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the commerce they carried on in the European seas; but finding it impossible to preserve their trade without the commodities of the East, they resolved to seek them at the original market, as they were deprived of every other.(1)

In consequence of this resolution, the Hollanders fitted out some ships for India; and, after an unsuccessful attempt to find a passage thither through the North Sea, they proceeded by the Cape of Good Hope, under the direction of Cornelius Houtman, a Dutch merchant, who had resided some time at Lisbon, and made himself perfectly acquainted with every thing relative to the object of his voyage. His success, though by no means extraordinary, encouraged the merchants of Amsterdam to form the project of establishing a settlement in the island of Java. Admiral Van Neck, who was sent on that important expedition with eight ships, found the inhabitants of Java prejudiced against his countrymen. They permitted him, however, to trade; and having sent home four vessels laden with spices, and other India commodities, he sailed to the Moluccas, where he met with a more favourable reception. The natives, he learned, had forced the Portuguese to abandon some places, and only waited an opportunity of expelling them from the rest. He entered into a treaty with some of the sovereigns, he established factories in several of the islands, and he returned to Europe with his remaining ships richly laden.(2)

The success of this voyage spread the most extravagant joy over the United Provinces. New associations were daily formed for carrying on the trade to India, and new fleets fitted out from every port of the republic. But the ardour of forming these associations, though terrible to the Portuguese, who never knew when they were in safety, or where they could with certainty annoy the enemy, had almost proved the ruin of the Dutch trade to the East. The rage of purchasing raised the value of commodities in Asia, and the necessity of selling made them bear a low price in Europe. The adventurers were in danger of falling a sacrifice to their own efforts, and to their laudable jealousy and emulation, when the wisdom of government saved them from ruin, by uniting the different societies into one great body, under the name of the East India Company.(3),

This company, which was invested with authority to make peace or war with the Indian princes, to erect forts, choose governors, maintain garrisons, and nominate officers for the conduct of the police and the administration of justice, set out with great advantages. The incredible number of vessels fitted out by the private associations had contributed to make all the branches of eastern commerce perfectly understood, to form many able officers and seamen, and to encourage the most reputable citizens to become members of the new company. Fourteen ships were accordingly fitted out for India, under the command of admiral Warwick, whom the Dutch look upon as the founder of their lucrative commerce and powerful establishments in the East. He erected a factory in the island of Java, and secured it by fortifications: he founded another in the territories of the king of Jahor, and formed alliances with several princes in Bengal. He had frequent engagements with the Portuguese, in which he was generally successful.(4) A furious war ensued between the two nations.

During the course of this war, which lasted for many years, the Dutch were continually sending to India fresh supplies of men and ships, while the Portuguese received no succours from Europe. Spain, it should seem, wished to humble her new subjects, whom she did not think sufficiently submissive, and to perpetuate her authority over them by the ruin of their wealth and power: she neither repaired their fortifications nor renewed their garrisons. Yet the scale remained even for a while, and the success was various on both sides; but the persevering Hollanders, by their unwearied efforts, at length deprived the Portuguese of Ceylon, the Moluccas, and all their valuable pos

(1) ADVERTISEMENT, à la tête de Recueil des Voyages, qui ont servi à l'Establissement, et aux Progres de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales. (2) Ibid.

(3) Voyages de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales. Salengre, Essai d'une Hist. des Prov. Unies. 4) Id. ibid.

VOL. II.-M

sessions in the east, except Goa, at the same time that they acquired the almost exclusive trade of China and Japan.(1) The island of Java, however, where they had erected their first fortifications, and early built the splendid city of Batavia, continued to be, as it is at present, the seat of their principal settlement, and the centre of their power in India.

But these new republicans, flushed with success, were not satisfied with their acquisitions in the east. They turned their eyes also towards the west: they established a colony, to which they gave the name of Nova Belgia, on Hudson river, in North America: they annoyed the trade and plundered the settlements of the Spaniards, in every part of the New World; and they made themselves masters of the important colony of Brazil in South America. But this was not a permanent conquest. When the Portuguese had shaken off the Spanish yoke in Europe, they bore with impatience in America that of the Dutch: they rose against their oppressors; and, after a variety of struggles, obliged them finally to evacuate Brazil, in 1654.(2) Since that era the Portuguese have continued in possession of this rich territory, the principal support of their declining monarchy, and the most valuable European settlement in America.

