A. D. 1648. 4J.5 



' manded toll on the Wefer, in order to difcourage and obiirud; com- 

 ' merce, efpecially that of this ftate.' 



Spain at this time was become fo feeble in point of naval affairs as te 

 be obliged to hire Dutch veflels for carrying on her American commerce. 



On the other hand (as fortune is feldom favourable every where) the 

 Dutch Weft-India company was this year driven out of Angola in Africa 

 by the Portuguefe. 



1649 — It is faid that the Englifli Ruflia company remained fole 

 maflers of the commerce to Archangel till the death of King Charles 1, 

 when it feems the Dutch, having by that time gained a powerful influ- 

 ence at the Ruffian court, the minifters thereof laid hold of that oppor- 

 tunity, on pretence of revenge againfl: a nation who had murdered their 

 king, to introduce the Dutch into the Archangel trade, upon condition 

 of paying 15 per cent on all imports and exports. Whereby they 

 reaped fuch advantage that the Polifh envoy, in 1689, affirmed they 

 had in that year 200 factors at Archangel. '[^Harris's Coll. of voyages, V. 

 '\\,p. '2''i2)^ This feems to be a more probable ftate of the Ruffian trade 

 than that of the author of the Relation of the eai'i of Carlifle's embafly 

 to Ruffia in the year 1663, who, in his introduftion, infinuates that the 

 czar Alexis Michaelowitz had aboliffied the company's privileges purely 

 out of refentment of the dilloyalty of fome of the members of our com- 

 pany to their late fovereign : for in fad their privileges were aboliffied 

 the year preceding King Charles's death. It is true indeed that this 

 czar had exprelTed great indignation againfl thofe concerned in King 

 Charles's death, and that he had lent his fon King Charles II, while in 

 exile, 40,000 crowTis, (King Charles I having lent this czar's father 

 40,000 dollars, befide forces) which was pundually repaid. But this re- 

 fentment ot the czar was no other than a political pretext, as appears by 

 the earl of Carhflc's embafly : for although his lordffiip remonflrated, 

 that, as the foundation of the good correfpondence between the two 

 nations was laid in the exclufive privileges granted to the Engliffi com- 

 pany, who firfl; eftabliffied the traffic to Archangel, fo the king his 

 mafter earneftly defired their re-efl:abliffiment : yet the czar perfifted in 

 his refufal, even alleging that one Luke Nightingale had been fecretly 

 fent to him by King Charles I, to delire the abolition of thofe privi- 

 leges ; (a mofl improbable thing) to which other frivolous reafons were 

 fuperadded. Kut it feems the true reafon vv-as the Dutch contrad, as 

 above : although it was alleged that the company had carried foreign 

 merchandize through Ruffia without paying any cuftom, which had oc- 

 cafioned a general complaint of the Ruffia merchants, fadors, and tradef- 

 men, that the Englifli engrofled all their trade, and grew vaflly rich, 

 whilfl: the czar's own fubjeds were thereby impoveriffied. It was far- 

 ther ffiamefully alleged, that all the Englifli merchants, to whom the 

 privileges were firfl granted, were dead, and that their privileges expired, 



3I2 



