Page 26 - History of Portuguese in the Gulf_Neat

1
xliv INTRODUCTION.
others, and to send by it a letter to the Emperor of China.1
The three ships—the Bear, the Beat’s Whelp, and the
Benjamin,—under the command of Captain Benjamin
1 See Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, East Indies, etc.,
1513-1616, p. 9S ; The Voyage of Robert Dudley, etc. (Hakluyt Soc.),
pp. xx, xxvii, S, and notes ; and Hakluyt, vol. iii, pp. S52-S54, where
the letter (in Latin) is printed, with an English translation. The only
existing details of the fitting out of this expedition are the meagre
ones prefixed by Hakluyt to the Queen’s letter, as follows: “The
letters of the Queenes most excellent Maiestie sent in the yere 1596
unto the great Emperor of China by M. Richard Allot [read Allen]
and M. Thomas Bromefield marchants of the citie of London, who
were embarqued in a fleet of 3 ships, to wit, The Beare, The Beares
Whelp, and the Beniamin; set forth principally at the charges of the
honourable knight Sir Robert Duddeley, and committed vnto the
command and conduct of M. Beniamin Wood, a man of approued
skill in nauigation : who, together with his ships and company
(because we haue heard no certaine newes of them since the moneth
of February next after their departure) we do suppose, may be arriued
vpon some port of the coast of China, and may there be stayed by the
said Emperour, or perhaps may haue some treacherie wrought against
them by the Portugales of Macao, or the Spaniards of the PhilippitiasP
As the Queen’s letter is dated July nth, 1596, the ships must have
sailed after that date ; and it appears from Hakluyt’s statement that
news of them reached England in February, 1597. This is confirmed
by Thomas Masham, who, in his account of the third voyage set forth
by Sir Walter Raleigh to Guiana in 1596, says : “The 28 of Januarie
[1597] wee made the furthermost part of Barbaric; and this morning
we met with M. Beniamin Wood with his fleete of 3 sailes bound for
the straights of Magellan and China, to wit, The Beare, The Whelpc,
and the Beniamin: who told us that there was no good to be done in
the river DoroP Masham then relates how the five English ships
kept together to Cape Blanco, where they found two French ships in
a bay, in which they stayed and refreshed. From Cape Blanco the
English and French ships set out “to take the Isle of Togo, if God
would giue us leaue.” On February 8th, they came to the island of
Sal, in the Canaries, where the French admiral and the caravel stayed
behind, the other ships (five English and two French) leaving on the
10th for Mayo, but the Frenchmen deserting them in the night. Next
day the five English ships anchored on the south of Mayo, where they
found six Flemish ships lading salt. “Here,” says Masham, “ended
our determination concerning the invading of Fogo. And here wee
left the rtie-boat of Dartmouth lading sake, and the China-ftccie to
refresh themselucs with goates, who as I haue heard since had at the
village . . . great store of dryed goates which they carried along with
them : which were like to bee a great helpe vnto them in their long
voyage. So vpon Saturday the 12 of Februarie at night wee set saile
and stood for the coast of Wiana, which wee were bound for’’
(Hakluyt, vol. iii, pp. 692-693). The river Doro mentioned by Masham
is evidently the Rio Oro, on the coast of north-west Africa, just north
of the Tropic of Cancer ; and it would seem as if Wood’s ships had
been there before falling in with the other two Englishmen. It will be
■
INTRODUCTION. xlv
Wood, left England in the latter half of 159^; and
apparently one of them was lost off the coast of South
Africa ; for when we first hear of the fleet from Portuguese *
sources only two ships arc mentioned, The earliest r
certain reference occurs in the annual letter of the Chamber
i':
of Goa to the King, written in December, 1597, in which H
the writers say:—1
The Count Viceroy wintered in Mombaga.2 He .arrived at this f
city on the 22nd of May last in rowing vessels. . . . He found K
everything necessary for war in a state of decay, and with little
i>
remedy; he strove with all speed to remedy everything, ordering
the repair of galleys that time had put into disrepair, and then in
the winter he ordered to be made in the north many light rowing h
vessels, and many crews of sailors for them, which were lacking; u
and having advice on the 20th of August from the captain of
Mozambique that in July there passed within sight of the said
fortress two English ships, the Count, in respect to this, with great
speed prepared a large fleet of two galleons, one of which lie
purchased for sixteen thousand five hundred parddos, two royal di
galleys, and nine foists, which he bought because of there being
none of your Majesty’s in the dockyard3 that could be made use
of; going down to the dockyard, dining, supping, and sleeping ; >'
there; the whole of this fleet well supplied with munitions and ir­
is r
artillery, the greater part of which he ordered to be made, because :
noticed that Masham speaks of Wood’s ships as “bound for the
straights of Magellan.” If they ever intended to go to China by that
route they must have abandoned the idea after Masham parted from •t.
them, as will be seen by the Portuguese accounts of their doings, r
which I have translated. The Venetian ambassador in Spain, writing !
from Madrid to the Doge and Senate on January 8th, 1597, says:
“ News from Lisbon that two English ships have sacked Pineda, the !
principal emporium of the Congo. This causes still greater anxiety
to the Portuguese, when they see that the enemy not only infests the
shores of Spain and Portugal, but appears in distant regions where
the navigation is very difficult” (Calendar of Slate Papers, Venice,
vol. ix, 1592-1603, p. 251). This can hardly, however, have reference l
to Capt. Wood’s ships, nor can I find any confirmation of the reported r
sack of Mpinda by English ships (of. Strange Adventures of Andrew
Bat tell, pp. 13, n., 165). For later tidings of Wood’s vessels received
in England through Lisbon, see footnote infra, p. li.
1 Archivo Portugucs-Oriental, fasc. i, Pt. 1, pp. 50-51.
2 See supra, p. xl and note. ■
3 Orig., ribcira—river, river-bank ; but I have here, and in the : ;■
extract from Couto below, translated it “dockyard,” which better i!
conveys the sense . For a description of the ribeira at Goa, see
Pyrard, vol. ii, p. 45-
:
i