Discourse
written by Thomas Clayborne, who seems to have sailed in the Ascension;
and, besides describing what particularly relates to the trip to Banda,
gives some general account of the whole voyage. In the Pilgrims of
Purchas, these narratives are transposed, the former being given in vol.
I. p. 703, and the latter in vol. I. p. 185. "But should have come in
due place before, being the second voyage of the company, if we had then
had it: But better late than never." Such is the excuse of Purchas for
misplacement, and we have therefore here placed the two relations in
their proper order, in separate subdivisions of the section. The first
indeed is a very bald and inconclusive article, and gives hardly any
information respecting the object and success of the voyage to the
Moluccas.
[Footnote 152: Purch. Pilgr. I.185, and I. 703. Astl. I.279, and I.
281.]
Sec. 1. Voyage of the General, Henry Middleton, afterward Sir Henry, to
Bantam and the Moluccas, in 1604.[153]
Being furnished with all necessaries, and having taken leave of the
company, we set sail from Gravesend on the 25th March, 1604, and arrived
about the 20th December, after various accidents, in the road of Bantam,
with our crews very weak and sickly.
