ATTEMPT TO FOUND AN ENGLISH COLONY. 23 
time, two of his captains and seventy -two other 
persons were slain.* 
In 1614, the English attempted to form a 
settlement at the Cape hoping, thereby, to facili- 
tate their efforts for sharing the Eastern com- 
merce with the Dutch. For this pnrpose, they 
landed a few convicts on Eobben Island, in Table 
Bay. These were, however, soon dispersed; some 
of them being killed in an affray with the natives 
on the mainland, while the remainder returned 
to England. 
In 1620, a fleet from Holland entered Table 
Bay, for the purpose of forming a Dutch Colony 
there. This having come to the knowledge of 
Andreas Shilling, and Humphrey Fitzherbert, 
the commanders of two English ships, likewise 
there, they determined to anticipate the Dutch. 
* This incident is thus described: — " On his way to Portugal, 
returning from India, after having doubled the Cape of Good Hope, 
the Viceroy, Francisco d' Almeida, stopped at Saldanha Bay to procure 
a supply of fresh water. The soldiers disputing with the natives, an 
affray ensued. Mello (one of his officers) seeing the venerable old 
man alone in the midst of that inhospitable country, observed to him 
in a sarcastic manner, ' Here I should wish to see by your side one 
of those whom you favoured in India.* Almeida's composed reply 
was. 1 This is not the time to think of that ; think rather how to 
save the Royal standard ; as for me, I am old enough, both in years 
and in sins, to die here, if that be the will of the Lord.' From this 
moment Mello never abandoned either the standard or his general, 
until Almeida fell, pierced by a lance. Thus, the man who had 
trampled over countless thousands of the Asiatics, who had humbled 
their sovereign princes, and annihilated in the seas the power of the 
Egyptian Soldan, perished on an obscure strand, by the hands of a 
few savages." 
