Gates of forreigne Lords then to tarry the good leisure of their own Magistrates Nor doe they beare so quietly the losse of some parcell confiscated abroad as the greater detriment which they suffer by some prowling Vice Admirall Customer or publique minister at their returne Whether this proceed from the Reverence which men yeild unto their proper Governour I will not here define or whether excesse of trouble in following their causes far from home or whether from despaire of such redresse as may be expected in their owne Country in the hoped reformations of disorders or whether from their more unwillingnesse to disturbe the Domesticall then the forreigne quiet by loud exclamations or whether perhaps their not daring to mutter against the Injustice of their owne Rulers though it were shamefull for feare of faring worse and of being punished for Scandalum Magnatum As slanderers of men in authority wheresoever it comes As there can be but one Allegeance so men are apt to serve no more then they needs must According to that of the Slave in an old Comoedie Non sum servus publicus my Master bought me for himself and I am not every mans man And this opinion there is no Prince unwilling to mainetaine in his owne Subjects Yea such as are most Rigorous to their owne Doe never find it safe to be better unto strangers because it were a matter of dangerous Consequence that the People should thinke all other Nations to be in better case then themselves The breife is Oppression in many places weares the Robes of Justice which Domineering over the naturalls may not spare strangers And strangers will not endure it but cry out unto their owne Lords for releife by the Sword Wherefore the Motive of Revenging Injuries is very strong though it meerly consist in the will of man without any inforcement of nature Yet the more to quicken it there is usually concurrent therewith A hopefull expectation of gaine For of the amends recovered Little or nothing returns to those that had suffered the wrong but commonly all runs into the Princes Coffers Such examples as was that of our late Queen Elizabeth of most famous memory are very rare Her Majestie when the goods of our English Merchants were attached by the Duke of Alva in the Netherlands And by King Philip in Spaine arrested Likewise the goods of the Low dutch here in England that amounted unto a greater value Neither was she contented that her Subjects should right themselves as well as they could upon the Spaniards by Sea But having brought King Philip within foure or five years to better reason though not so far as to Restitution She satisfied her owne Merchants to the full for all their losses out of the Dutchmens goods and gave back to the Duke what was remayning This among many thousand of her Royall Actions that made her glorious in all Nations though it caused even strangers in their speech and writing to extoll her Princely Justice to the skies yet served it not as a President for others of lesse vertue to follow It were more costly to take patterne from those Acts which gave Immortall renowne to that great Queen then to imitate the thirsty dealing of that Spanish Duke in the self same busines who kept all to his owne use or his Masters Restoring to the poore Dutch Merchants not one penny It falls out many times indeed that a Prince is driven to spend far more of his treasure in punishing by War the wrongers of his people Then the losse of his People did amount unto In such cases it is reason that he satisfy himself and let the people whereto commonly they are apt rest contented with the sweetnesse of revenge But when victory makes large amends for all it Royally becomes a Prince to satisfy those for whose satisfaction he undertooke the Warre For besides the purpose it were now to teach how victory should be used or the gaines thereof Communicated to the generall content This being only brought into shew that the profit thereby gotten is a stirring provocation to the redresse of Injuries by the sword As for the redresse of Injuries done unto Princes themselves it may conveniently though not alwayes for it were miserable injustice to deny leave to Princes of mainetaining their owne honour be referred unto the third motive of Arbitrary Warres which is meere Ambition This is and ever hath been that true cause of more Wars then have troubled the world upon all other occasions whatsoever though it least partake of nature or urgent necessity of State I call not here alone by the name of Ambition that vaine glorious humour which openly professeth to be none other and vaunts it selfe as an imperiall vertue for the examples are not many of that kind But where occasion of Warre is greedily sought or being very slight is gladly entertained for that increase of Dominion is hoped thereby we should rather impute the Warre to the scope at which it aimeth then to any idle cause pretended The Romans feared lest they of of Carthage by winning Messana should soone get the mastery over all Sicilie And have a faire entrance at pleasure into Italy Which to prevent they made a Warre upon the Carthaginians this feare I call Ambition Had they not trusted in their own Armes hoping thereby to enlarge their empire but being weaker and more afraid indeed they would have feared lesse For Colour of this Warre they tooke the Mamertines A Crewe of Theeves and cut throats into their protection Whom being their associats they