32 



Annals of the South African 



ID -A/STEW M r -.orysHip 

 svwv N APJVED -.i?-. TEW *:a 



DEWRTfD 6 MARCH: ' J 



ALA, r> ALLE>X l BANISTER 

 OJ-N RpWJAfT (\OB-LITLfR 



FIG. 18. 

 27 cm. x 20 cm. 



D : AUSTEN M K ' OF Y E SHIP SWAN ARRIVED 23 FEBR(UARY) 1632 

 DEPARTED 6 MARCH I ALEX : BANISTER JOHN ROW. E : ROB : LITLER. 



the instructions to the English Commanders to look for or deposit 

 letters, etc., applied to Saldania, but the island may have been 

 considered to have been part of the Bay. 



DUTCH INSCRIPTIONS. 



It is only at the end of the sixteenth century that the Dutch, who 

 were still pressing on strenuously in their search for the North-West 

 Passage to reach India, began to turn their attention to the Cape 

 route, and the " Compagnie van Verre " (Association of Distant 

 Lands) of Amsterdam and Middelburg sent Cornells Houtman from 

 the Texel with four vessels to find the way to the east. Houtman 

 sailed from Texel on April 2, 1595, reached Sumatra in July, 

 1596, and returned to Amsterdam in August, 1597. The new 

 venture was so readily taken up that within six years no less than 

 forty-nine ships were dispatched to India. They included the fleets 

 of C. Houtman in 1595 ; of the same C. Houtman, Jan van Neck, 

 W. van Warwyk, S. de Weert, and 0. van Noort in 1598 ; of 