The English East India company was established as early as the year 1600, and with a fair prospect of success. A fleet of five stout ships was fitted out the year following, under the command of captain James Lancaster; who was favourably received by the king of Achen, and other Indian princes, with whom he formed a commercial treaty, and arrived in the Downs, after a prosperous voyage of near two years. Other voyages were performed with equal advantage. But notwithstanding these temporary encouragements, the English East India company had to struggle with many difficulties, and laboured under essential inconveniences. Their rivals, the Portuguese and Dutch, had harbours of which they were absolute masters; places of strength, which they had built, and secured by garrisons and regular fortifications; whole provinces, of which they had acquired possession either by force or fraud, and over which they exerted an arbitrary sway. Their trade was therefore protected, not only against the violence or caprice of the natives of India, but also against the attempts of new competitors. They had every opportunity of getting a good sale for the commodities they carried out from Europe, and of purchasing those they brought home at a moderate price; whereas the English, who at first acted merely as fair traders, having none of these advantages, were at once exposed to the uncertainty of general mar kets, which were frequently anticipated or over-stocked, to the variable humour of the natives, and to the imperious will of their European rivals, who had the power of excluding them from the principal ports of the East.(3) In order to remedy these inconveniences, the English company saw the necessity of departing from their original principles, and of opposing force by force. But as such an effort was beyond the resources of an infant society, they hoped to receive assistance from government. In this reasonable expectation, however, they were disappointed by the weak and timid policy of James I., who only enlarged their charter; yet by their activity, perseverance, and the judicious choice of their officers and other servants, they not only maintained their trade, but erected forts and established factories in the islands of Java, Poleron, Amboyna, and Banda.(4)

The Dutch were alarmed at these establishments. Having driven the Portuguese from the Spice islands, they never meant to suffer any European nation to settle there; much less a people whose maritime force, government, and character would make them dangerous rivals. They accordingly endeavoured to dispossess the English by every possible means. They began with attempting, by calumnious accusations, to render them odious to the natives of the countries where they had settled. But finding these shameful expedients ineffectual, they had recourse to force; and the Indian Ocean

(1) Salengre, ubi sup.

13) Hist. Gen. des Voyages, tom. ii. Raynal, tom. i.

(2) Hist. Gen. des Voyages, tom. xiv.

(4) Harleian Collect. of Voyages, vol. viis

became a scene of the most bloody engagements between the maritime forces of the two companies.(1)

At length an attempt was made to put a period to those hostilities by one of the most extraordinary treaties recorded in the annals of mankind; and which does little honour to the political sagacity either of the English or Dutch, if the latter, as is alleged, did not mean it as a veil to their future violences. It was agreed, that the Moluccas, Amboyna, and Banda should belong in common to the companies of the two nations; that the English should have one-third, and the Dutch two-thirds of the produce, at a fixed price; that each, in proportion to their interest, should contribute to the defence of those islands; that this treaty should remain in force twenty years, during which the entire trade of India should remain equally free to both nations, neither of them endeavouring to injure the other by separate fortifications, or clandestine treaties with the natives; and that all disputes, which could not be accommodated by the councils of the companies, should be finally settled and determined by the king of Great Britain and the states general of the United Provinces.(2)

The fate of this treaty was such as might have been expected from one party or the other. The avarice of the Dutch prompted them to take advan tage of the confidential security of the English, and to plunder the factories of Lantore and Poleron, after exercising the most atrocious cruelties on the servants of the company. The supineness of the English government encouraged them to act the same tragedy, accompanied with still more horrid circumstances of barbarity, at Amboyna ;(3) where confessions of a pretended conspiracy were extorted, by tortures at which humanity shudders, and which ought never to be forgotten or forgiven by Englishmen.

In consequence of these unexpected violences, for which the feeble and corrupt administration of James I. obtained no reparation, the English East India company were obliged to abandon the Spice islands to the rapacity of the Dutch; and though they were less unfortunate on the coasts of Coromandel and Malabar, the civil wars in which England was involved towards the latter part of the reign of Charles I., and which took off all attention from distant objects, reduced their affairs to a very low condition. Their trade revived during the commonwealth; and Cromwell, on the conclusion of the war with Holland, obtained several stipulations in their favour; but which, from the confusions that ensued, were never executed. On the accession of Charles II. they hoped to recover their consequence in India. But that needy and profligate prince, who is said to have betrayed their interests to the Dutch for a bribe, cruelly extorted loans from them, at the same time that he hurt their trade, by selling licenses to interlopers; and by these means reduced them to the brink of ruin.

