Page 20 - History of Portuguese in the Gulf_Neat

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xxxii INTRODUCTION.
advises that the homeward-bound ships should carry as
much water as possible so as to obviate calling at St.
Helena, and orders that if they were obliged to call at
some port it should be at Angola j1 while the captains were
to be instructed to rendezvous at Corvo, in the Azores,
where a fleet would be waiting to escort them to Lisbon.
The only Portuguese documents that I have found, how­
ever, undoubtedly referring to Lancaster’s voyage are the
two following. The first is a royal letter, written more
than two years later, and, in fact, just at the time that
Lancaster’s troubles were coming to a culmination off the
coast of North America. The letter2 runs :—
Friend Viceroy. I, the King, send you all greeting. Luis
Fernandes Duarte,3 who is at the court of the King Xariffe,
wrote to me that in Marrocos was an English merchant'1 of credit
in those parts who spoke of the affairs of that State like one who
has some experience thereof although he has not been there, and
that to the effect that in Samatra and Pegu, which are places
remote from that State and in which I have no fortresses, are to
be established factories, and that commerce is to be carried on
with the inhabitants thereof; and that for this purpose he is
endeavouring to obtain authentic instruments from the said
Xarille, to the effect that the English are capital enemies of the
Spaniards and great friends of the Moors, and that wherever
they find them they treat them like companions, and that any
Moors they find captives they ransom and convey to the ports of
Berberiaand give them their liberty: in order with these credentials
to go to England and put into execution this voyage which he
designs to make beyond the Cape of Good Hope and not to
Mozambique; for which purpose he has made a ruttier of which
1 A similar letter of March 15th, 1593 (in Archivo Portuguez-
Onen/al, fasc. iii, pp. 389-390), orders the ships to call at the watering-
place of Saldanha (i.e., Table Bay).
" Printed in Archivo Portuguez-Oriental, fasc. iii, pp. 400-401.
3 This may possibly be the same man as the unnamed “Spaniard
who has been living in Morocco for many years, not as a foreigner,
but as a well-known subject of the King,” the capture of whose richly-
laden vessel by English ships is reported in a letter of March 20th,
1603, from the Venetian Secretary in England to the Doge and Senate
{Calendar of State Papers, Venice, vol. ix, 1592-1603, p. 555).
4 I cannot identify this man.
C1 1
INTRODUCTION. xxx iii /f
the said Luis Fernandes sent me a copy.1 And because this l
matter is of the importance that you have been advised of, ■ it
although in what this Englishman intends there are many
f
difficulties in the way of his being able to carry it into effect, yet H
it is to be believed that in so far as is possible the English will
, attempt everything from which they will gain some profit even if
though it be in remote parts, because of their lack of commerce
If
there, I thought that I ought at once to advise you by land," as
also I commanded to be done by the fleet of the coming year, in it
order that you may observe great vigilance in this particular,
I
taking all necessary precautions in the places mentioned and in
any others that you consider needful, and providing in every way if-
so that by no means may these English set foot on land ;3 keep­ I
ing the kings of those parts in the friendship that they have with I
that State, and in the case of those that have it not you shall $
arrange that this good office shall be performed towards them by
the nearest king who is friendly to that State. IS
. . Written in Lisbon the 6th of August, 1593.
!
It is also proper that you should know that through the same
Englishman it was understood, that it may be a little over two
years ago there left England for those parts Captain Timbertoe,4
regarding whom they had advice by land of his having arrived
there, and that he had captured two galleons.6 You will there­ i
fore well see how important it is to intervene ; and you shall i
advise me of everything. .
1 This ruttier may possibly be still in existence among the archives
at Madrid.
5 According to a note in Archivo Portuguez-Oriental, fasc. iii, p. 400,
“ On the margin of the paper is this statement in contemporary
writing : ‘Copy of what was written in cypher by land.’” Whether the
original reached India does not appear.
3 Cf. the statement in a letter from Seville, quoted by Hunter,
History of British India, vol. i, p. 234.
•i Orig., “0 capitao P6 de pdo.” This seems to have been a nick-
name acquired by Lancaster during his service as a soldier in Portugal;
but the reason for it is not evident.
6 The Venetian Ambassador in Spain, writing to the Doge and
Senate from Madrid on August 30th, 1593, says “ News has come
from Lisbon that two ships of the East India fiect have arrived, and
that they only saved themselves from the attack of four English
corsairs with the greatest difficulty. These English ships followed
them up for a long while. They report that in the China seas an X
Englishman seized a ship with a cargo worth upwards of a million ;
and that as there is no word of the two ships of last year it is thought i
certain that they are either sunk or captured by the English” {Calendar
of State Papers, Venice, vol. ix, 1592-1603). Sec also infra, p. lxi. 6
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