader is aware, this expedition to the East Indies had been fitted out for the purpose of opening up trade. But no Elizabethan sailor could content himself with such lawful limits. Privateering was in his blood: he was always spoiling for a fight at sea, especially against any Spanish or Portuguese ship. It was a much quicker way of winning wealth and, incidentally, of paying back old scores to the people who had tried to keep Englishmen out of the strange seas of the world. And Lancaster was a sufficiently good strategist to know that if he selected some pivot of a busy trade-route, such as some narrow straits, all that he had to do was to hang about there long enough and it was only a question of time as to whether a big haul would be made. He could rely implicitly on his own men and their gunnery, even against superior strength. It only wanted the opportunity, and that, again, demanded merely a little patience.

So whilst his factors were busy at Acheen buying a cargo, he betook himself to the Straits of Malacca, the gateway for the shipping which voyaged between the Pacific and the Indian Ocean; and before long he had descried a fine Portuguese craft of 900 tons called the St Thomé. It was a little unfortunate that the day was nearly spent, as that meant that the enemy might possibly escape under cover of darkness. “And being toward night,” wrote one who was there at the time, “a present direction was given that we should all spread our selves a mile and a halfe one from another, that she might not passe us in the night.” So the four English ships did as the admiral wished them. The Hector shot two or three “peeces of ordnance,” and this warned the other three ships, who now closed in and surrounded the Portuguese carack on all sides. Then the Red Dragon began to fire at her from the bow guns, with the satisfactory result that the carack’s main-yard came tumbling down.

That was deemed enough for the present: it would be better to wait till the night had passed, thought Lancaster, for he feared “least some unfortunate shot might light betweene wind and water, and so sinke her,” which would mean that her valuable cargo would be for ever lost. He therefore stayed his hand for a little while: but next morning at daybreak he again attacked and this time took the prize. Only four of Lancaster’s men were placed on board, “for feare of rifling and pillaging the good things that were within her ... and their charge was, if any thing should be missing, to answer the same out of their wages and shares.” For he knew full well that when once a band of these rough seamen were aboard they would stop at nothing, and no threats could prevent them from helping themselves to the rare cargo in the holds.

So full was this St Thomé of Eastern goods that it took six days to unload her of her 950 packs of calicoes, etc. And then, as a storm came up, she had to be left behind, so Lancaster returned to Acheen, and took in his cargo of pepper, cinnamon and spices, together with a letter and presents from the King of Acheen to Elizabeth. He then set sail for Bantam, in the Island of Java, on the 9th of November, and soon after sent home to England the Ascension and the Susan, which had completed their cargoes. In the meantime Lancaster continued his cruise with the Dragon and Hector, and arrived at Bantam, “in the island of Java major,” which he reached on the 16th of December. Here, as was the routine of the venture, he put his merchants ashore with their goods and began trade with the natives. And although the English reckoned the Javanese “among the greatest pickers and theeves of the world,” yet our merchants were able to do some very good business; and so again the ships were laden with cargoes of pepper, and a regular factory was here established for further trade between England and the East. Lancaster had as fine an ability for trading enterprise as he had for capturing a Portuguese ship, and he obtained a 40-ton pinnace laden with merchandise, which was sent to the Moluccas to trade and establish a factory there, in charge of Master William Starkey. When the next English ships should come out they would thus find immediate opportunity for getting rid of their lead, iron, tin, cloth, and another cargo waiting to be taken on board.

Such, then, was the completion of the business in the Orient. The first voyage under the East India Company had done its work in the East Indies. It had got there in safety, it had established factories, it had disposed of its freights and obtained very valuable goods to take home. It had certainly been fortunate, the only real calamity being the sickness and death of Captain John Middleton of the Hector. It was a long period since they had set out from the Thames, and the time had now arrived when they must weigh their anchors and start back to England: so early in the new year they took on board stores and made their final preparations for the long voyage back over lonely seas.

CHAPTER VI
CAPTAIN LANCASTER DISTINGUISHES HIMSELF

On the 20th of February the two ships were ready for sea. “We went all aboord our ships, shot off our ordnance, and set sayle to the sea toward England, with thankes to God, and glad hearts, for his blessings towards us.” On the 13th of March they crossed the Tropic of Capricorn, steering south-west “with a stiff gale of wind at south-east,” and this was sending them over the Indian Ocean towards the African coast in fine style. But “the eight and twentieth day we had a very great and a furious storme, so that we were forced to take in all our sayles. This storme continued a day and a night, with an exceeding great and raging sea, so that in the reason of man no shippe was able to live in them: but God (in his mercie) ceased the violence thereof, and gave us time to breath: and to repaire all the distresses and harmes we had received, but our ships were so shaken, that they were leakie all the voyage after.”

This was, in fact, to be a return full of excitement and those serious incidents which bring out all the seamanship and resource of the real sons of the sea. If it be true that a man’s real character is exhibited only in big crises, then we see Lancaster standing out magnificently as a cool, resourceful, self-sacrificing leader of men, for whom we cannot help having the highest admiration. These Elizabethans were very far from perfect. They were guilty of some abominable and atrocious acts of sacrilege on occasions: their hatred of the Portuguese and Spaniards knew few bounds. They imagined that might on the sea was right, and honesty was deemed not always the best policy. But among their virtues they were the very opposite of cowards. They knew how to bear all kinds of pain with a courage and resignation that are to be extolled. And if things went against them they knew how to die as bravely as they had fought and striven. There was no panic, no kicking against the inevitable: they did their best, and according to their own rough morality left the rest to God.

Another “very sore storme” overcame them on the 3rd of May, “and the seas did so beate upon the ships quarter, that it shooke all the iron worke of her rother [i.e. rudder]: and the next day in the morning, our rother brake cleane from the sterne of our shippe [i.e. the Red Dragon], and presently sunke into the sea.” Here was a terrible predicament, for of all the casualties which can befall a ship at sea not one is more awkward than this. And to-day only the steamship with more than one propeller can continue on her way without worrying much about such an occurrence. If, however, the vessel is a sailing ship, or has only one propeller, the only recourse is to tow a spar or sea-anchor (cone foremost) with a rope from each quarter. Then, if an equal strain is kept on both ropes, the spar will be thus in line with the ship’s keel, but as soon as one rope is slacked up and another tightened, the vessel’s quarter will be pulled to one side and her head pay off to the opposite.

Let us now see what they attempted in the Dragon. You will of course understand that the rudder was attached to the stern-post by means of irons on either side of the former, these working on their respective pins attached to the stern-post. Consequently, if these irons carried away, either through rust or the violence of the waves, there was nothing to hold the rudder in place and the ship was not under command. This is exactly what had happened in the present instance, and the means of steering was vanished. Naturally, therefore, the Dragon “drave up and downe in the sea like a wracke,” but all the while the Hector stood by, though unable to do anything. At length the commander of the Dragon decided to do exactly what the master of a modern sailing vessel would set about. Her mizen-mast was unstepped, and they then “put it forth at the sterne port to prove if wee could steere our shippe into some place where we might make another rother to hang it, to serve our turnes home.” The spar was placed over the side and lashed to the stern, but it was found to put such a heavy strain on the latter that the mast had to be brought on board again.

Lancaster then ordered the ship’s carpenter to make the mast into a rudder, for in those days the shape of the latter was very long and narrow: but when they wanted to fix it in position it was noticed that the rudder irons “wherewith to fasten the rother” had also gone. However they were not to be dismayed by this very inconvenient discovery, and were determined to do what they could. One of the crew accordingly went overboard to make an examination, and found that two of the rudder irons were still remaining and that there was one other broken. This was a slice of luck, so, when the weather eased down a little later, the new rudder was able to be fixed into position and once more the Dragon got on to her course. However, this good fortune was but short-lived, and after three or four hours “the sea tooke it off againe, and wee had much adoe to save it. Wee lost another of our irons, so that now we had but two to hang it by.”

Matters began to look pretty desperate by now, the men wanted to abandon the ship and be picked up by the Hector, and the position of Lancaster was no easy one. On the one hand, he knew that they could not continue like this, making no headway and with provisions running out and a dissatisfied crew against him. On the other hand, he was responsible to the East India Company for the safety of the ship and all that valuable cargo that was in her hold. It was sheer hard luck that for the second time in his life he should be returning from the Orient well laden with riches, only to be brought up short by an unexpected event that boded ill. Still, he was not the type of man to give way in such a critical time, and he for his part was going to stand by his ship, whatever else might happen. He appreciated quite fully the seriousness of the case, and yet for all that he was prepared to go through with it. There must be no sort of flinching.

He went below into the privacy of his cabin, and unknown to the crew sat down and wrote the following letter, having resolved to give it to the captain of the Hector, sending her home at once, and on her arriving back to have this letter handed over to the directors of the Company. This epistle read thus:

“Right Worshipfull,—What hath passed in this voyage, and what trades I have settled for this companie, and what other events have befallen us, you shall understand by the bearers hereof, to whom (as occasion hath fallen) I must referre you. I will strive with all diligence to save my ship, and her goods, as you may perceive by the course I take in venturing mine own life, and those that are with mee. I cannot tell where you should looke for mee, if you send out any pinnace to seeke mee: because I live at the devotion of the wind and seas. And thus fare you well, desiring God to send us a merrie meeting in this world, if it be his good will and pleasure.

“The passage to the East India lieth in 62½ degrees, by the North West on the America side. Your very loving friend,

“James Lancaster.”

Such was the brief, matter-of-fact, intensely practical letter which he indited—the very letter which we should have expected from a leader of this type. He succeeded presently in getting it put aboard the Hector, with the order to her captain to proceed. Night came on and when the morning broke Lancaster little expected to find his “chummy ship” still by his side. But he had forgotten that the Hector’s commander was a man like himself, and being a real good fellow he declined to leave a friend in distress, even though it was disobeying the orders of his admiral. So with excellent seamanship the Hector was kept at a reasonable distance from the Dragon, determined to stand by. Meanwhile the Dragon’s carpenter had got to work again and the rudder had been repaired. As if to encourage them, the weather after two or three days began to get better, and the sea to go down. The admiral therefore made a signal ordering the Hector to come nearer. This she did, and then her master, Sander Cole by name, was able to come aboard the flagship, bringing with him the best swimmer in the ship, and the best divers. These men were of the greatest assistance, and did their work round the stern of the ship to such good effect that the rudder was eventually hung again on the two remaining hooks. It was a triumph of patience, persistence and pluck, that the Dragon was able once again to go ahead and let her sheets draw.

But all this time things on board had been very trying. The ship had been buffeted about ceaselessly by many storms for week after week. Men had fallen sick and the ship could not be worked as she ought. However, the Cape of Good Hope was rounded, and then there had to be endured the weary, agonising experience of being becalmed. Still they knew “by the height wee were in to the Northward” that they had long since passed the dreaded Cape of storms. Just one more casualty convinced them that they were not yet out of danger, and this occurred when the main-yard fell down and knocked a man into the sea, drowning him.