must needs defend But had not their Ambition been mightier then their Justice they would have endeavoured to punish these Mamertines and not to protect them Innumerable are the like examples Know ye not said Ahab that Ramoth Gilead is ours He knew this before and was quiet enough till opinion of his forces made him looke into his right And of this nature though some worse then other in degree are claims of old forgotten tribute or of some acknowledgements due perhaps to the Ancestors of a vanquished King And long after challenged by the Heirs of the Conqueror broken titles to Kingdomes or Provinces Mainetenance of friends and Partizans pretenced wrongs and indeed whatsoever it pleased him to alleadge that thinketh his owne sword sharpest But of old time perhaps before Helen of Greece was borne Women have been the common Argument of these Tragedies As of late Ages in our parts of the world since the names of Guelf and Ghibeline were heard The right of St. Peter that is the Popes Revenews and Authority This last and other of the same kind I know not how patiently they will endure to be ranged among Ambitions quarrels For the Warre that hath such foundation will not only be reputed free from worldly Ambition Just and honourable But holy and meritorious having thereto belonging Pardon of Sins Release from Purgatory And the promises of the life to come As may be seen in the
he imposed the like penance upon England Also when our King Edward the First made Warre upon the Scots word came from Rome that he should surcease for that the Kingdome of Scotland belonged unto the Popes Chappell A great oversight it was of St. Peter that he did not accurse Nero and all heathen Princes whereby the Popes Chappell might have gotten all that the Devill offered and our Saviour refused Yet what need was there of such a banne Since Fryar Vincent of Valnarda could tell Atatalipa King of Peru That all the Kingdomes of the Earth were the Popes who had bestowed more then halfe thereof upon the King of Spaine If the Pope will have it so it must be so otherwise I should have interpreted that place in Genesis Increase and multiply and fill the Earth As spoken to Noah and his Children not as directed only to Tubal Homer and Phatto the supposed Fathers of the old Iberians Gothes and Moores of whom the Spanish blood is compounded But of such impudent presumption in disposing of countryes farre remote And whereto the sword must acquire a better title the mischiefe is not presently discerned It were well if his Holinesse had not loved to set the world in an uproare by nourishing of War among those that respected him as a Common Father His dispensing with oaths taken for agreement between one King and another or between Kings and Subjects doe speake no better of him For by what right was it That Fardinand of Arragon won the Kingdome of Navar why did not the Confederacie that was between Lewis the Twelfth of France and the Venetians hinder that King from warring upon Venice why did not the like between England and France hinder our King Henry the eighth for warring upon the same King Lewis Was it not the Pope who did set on the French to the end that himself might get Ravenna from the Venetians Why was it not the same Pope who afterwards upon desire to drive the French out of Italie excommunicated Lewis and his adherents By vertue of which Excommunication Fardinand of Arragon seized upon Navarr And served not the same Warrant to set our Henry upon the back of France But this was not our Kings fault more then all the peoples We might with shame confesse it if other Countries had not been as blindly superstitious as our Fathers That a Barque of Apples blessed by the Pope and sent hither for presents unto those that would be forward in the War upon France made all our English hasty to take Armes in such sort as the Italians wondred and laughed to see our men no lesse greedy of those Apples then Eve was of the forbidden fruit for which they were to hazard their lives in an unjust War Few ages have wanted such and more grievous examples of the Popes tumultuous disposition but these were amongst the last that fell out before his unholinesse was detected Now for his dispensing betweene Kings and their Subjects we need not seeke instances far from home He absolved our King Iohn of an oath given to his Barons and people The Barons and people he afterwards discharged of their alleageance to King Iohn King Henry the third had appeased this Land how wisely I say not by taking such an oath as his Father had done swearing as he was a Knight A Christian and a King But in a Sermon at Paules People were taught how little was to be reposed on such assurance the Popes dispensation being there openly read which pronounced that Oath voyde Good cause why For that King had the patience to live like neither Knight nor King But as the Popes Tenant and Rent-gatherer of England But when the same King adventured to murmure the Pope could threaten to teach him his duty with a vengeance And make him know what it was to winch and play the Fredericke Thus we see what hath been his Custome to oppresse Kings by their people And the people by their Kings yet this was for serving his owne turne Wherein had our King Henry the sixt offended him which King Pope Iulius would after for a little money have made a Saint Neverthelesse the Popes absolving of Rich Duke of Yorke from that honest oath which he had