Page 182 - Early English Adventurers in the Middle East_Neat

182 EARLY ENGLISH ADVENTURERS IN THE EAST

such circumstances as to leave him no alternative but to
comply with the mandate. David Middleton in 1610 had a
like experience when he attempted to trade with Banda,
one of the principal islands of the group.
At last the English Company’s eyes were opened to the
full significance of the claims made by the Dutch. In
their indignation they appealed to the Government through
the Lord Treasurer for redress of their “ notorious in­
juries.” The response came somewhat later in the ap­
pointment of Joint Commissioners by England and Hol­
land to consider the points in dispute. The conference,
which was held in London in 1613, sat for two months
without result and was then dissolved on the understand­
ing that the matters should be reconsidered later.
Meanwhile, another effort was being made to penetrate
the monopolistic wall which the Dutch had raised in the
Moluccas. Jourdain, whose acquaintance the reader has
made in a previous chapter, early in 1613 proceeded from
Bantam to the Moluccas in the Darling. The natives who
had had a taste of the cruel mercies of the Dutch, every­
where he touched received him with enthusiasm, but he
had not been long in the islands before he received from
Steven Coteels, the Dutch Resident at Amboina, a warn­
ing not to trade with the natives in spices, on the ground
that to do so would be to infringe Dutch rights. Later
on this was endorsed in peremptory terms in a letter sent
by Coteel’s superior, the Governor of Amboina.
Jourdain, who was of the true bull-dog type of coinman-
der which the Company’s service seemed to breed, for­
warded a defiant message in reply, asserting that the trade
of the islands was free to all men, stating that he knew of
no contracts with the natives, and declaring that even if