But on the 5th of June they passed the Tropic of Capricorn, and on the sixteenth of that month sighted St Helena, where they let go in twelve fathoms. Here they took on board fresh water, shot some wild goats and hogs, refitted the ships and inspected the Dragon’s rudder, “which wee hoped would last us home.” During the sojourn here all the sick recovered their health, and on the 5th of July they set out again to the north-west. Five days more they were becalmed, but before that they had succeeded in passing Ascension, on 11th July, and then fell in with a favourable south-east wind. Thus they proceeded until the 7th of September, when they imagined themselves near to home. “Wee tooke sounding, judging the Lands end of England to be fortie leagues from us. The eleventh day we came to the Downes, well and safe to an anchor: for the which, thanked be almightie God, who hath delivered us from the infinite perils and dangers, in this long and tedious Navigation.” Thus the voyage which had been begun on 13th February 1601 was now brought to a finish on 11th September 1603. It had been a most successful voyage, and 1,030,000 lb. of pepper had been brought to England by these four ships. But, important as that was to the merchants, still more admirable was the achievement of Lancaster in getting his ship home at all. However, he was not to go without his reward. He had had the responsibility of bringing this first voyage of the English East India Company to a conclusion that was as happy as financially it was successful, and he was granted a knighthood by James I. Those who had invested their money in this concern could scarcely regret their decision, for they eventually received 95 per cent. on their capital, and it was now established beyond doubt that henceforth the East Indian trade was the thing for enterprising London merchants. For a hundred years the Portuguese had kept the secret to themselves and succeeded in preventing other countries from coming as interlopers. But that was now all past and done with. The future rested not with the Portuguese, whose Indian colonial system proved to be an utter failure, but with the English or the Dutch, between whom the contest would soon become keen. For already the latter had formed so many associations for trade that by the year 1602 they were amalgamated by the States-General into one corporation entitled the Dutch East India Company.

As this first voyage had been so fortunate, it was not long before a second was inaugurated by the English East India Company. During that winter preparations went ahead, and on the following Lady Day 1604 another expedition left Gravesend, this time under the leadership of Henry Middleton, a kinsman of the Middleton who had died during Lancaster’s voyage. This project consisted of the same ships as before, and these duly arrived at Bantam on the 20th of December. From here two of the ships were sent home—namely, the Hector and the Susan, eight months ahead of the other couple, which proceeded first to the Moluccas before leaving Bantam finally for England. Middleton found that trading was not quite as easy as it might be, for the Dutch gave him a great deal of opposition in the East. However, you will realise that this second voyage was far from being a failure when it is stated that the profits were just under 100 per cent. to those who had raised the capital. And this in spite of the fact that the Susan was lost on her way home. It is a singular coincidence that when this ship had been purchased, as already noted in the preceding chapter, from a London alderman at the price of £1600, the condition was that he should buy her back from the Company at the end of the voyage, for half the purchase price. Middleton had reached the Downs on 6th May 1606, and it was not long before preparations began to be made for next year’s voyage. The second expedition had necessitated a capital of £60,000, of which only £1142 had been spent in goods, so you will understand to what extent privateering was responsible for swelling the profits.

On 12th March 1607 an expedition was off again, for the third voyage. This time the sum of £53,000 had been subscribed, £7280 being expended in merchandise to take out. There were only three ships on the present occasion, consisting of those two veterans, Red Dragon and Hector, and a vessel named the Consent, of 105 tons. The “Generall” in this case was Captain Keeling. The latter left England on 12th March, alone, and reached the Moluccas. Although he was unable to obtain a cargo from there, yet he purchased from a Java junk a cargo of cloves for £2948, 15s., which on their arrival in England fetched the considerable sum of £36,287. The reason why spices of the East were so readily bought up by the West is explained at once by the fact that a great demand existed throughout civilised Europe at that time for their employment in cookery and in certain expensive drinks.

The Dragon and Hector had left the Downs on the 1st of April, and, like those previous voyages which we have noted, they again went round the Cape of Good Hope and then as far north-east as Socotra, where the two ships separated, the Dragon proceeding to Sumatra and Bantam, while the Hector went on to Surat, just north of Bombay. Thus, at last and for the first time, one of the Company’s ships had brought up in a port of the Indian continent, as distinct from those East Indian islands which had been previously visited. The captain of the Hector was Hawkins, whilst the Dragon was under the command of Captain Keeling. Some historians assert that Captain Keeling himself went to Surat, where he landed a Mr Finch to form a factory, and then sent Captain Hawkins to persuade the Great Mogul at Agra to order his officers to deal justly with the English: but at any rate Hawkins remained ashore, as there was a fine opportunity for inaugurating a big business, and sent the Hector on to Bantam to join Captain Keeling. Hawkins had come out from England with a letter from King James I. to the Great Mogul, and the latter promised to grant the Company all the privileges asked for. This Indian potentate further suggested that Hawkins should remain at his Court as English representative at a commencing salary of £3200 a year. This offer Hawkins accepted, but not unnaturally the appointment aroused a good deal of jealousy both among the Portuguese and the officials of the Court. In a little time the Great Mogul had regretted his decisions both as to Hawkins and the East India Company. The Englishman therefore was compelled to leave Agra (minus his promised salary), and then went down to the coast again at Surat. As to the privileges which had been promised to the Company, these also vanished. Trouble was obviously brewing. But this third voyage, yielding a profit of 234 per cent., had not by any means been a failure, but a great financial success. The Dragon had been sent home with a good cargo, and then Captain Keeling (this time in the Hector) had visited the Moluccas and Bantam, where the factory had been more firmly established, subsequently reaching England on 9th May 1610.

It will be remembered that the original charter granted to the Company by Elizabeth was for a period of fifteen years. But in the year 1609 the Company were compelled to petition James I. for a renewal, or rather for much greater powers, notwithstanding that the original charter had still six years to run. The reason for this application is not hard to appreciate. The Portuguese now began to realise that the Englishmen were very serious rivals, and they must be met by force. The East India Company, on the other hand, were equally determined that they would not give up such a valuable trade that had paid them so handsomely during these few years. Therefore opposition must be met by other force: in other words, a greater number of ships would be required. King James also recognised this, so the application was granted, the number of merchant-adventurers was increased from 218 to 276, the Crown to have the power of repealing the Company’s charter after three years’ notice.

So three new ships were fitted out for the sixth voyage. (There had in the meanwhile been two “separate” voyages, about which we shall speak presently.) The cost of these three new ships, together with the merchandise which they carried out, was £82,000, this large sum being rendered possible only by the increased members of the Company. The leader of this voyage was that same Henry Middleton whom we saw taking out the second voyage: but since that time he had received a knighthood. This time his flagship was to be the Trade’s Increase. And as this was one of the most famous of all the seventeenth-century ships, and certainly the largest East Indiaman built up till then, we must say something about her.

At the time of her launch she was the biggest merchantman of any kind that had been built in England. She created, in fact, to the Jacobeans something of the sensation which the launch of the Mauretania in our own time created. James I. attended the ceremony, together with other members of the royal family, and attended by his nobles. This was on the 13th of December 1609, her first voyage being due to commence on the following 1st of April. In consequence of the high position which the East India Company had now begun to occupy, and not less owing to the phenomenal size of this ship, the incident was made the most of. After the ship was afloat in the water, the King and his retinue were entertained on board with a magnificent dinner provided at the Company’s expense and served on some of those dishes and plates of China ware which had been brought home from the East by the Company’s ships and were then looked upon as something rare and wonderful, nothing of the kind having yet been seen in the country. But the Trade’s Increase, with her 1100 tons, was a clumsy, unwieldy ship and somewhat top-heavy. She was anything but a lucky craft, and we shall see presently that her end was to be tragic. For English shipbuilding was in a transition stage, which lasted about another two hundred years or more. It was trying hard to get away from the unscientific, rule-of-thumb method which had come down from the Middle Ages and had not yet come under the influence of science and the principles of true naval architecture.

CHAPTER VII
THE BUILDING OF THE COMPANY’S SHIPS

Now, before we proceed with the further voyages and trading of these Indiamen, we shall find it very interesting if we attempt to paint the picture of the building of these ships. Happily the data handed down are of such a nature that we can learn practically all that we should like to know on the subject.

The reader will remember that the ships which went on the first and second voyages had been obtained by purchase. But, then, since it was obvious that more ships would be required as the trade increased and losses occurred by wrecks, the Company had to look out for additions to their small fleet. It was then that they were confronted with a big problem. First of all, England was still a comparatively new-comer into the position of an ocean-going shipowner, as distinct from Portugal, Spain, Venice and Genoa. Practically all her shipping consisted either of fishing or coasting craft. Therefore she possessed only a very small supply of what could be called in those days large vessels. This supply had been still further depleted by the purchases which the Dutch East India companies had made from English owners at the beginning of the East Indian boom. The result was that those very few big ships which remained in England were at a premium. To voyage round the Cape of Good Hope and across the Indian Ocean, able to fight stalwart Portuguese craft and to carry well a heavy cargo, in addition to provisions for many months, demanded a big-bellied ship of exceptional strength; and that was why the Mare Scourge (which had been built for privateering) was just the thing.

But now the owners of the small amount of big shipping that still survived, in consequence of the big financial success which the East India Company had made from their first two voyages, were determined not to let them have any more ships except at very high prices. The rates which these sellers now asked were preposterous—as much as £45 a ton being demanded. The East India Company, being therefore in the position of needing ships and yet unable to purchase such at a reasonable figure, were compelled to decide on building for themselves. This dates from the year 1607, and a yard was leased at Deptford, the first two craft thus built being the Trade’s Increase, mentioned in the last chapter, and the Peppercorn, both of which went out under Sir Henry Middleton in the spring of 1610. From the first this change of policy was found to be justified, for the Company was able to build their ships at £10 a ton instead of £45, which meant the very handsome saving of £38,500 in the case of a ship the size of the Trade’s Increase—or two ships equal to her tonnage.

THE LAUNCH OF THE HONOURABLE EAST INDIA COMPANY’S SHIP “EDINBURGH”
(CAPTAIN HENRY BAX).
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

[Larger image]

In this yard before very long the Company were employing no fewer than five hundred ships’ carpenters, caulkers, joiners and other workmen. The result was that by the year 1615 the Company had built more ships in those short eight years than any other trade had done. Altogether they had owned during that period twenty-one able ships, and by the year 1621 the Company owned not less than 10,000 tons of shipping, employing as many as 2500 seamen. When we consider that even as late as the year 1690 the whole population of England was less than 5,500,000, and that of this number the seafaring people were a very small figure, it is obvious what this great East India Company meant to the country, with its wealth, enabling large sums of money to be spent in wages to seamen, workmen and factors. After the Company had been trading only twenty years there were about 120 of these factors alone. But, in addition, the Company was paying out large sums of money for the relief of seamen’s widows and their children. I will not burden the reader with statistics, but I may be allowed to state that up to November 1621 the Company had exported woollen goods, lead, iron, tin and other commodities from England to the value of £319,211. From the East these ships had brought back cargoes which had been purchased in the East for the sum of £375,288. But you will appreciate the profit when it is stated further that these cargoes were sold in England for £2,044,600. As against this there was always the possibility of losing the ships and the cargoes in their holds either outward or homeward bound. There was the cost of building and upkeep of ships and dockyard. There was the heavy expense, too, of victualling the ships for many months, the purchasing of English merchandise, the various stores, the wages of captains, officers and crews, and factors, as well as the payment of customs. And though it is perfectly true that the average profit made by the first twelve voyages was not less than 138 per cent., yet we must remember that the voyages were never made in less than twenty months and often extended to three and four years.

So also we must remember that after the arrival in this country of the goods from India they were sold at long credits—even as much as eighteen months and two years. Owing to the irregularity of the factors in keeping and transmitting their accounts, the concerns of the voyage could not be finally adjusted under six or eight years. “Taking the duration of the concern at a medium of seven years,” says Macpherson in his “History of European Commerce with India,” “the profit appears to be somewhat under twenty per cent. per annum.” The current rate of interest in those days was about 8 per cent., so that 20 per cent. could not be deemed for that time a very abnormal rate of remuneration when we consider the amount of enterprise required at the outset, and the vast risks which necessarily had to be run. Included in these profits were also the results of privateering and bartering. Between the years 1601 and 1612 the profits ranged from 95 to 234 per cent., with the exception of the year 1608, when both ships were wrecked.

