A. D. i6oi. 219 



VI) The fource of our Eail -India trade was the fee ret malice of feme 

 againft the Turkey company. 



' Anfwer. If the Eaft-Tndia trade proves beneficial, it ought to be 

 * purfued without regarding private grudges ; and men would not ven- 

 ' ture fuch great ftocks in it, if they did not think it fo *.' 



To thefe obje6tions, fays Sir William Monion, the anfwers are in the 

 mainjuft, after twenty-five years experience ; f but he adds, that the 

 bane of that trade in his time was, their having triple the number of 

 eight or nine (liips at firfl propofed for this trade, thereby over-cloyed ; 

 whereby alfo the prices of Eaft-India merchandize were enhanced there. 

 And moreover, it drew mighty flocks of money to maintain it, where- 

 by all the kingdom imputed the fcarcity of money to it. 



Werdenhagen obferves [F". ii, p. 19] that till the beginning of the 

 feventeenth century the merchants of Hamburgh, and fome others of 

 the Hanfe towns, made regular annual voyages up the Mediterranean 

 fea, as far as Venice, to their great profit ; but now thofe of Amfter- 

 dam getting into that trade, fo completely vv^ormed the Hanfeatics out 

 of it, that at length the Hamburghers had no other trade left to them 

 with Venice, but to fell their large fhips there, and return home over- 

 land. This author farther fays, that they formerly traded alfo to Flo- 

 rence, Genoa, and Meflina, for filk, in exchange for their corn ; and 

 the fhips of Lubeck, Wiimar, and Straelfund, then alfo ufed to fre- 

 quent the ports of Spain, till fupplanted therein alfo by the more dex- 

 terous Hollanders. 



Wl:ieeler, the advocate and fccretary of the merchant-adventurers 

 company of England, and the great antagonifi: of the Hanfeatics, who 

 wrote in this year, pleafes himfelf not a little, that the latter were then 

 fo much decayed in power and flrength, as that the flate need not 

 greatly to fear them ; for as the caufes, which made the Hanfe towns of 

 eftimation and account in old times, were the multitude of their fhip- 

 ping and fea-trade, whereby they ftored all countries with their eaflern 

 commodities (naval flores, fJax, hemp, linen, iron, copper, corn, &c.) 



* With refpefl: to thefe anfwers to the objec- largely in that fpice, as it ever will probably be in 



tions againft an Ead-India trade, we may biicfly moll general demand all over the world by all ranics 



note, that the anfwer to the firil is in our days and conditions of people. Yet it is coiifefled, that 



flrongly coiifnmtd ; for the le-exportaticn of Eall- the afftrrtion m the anfwer to the fixth objedion is 



India goodi brings back a much greater balance far from being conchifive with refpeft to the ge- 



from toreign nations than all the bullion we fend neral benefit, lince there may be branches of com- 



to India. And with relation to the fifth, the niercc very beneficial to the mercliant, which may 



Dutch company having foon after got pofftfllon be, at the fame time, pernicious to the public, 



of the coaft of Ceylon, in which alone the bed As the trade from England to Eaft- India is be- 



cmnamon is produced, and the iile of Ambovna come of fo great importance to the public, and 



being the bell for cloves, and the Molucco iflcs employs fo vaft a capital, we fliall throughout the 



ifor nutmegs and" mace, the Englifh company ha^c remaining part of our woik take fpecial cognizance 



long fince been excluded from thofe fpices at the of all debates and reafonings for and againil it, and 



ftrd hand ; only pepper abounding in fo many dif- of all the material alterations and changes in it. 



fcient parts of India, our company muft ever deal \ He wrote his Naval trails in 1625. 



2. E e 3 



