54 Tlie West India Company and the Walloons. 



June, 1623, the corporation of the West India Company was possessed 

 of a monopoly of trade and commerce that seems almost past belief. 

 For the States General of the United Netherlands had by this charter 

 specially enacted "that for the term of four and twenty years none of 

 the natives or inhabitants of these countries (that is, the United Neth- 

 erlands) shall be permitted to sail to or from the said lands (that is, the 

 West Indies and Africa and places hereafter prescribed) or to traffic 

 on the coast of Africa from the Tropic of Cancer to the Cape of Good 

 Hope, nor in the countries of America or the West Indies, beginning at 

 the fourth end of Terra Neva, by the Straits of Magellan, La Maire, or 

 any other straits and passages situated thereabouts to the Strait of 

 Anian, as well on the North sea as the South sea, nor on any islands 

 situated on the one side or the other or between both ; nor in the 

 western or southern countries reaching, lying and between both 

 the meridians, from the Cape of Good Hope in the east, to the east 

 end of New Guinea in the west inclusive, but in the name of this 

 United Company of these United Netherlands."* 



And if the provisions of this charter were violated by any of the 

 people of the New Netherlands — if any of the inhabitants presumed 

 to enter into trade with any of these countries without the consent of 

 this company — their ships and their goods were forfeited and became 

 the property of the company upon being actually seized by them; and 

 if taken to other countries and sold by their owners, the company was 

 permitted to fine the owners an amount equal to the value of the ship 

 and the goods. These certainly were extraordinary privileges, and ex- 

 traordinary powers were needed to make them effectual; it would have 

 been but of small avail, to invest a company with the control of the 

 trade of half the world, and withhold from them the authority to carry 

 out their stupendous schemes. And these powers were granted as 

 lavishly as the privileges had been bestowed. They granted them ex- 

 ecutive, legislative, judicial, military and naval powers, besides prom- 

 ising to defend them against every person who might seek to engage 

 in trade and traffic; and agreeing to assist them with a million of 

 guilders in five years. They gave them the power to make treaties 

 with the princes and natives of the countries before mentioned; to 

 make alliances both offensive and defensive ; to build forts, for the 

 garrisoning of which the States General were to furnish troops who were 

 to swear to obey the commands of the company; to appoint and dis- 

 charge governors and officers of justice and other public officers; and 

 to seek to colonize all the countries over which the charter extended, 

 ♦O'Callaghan's History, vol. I, appendix A, page 399. 