Nowhere was the Company’s system of thoroughness better shown than in the completeness and organisation of her shipyard. The East India Company took itself very seriously and arrogated to itself all the dignity and self-importance which its unique prerogatives permitted. The Court was presided over by the Governor and it had its own rules of procedure. “Every man,” for instance, “speaking in the Court shall stand up and be bareheaded, and shall addresse his speach to the Gouernour or Deputy in his absence.” So runs one of the Company’s rules. Now the connecting link, so to speak, between the Company and its ships was the man who was known as the ship’s husband, one of its salaried servants. When the Court were met to discuss the plans for the yearly voyages to India, the husband had to attend in order to learn what shipping would be required. He then had to draw out a table of the proportion of victuals and other necessaries for each ship and to see that such were provided. After being got together these stores were then placed in the Company’s warehouses. In addition to being the victualler of the ships he was responsible also for providing the amount of iron likely to be required—“yron both English and Spanish”—and had to deliver it to the smiths at Deptford yard for the rudder irons and other purposes, and also to the coopers for making the hoops of the casks. The husband was also responsible for the supervision of the clerks and for keeping the account-books, the stores in the London warehouses being under the care of a “Clerke of the Stores.”

In the Deptford yard large stocks of “timber, planckes, sheathing-boards, and treenayles” had to be maintained by officials called “purveyers,” or, as we should name them nowadays, “buyers.” These men had to see to the purchasing of all kinds of wood used. It was kept in the Company’s private timber-yards at Reading, whence it was put into barges and so brought down the Thames to Deptford. The trenails were the old-fashioned means of fastening a ship’s timbers and planking and had existed from the times even of the Romans and the Vikings. They were small wooden pegs—“tree-nails”—driven in something after the appearance of the modern rivet, but minus the head. The sheathing-boards were a very necessary protection for the ship’s hull in hot climates against the insidious attacks of the worm. (In another chapter will be found an instance of this.) There was also employed a “measurer of timber and plancke,” whose job was to go down to the waterside and mark the timber.

But it was the “Clarke of the Yard” who had the supervision of the shipwrights, the “cawlkers,” carpenters and labourers, and one portion of his duties was to see that the men “doe not loyter in the Taphouse.” For the Company certainly allowed such a tap-house in their yard, which was “lycensed by the Companie from yeare to yeare” to certain persons on condition that they retailed the beer at not more than six shillings the barrel and not less than “three full pynts of Ale measure for a penny.” The tap-house also sold to the workmen of the yard such victuals as bread, “pease,” milk, porridge, eggs, butter, cheese, but they were not allowed to sell anything else, nor were they allowed to sell to any person other than one of the Company’s workmen in the yard.

The whole of the work at the yard was subdivided under so many responsible heads of departments, just as it is to-day in any shipyard. The Master Shipwright’s duties were to build and repair the Company’s ships and to design the “plots and models compleat, of all the new ships.” And he was forbidden to build ships for anyone else except this Company. It is significant of our modern system of extreme division of labour that the duties of ship-designer and ship-builder have become quite separate and distinct.

Then there was another important official attached to the Company, known as the “Master-pilot.” “The Mr Pylot his office is to commaund and order the workes which concerne the setting up and taking downe of Masts, Yards, Rigging, unrigging and proportioning the quantities, sorts and sizes of Cordage to the Companies ships ... and to use care and diligence ... that the Company may not be ouercharged with idle, unskilfull, or a needlesse number of workmen, or in the rate of their wages.” This same master-pilot had to survey the Company’s ships at Deptford and Blackwall and to see that, after being launched, they were safely moored. He had also to see that the canvas given out was duly made into sails, and was further responsible that the Company’s ships set forth up to time from Deptford, Blackwall and Erith. In addition he took charge of them whilst in the Thames to “pylot downe the Companies ships to Eirth and Grauesend, attending them there untill they shall be dispatched into the Downes.” So also when they came back from India he would pilot them up from Gravesend “untill they be safely moored at an Anchor, or indocked at Blackwall.” This official was assisted in the supervision of cordage by a man called the “Boatswaine Generall.”

The treasurers looked after the Company’s accounts, and once a week they handed to the “Purcer-Generall” the sums of money for paying the wages of the sailors and labourers: also the “harbour wages” to “officers and Maryners, who goe the Voyage.” Every ship of course also carried its own “purcer,” who with their mates had to look after the lading, the ship’s accounts and the conditions of the victuals on board, etc.

After the end of the day’s work the Clerk of the Works would go round the yard to see that there was no risk of fire breaking out owing to negligence in respect of the pitch cauldrons or other instances. The yard boasted of a “porter of the lodge,” and as soon as the workmen had done for the day watchmen came on duty in the yard, where they remained until the bell rang next morning summoning the labourers back to their work. The Company insisted on these watchmen doing their supervision thoroughly, “often calling one to another to prevent sleepe, and euery houre when the clocke strikes” they were bidden to “walke round” and ring a bell in the yard.

The “Clarke of the Cordage” looked after the ropes, marlin, “twyne,” ordnance, “great shot,” pulleys, blocks and the like. The “Clarke of the Iron Works” was similarly responsible for all the anchors, nails, bolts, chain-plates, and so on, and had to look to these when the ships came home from the East. He was further responsible for the lead and copper. If an anchor or anything had to be made or repaired in this metal it was done by the Company’s smith on the yard.

The “Chirurgion Generall” and his deputy had their lodgings in the yard, and one or the other was bound to be in attendance daily from morning till night “to cure any person or persons who may be hurt in the Service of this Company, and the like in all their ships riding at an anchor at Deptford and Blackwall, and at Erith, where hee shall also keepe a Deputy with his Chest furnished, to remaine there continually, until all the said ships be sayled downe from thence to Grauesend.” And it is amusing to read that the duties of the “chirurgion” included that of cutting the “hayre of the carpenters, saylors, caulkers, labourers” and other workmen once every forty days “in a seemely manner, performing their works at Breakfast and Dinner times, or in raynie weather, and in an open place where no man may loyter or lye hidden, under pretence to attend his turne of trimming.” In addition this same surgeon had to report all persons who seemed to be decrepit or unfit: and every carpenter, sailor, labourer or workman in the yards or ships had to pay twopence every month out of his wages to the said “Chirurgion Generall”; so you may take it as certain that he was not the most popular of beings. He was also compelled to find “skilfull and honest chirurgions and their Mates” for the ships. The Company took special precautions to see that these vessels set out with all the medical comforts and supplies of those days, having regard to the changing climates and the heavy losses of life through scurvy and dysentery (or flux). Thus these medicine-chests had to be brought into the Company’s house fourteen days before the ships sailed, so that the doctors and apothecaries and other people appointed by the Committee dealing with this subject might make a full inspection.

In addition to the officials on the Thames there was also a “Keeper of Anchors and Stores in the Downes,” at Deal, who looked after the cables, hawsers, anchors and ships’ boats sent to the Downs, so that whenever any of the Company’s ships arrived there lacking any of these articles they could always be supplied. At Deptford yard there was every single trade represented that was employed in the construction and fitting out of a seventeenth-century ship. There were coopers and boatmakers and the carvers who deftly gave those fantastic decorations to the ships’ hulls. There were smiths and painters and riggers, but in addition to the large staff which were concerned with the ships themselves, there was another staff who had to look after the providing of the salt meat for the voyages. For the Company was determined to keep the profit of victuals to itself. This department was under the management of the “Clerk of the Slaughter-house,” his duties being to look after the killing, salting, pickling and packing of the “beefes and hogges.” This salt beef and pork comprised the main food of these sailormen to the Far East and back. They had no vegetables except dried peas and beans, no bread other than mouldy ship’s biscuit, and no fruit.

The Company included a “Committee for Entertaining of Marriners,” and they were on the look-out for “able men, unmarryed and approved saylors.” Many of these fellows were of the reckless, dare-devil type, coarse of morals and frequently drunk when ashore: yet heroic in a crisis, imprudent, contemptuous of danger, brutal and unruly. Many a young man—sailor and factor alike—was sent in these ships in order that he might be got out of the way after disgracing his family: and numbers of them never again set foot in England. If the seamen who were shipped happened to be married, the “Clarke of the Imprest” paid the wages allowed to their wives whilst the men were at sea. This official was also bound to pay the wages to the “marriners which shall returne home in the Companies ships, or to their Assignes.”

After the masters and their mates of the respective ships had been hired for a voyage, their names were entered under the list of harbour-wages, and they took their oaths openly in the Court of the Committees of the Company. After this they sought able and good mariners “whom they shall preferre for entertainment unto the Committees appointed to that businesse.” These masters were bound to sleep on board the ships to which they had just been appointed, every night, and there keep good order. They were also to appoint quartermasters and boatswains, who were to see that the victuals, provisions, stores and merchandise were properly stowed. The boatswain, gunner, cook, steward, carpenter and other officers were each responsible for their own special stores.

Within ten days after the arrival of their ship in the Thames from India the master was bound to deliver to the Governor of the Company four copies of his journal and other “worthy observations” of his voyage. When the ship was bound out the master was always to be on board and to assist the master-pilot. When the ship returned home, a Committee of the Company for the Discharge of the Ships was always present on board in order to see the hold opened. This was to prevent theft. The goods were then placed in lighters and one of the Company’s “trusty servants” then went in the latter to watch that no embezzlement occurred. The goods were then taken to Leadenhall, where they were sold. “The custome hath been used heretofore [i.e. prior to 1621] in selling the wares of this Company at a Generall Court, and the Remnants of small value in the Warehouses by the light of a candle,” and this custom was continued. Selling by the “light of a candle” was as follows:—The article was put up for auction, a small piece of candle burning the while. So long as that piece of candle was there the bids could go on, but as soon as it burned out the last bid was completed and no more could be made for that commodity.

Before the crew put to sea, two months’ wages were allowed ahead, and “gratifications” were also paid “unto worthy and well deserving persons.” In these ships there went out also the merchants, factors and supercargoes. Some, as we have already seen, founded factories where they landed and circumstances permitted: but later on there were factors resident in every port, just as each steamship company to-day has its own agents wherever the ships touch.

INDIA HOUSE—THE SALE ROOM.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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The Deptford yard, which the Company leased from the year 1607 and used for the next twenty years, was of the greatest assistance to the Company. The best merchant ships in the country there came into being, were fitted out, repaired on their return, resheathed and then sent to sea in excellent condition. It was true that the saving in building for themselves was to the Company’s great benefit; but, on the other hand, the yard with all this staff and detail was found in the long run to be so costly that it swallowed up too much of the capital, which could more profitably have been employed in hiring ships. It was seen also that even with the carefulness expended in the construction of the Company’s ships, the latter became worn out after four voyages: so at the end of twenty years it was decided to give up this expensive yard and to revert to the original custom of hiring vessels as required. Later on we shall see that this system developed in a curious manner, but for the present we must go back to see the progress which the voyages of these early East Indiamen brought about in the Eastern trade. It took four months to fit out these ships for sailing again to the East, and the refit was very thorough. A large magazine of warlike stores to the value of £30,000 was kept always ready, and this was really a very useful asset in the country, since in the time of necessity the material could be used by the English navy. Even in the year 1626, within a few months of the closing down of the shipyard, the Company were so enterprising as to erect mills and houses for the manufacture of their own gunpowder, obtaining the saltpetre from the East, which of course came home in their own ships. If ever monopoly was allowed to have its own way, surely it never had such good opportunity as was vouchsafed to the East India Company, with its own shipyards, victualling, and its own particular trade with full cargoes each way and a high percentage almost assured. We are accustomed in this twentieth century to bewail the existence of “corners” and trusts: yet these are as nothing compared with the privileges which the East India Company enjoyed and so jealously guarded through generation after generation, through two centuries and well into a third. And that meant more than was really apparent. The whole world had not been developed and opened out as it is to-day. Rather this exclusive privilege meant the granting of about half the world to a select few, and the democratic spirit of the twentieth century would instantly revolt against any such condition of affairs. It must not be thought that there were not those who protested even in the seventeenth century. Some did certainly protest—in a very forcible manner—by cutting in as interlopers. But it was a short-lived victory and had no lasting effect.

