To Prevent,
Therefore, This Hindrance In Loading Our Ships, I Was Forced To Pay Him
In Hand, As Had Been Done On The Former Occasion, And To Let The Full
Agreement Remain Open Till The Return Of Our General.
[Footnote 126:
This expression, tall ships, so often used in these
early voyages, evidently means square-rigged vessels having top-masts;
as contradistinguished from low-masted vessels, such as sloops and
pinnaces. - E.]
It pleased God to take away the two masters of the two ships which were
now loading, Samuel Spencer, master of the Hector, and Habakkuk Pery, of
the Susan; as also William Smith, master's mate of the Hector, and soon
afterwards Captain Styles, with several other principal men, and many of
their sailors, so that we were forced to hire men to ease them of their
work in loading, and also to engage as many as we could get of Guzerat
and Chinese mariners, to help to navigate the ships home, at a great
expence. With much ado we got them laden by the 16th February; but it
was the 4th of March before we could get ready for sea. They then
sailed, the Hector having on board 63 persons of all sorts, English and
others, but many of their own men were sick. The Susan had 47 of all
sorts, but likewise had many English sick: I pray God to send us good
news of them.
The 6th May a Holland ship came in, which came from the coast of Goa,
[Malabar,] where, along with two other Dutch ships bound for
Cambay,[127] they took four very rich Portuguese ships, one of which,
laden with great horses, they set on fire. This ship had left Holland in
June, 1604, but could give us no farther news than we had already got
from our own ships. The captain of this ship was Cornelius Syverson, a
proud boor, having neither wit, manners, honesty, nor humanity; and
presently after his arrival the Hollanders withdrew their familiarity
from us. I shall now, however, leave this despiser of courtesy and hater
of our nation, with his rascally crew, and give some account of the
ceremonial of the young king's circumcision, and the triumphs held daily
in consequence for more than a month before he went to church, [mosque]
in preparations for which all the better sort had been busied since
February or March, till the 24th of June.
[Footnote 127: Cambay, in this place, probably means Camboja, or
Cambodia, in Eastern India, not Cambay in Guzerat. - E.]
For this ceremonial a great pageant was prepared, the fore part of which
was made in the resemblance of a great devil, on which were placed three
chairs of state; that in the middle for the king, being elevated about
two feet above those on either side, which were for the two sons of
Pangran Goban, heir to the crown if the king should die without issue.
This pageant was placed on a green or open space, in front of the palace
gate, and railed in all round.
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