given by mediation of all the Land to that good King occasioned both the Dukes and the Kings ruine And therewithal those long and cruell Wars betweene the Houses of Lancaster and Yorke and brought all England into an horrible Combustion What he meant by this I know not unlesse to verifie the Proverbe Omnia Romae venalia I will not urge the dispensation whereby the Pope released King Philip the second of Spaine from the solemne Oath by which he was bound to maintaine the priviledges of the Netherlands though this Papall indulgence hath scarce as yet left working And been the cause of so many hundred thousands slaine for this last forty years in the Netherlands Neither will I urge the Pope encouraging of Henry the second and his sons to the last of them against the French Protestants the cause of the first three Civill Warres And lastly of the Leavyings of Byrons in which there hath perished no lesse number then in the Low-Countryes For our Country it affords an example of fresh memory since we should have had as furious Warre as ever both upon us and amongst us in the daies of our late famous Soveraigne Queene Elizabeth if Pope Pius his Bull Could have gored as well as it could Bellow Therefore it were not amisse to answer by a Herald the next Pontificall attempt of like nature rather sending defiance as to an enemy then publishing answers as to one that had here to doe though in deed he had never here to doe by any lawfull power either in Civill or Ecclesiasticall businesse after such time as Brittaine was won from the Romane Empire For howsoever it were ordered in some of the first holy generall Councills that the Bishop of Rome should be Patriarch over these quarters yea or it were supposed that the forged Canons by which he now challengeth more then precedency and primacie had also been made indeed yet could this little help his claime in Kingdomes that hold not of the Empire For those right holy Fathers as in matters of Faith they did not make truth But religiously expounded it so in matters of Ecclesiasticall Government they did not create provinces for themselves But ordered the Countries which they then had They were assemblies of all the Bishops in the Romane world and with the Romane dominion only they medled Requisite it is that the faith which they taught should be imbraced in all Countryes As it ought likewise to be entertained if the same had been in like sort illustrated not by them but by a generall Councill of all Bishops in the great Kingdome of the Abissines which is thought to have been Christian even in those daies But it was not requisite nor is that the Bishops of Abissines or of India
Sir WALTER RAWLEIGHS JUDICIOUS AND Select Essayes AND OBSERVATIONS UPON The first Invention of Shipping Invasive War The Navy Royal and Sea-Service WITH HIS Apologie for his voyage to Guiana Virtus recludens immeritis mori Caelum negatâ tentat iter viâ Hor. LONDON Printed for A. M. and are to be sold by Robert Boulter at the Turks-head in Bishops-gate street near the Great James 1667. To the Reader IT is apparent that nothing do's more Eternize men upon Earth then their Writings The Statues of the Romane Emperours time has moulderd to ashes quandoquidem data sunt ipsis quoque fata Sepulchris and Tombes themselves the Fates obey But Caesars Commentaries the Dictates of Marcus Aurelius the Workes and glories of those Men and Ages we see perpetuated to all posterity It is truly said that Bookes shew in a little time what Experience teacheth not but with the expence of many yeares and how miserable had we been had not the industrious Pens of severall Authors famous in their times buoyd up and left us Traces to follow them in the paths of Vertue In every Generation there wanted not some the flame of whose Torch is yet unextinguished and I may with modesty appeale whether the Century of yeares in which this worthy Author lived may not equall I would have said transcended some Ages that wanted such a Person to transmit it to Posterity as renowned Raleigh was It cannot be accounted either arrogancy or ostentation in Augustus Caesar who dying desired of his friends that stood about his Bed That when he expired they would give him a Plaudite as if he were conscient to himselfe he had plaid his part well upon the Stage Nor will it offend any I am sure to say That this most worthy Heroe truly deserved the Plaudites and Encomiums of the Amphitheaters of the whole Universe T was well observed by him that writ the lives of so many Noble Greekes and Romans They are wise that in Tragicall Events doe carry an invincible heart reasonably obeying Necessity and a more high Providence then that of Man And aswell by another The greatnesse of the mind never sheweth it self more cleerly then amongst the wounds of Fortune How fitly appropriate these sayings are to him let them judge that knew his actions But I come not here to give a Character of our Author that were but to hold a Candle in the Sun or by drawing shadows to hinder the cleare beauty of the Picture Reader thou hast enough of him in his History of the World which speaks him to Fame only thou mayst herein truly lament That Fortune was so bitter to him and us to deprive us of that happinesse in snatching him hence before his perfecting that glorious worke However it may prompt thee to value at a higher rate this his Posthume Production Now it is not unlikely that Custome expects something