CHAPTER VIII
PERILS AND ADVENTURES

It is only by examining the official correspondence which passed between the Company’s servants and themselves that we are able to get a correct insight into the lesser, though usually more human, details connected with these ships. In the last chapter but one we saw that the third voyage had been financially satisfactory. But there are a few sidelights which show that these voyages were not mere pleasure cruises. If this particular one earned 234 per cent. it was by sheer hard work on the part of the men and of the ships. Captain Keeling writes that he had, whilst in the East, to buy “of the Dutch a maine top-sayle (whereof we had extreame want) and delivered them a note to the Company, to receive twelve pounds twelve shillings for the same.” So also it was with men as with sails. Anthony Marlowe writes home to the Governor of the Company, under date of 22nd June 1608, from on board the Hector, that during the voyage “there hath died in our ship two foremast men—Wallis and Palline: and two lost overboard, Goodman and Jones: also there hath died Dryhurst, steward’s mate, John Newcome, John Asshenhurst, purser’s mate, Mr Quaytmore, purser, and Mr Clarke, merchant.”

If there was ill-feeling ashore between the English and the Portuguese, and the English and Dutch, so all was not ever as happy as wedding bells in the English ships. One June day in 1608, during this third voyage, a violent enmity had broken out between Anthony Hippon, master of the Dragon, and his mate, William Tavernour. Someone endeavoured to get them to make up their quarrel, but Hippon was obdurate, and “was heartened forward in his malice against the said Tavernour by Matthew Mullynex the master of the Hector.”

And there is a further letter, dated 4th December 1608, which was sent by another of the Company’s servants named James Hearne, which again calls attention to the Dragon’s want of sails, the ship then being at Bantam. There was no canvas procurable out there, “therefore,” he suggests, “one hundred pound more or less, would not be lost in laying it out in spare canvas in such a voyage as this.” And then he concludes his letter with a postscript, which shows that the life of a factor in the Company’s service ashore out in the East was not a lucrative occupation. “That it may please your worships,” he petitions, “to consider me somewhat in my wages, for I have served 2 years already at £4 a month, and in this place I am in, my charge will be greater than otherwise.”

We have already alluded to the setting forth of the sixth expedition under Sir Henry Middleton in 1607. Middleton was instructed to proceed to the west coast of India with the intention of obtaining from Surat Indian calicoes which would find a ready sale at Bantam and the Moluccas. Having set forth from England in the year 1610, he arrived at Aden, where he left the Peppercorn, and then with his flag in the Trade’s Increase sailed for Mocha, which is at the southern end of the Red Sea. No English vessel had yet thrust her bows into this sea, though the Portuguese had been there even during the previous century. And here the Trade’s Increase, which had received such an ovation when she was first launched at the Deptford yard, was to begin the first of her serious mishaps. Like many another ship that came after her, famous for unprecedented size, she was destined to be unlucky.

She was making for Mocha with the assistance of native pilots when she had the misfortune to get badly aground. She was a clumsy, unhandy ship, and it was natural enough that the natives who had been accustomed only to their smaller craft might get her into trouble. The incident occurred in November 1610, and the following account sent home by one who was on board her at the time may be taken as representative of the facts. “About five a clocke,” runs the account, “in luffing in beeing much wind, we split our maine toppe sayle, and putting abroad our mizen, it split likewise: our Pilots brought our shippe a ground upon a banke of sand, the wind blowing hard, and the Sea somewhat high, which made us all doubt her coming off ... we did what we could to lighten our ship, sending some goods a-land and some aboard the Darling ... we land as well our Wheat-meale, Vinegar, Sea-coles, Pitch and Tarre, with our unbuilt Pinnasse, and other provisions which came next hand, or in the way, as well as Tinne, Lead, Iron, and other merchandise to be sould, and staved neare all our water.” The reference to the “unbuilt pinnasse” is explained by the fact that it was the custom of the Elizabethan and later voyagers to take out from home the necessary timber and planks and to build the little craft on board as they proceeded. This kept the men occupied and was a saving in wages, besides not involving the risk of losing such a craft before the end of the voyage was being approached. Such a top-heavy, cumbrous vessel as the Trade’s Increase would need very careful “nursing” in a squall to prevent her from capsizing, and it is perfectly clear that the sudden luffing up into the wind to ease her was too much for the canvas that had already been considerably worn and chafed during the voyage across the Equator and round the Cape of Good Hope up to the Gulf of Aden.

After some anxious hours the ship was eventually got afloat again, but Middleton was taken prisoner by the Arabs. For a long while he was compelled to endure his captivity, but was eventually released and sailed for Surat, where he arrived with his ships on 26th September 1611, a great deal of valuable time having been lost. Here again he was unlucky, for a Portuguese squadron of seven ships was waiting outside. The Portuguese were now so indignant and jealous of the English interlopers that they were resolved to resist them to the utmost: otherwise it was obvious that the hard-won wealth of the East would before long slip right away. All the inspiration and enthusiasm of Prince Henry the Navigator, all the heroic voyages of the first Portuguese navigators to the East, all the capital which had been expended in building and fitting out their expensive caracks would assuredly be thrown into the sea unless the aggressive Englishmen, who had penetrated their secrets, were to be thwarted now with determination. The Portuguese were expecting Middleton’s arrival, for they had already heard of his being in the Red Sea, and now they were in sufficient and overwhelming strength to oppose him: for besides the big ships outside, there were nearly twice as many smaller craft waiting inside the bar. The Portuguese contention was that they alone had the right to trade with Surat: the English were not wanted and had no justification to be there at all.

Middleton’s position was that he had come out from the King of England bearing a letter and presents to the Great Mogul to put on a firm footing that trade which Englishmen had already inaugurated, and that India was open to all nations who wished to trade with her. But, of course, Middleton did not know at the time the incident which has already been mentioned in connection with Hawkins and the Great Mogul. When, however, the news presently reached him, it was to modify his plans entirely: there could be no good object attained in endeavouring to establish trade against the opposition of the Mogul and the Portuguese. The natives were clearly under the thumb of the Portuguese, and, however willing they might have been, no trade with them was possible.

So, after taking Hawkins on board, together with the Englishmen who had been left at Surat, a council was held and ultimately it was decided to return to the Red Sea so that he could there trade with the ships from India, since to deal with them in their own country was not practicable. This decision was carried out, and whether the traders liked it or not they were compelled to barter the goods which Middleton required to take farther eastwards to the Indian Archipelago as previously indicated. But meanwhile there had set out from England another expedition, consisting of the three ships Clove, Thomas and Hector, under the command of Captain Saris, bound for the Red Sea, having previously obtained a firman, or decree, from Constantinople which would grant him and his merchants kindly treatment in the neighbourhood of Mocha and Aden. But on arriving at Socotra, Saris found a letter from Middleton giving warning of the treacherous treatment to expect. In spite of this, however, Saris found that the firman was respected, but eventually deemed it prudent to make for the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, where he met Middleton and agreed with him to engage in privateering the ships of India. If you had questioned these English seamen they would have replied unhesitatingly that they were merely engaged in trade by barter, and that as they had been prevented by circumstances from carrying on this direct with the Indian continent they had no other opportunity than to do it at sea. They had been sent out by the English Company to get the cloths and calicoes to exchange farther east and they were merely fulfilling their instructions. But in plain language there was little difference between this and robbery, or, at the best, compulsory sale at the buyer’s own price.

THE HONOURABLE EAST INDIA COMPANY’S SHIP “BRIDGEWATER” ENTERING MADRAS ROADS UNDER JURY-RIG AFTER ENCOUNTERING GALES OF WIND.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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But when all this “trading” was finished and the Trade’s Increase went to Malay Archipelago, she was to bring to a tragic end her short and adventurous career. Middleton had gone ahead in the Peppercorn, and the Trade’s Increase had been ordered to follow after. Unfortunately she needed some repairs to her hull. It was customary before an East Indiaman left the East on her homeward voyage for the sheathing outside to be attended to, in order that she might make as fast a passage home as possible. But there were no dry docks out there, and very few anywhere, even in England or Holland. The practice, which lasted well into the nineteenth century, was to careen a ship if she required any attention below the water-line—her seams caulked, or her bottom tarred. This was done in the case of the Trade’s Increase whilst she was at Bantam, where her sheathing was being seen to. But she fell over on to her side and became a total loss. One contemporary account states that whilst the repairs were being done “all her men died in the careening of her,” and that then some Javanese were hired to do the job, but five hundred of these “died in the worke before they could sheath one side: so that they could hire no more men, and therefore were inforced to leave her imperfect, where shee was sunke in the Sea, and after set on fire by the Javans.” This was towards the end of the year 1613. Another contemporary account states that she was laid up in the ooze, and was set on fire from stem to stern, having been previously fired twice, at the supposed instigation of a renegade Spaniard, “which is turned Moor.” She blazed away during the whole of one night, and her wreck was eventually sold for 1050 reales. When Sir Henry Middleton heard the news of the loss of his famous flagship, the pride of all the seas, he was so heart-broken that he died. Thus both admiral and flagship had perished: it had been a calamitous voyage.

As for Captain Saris, he had sailed to Japan in order to establish a factory. Notwithstanding the opposition of the Dutch, who were as jealous of his arrival in the Far East as the Portuguese had been in India, the Emperor received him favourably and the seeds were sown for future trade with England which, to change the metaphor, were to prepare the way for the adoption of Western ideas by the Japanese during the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries. Strictly speaking, Japan and China have nothing to do with India. But historically, so far as our present subject is concerned, they are to an extent bound together. Not merely did these first captains of the English East India Company sail thither, but, as the reader will see further on in this volume, a great deal of trade was done with those parts by the Company’s servants: and at least one interesting engagement took place on sea near by, in which the Company’s merchant ships distinguished themselves.

Notwithstanding the sad loss of the costly Trade’s Increase, Middleton’s voyage had yielded to the Company a profit of 121 per cent. Captain Saris’s voyage had done even better still, earning 218 per cent.; but, as we have shown, this was not all earned by legitimate trade.

The journal of Captain Nicholas Downton of the homeward voyage of the Peppercorn (which you will remember had been built at the Deptford yard and went out in company with the Trade’s Increase) shows the kind of hardships which our sailors had to endure whilst earning such handsome profits for their owners. With thankful hearts this craft started back from Bantam, though it was to be no pleasant voyage. On getting under way Downton saluted the admiral by way of farewell. “I gave him 5 shot,” he writes, “having no more pieces out nor ports uncaulked”—that is to say, he had prepared his ship for sea, having run inboard most of his guns and caulked up the ports. The ship had previously had her sheathing attended to, and all the stores were aboard. The meat was kept in casks, while the bread and corn were kept in a “tight room” in order to avoid the ravages of the cacara—“a most devouring worm,” as Downton quaintly calls it, “with which this ship doth abound to our great disturbance.” The drinking-water to the extent of twenty-six tons had also been brought aboard, where it was kept in casks. But as these were decayed, weak, rotten and leaky the crew were bound to suffer before they reached home. He did his best to make her what he calls “a pridie ship”—that is, a trim ship—but though this was her first homeward voyage she leaked like a basket through the trenail holes in the stern, owing to the negligence of the wicked Deptford carpenters, who had scamped their work. The result was that there were soon twenty inches of water “on our lower orlop.” Certainly the Company’s yard had not earned much real credit for the way they had designed and built the Peppercorn and the Trade’s Increase.