The English were more successful in establishing themselves, during this period, in North America and the West Indies. As early as the year 1496, John Cabot, a Venetian mariner, in the service of Henry VII., had discovered the island of Newfoundland, and sailed along the northern shore of the American continent, from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Cape Florida. But no advantage was taken of these discoveries before the middle of the reign of Elizabeth; when the bigotry and ambition of Philip II. roused the indignation of all the Protestant powers, but more especially of England, and incited many bold adventurers to commit hostilities against his subjects in the New World. The most distinguished of these was sir Francis Drake; who, having acquired considerable wealth by his depredations against the Spaniards in the isthmus of Darien, passed with four ships into the South Sea, by the straits of Magellan, took many rich prizes, and returned to England, in 1579, by the Cape of Good Hope.(4) His success awakened the avidity of new adventurers; and the knowledge which was, by these means, acquired of the different parts of the American continent, suggested to the

(1) Harleian Collect. of Voyages, vol. vii.
(4) Hackluyt a Collect. vol. iii.

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celebrated sir Walter Raleigh the idea of a settlement within the limits of those coasts formerly visited by John Cabot.

A company was accordingly formed for that purpose, in consequence of Raleigh's magnificent promises; a patent was obtained from the queen, conformable to their views, and two ships were sent out, commanded by Philip Amidas and Arthur, Barlow in 1584. They came to anchor in the Bay of Roanoke, in the country now known by the name of North Carolina, of which they took formal possession for the crown of England. On their return, they gave so favourable an account of the climate, soil, and temper of the inhabitants, that a colony was established the following year:(1) and Elizabeth, in order to encourage the undertaking, honoured the colony with the name of VIRGINIA, in allusion to her favourite, but much disputed virtue.

This settlement, however, never arrived at any degree of prosperity, and was finally abandoned in 1588. From that time to the year 1606, when two new companies were formed, and a charter granted to each of them by James I., no attempt appears to have been made by the English to settle on the coast of North America. One of the new companies consisted of adventurers residing in the city of London, who were desirous of settling towards the south, or in what is at present called Virginia; and the other, of adventurers belonging to Plymouth, Bristol, and Exeter, who chose_the_country more to the north, or what is now called New-England. The London company immediately fitted out three vessels, under the command of Christopher Newport, an able and experienced mariner, with a hundred and ten adventurers on board, and all manner of implements for building and agriculture, as well as the necessary arms for their defence. After a tedious voyage, and many discontents among the future colonists, their little squadron reached the bay of Chesapeake. One of the adventurers, in the name of the whole, was appointed to treat with the natives, from whom he obtained leave to plant a colony on a convenient spot, about fifty miles from the mouth of the river Powhatan, by the English called James river. Here they erected a slight fort, barricadoed with trunks of trees, and surrounded by a number of little huts, to which they gave the name of Jamestown, in honour of the king.(2) Such was the slender beginning of the colony of Virginia; which, though it had to struggle at first with many difficulties, became, even before the restoration, of very great national consequence.

The rapid prosperity of Virginia was chiefly owing to the culture of tobacco, its staple commodity, and to the number of royalists that took refuge there, in order to escape the tyranny of the parliament. A like cause gave population and prosperity to the neighbouring province of Maryland, whose staple also is tobacco. This territory being granted by Charles I. to Cecilius lord Baltimore, a Roman Catholic nobleman (whose father, sir George Calvert, had sought an asylum in Newfoundland, in order to enjoy the free exercise of his religion), he formed the scheme of a settlement, where he might not only enjoy liberty of conscience himself, but also be enabled to grant it to such of his friends as should prefer an easy banishment with freedom, to the conveniences of England, imbittered as they then were by the sharpness of the laws against sectaries, and the popular odium that hung over papists. The project succeeded: the Roman Catholics flocked to the new settlement in great numbers, especially on the decline of the royal cause; and Maryland soon became a flourishing colony.(3)

New-England owed its rise to similar circumstances. A small body of the most enthusiastic puritans, afterward known by the name of independents, in order to avoid the severity of the English laws against non-conformity, had taken refuge in Holland, soon after the accession of James I. But although Holland is a country of the greatest religious freedom, they did not find themselves better satisfied there than in England. They were tolerated

(1) Smith's Hist. of Virginia.