should be said in Commendation of these following Discourses that would wrong rather then adde to their worth No Raleighs very Name is Proclamation enough for the Stationers advantage who prays thee to believe this to be what the Worke it selfe will assure thee the legitimate issue of so excellent a Father But to keepe thee longer from the thing it self were by deteyning thee in the Porch to envy thee the delight of the Fabrick A Discourse of the invention of Ships Anchors Compasse c. The first Naturall warre the severall use defects and supplies of Shipping the strength and defects of the Sea forces of England France Spaine and Venice Together with the five manifest causes of the suddaine appearing of the Hollanders Written by Sir WALTER RAWLEIGH THat the Ark of Noah was the first Ship because the Invention of God himself although some men have believed yet it is certaine That the world being planted before the Flood the same could not be performed without some transporting vessels It is true the successe proves it That there was not any so capacious nor so strong to defend it self against so violent and so continued a powring down of raine as the Arke Noah the Invention of God himself or of what fashion or fabrick soever the rest withall mankind perished according to the Ordnance of God And probable it is that the Anchors whereof Ovid made mention of found on high Mountains Et inventa est in montibus Anchora Summis were remaining of Ships wrackt at the generall flood After the Flood it is said that Minos who lived two discents before the War of Troy set out Ships to free the Grecians Seas of Pyrats which shews that there had beene either trade or Warre upon the Waters before his time also The expedition of the Argauants was after Minos And so was the plantation of Tyrene in Africa by Battus who was one of Iasons Companions And that the Tyrians had Trade by Sea before the Warre of Troy Homer tells us Others give the first Dominion upon the Waters to Neptune who for the great exploits he did in the service of Saburne was by after ages called the God of the Seas But the Corinthians ascribe the invention of Rowing vessells to a Citizen of their owne called Amaenocles And that the first Navall Warre was made betweene the Samiens and Corcyriens Ithicus History changed into Latine by St. Hierome affirmes that Griphon the Scythian was the inventor of long Boats or Gallies in the Northerne Seas And Strabo gives the advise of the Anchor with two Hookes to the Scythian Anacharsis but the Greeks to Eupolemus It is also said that Icarus invented the saile and others other pieces and parts of the ships and Boats whereof the certaine knowledge is of no great moment This is certaine that the Sons and Nephews of Noah who peopled the Isles of the Gentiles and gave their owne names to many of them had vessells to transport themselves long before the daies of Minos And for my own opinion I doe not thinke that any one Nation the Syrian excepted to whom the knowledge of the Arke came as the story of the creation did soone after Moses did find out at once the device either of ship or Boate in which they durst venture themselves upon the Seas But being forced by necessity to passe over Rivers or Lakes they first bound together certaine Reeds or Canes by which they transported themselves Calamorum falces saith D Siculus admodum ingentes inter se conjungunt Others made Raffes of Wood and other devised the Boate of one tree called the Canoa which the Gaules upon the River of Roan used in assisting the transportation of Hannibals Army in his enterprise of Italie Primum Galli inchoantes cavabant Arbores saith Livie But Polydor Virgil gives the invention of those Canoas to the Germains inhabiting about the River of Danubius which kind of Hollow trees Isidor calls Carabes The Brittains had Boats made of Willow Twigs and covered on the out side with Bullock hydes and so had the Venetians
setting winds West the rest North and South and so by the same termes In all the Divisions of Southeast Northeast Southwest Northwest and the rest And if we compare the marveilous great transportations of people by the Saxons Angles Danes Gothes Swedes Norwegians especially and other And how many Fleets for supplies have been set out by them with the swarmes of Danes aswell in our Seas as when they invaded and conquered Scicilie together with the Colonies planted by the Tyrians in Africa as else where and of the Carthaginians the Sons of the Tyrians in Spaine It s hard to judge which of these Nations have most commanded the Seas though for priority Tribullus and Ovid give it the Tyrians Prima ratam Ventis credere docta Tyros And Ovid Magna minorque fere quarum Regis altera Gratias altera Sydonias uterque sicca rates And it is true that the first good Ships were among the Tyrians and they good and great Ships not long after the Warre of Troy and in Solomons time they were of that account as Solomon invited Hiram King of Tyre to joyne with him in his Journey into the East-Indies for the Israelites till then never traded by Sea and seldome if ever after it and that the Tyrians were the chiefe in that enterprise It appears in that they were called Nautas peritos maris in the Hebrew saith Iunius homines navium And in our English Marriners It is also written in the second of Chronicles the eight That Hiram sent Solomon Ships Et servos peritos maris And servants skilfull of the Sea