And so this leaky, crank, badly built ship came fighting her way along over the trackless ocean, a continuous source of anxiety to her commander. Troubles often enough come not singly, and the Peppercorn was another unlucky ship. By sheer carelessness she and all hands barely escaped ending all things by fire at sea. “At noon,” says Downton, “our ship came afire by the cook his negligence, o’erguzzled with drink, digged a hole through the brick back of the furnace and gave the fire passage to the ship’s side, which led to much trouble besides spoil to our ship.” The punctuation of this sentence needs no modification to show the short, sharp impressions jotted down by a choleric captain. The name of this “o’erguzzled” cook was Richard Hancock, and no doubt he had so undermined his health with drink, or had been so severely punished by his commander that he could not long survive, for he died shortly after one day at noon and was buried at sea.

But he was not the only careless member of the ship’s company. At least one of the watch-keeping officers was just as bad in his own sphere. “The 27th at 2 after noon we were suddenly taken short with a gust from the SE, which by neglect of the principal of the watch not setting in time, not only put us to much present trouble but also split us two topsails at once, and blew a third clean away.” The following month on the eleventh the Peppercorn was at midnight overwhelmed by heavy squalls which “split our main bonnet and fore course, whereby we were forced to lie a try with mainsail, the sea very violent, we mending our sail.”

The meaning of this may not be quite apparent to those unfamiliar with the ships of those days. The “bonnet” was an additional piece of canvas laced on to the foot of these square-sails. It had been long in use by the ships of the Vikings and the English craft of the Middle Ages, and continued to be used during the Tudor period and the seventeenth century. Even in the twentieth century it is not quite obsolete, and is still used on the Norfolk wherries and on some of the North Sea fishing vessels. It was such a canvas as certainly ought to have been taken in quickly if the Peppercorn was likely to be struck by a heavy squall, being essentially a fine-weather addition. And whenever it was unlaced the equivalent was obtained of putting a reef in the sail. To “lie a try” was a well-known expression used by the Elizabethan seamen and their successors: it meant simply what we mean to-day when we speak of heaving-to. The ship would just forge ahead very slowly under her mainsail only, being under command but making good weather of the violent sea of which Downton speaks, and allowing most of the hands to get busy with the sails, which had to be sent down and repaired.

They had barely begun to resume their voyage when, on the thirteenth of the month, the Peppercorn broke her main truss—that is to say, the rope which kept the yard of the mainsail at its centre to the mast. The main halyards also carried away and again the main bonnet was split, but this time the mainsail as well. The “main course,” says Downton, “rent out of the bolt rope”—that is to say, blew right away from the rope to which it is sewn—and so they were, owing to “want of fit sail to carry, forced to lie a hull,” which means that they had to heave-to again. Meanwhile the Peppercorn was still leaking away merrily. “This day again,” reads an entry in the journal a little later on, “by the labouring of the ship and beating of her bows in a head sea, whereby we found in the powder room in the fore part on the lower orlop, 20 or 24 inches water, which have so spoiled, wet and stained divers barrels, so that of 20 barrels of powder I do not now expect to find serviceable 2 barrels, besides all our match and divers other things.” It would therefore have gone ill with the Peppercorn if she had fallen in with a big, powerful Spanish ship on the high seas ready to blaze away at her.

It took thirty-six hours to get these sails repaired and new ropes spliced. This mending became in fact the rule rather than the exception. “Our daily employment either mending of our poor old sails daily broken, or making new with such poor stuff as we have.” There can be no doubt whatever that these ships were sent to sea with all too few stores to allow of accident. We have already seen that additional canvas could not be obtained in the East, except with the indulgence of some Dutch captain, who would naturally charge the English the full value of a new sail, and a bit more. One wonders, indeed, how often those London merchants realised how dearly these big percentages had been bought—how only the dogged determination of the captains and masters, the sufferings of the crews in the leaky, ill-found ships could provide fortunes and luxuries for those who stayed at home in ease. However, little though they knew it at the time, it was these ill-faring mariners who were really building up the foundations of England’s Eastern wealth and her Eastern Empire. Human lives in those harsh days were rated low enough, and a poor, common sailor was not slobbered over. He was merely one of the meshes of the big net cast into the sea to bring in large spoil to the financiers of that time. But it has always been thus, and the more long-suffering the seaman has shown himself, the more courageous and patient he has been, the more he has been treated with contumely by those very persons who have obtained all that they possess through his achievements.

It cannot be supposed that these seventeenth-century Indiamen were on the whole happy ships. The captains feared mutiny all the time, and the men were compelled to live and work under trying conditions which were enough to break the spirit of any landsman. Downton’s journal shows this all too well. Take the following entries, which are sufficiently expressive:—

“July 2. Mr Abraham Lawes conceives he is poisoned for that his stomach falls away, and he hath often inclination to vomit, for he saith he was so at Venice, when he was formerly poisoned.”

Three days later Thomas Browning died, and on 27th July comes this entry:

“This day Mr Lawes died and is opened by the surgeon who took good note of his inward parts which was set down by the surgeon and divers witnesses to that note.” Similarly on 21st August: “Men daily fall down into great weakness”; and, again, four days later: “Edw. Watts, carpenter, died at midnight.” Under the twenty-ninth of the same month we find the following entry:—“Stormy weather, dry, the night past Thomas Dickorie died. Most of my people in a weak estate.” The last day of the month we read that “John Ashbe died by an imposthume at 7 o’clock after noon,” and other members of the ship’s company continued to die almost daily. An “imposthume,” by the way, is an abscess.

But the Peppercorn, though she had long since crossed the line, and was even now beyond the Bay of Biscay, was destined to suffer ill luck right to the end of her voyage. She ought, of course, to have rounded Ushant and then squared away up the English Channel. But as a fact Downton got right out of his reckoning. He rather imagined that his reckoning was wrong and suspected “all the instruments by which we observed the variation by.” The result was that he got farther to the north than he expected. He therefore ran right across the western mouth of the English Channel without sighting anything, so that eventually he found himself between Wales and Ireland—miles and miles out of his course. All too late he realised the mistake, so determined to put in to the nearest port. He thought of Milford, but as the Peppercorn would not fetch thither, he decided to run for Waterford in Ireland. He ran down to the coast, but when off the entrance a thick fog enshrouded the land, so he had to put out to sea once more, being able eventually to run into Waterford river when a more favourable opportunity presented itself. He had got his ship safe back into the Narrow Seas, but he had arrived a long way short of the River Thames and the port of London, and it would mean the wasting of further delay before the Peppercorn’s rich cargo could be sold in the metropolis. But with what success this voyage concluded to the stock-holders we have already seen.

THE “HALSEWELL,” EAST INDIAMAN.
(By courtesy of Messrs. T. H. Parker Brothers)

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Apropos of this voyage there is still preserved a letter written by Downton “aboard the Peppercorn to the Right Worshipful the Indian Company in Philpot Lane, September 15, 1613,” in which this captain asks for “3 cables and other cordage of divers sizes, a set of sails, sail needles and twine, and some Hamburrough lines for sounding lines.” With regard to the bad land-fall which Downton made coming home, there can be no doubt that he had reason to suspect those crude, inaccurate navigation instruments to which we have already called attention. In addition, of course, the early seventeenth-century charts bristled with errors. As for Eastern waters, the English skippers were much indebted to the charts which the Dutchmen had made for themselves, the Dutch at this time being the best cartographers in the world. There is at least one instance of a navigator of one of the English East India Company’s ships “finding it to be truely laid down in Plat or Draught made by Jan Janson Mole, a Hollander, which he gave to Master Hippon, and he to the Companie.” To this knowledge received by the Company were added the “plots” (i.e. charts) which their own masters of ships brought home at the end of every voyage, amended and added to as their experience dictated. We have already seen that it was compulsory for the master of every East Indiaman to deliver to the Governor of the English East India Company four copies of his journal and other “worthy” observations of his voyage within ten days of his arrival back in the Thames. The information thus derived was systematised, and as time went on and the voyages became more numerous still there was thus accumulated a number of invaluable sailing directions which were to be condensed into “Rules for our East India Navigations” by the famous John Davis of Limehouse, who had himself made no less than five voyages. The East India Company thus not only built its own ships at its own dockyard, victualled them from its own stores, but conducted its own hydrography department. It was therefore positively unique in its monopolies and self-dependence. England has never had any corporation like it: and it is pretty certain it never will.

CHAPTER IX
SHIPS AND TRADE

We alluded on an earlier page to what were known as “separate” voyages. In the year 1612 the owners of the different stocks joined together and made one common capital of £740,000. Until that year the custom had been for a number of men to subscribe together for one particular voyage out and home. This was found by no means satisfactory, for it meant there was too much rivalry and no co-operation. Before one voyage was completed another would be sent out, and it happened that out in the East several agents in their zeal to obtain cargoes for their ships would be found bidding against each other, to the great advantage of the natives and the loss of the English stock-holders. Then, again, it would also happen that the ship of one particular voyage might be lying empty at some Indian port waiting till her factor had obtained the spices and other goods destined for England. Meanwhile the factor of a second voyage had his goods ready but no ship in which to send them home. Each “voyage” was thus a separate and distinct concern, declining to have anything to do with any other “voyage,” or group of adventurers. When, therefore, this practice came to an end, the union made for strength and did away with the ill feeling and waste of energy till then so noticeable. The first joint stock began in the year 1613 and ended in 1617.

During this period twenty-nine ships of the Company were employed, and by the end of the year 1617 eight had returned with cargoes, four had been either lost or broken up, two had fallen into the hands of the Dutch, and fifteen were still in the East Indies. When the new stock was undertaken, most of these ships still in India were taken over at valuation. The biggest East Indiaman craft at this time were the Royal James, of 1000 tons; the Anne Royal, of 900 tons; and The New Year’s Gift, of 800 tons.

The Master Hippon, of whom we made mention in the last chapter, had command of the Globe, which set forth from England alone and made direct for the Coromandel coast (the south-east portion of India). He called neither at the Red Sea, the Nicobars, nor the East Indian Archipelago. His mission was to inaugurate a new sphere of trade, and in so doing he was laying the foundations of those rich commercial centres of Madras and Calcutta. His work was not easy, for the Dutch would not allow him to operate in their neighbourhood, but he left a little band of men near Masulipatam to found a factory, and then went on to establish other factories in the Malay Peninsula and Siam. In the year 1612 Captain Best had obtained from the Court of Delhi considerable privileges, including that of establishing a factory at Surat. This was to become the chief English station in India until the acquisition of Bombay. In establishing these factories, the English were but copying the example of the Portuguese and Dutch. They were essential as depots for the goods brought from home and the commodities which had been obtained from the natives, and were awaiting the arrival of the Company’s ships. In charge of these factories were the Company’s agents and their clerks. But it is well to bear in mind that these factories and factors were destined to undergo development. As a measure of precaution the former were in the course of time strengthened, and at a still later stage they became even forts, so that the agents and clerks developed into a garrison. And from a strictly defensive policy a more aggressive influence occurred which resulted in acquisition of territory as well as trading rights.