(3) Douglas's Summary, Part II. sect. xv.

(2) Ibid.

indeed, but watched; their zeal began to have dangerous languors for want of opposition, and, being without power or consequence, they grew tired of the indolent security of their sanctuary. They were desirous of removing to a country where they should see no superior. With this view, they applied to the Plymouth company, for a patent of part of the territory included in their grant, Pleased with this application, the company readily complied; and these pious adventurers, having made the necessary preparations for their voyage, embarked in one ship, in 1620, to the number of a hundred and twenty persons, and landed at a place near Cape Cod, where they founded a settlement, to which they gave the name of New-Plymouth.(1) Other adventurers, of the same complexion, successively followed those ;(2) and NewEngland, in less than fifty years, became a great and populous colony, consisting of several independent governments, which were little inclined to acknowledge the authority of the mother country.

Besides these large colonies in North America, the English had established a colony at Surinam, on the coast of Guiana, in South America, and taken possession of several of the West India islands, early in the seventeenth century. Barbadoes and St. Christopher's were thriving colonies before the conquest of Jamaica; and the rapid cultivation of that large and fertile island, which had been much neglected by the Spaniards, together with the improvement of her other plantations in the West Indies, soon gave England the command of the sugar trade of Europe.(3)

For the benefits of this, however, and of her whole colony trade, England is ultimately indebted to the sagacity of the heads of the commonwealth parliament. They perceived that those subjects, who, from various motives, had taken refuge in America, would be lost to the parent state, if the ships of foreign powers were not excluded from the ports of the plantations. The discussion of that important point, with other political considerations, brought on the famous navigation act, which prohibits all foreign ships, unless under some particular exceptions, from entering the harbours of the English colonies, and obliges their principal produce to be exported directly to coun tries under the dominion of England.

Before this regulation, which was with difficulty submitted to by some of the colonies, and always evaded by the fanatical and factious inhabitants of New-England, the colonists used to send their produce whithersoever they thought it could be disposed of to most advantage, and indiscriminately admitted into their harbours ships of all nations. In consequence of that unlimited freedom, the greater part of their trade fell into the hands of the Dutch, who, by reason of the low interest of money in Holland, and the reasonableness of their port duties, could afford to buy at the dearest, and sell at the cheapest rate; and who seized upon the profits of a variety of productions, which they had neither planted nor gathered. (4) The navigation act remedied this evil; and the English parliament, though aware of the

(1) Douglas. Hutchinson. Winslow, ap. Purchas.

(2) Among the number of persons so disposed, we are told, appeared John Hampden and Oliver Cromwell, who were only prevented from executing their purpose of going into voluntary exile, by a royal proclamation, issued after they were on shipboard, in 1635, prohibiting future emigrations, until a license should be obtained from the privy council. (Neale's History of the Puritans, vol. ii.) The exultation of the puritanical writers on this subject is excessive. They ascribe all the subsequent misfortunes of Charles I., in connexion with the scheme of Providence, to that tyrannical edict, as they are pleased to call it. (Neale, ubi sup. Harris's Life of Oliver Cromwell, &c.) Nor can the speculative politician help indulging a conjecture on the possible consequences of the emigration of two such extraordinary men, with that of others who would have followed them, at such a crisis. Charles I., roused to arms, but not crushed by the parliament, might have established absolute sovereignty in England; while Hampden founded a commonwealth, or Cromwell erected a military despotism, in America. Possessed of a boundless country (for wherever they had gone they must have become leaders), they would never have submitted to the control of any power on this side of the Atlantic. The work of ages would have been accomplished in a few years. Sooner than have borne such control, Hampden would have taken refuge in the woods; have associated with the wild natives, and enrolled them among the number of his citizens. Cromwell, in such emergency, would also have led his fanatical herd into the bosom of the forest: have hunted with the savages; have preached to them; have converted them; and when he had made them Christians, they would have found they were slaves! Though destitute of the talents of a Hampden or a Cromwell, the emigrants to the northern plantations had strongly imbibed the sentiments of political as well as religious independency, which they have ever since continued to cherish.

(3) Account of the European Settlements in America, vol. ii.

(4) Id. ibid.

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