whereby it is probable that the Tyrians had used the Trade of East-India before the dayes of Solomon or before the Raigne of David when themselves commanded the Ports of the Red Sea But the Edumaeans being beaten by David and the Port of Ezion-Geber now subject to Solomon the Tyrians were forced to make Solomon the cheife of that expedition and to joine with him in the enterprise For the Tyrian had no passe to the Red Sea but through the territory of Solomon and by his sufferance Whosoever were the inventers we find that every age had added somewhat to ships and to all things else And in my owne time the shape of our English ships hath been greatly bettered It is not long since the striking of the Top-mast a wonderfull great ease to great ships both at Sea and Harbour hath been devised together with the Chaine pumpe which takes up twice as much water as the ordinary did we have lately added the Bonnett and the Drabler To the courses we have devised studding Sayles Top gallant Sayles Sprit stayles Top stayles The weighing of Anchors by the Capstone is also new We have fallen into consideration of the length of Cables and by it we resist the malice of the greatest winds that can blow Witnesse our small Milbrooke men of Cornewall that ride it out at Anchor half Seas over betweene England and Ireland all the winter quarter And witnesse the Hollanders that were wont to ride before Dunkirke with the wind at Northwest making a Lee shoare in all weathers For true it is that the length of the Cable is the life of the Ship in all extreamities and the reason is because it makes so many bendings and waves as the Ship riding at that length it is not able to stretch it and nothing breaks that is not stretched In extreamity we carry our Ordnance better then we were wont Because our Netheroverloops are raised commonly from the water to wit betweene the lower part of the Port and the Sea In King Henry the eights time and in this present at Portsmouth the Marie Rose by a little sway of the Ship in casting about her Ports being within sixteene Inches of the waters was overset and lost and in her that worthy Knight Sir George Carew Cozen Germaine to the Lord Carew and with him besides many other Gentlemen the Father of the late renowned Sir Richard Greenevile Wee have also raised our second Decks and given more vent thereby to our Ordnance tying on our Nether-overloope We have added crosse pillars in our Royall ships to strengthen them which be fastned from the Kelson to the beams of the second Decke keepe them from setling or from giving way in all distresses We have given longer Floares to our Ships then in elder times and better bearing under water whereby they never fall into the Sea after the head and shake the whole body nor sinck sterne nor stoope upon a wind by which the breaking loose of our Ordnance or the not use of them with many other discommodities are avoided And to say the truth a miserable shame and dishonour it were for our Shipwrights if they did not exceed all other in the setting up of our Royall Ships the Errors of other Nations being farre more excusable then ours For the Kings of England have for many years been at the charge to build and furnish a Navy of powerfull Ships for their owne defence and for the Wars only Whereas the French the Spaniards the Portugalls and the Hollanders till of late have had no proper Fleete belonging to their Princes or States Only the Venetians for a long time have maintained their Arsenal of Gallyes the Kings of Denmark and Sweden have had good Ships for these last Fifty years I say that the forenamed Kings especially the Spaniards and Portugalls have ships of great bulke but fitter for the Merchant then for the man of Warre for burthen then for Battaile But as Popelinire well observeth the forces of Princes by Sea are Marquess de Grandeux d' Estate Are markes of the greatnesse of an Estate For whosoever commands the Sea Commands the Trade whosoever Commands the Trade of the world Commands the Riches of the world and consequently the world it selfe yet can I not deny but that the Spaniards being afraid of their Indian Fleets have built some few very good ships but he hath no ships in Garrison as his Majestie hath and to say the truth no sure place to keepe them in But in all Invasions he is driven to take up of all Nations which comes into his Ports for Trade The Venetians while they attended their Fleets and imployed themselves in their Easterne Conquest were great and powerfull Princes and Commanded the Maritimate parts of Croatia Dalmatia Albania and Epirus were Lords of Peloponesus and the Islands adjoyning of Cyprus Candia and many other places but after they sought to greaten themselves in Italie it self using strangers for the Commanders of their armies The Turkes by degrees beate them out of all their goodly Countryes and have now confined them Candia excepted to a few small Grecian Islands which with great difficulty they enjoy The first honour they obtained was by making Warre upon the Istrii by Sea and had they been true to their spouse to wit the Seas which once a yeare they marry the Turks had never prevailed against them nor ever