Captain Best had sailed from Gravesend on 1st February 1612, with the Red Dragon and the Hoseander, and arrived in the Swally, the roadstead for Surat, on 5th September. Here also were the Portuguese fleet a few weeks later ready to thwart the English, but Best was ready for them, and eventually hostilities were inevitable. But Best had the true English spirit in him, and besides being an excellent leader of a trading expedition, he was also no mean tactician, taking advantage of tide and the proximity of sandy shoals. The result was that the English were victorious and the Portuguese admiral defeated. But this meant something more than was immediately apparent. In a word it was to have a considerable influence on the future Anglo-Indian trade, and so give a still greater demand for the Indian merchant ships. In order properly to realise the position, you have to think of a weak man over-awed by a giant. Another giant comes along and asks the weak man for certain favours. The latter replies that he would be willing to make the concessions if the second giant could conquer the first, for whom the weak man has no real love. In the present instance the first giant is represented by the Portuguese, the weak man is the Great Mogul, and the second giant the English. The latter had been thwarted from trading with Surat by the Portuguese. What the Mogul had said amounted to this: “Defeat the Portuguese and I will give you and yours every opportunity to trade in my dominions: your merchants shall not be molested, the customs imposed shall be as light as possible, and if there is any delinquency by which my people shall in any way injure your men, I will see that the matter is soon set right and redress given. Your country shall be allowed to send its ambassador and reside at my Court—but you must first exhibit your strength by conquering the hated Portuguese.”

So Best’s victory succeeded as only success can. The mighty power of the Portuguese was now broken like a reed. They had been defeated on sea who prided themselves on sea-power. They had lost their prestige with the natives, who had had the first Europeans in awe. The whole of the Portuguese Indian system, which had amounted to piracy, oppression and native ruin, had been, in the words of India’s great modern historian, Sir Wm. Wilson Hunter, “rotten to the core.” It was now to receive its death-blow, and a new order of things was to follow. Instead of the previous opposition, the English were now allowed to open their trade and to start factories both at Surat and elsewhere, and the English East India Company obtained a most firm footing—not as interlopers doing the best they could against Portuguese vigilance, but recognised by the Great Mogul as an important and powerful trading corporation. It was after these concessions had been made and various factories set up that the latter needed obvious protection both from the Portuguese and the pirates who were greatly harassing the trading ships. Thus on land the nucleus was formed of an Indian army: thus afloat the nucleus also was formed of the Bombay Marine, afterwards to be known as the Indian navy.

For the latter the Company’s Surat agent was compelled to do the best with local material, collecting native craft called grabs and gallivats and commanded by officers who volunteered from the Company’s merchant ships. As these craft, like all other local craft, were the most suitable for the conditions of the place, the Company was well able to patrol the Gulf of Cambay and protect the vessels loaded with merchandise. This Indian marine had come into being during the year 1613, and two years later consisted of ten local craft. In the same year arrived from England four of the Company’s ships, under Captain Keeling, with Sir Thomas Roe, who had been sent by James I. as ambassador to the Great Mogul, and the treaty with the latter was ratified.

So the voyages continued to be made between England and the East. There was still opposition on the part of the Dutch, who would occasionally seize the Company’s ships, and in the year 1623 this opposition reached its crisis in the notorious Massacre of Amboyna, when the English Company’s agent and nine more Englishmen were executed on a trivial charge. Nor were the Portuguese ships swept from the Eastern seas. The sea-power was broken, but it still existed in its weakly condition, and nothing gave the English seamen greater pleasure than to meet any of their big caracks in the Indian Ocean or elsewhere and attack them. But the factors who had been installed at Surat were in no way deficient in enterprise. They were doing an excellent trade, not merely between England and India, but between India and Bantam. This was not enough: they were determined to open up commerce with the Persian Gulf.

Now this meant that trouble was inevitable. If the Portuguese had lost their hold on India, they were certainly just as strong as formerly at Ormuz and other parts of the Persian Gulf. To traffic, or to attempt to traffic, with this part of the Orient was certain to mean further conflict with the nation which had received so much injury from Captain Best. For most of a hundred years the Portuguese had been enjoying their monopoly up the Gulf. However, neither this nor the certainty of conflict could turn aside the ambition of the English East India Company. Their ships were sent from Surat with Indian goods, the Portuguese vessels opposed them, the victory went to the English, and thus once more, as it had been in the territory of the Great Mogul, so the result was to be in regard to the Persian trade. The natives realised that the English were worth listening to, and their prestige was raised to the height from which the Portuguese simultaneously dropped. Henceforth the English factors could bring from Surat their calicoes and take back silks. A little later Ormuz was destroyed—Ormuz which had been the seat of Portuguese supremacy in the Persian Gulf and the centre of its wealthy trade in that region—and thus once more the nation which had been the first of European countries to unlock the secrets of the East was told to quit. By the year 1622—a short enough period since the inauguration of the East India Company in London—the Portuguese had thus been driven out from those very places in the East which had been so dear to them and the means of so much wealth. By the year 1654 they had been compelled to agree that the English should have the right to reside and trade in all these Eastern possessions. It was a terrible blow to Portuguese pride, a grievous disappointment to a nation which had done so much for the discovery of the world, and enough to make Prince Henry the Navigator turn in his grave. But it was inevitable, for the reason that as the Portuguese had declined in sea-power, so the English had been rising ever since the mid-sixteenth century, though more especially during the latter half of Elizabeth’s reign. The call of the sea to English ears was being listened to more attentively than ever, and when that call summoned men to such profitable trade it continued to be heard through the centuries. Each success added zest and gave an increased enthusiasm. Men who wanted to see the world, or to increase their meagre incomes, or to get away from the narrow confines of their own town or village were eager to take their oath to the Company and go East, where a more adventurous life awaited them. But with the Portuguese it was not so. Most of their Latin enthusiasm had run out: they had begun well, but they had been unable to sustain. And the series of blows—the capture of their finest caracks, the revelation of their East Indian secrets, the colossal defeat of the Armada, the persistent and successful impertinence of English interlopers in India, the glaring proof that English seamanship, navigation, naval strategy, tactics and gunnery were as good as their own—this succession of hard facts tended to break their spirit, made them compelled to bow to the inevitable. Sic transit gloria mundi.

Between the years 1617 and 1629 the English East India Company had sent out no fewer than 57 ships, containing 26,690 tons of merchandise. In addition they employed eighteen pinnaces which spent their time trading from port to port in the East Indies. We have already alluded to the inception of the Indian navy by the Surat factory. As time went on this flotilla of local craft was strengthened by big ships sent out from England. But as this volume is not a history of either the East India Company or of the development of the Indian navy, we must confine our attention to the story of the Company’s merchant ships during the many years in which they existed with such marvellous and unprecedented benefit to India and the English nation. Those who are interested merely in the rise of the Indian navy will find the account in Captain Low’s volumes.

Now covetousness is a sin which is peculiar not merely to individuals, but to corporations and even nations. You may be sure that all this success on the part of the East India Company’s ships and of their trading ashore led to no small amount of jealousy and longing at home. It is true that the State had assisted and encouraged the Company in every way: for it was obvious that it was for the nation’s welfare generally, and in particular a fine support for the navy in respect of ships, men and stores. But the time arrived when the Company began to be pinched and squeezed by the power that hitherto had given only assistance. Covetousness was at the bottom of it all, but the actual opportunity had arisen over the capture of Ormuz, from which, it had been reported, a large amount of spoil had been taken. It was easy enough to invent some excuse, and this came in the year 1624 when the Company, understanding that the Portuguese were preparing a fleet against them in Indian waters, began to get ready a squadron of seven ships to leave England. When these ships were ready to sail, the Lord High Admiral of England, who happened to be the Duke of Buckingham, obtained from Parliament an order to lay an embargo on these ships, lying at Tilbury. A claim was made for a portion of the spoil supposed to have been taken at Ormuz and elsewhere. And in spite of protests the sum of £10,000 had to be paid before the ships were released. About this time, also, the Company were attacked in Parliament on three grounds: (1) For exporting the treasure of the kingdom, it being alleged that £80,000 had been sent out yearly in money: (2) For destroying the invaluable timber of the country by building exceedingly great ships, the timber being wanted for the navy: (3) For causing the supply of mariners to become injured by these voyages. The last item was certainly unreasonable: for, as a fact, about one-third, or sometimes one-half, of every ship’s complement consisted of landsmen, who went on board “green” to sea life. But as happens over and over again, even in our luxurious times, many a green-horn discovers after a while that the life of a seaman is just what really suits him: and it was so with these landsmen to a large extent. The service opened up a new career for them, and these fellows were to add to rather than diminish the country’s supply of sailors.

The ships were getting slightly more habitable and better built, though no very great change was taking place. How unseaworthy were some of the Company’s best vessels may be seen from a letter sent on 10th June 1614 by Robert Larkin, who murmurs bitterly of his craft, the Darling. “The Darling,” he writes, “complaineth sore, but I hope to God she will carry us well to Puttam, and further tediousness I omit. But I wish to God I were well rid of my captainship, or the Darling a sounder vessel to carry me in.” So also that big East Indiaman, the Royal James, during the year 1617 sprang a serious leak, and the way in which this was stopped makes most interesting reading to all lovers of ships. Her commander at that time, Captain Martin Pring, wrote to the Company on the 12th of November of the year mentioned that about a fortnight before the Royal James had reached Swally—the port of Surat—“we had a great leak broke upon us in the James, which in four hours increased six foot water in hold, and after we had freed it and made the pumps suck, it would rise thirteen inches in half-an-hour. It was a great blessing of God that it fell out in such weather, by which means we had the help of all the fleet, otherwise all our company had been tired in a very short time. The 9th, we made many trials with a bonnet stitched with oakum under the bulge of the ship, but it did no good. The 11th, we basted our spritsail with oakum and let it down before the stem of the ship and so brought it aft by degrees: in which action it pleased God so to direct us that we brought the sail right under the place where the oakum was presently sucked into the leak: which stopped it in such sort that the ship made less water the day following than she had done any day before from the time of our departure out of England.”

The device here employed was well known to the old-fashioned sailor, and designated “fothering.” Briefly the idea was as follows. In order to stop the leak a sail was fastened at the four corners and then let down under the ship’s bottom, a quantity of chopped rope-yarns, oakum, cotton, wool—anything in the least serviceable for the job—being also put in. If you were lucky you would find that after the first few attempts the leak would have sucked up some of the oakum or whatever was put into the sail, and so the water would not pour in as badly. This device certainly saved Captain Cook during one of his voyages after his ship had struck a rock and the sea poured in so quickly that the pumps were unable to cope with it. In the description given above by Captain Pring you will notice that he used his spritsail for this purpose. This was a quadrilateral sail set at the end of the bowsprit, but was abolished from East Indiamen and other ships in the early part of the nineteenth century. At first, you will observe, the bonnet—doubtless the bonnet of the mainsail—the use of which we described on an earlier page, was tried and lowered under the “bulge” (or, as we now say, the “bilge”) of the ship. “Stitched with oakum” means that the little tufts of oakum were lightly stitched to the canvas just to keep them in position until the suction of the leak drew them up the hole away from the canvas. When he says he “basted” the spritsail with oakum he means again that the latter was sewn with light stitches. This spritsail was lowered down at the bows till it got below the ship’s forefoot and then brought gradually aft till the position of the leak was reached, and then the oakum was sucked up with the happy result noted. This all reads much simpler than it was in actuality: and you can imagine that it was no easy matter getting this sail into its exact position while the ship was plunging and rolling in a seaway.

Eventually the Royal James got over the bar at Swally, and a consultation was then held aboard her by Captain Pring and a number of other captains as to what had now best be done. One opinion was to careen her so as to get at the leak and caulk it. Another opinion was to “bring her aground for the speedy stopping of her dangerous leak.” But these captains had before their minds the recollection that the Trade’s Increase had been lost whilst being careened, and another ship named the Hector likewise: so they unanimously agreed that the best thing would be to put the Royal James ashore, first taking out of her the merchandise. They were more than a little nervous as to how this big ship would take the ground, so “for a trial” they brought ashore the Francis, an interloping vessel which they had captured. When it was seen that the Francis seemed to take the ground all right and that she lay there three tides without apparent injury “and never complained in any part,” they put the Royal James ashore also. Unluckily this was not with the same amount of success, “for she strained very much about the midship and made her bends to droop: which caused us to haul her off again so soon that we had not time to find the leak. Yet (God be praised) since we came afloat her bends are much righted and she hath remained very tight: God grant she may so long continue.”

