ANTIQUITY OF THE LEVANT TRADE 



certaine clothes called Statutes, and others called Cardinal- 

 whites, and Calveskins which were well sold in Sicilie, 

 &c. The commodities which they returned backe were 

 Silks, Chamlets, Rubarbe, Malmesies, Muskadels and 

 other wines, sweete oyles, cotten wooll, Turkie carpets, 

 Galles, Pepper, Cinamom, and some other spices, &c. 

 Besides, the naturall inhabitants of the foresayd places, 

 they had, even in those dayes, traffique with Jewes, 

 Turkes, and other forreiners. Neither did our mer- 

 chants onely employ their owne English shipping before 

 mentioned, but sundry strangers also : as namely, 

 Candiots, Raguseans, Sicilians, Genouezes, Venetian 

 galliasses, Spanish and Portugale ships. All which 

 particulars doe most evidently appeare out of certaine 

 auncient Ligier bookes of the R. W. Sir William 

 Locke Mercer of London, of Sir William Bowyer 

 Alderman of London, of master John Gresham, and of 

 others ; which I Richard Hakluyt have diligently per- 

 used and copied out. And here for authorities sake I 

 doe annexe, as a thing not impertinent to this purpose, 

 a letter of king Henry the eight, unto Don John the 

 third, king of Portugale. 



A letter of the king of England Henry the eight, 

 to John king of Portugale, for a Portingale 

 ship v^ith the goods of John Gresham and 

 Wil. Locke with others, unladen in Portu- 

 gale from Chio. 



Erenissimo Principi, domino Joanni Dei 

 gratia Regi Portugalliae, & Algarbiorum 

 citra & ultra mare in Africa, ac domino 

 Guineas, & conquistae, navigationis, & 

 commercii ^Ethiopiae, Arabiae, Persiae, 

 atque Indiae, &c. Fratri, & amico nostro 

 charissimo. 



Henricus Dei gratia, Rex Angliae & Francias, fidei 

 defensor, ac dominus Hibernias, Serenissimo Principi ; 



63 



A.D. 