or slaughter the men or utterly disorder any Fleet of crosse sailes with which they encounter I say then if a Vanguard be ordeined of these hoyes who will easily recover the wind of any other ships with a Battaile of 400 other warlike ships and a Reare of thirty of his Majesties ships to sustaine relieve and countenance the rest if God beat them not I know not what strength can be gathered in all Europe to beat them And if it be objected that the States can furnish a farre greater number I answer that his Majesties 40 ships added to 600 before named are of Incomparable greater force then all that Holland and Zeeland can furnish for the Wars As also that a greater number would breed the same confusion that was found in Zerxes Land Army of seaventeene hundred thousand souldiers For there is a certaine proportion both by Sea and Land beyond which the excesse brings nothing but disorders and amazement Of those hoyes Carvills or Crumsters Call them what you will there was a notable experience made in the yeare 1574. in the River of Antwerpe neere Rummerswaell where the Admirall Boysett with his Crumsters overthrew the Spanish Fleet of great Ships Conducted by Iulian Romero So contrary to the expectation of Don Lewis the great Commander and Lieutenant of the Netherlands for the King of Spaine as he came to the bancks of Bergen to behold the slaughter of the Zelanders But contrary to his expectation he beheld his Armado some of them sunck some of them thrust on the shoare and most of the rest mastered and possessed by his enemies Insomuch as his great Captain Romero with great difficulty some say in a skiffe some say by swymming saved himselfe The like successe had Captaine Werst of Zeeland against the Fleet which transported the Duke of Medini Coeli who was sent out of Spaine by Sea to governe the Netherlands in place of the Duke of Alva For with twelve Crumsters or Hoyes of the first troope of 21. sayle he tooke all but three and he forced the second being twelve great ships filled with 2000. souldiers to run under the Ramakins being then in the Spaniards possession But whence comes this dispute Not from the increase of numbers Not because our Neighbours breed more Marriners then we doe Nor from the greatnesse of their Trade in all parts of the world For the French creepe into all corners of America and Africa as they doe and the Spaniards and Portugalls imploy more ships by many fishing trades excepted then the Netherlands doe But it comes from the detestable covetousnesse of such particular persons as have gotten Licences and given way to the transporting of the English Ordnance Fuit haec Sapientia quondam publica privatis secernere Sacra profanis And that in so great abundance as that not only our good friends the Hollanders and Zealanders have furnished themselves and have them lying on their Wharfes to sell to others but all other Nations have had from us not only to furnish their Fleets but to Garnish all their Forts and other places fortifying their Coasts without which the Spanish King durst not have dismounted so many pieces of Brasse in Naples and else where therewith to Arme his great Fleete in 88. But it was directly proved in the Lower House of Parliament Anno of Queene Elizabeth That there were landed in Naples above 140. Culverins English since which time also and not long since It is lamentable that so many have beene transported into Spaine But those that belike then determined it and the transporters have now forsaken the Country and though the procurers remaine I am resolved that they also have forsaken the care of his Majesties Estate And the honour of this Nation I urge not this point as thinking it unfit to furnish his Majesties good friends and Allyes who have had with us one common enemy for many yeares But all politique Estates have well observed this precept Ut sic tractarent amicum tanquam inimicum futurum For what are all the Ships in the world to be valued at other then a company of floating tubs were they not furnished with Ordnance either to offend others or defend themselves If a Ship of a thousand runs had in her a thousand Muskateers and never a great Gun with one Crumster carrying ten or thirteene Culverins she may be beaten to pieces and her men slaughtered Certainly the advantage which the English had by their Bowes and Arrowes in former times was never so great as we might now have had by our Iron Ordnance if we had either kept it within the Land kept it from our enemies or imparted it to our friends moderately For as by the former we obteined many notable victories and made our selves masters of many parts of France so by the latter we might have Commanded the Seas and thereby the Trade of the world it selfe But we have now to our future prejudice and how far to our prejudice I know not forged Hammers and delivered them out of our hands to breake our owne Bones withall For the conclusion of this dispute there are five manifest causes of the upgrowing of the Hollanders and Zelanders 1. The first is the favour and assistance of Queene Elizabeth and the Kings Majesty which the late worthy and famous Prince of Orange did alwayes acknowledge and in the yeare 1582. when I tooke my leave of him at Antwerpe After the returne of the Earle of Leicest into England And Monsieur's arrivall there when he delivered me his Letters to her Majesty He prayed me to say to the Queen from him Sub umbra alarum tuarum protegimur for certainly they had withered in the Bud and sunck in the beginning of their Navigation had not her Majesty assisted them 2. The second cause was The imploying of their owne people in their Trades and Fishings and the entertaining of strangers