When Sir Thomas Roe went out from England in the year 1615 to Surat as English Ambassador to the Great Mogul, he was accompanied by Edward Terry, his chaplain. The latter has left behind an account of his voyage to India, and though we cannot do much more than call attention thereto, we may in passing note that this setting forth shows how much valuable time was wasted in those days waiting for a fair wind. For these seventeenth-century ships had neither the fine lines nor the superiority of rig which was afterwards to make the East Indiamen famous throughout the world. The Company’s seventeenth-century ships were clumsy as to their proportions, they were built according to rule-of-thumb, the stern was unnecessarily high, the bows unnecessarily low. Triangular headsails had not yet been adopted, except by comparatively small fore-and-aft-rigged craft, such as yachts and coasters. The mizen was still of the lateen shape, but all the other sails were quadrilateral, even to the spritsail, which was suspended at the outer end of the bowsprit and below that spar. Above the latter on a small mast was hoisted another small squaresail, and then at the after end of the bowsprit (which was very long and practically a mast) came the foremast, stepped as far forward as it could go.

With this unhandy rig, the bluff-bowed hulls with their clumsy design and heavy tophamper could make little or no progress in a head wind. They were all right for running before the wind, or with the wind on the quarter: but not only could they not point close to the wind, but even when they tried they made a terrible lot of leeway. It was therefore hopeless to try and beat down the English Channel. Most seamen are aware that the prevailing winds over the British Isles are from the south-west, but that often between about February and the end of June, more especially in the earlier part of the year, one can expect north-east or easterly spells. The old East Indiamen therefore availed themselves of this. For a fair wind down Channel was a thing much to be desired, and a long time would be spent in waiting for it. As these awkward ships had to work their tides down the River Thames, then drop anchor for a tide, and take the next ebb down, their progress till they got round the North Foreland was anything but fast.

Of all this Edward Terry’s account gives ample illustration. He was a cleric and no seaman, but he had the sense of observation and recorded what he observed. It was on the 3rd of February 1615 that the squadron, including the flagship Charles—a “New-built goodly ship of a thousand Tuns (in which I sayled) ... fell down from Graves-send into Tilbury Hope.” Here they remained until 8th February, when they weighed anchor, and not till 12th February had they weathered the North Foreland and brought up in the Downs, where they remained for weeks waiting till a fair wind should oblige them. On the 9th of March the longed-for north-easter came, when they immediately got under way and two days later passed the meridian of the Lizard during the night. With the wind in such a quarter these Indiamen would bowl along just as fast as their ill-designed hulls could be forced through the water, making a lot of fuss and beating the waves instead of cutting through them as in the case of the last of the East Indiamen which ever sailed.

By the 19th of May they had passed the Tropic of Capricorn and Terry marvelled at the sight of whales, which were “of an exceeding greatnesse” and “appear like unto great Rocks.” Sharks were seen, and even in those days the inherent delight of the seaman for capturing and killing his deadly enemy was very much in existence. As these cruel fish swam about the Charles the sailors would cast overboard “an iron hook ... fastened to a roap strong like it, bayted with a piece of beefe of five pounds weight.”

THE “SERINGAPATAM,” EAST INDIAMAN, 1,000 TONS.

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The squadron duly arrived in Swally Roads on the 18th of September. Sir Thomas Roe performed his mission to the Great Mogul, and eventually reached England again. So also Edward Terry, after having been for some time in the East India Company’s service, was made rector of Great Greenford, Middlesex, and in the year 1649 we find him one day in September preaching a “sermon of thanksgiving” in the Church of St Andrew’s, Undershaft, before the Committee of these East India Company merchants. The occasion was the return of seven of the Company’s ships which had arrived from the Orient together—“a great and an unexpected mercy” after a “long, and tedious, and hazardous voyage.” Terry’s discourse is typical of the pompous, obsequious period. We can almost see these worthy East India merchants strolling into the church and taking their places by no means unconscious of their self-importance, yet not ashamed to do their duty and give thanks for the safe arrival of ships and their rich cargoes. Many of them, if not all, had never been out of England. Terry had been to India and back: he was therefore no ordinary rector, and he rose to the occasion. He hurls tags of Latin quotations at his hearers and then, after referring to the great riches which they were obtaining from the East, reminds these merchants that there are richer places to be found than both the East Indies and the West, better ports than Surat or even Bantam, and so went on to speak of the land where “nor rust, nor moth, nor fire, nor time can consume,” where the pavement is gold and the walls are of precious stones. And then, after this simple, direct homily, the Committee came out from their pews and went back to their daily pursuits.

If these seventeenth-century men were crude and had lost some of the religious zeal of the pre-Reformation sailors, they still retained as a relic of the Puritan influence a narrow but sincere personal piety. And this comes out in the following prayer which was wont to be used aboard the East Indiaman ships of the late seventeenth century. It is called “A prayer for the Honourable English Company trading to the East Indies, to be used on board their ships,” and bears the imprimatur of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, who append their signatures to the statement that “we do conceive that this prayer may be very proper to be used, for the purpose express’d in the tittle of it.” It has none of the beautiful English of the Middle Ages, for liturgical ability, like stained-glass window painting, was at this time a lost art. But for its simple sincerity, its suggestive deep realisation of the terrors of the sea, its true pathos and its plain religious confidence, it is characteristic of the period and the minds of the men who joined in this prayer:—

“O Almighty and most Merciful Lord God, Thou art the Soveraign Protector of all that Trust in Thee, and the Author of all Spiritual and Temporal Blessings. Let Thy Grace, we most humbly beseech thee, be always Present with thy Servants the English Company Trading to the East Indies. Compass them with thy Favour as with a shield. Prosper them in all their Publick Undertakings, and make them Successful in all their Affairs both by Sea and Land. Grant that they may prove a common Blessing, by the Increase of Honour, Wealth and Power ... by promoting the Holy Religion of our Lord Jesus Christ. Be more especially at this time favourable to us, who are separated from all the world, and have our sole dependance upon thee here in the great waters. Thou shewest they wonders in the Deep, by commanding the Winds and the Seas as thou pleasest, and thou alone canst bring us into the Haven where we would be. To they Power and Mercy therefore we humbly fly for Refuge and Protection from all Dangers of this long and Perilous voyage. Guard us continually with thy good Providence in every place. Preserve our Relations and Friends whom we have left, and at length bring us home to them again in safety and with the desired Success. Grant that every one of us, being always mindful of thy Fatherly Goodness, and Tender Compassion towards us, may glorifie thy Name by a constant Profession of the Christian Faith, and by a Sober, Just and Pious Conversation through the remaining part of our Lives. All this we beg for the sake of our Saviour Jesus Christ, to whom with thee and the Blessed Spirit be ascrib’d all Honour, Praise and Dominion both now and for evermore. Amen.”

CHAPTER X
FREIGHTING THE EAST INDIAMEN

The joint stock arrangement, as distinct from the separate voyages, which had been instituted in 1613 worked very well: and after the Restoration the practice of buying and selling shares became common, the system approximating to that of modern times. The Company’s ships were continuing to bring back much wealth to the shareholders, but again covetous desires had to be appeased. In the year 1649 the Commissioners of the Navy constrained the East India Company to lend them £4000. It was in the year 1654 that Cromwell, by means of his treaty with the Portuguese, obtained the right of English ships to trade with any Portuguese possessions in the East Indies. Now this meant a very handsome additional benefit to the East India Company’s ships. Cromwell was shrewd enough to know what he was about, and accordingly in the following year got his quid pro quo when he succeeded in borrowing £50,000 from the Company, seeing that the latter had gained so much from national successes; and a little later on in the same year obtained from the same source another £10,000 to pay Blake’s seamen, whose wages were in arrears. And this was not the last instance of the Company being fleeced by the State.

In the year 1640 permission had been obtained from the native authorities to build the first of the Company’s forts in India. This became known as Fort St George (Madras), and in the year 1658 the Madras settlement was raised to a presidency. In 1645 the Company had begun to establish factories in Bengal, so the ports for the East Indiamen were now becoming more numerous, and the area from which the cargoes could be obtained was being widely extended. The Portuguese, as we have seen, were now out of the running as regards the East. And as for the repeated collisions which the English had with the Dutch, the three Anglo-Dutch wars which had been long foreseen, as they were destined long to last, had given quite a new complexion to affairs in India, leaving the English East India Company in a position stronger than ever. One of the stipulations had been that the Dutch should indemnify the English merchants and factors in India with regard to the massacre at Amboyna, and the guilty parties therein concerned were to be punished. In 1664 the French East India Company had been formed, and ten years later the foundation of their settlement at Pondicherry was laid.

In the year 1681 the Company had developed their fleet to such an extent that they now owned about thirty-five ships, ranging in size from 775 to 100 tons. In customs alone the Company were paying £60,000 a year, and they were carrying out to India £60,000 or £70,000 worth of lead, tin, cloth and stuffs every year, bringing back raw silk, pepper and other goods of the East. By the year 1683 so profitable were the annual results of the Company’s trading that a £100 share would sell for £500. Before long the size of the ships just mentioned was to increase to 900 and even to 1300 tons, such was the demand for Indian products; and between the years 1682 and 1689 no fewer than sixteen East Indiamen varying in size from 900 to 1300 tons were constructed. All the East Indiamen were well armed, for even in the year 1677, when the Company owned from thirty to thirty-five ships of from 300 to 600 tons apiece, these vessels each mounted from forty to seventy guns.

It will be recollected that Bantam had been the first headquarters or chief factory whither the Company’s ships went for their trade. This continued until 1638, when Surat had developed so much, thanks to the concessions by the Great Mogul, that it replaced Bantam in pre-eminence. The last-mentioned factory, together with Fort St George in Madras, Hooghly in Bengal, and those establishments in Persia were all made subservient to Surat. A far-sighted person could have foreseen that all these scattered strongholds of trade might not improbably develop eventually into something very much more important politically. But it was Sir Josiah Child, the principal manager of the Company’s affairs at home, who was one of the first to project the forming of a territorial Empire in India.

We had reason to mention just now a ship which we described as being an interloper. The reader is well aware that in the first instance the charter granted to the English East India Company by Queen Elizabeth conveyed to them the exclusive privilege of trading to the East. This charter was renewed in the years 1609, 1657, 1661 and subsequently in other years. But such was the jealousy, such the covetousness which were aroused by the Company’s successful voyages that a number of interlopers, quite contrary to the terms of the charter, fitted out expeditions of their own. These were evidently successful, too, especially during the latter part of the reign of Charles II., for the number of these private adventurers increased considerably. The result, of course, was that the Company became exceedingly indignant and had to exert themselves to put an end to the trouble. But this, again, opened up the whole of the question as to whether the Company should continue to enjoy such a fine monopoly. There was a good deal of resentment against India being restricted to a favoured few. However the Government favoured the Company, for it had been found more than useful to the country in times of crisis, so again in the year 1693 it received its fresh charter.

But between the years 1694 and 1698 this Eastern trade practically was thrown open. And then the State happened to require a loan of £2,000,000. This was found by a newly formed company of associated merchants who had been very vigorous in opposing the East India Company’s privilege. And since this new company wanted only eight per cent. (not a high rate for those days) for their loan, they also received a charter. The result was that there were two companies trading to India and each with its own charter. The title of this fresh association was the New East India Company, and presently a kind of third company arose as an offshoot from this second one. All this competition had a most disastrous effect and brought both the old and new companies almost to ruin. Each company hated the other, while the public detested both most heartily. There were only two possibilities open. Either both companies must be wrecked or they must amalgamate. It was wisely decided to choose the latter. They therefore adjusted their differences, and in the year 1708 were amalgamated into one corporation, calling themselves “The United Company of Merchants of England Trading to the East Indies.” The capital was increased to £3,200,000. They were the means of aiding the Government by advancing to the latter £1,200,000 without interest, and the Government in turn agreed to extend the Company’s charter till the year 1726, with three years’ notice of termination. And it was subsequently extended till 1766.

During the last decade of the seventeenth century when hostilities existed between England and France the East India Company laid before the House of Lords an account of the great losses which the former had incurred at sea, owing to the lack of English cruisers. Those were no easy times for the ships bound either to or from the Orient, for, besides possible attacks from French men-of-war, the English Channel and approaches thereto were alive with privateers, to the great detriment of the Anglo-Indian trade. Some idea of the size and strength of the East India Company’s ships about this time may be gathered from the following list of craft which the French captured from them during the year 1694 alone:—

In later years one of the most valuable commodities which India was to produce and send to England in these ships was tea. The first importation by us was in the year 1667. Only a small amount, consisting of 100 lb., was sent, but it was not long before this was greatly exceeded. However, the early years of the eighteenth century were marked by a disappointment in the trade which the Company was doing. Although the latter’s ships were now trading also with China, yet the value of our exports to the East were less than £160,000 a year: and this, let it be remembered, included also military stores for the Company’s settlements in the East and at St Helena. The reason for this slump is easily explained. Every authority will admit that the finest tonic for trade is competition. Monopoly is death to enterprise, while a spirit of rivalry encourages progress. The East India Company was suffering from the decaying, deadening influence of its exclusive privilege and this went on till about the middle of the eighteenth century. The first half of that century is decadent, not merely with regard to India, but most things English. Art was at its lowest, manners were never less sincere, morals were corrupt, politics were little better. It almost seems as if England had lost the fair wind which had carried her through the Tudor times and then become gradually becalmed in the Stuart era till she rolled about with no progress, making only stern-way. And then, after a period of profitless existence, she seems to have picked up another breeze which has sent her along through the successful industrial age, the great wars, the Victorian and Edwardian years of prosperity up till to-day. The end of the eighteenth century is a period quite different from its first portion. And if it was so generally it could scarcely be different in regard to a corporation directed and managed by men of this period.

Just for a moment let us go back to that time when the East India Company decided it were best to close the Deptford yard and obtain their ships ready built. Now as time went on the hiring of ships to the Company for this Eastern trade led to great abuses. Officially the Company did no longer build their ships. But the Company’s directors used to build them privately and then hire them out to the Company, to the great personal gain of the directors. There were few other ships big enough or strong enough. The directors would know how many to build and to what extent prices could be demanded from the Company: and altogether they feathered their nests very nicely. This went on till the year 1708, when the old and new East India companies had become amalgamated. After this year the directors were prohibited by Act of Parliament from supplying ships to the Company.

Instead of the former corrupt arrangement, ships for the East India Company were to be hired in the future by open tender from the commander and two owners. But here again was a difficulty. Inasmuch as a special type of stalwart ship was required for this trade, the supply was small and in the hands of a ring called the Marine Interest. Therefore the Company was just about as badly off as before. And throughout the eighteenth century there was one continued contest between the East India Company and the shipbuilders, who did their level best to fleece the former as it had been fleeced by the State at different dates.

A BARQUE FREE-TRADER IN THE LONDON DOCKS.

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For the East India Company did not literally own their ships, even though they were called East Indiamen, flew the Company’s flag and made their regular voyages. A shipping company to-day buys and owns its own ships, but the East India Company had quite a different method. Up to the time when the old and new companies were amalgamated, in the year 1708, the owners and the Company were unfettered by any legislative provision. They could settle and adjust the points between themselves, and since the directors were part owners you may be sure there was little cause for dispute! But the by-law which came into force after the union of the two companies, prohibiting directors from being concerned in hiring ships to the Company, brought about a rather curious order of things. They were hired for so many voyages at so much a ton, the Company binding itself to freight a stipulated number of tons. These, by the way, were generally less than the official measurement. About the year 1700 the largest East Indiamen were under 500 tons, though their burthen was one-third greater.

Under the new arrangement the ships were to be taken up by the Company and their respective voyages agreed to in a Court of Directors by ballot. No tenders were to be accepted except such as had been made by the commander and two owners of each ship. Furthermore, the sale of the post as captain or any other office was forbidden in the Company’s ships. This latter was an important modification. The actual owner of the ship from whom the vessel was hired was termed the ship’s husband, and the practice had been for him to sell the command of the ship to a captain whom he would select. The expression in this case was to “sell the ship,” and a captain would sometimes pay as much as £8000 or £10,000 for the privilege of the appointment, because this position afforded him unique opportunities of making some handsome profits by the goods he brought home from the East in his ship as his own perquisites. To such an extent did this practice become established that the sale of a command became transferable property of the captain who had bought it. Whenever he died or resigned his heirs or he himself had the undoubted right to dispose of the billet to the highest bidder.

The reason for the abolition of this custom was that it was largely responsible for the high rates of freight which the Company was forced to pay. A compensation was paid to the captains in the service at the time of the abolition, but henceforth money could not buy the command of a ship for a man that was not adequately qualified for the post. Previously commands of ships had been held in some cases by men who possessed no right to such responsible tasks. Captain Eastwick, a master mariner of the eighteenth century, who has happily left behind his autobiography, relates among a number of interesting personal reminiscences that he married the niece of a man who was sole owner of one East Indiaman and part owner of two more of these ships. It was therefore suggested that Eastwick should enter the Honourable Company’s service, and a command was promised as soon as he was qualified. “This was a very tempting offer,” writes the old sailor, “as there was no service equal to it, or more difficult to get into, requiring great interest.”

“It was the practice of the Company in those days to charter ships from their owners; these vessels were especially built for the service, and were generally run for about four voyages, when they were held to be worn out, and their places taken by others built for the purpose. About thirty ships were required for the Company every year,” he states, and then goes on to say that “there was never any written engagement on the part of either the owners or the Company as to the continuance of these charters, but the custom of contract was so well established that both parties mutually relied upon it, and considered themselves bound by ties of honour to observe their implied customary engagements. When, therefore, a ship’s turn arrived to be employed, the owner, as a matter of form, submitted a tender in writing to be engaged, and proposed a particular person as captain, and this tender and proposal were always accepted. Thus the owners of these East Indiamen had everything in their own hands, and the favour of one of them was a fine thing to obtain, leading to appointments of great emolument.”

Some idea of the value of the East Indiaman captain’s appointment may be gathered from what Eastwick remarks under this head. “The captain of an East Indiaman, in addition to his pay and allowances, had the right of free outward freight to the extent of fifty tons, being only debarred from exporting certain articles, such as woollens, metals, and warlike stores. On the homeward voyage he was allotted twenty tons of free freight, each of thirty-two feet; but this tonnage was bound to consist of certain scheduled goods, and duties were payable thereon to the Company. As the rate of freight in those days was about £25 a ton, this privilege was a very valuable one. Of course much depended upon the skill and good management of the individual commander, the risk of the market, his knowledge of its requirements, and his own connections and interest to procure him a good profit. In addition to the free tonnage, he further enjoyed certain advantages in the carrying of passengers, for although the allowance of passage money outward and homeward was arbitrarily fixed by the Company, there being a certain number of passengers assigned to each vessel, and their fares duly determined, ranging from £95 for a subaltern and assistant-surgeon to £235 for a general officer, with from one and a half to three and a half tons of free baggage, exclusive of bedding and furniture for their cabins, yet it was possible for captains, by giving up their own apartments and accommodation, to make very considerable sums for themselves. In short, the gains to a prudent commander averaged from £4000 to £5000 a voyage, sometimes perhaps falling as low as £2000, but at others rising to £10,000 and £12,000. The time occupied from the period of a ship commencing receipt of her outward cargo to her being finally cleared of her homeward one was generally from fourteen to eighteen months, and three or four voyages assured any man a very handsome fortune.”

But though these commands were very expensive to purchase and highly remunerative when obtained, yet like the professional man to-day this high remuneration was preceded by years of bad pay. Before a man could obtain the command of an East Indiaman he must necessarily have made a voyage as fifth or sixth mate, then another voyage as third or fourth mate, and finally a third voyage as first or second mate. Now these junior officers in the Company’s service were quite unable to live on their pay “and it required a private capital of at least five hundred pounds to enable a man to arrive at the position of second mate, which was the lowest station wherein the pay and allowances afforded a maintenance.”

Whenever an Indiaman became worn out, or condemned, another ship was hired to replace her, and was said to be “built upon the bottom” of the first. The member or members of the Marine Interest who had built the first ship claimed the right of building the second, and so it went on. The result was that there arose what were known as “hereditary bottoms.” This went on till the year 1796, when some of the more public-spirited of the directors and shareholders of the East India Company put their heads together and determined to have this system entirely altered. It is indeed most extraordinary that the principle of monopoly seemed to pervade every feature of the Company’s transactions, from the broad, important principle of exclusive trade with the East down to the building of ships and the exclusive privileges of their commanders. In any other line of commerce the rate of freight found its own level, but in the East India Company there was but one bidder, and that also a monopoly. As the voyage was long and difficult and full of dangers, it was natural enough that good commanders should be desired. If an owner had a good captain, the Company were only too pleased to have him.

The passing of a by-law in the year 1773 prevented a ship from being engaged for the Company’s service for more than four voyages at a certain freight, this being calculated on an estimate of the building and the cost of fitting out a vessel with provisions and stores for a certain number of months. In the years 1780 and 1781 differences of opinion arose between the owners of the ships and the Court of Directors of the East India Company as to the rate of freight demanded. Owing to the hostilities with the Dutch, the rates of insurance and fitting out were stated to have caused an additional charge of £10, 14s. a ton. The contest between these two opposing sets of monopolists was always amusing to an outsider. The Company wanted the ships badly, for their very existence depended on their ability to carry cargoes between England and India. On the other hand the owners had built these ships especially for the Company’s service. They represented a great outlay of capital, and they were so big and efficient that there was practically no other trade in which they could be profitably employed. So, after a certain amount of mutual indignation had cooled off, and the usual haggling had proceeded, both parties were wont to come to a compromise and matters went on as before till the next dispute occurred.

Thus, for instance, in the year 1783 the Court of the East India Company’s directors fixed the rate of freight at £32 per ton for a ship of 750 tons. To this the owners replied that it was quite impossible to provide the ships under £35 a ton. The Court then showed their independence. They were resolved not to suffer the intolerable humiliation of being dictated to by these owners, so the Company advertised for tenders. Eventually twenty-eight ships were offered the Company by various private owners in respect of this advertisement. But after the Company’s inspecting officer had carefully examined these vessels he had to report that they were either foreign-built, or weak of structure, or else almost worn out: in any case quite unfitted for the long voyage to India and back. This placed the Company in rather a dilemma, and gave something of a shock to their independent spirit. Meanwhile the owners who had hitherto provided the Company with ships had taken alarm at thus throwing open the tender for competition. They were in serious danger of losing their own monopoly: so they began to climb down and offered the Company the rate of £33 a ton. And inasmuch as the latter required as much as 10,000 tons the two parties agreed on this last-mentioned price, more especially as the ships were known to be sound in every respect, having actually been built under the direction of the Company’s officials.