to serve them in their armies by Land 3. The third is the fidelity of the house of Nassawe and their services done them especially of that Renowned Prince Maurice now living 4. The fourth the withdrawing of the Duke of Parma twice into France while in his absence he recovered those strong places of Zealand and Frizland as Deventer Zuphen c. 5. And the fifth the imbarging and confiscating of their Ships in Spaine which constrained them and gave them courage to Trade by force into the East and West Indies and in Africa in which they imploy 180 Ships and 8700 Marriners The successe of a Counsell so contrary to their wisdome that gave it as all the wit and all the force the Spaniards have will hardly if ever recover the damage thereby received For to repaire that ruine of the Hollanders trade into both Indies the Spaniards did not only labour the truce But the King was content to quit the Sovereigntie of the united Provinces and to acknowledge them for free States neither holding nor depending on the Crowne of Spaine But be their estates
what it will let not them deceive themselves in believing that they can make themselves masters of the Sea For certainly the shipping of England with the great squadron of his Majesties Navy Royall are able in despight of any Prince or State in Europe to Command the great and large Field of the Ocean But as I shall never thinke him a Lover of this Land or of the King that shall perswade his Majesty from imbracing the amity of the States of the united Provinces For his Majesty is no lesse safe by them then they invincible by him So I would wish them Because after my duty to mine owne Soveraigne and the love of my Country I honour them most That they remember and consider it that seeing their passage and Repassage lyes through the Brittish Seas that there is no Port in France from Callice to Flushing that can receive their ships that many times outward by Westerly winds and ordinarily homewards not only from the East Indies but from the Straits and from Spaine all Southerly winds the Brises of our Clymate thrust them of necessity into the Kings ports how much his Majesties favour doth concerne them for if as themselves confesse in their last treaty of Truce with the Spaniards They subsist by their trades the disturbance of their trades which England can only disturbe will also disturbe their subsistance The rest I will omit because I can never doubt either their gratitudes or their wisdomes For our New-castle trade from which I have digressed I refer the Reader to the Author of the trades increase a Gentleman to me unknowne But so far as I can judge he hath many things very considerable in that short treaty of his yea both considerable and praise worthy and among the rest the advise which he hath given for the maintenance of our Hoyes and Carvills of Newcastle which may serve us besides the breeding of Marriners for good ships of Warre and of exceeding advantage and certainly I cannot but admire why the Impositions of five shillings should any way dishearten them seeing there is but one Company in England upon whose trade any new payment are layd But that they on whom it is laid raise profit by it The Silkemen if they pay his Majesty twelve pence upon a yard of Sattin they not only raise that twelve pence but they impose twelve pence or two shillings more upon the subject so doe they upon all they sell of what kind soever as all other Retaylers doe of what quality or profession soever And seeing all the Maritimate provinces of France and Flanders all Holland and Zealand Embden and Breame c. Cannot want our New-castle or our Welsh Coales The Imposition cannot impoverish the transporter but that the buyer must make payment accordingly And if the Impositions laid on these things whereof this Kingdome hath no necessary use as upon Silkes Velvets Gold and Silver Lace and cloaths of Gold and Silver Cut works Cambricks and a world of other trumperyes doth in nothing hinder their vent here But that they are more used then ever they were to the utter impoverishing of the Land in generall and of those Poppinjayes that value themselves by their out sides and by their Players coats Certainly the imposing upon Coales which other Nations cannot want can be no hinderance at all to the Newcastlemen but that they may raise it againe upon the French and other Nations as those Nations themselves doe which fetch them from us with their owne shipping For conclusion of this Chapter I say that it is exceeding lamentable that for any respect in the world seeing the preservation of the State and Monarchie doth surmount all other respects that strangers should be permitted to eat us out by exporting and importing both our owne Commodities and those of Forreigne Nations For it is no wonder we are overtopped in all the trades we have abroad and far off Seeing we have the grasse cut from under our feet in our fields and pastures FINIS A Discourse of the Originall and fundamentall cause of Naturall Customary Arbitrary Voluntary and necessary War with the misery of invasive Warre That Ecclesiasticall Prelates have alwayes been subject to Temporall Princes and that the Pope had never any lawfull power in England either in Civill or Ecclesiasticall businesse after such time as Brittaine was won from the Roman Empire THe ordinary Theme and Argument of History is War which may be defined the exercise of violence under Soveraigne Command against withstanders force Authority and resistance being the essentiall parts thereof violence limited by authority is sufficiently distinguisht from Robbery and the like outrages yet consisting in relation towards others It necessarily requires a supposition of resistance whereby the force of War becomes different from the violence inflicted upon Slaves or yeilding Malefactors as for Armes Discipline and whatsoever else belongeth to the making of War prosperous they are only considerable in degree of perfection since naked savages fighting disorderly with stones by appointment of their Commanders may truly and absolutely be said to War Neverthelesse it is true that as the Beasts are armed with fierce teeth pawes horns and other bodily instruments of much advantage against unweaponed men so hath reason taught man to strengthen his hand with such offensive Armes as no creature else can well avoid or possibly resist And it might seeme happy if the sword the Arrow the Gun with many terrible Engines of death could be wholly imployed in the exercise of that Lordly rule which the Lord of all hath given to mankind over the rest of living things But since in humane reason there hath no meanes been found of holding all mankind at peace within it self It is needfull that against the wit and subtilty of man we oppose not only the bruit force of our bodyes wherein many Beasts exceed us but helping our strength with art and wisdome strive to excell our enemies in those points wherein man is excellent over other Creatures The necessity of War which among humane Actions is the most lawlesse hath some kind of affinity and neere resemblances with the necessity of Law For there were no use at all either of War or of Law If every man had prudence to conceive how much of right were due both to and from himselfe and were withall so punctually just as to performe what he knew requisite and to rest contented with his owne But seeing that no conveyance of Land can be made so strong by any skill of Lawyers with multiplicity of clauses and provisoes That it may be secure from contentious Avarice and the malice of false seeming Justice It is not to bee wondered that the great Charter whereby God bestowed the whole earth upon Adam And confirmed it unto the Sons of Noah being as breife in word as large in effect hath bred much quarrell of interpretation Surely howsoever the Letter of that Donation may be unregarded by the most of men yet the sense
give commonly a willing eare And in this case I think it was that the great Cardinall Francis de Amiens who governed Spaine in the minority of Charls the fift hearing tell that 8000. Spaniards were lost in the enterprise of Algier under Don Diego de Vera made light of the matter Affirming that Spaine stood in need of such evacuation forreigne Warre serving as King Fardinard had been wont to say like a potion of Rubarbe to wash away Choler from the body of the Realme Certainly among all Kingdomes of the earth we shall scarce find any that stands in lesse need then Spaine of having the veines opened by an enemies sword The many Colonies which it sends abroad so well preserving it from swelling humors Yet is not that Country thereby dispeopled but mainteineth still growing upon it like a tree from whose plants to fil a whole Orchard have bin taken as many as it can well nourish And to say what I think if our King Edward the third had prospered in his French Wars and peopled with English the Towns which he won As he began at Calice driving out the French the Kings his Successors holding the same course would by this time have filled all France with our Nation without any notable emptying of this Island The like may be affirmed upon like suspition of the French in Italy or almost of any others as having been verified by the Saxons in England and Arabians in Barbarie What is then become of so huge a multitude as would have over spread a great part of the Continent surely they dyed not of old age nor went out of the world by the ordinary wayes of nature But famine and contagious diseases the sword the halter and a thousand mischiefs have Consumed them Yea many of them perhaps were never borne for they that want means to nourish Children will abstaine from marriage or which is all one they cast away their bodies upon rich old women or otherwise make unequall or unhealthy Matches for gaine or because of poverty they thinke it a blessing which in nature is a curse to have their wives barren Were it not thus Arithmeticall progression might easily demonstrate how fast mankind would increase in multitude overpassing as miraculous though indeed naturall that example of the Israelites who were multiplyed in 215. yeares from seaventie unto 600000. able men Hence we may observe that the very propagation of our kind hath with it a strong insensive even of those daily Wars which afflict the earth And that Princes excusing their drawing the sword by devised pretences of necessity speake often more truly then they are aware there being indeed a great necessity though not apparent as not extending to the generality but resting upon private heads Wherefore other cause of Warre meerly naturall there is none then want of roome upon the earth which pinching a whole nation begets the remedilesse Warre vexing only some number of particulars It draws on the Arbitrary But unto the kindling of Arbitrary Warre there are many other motives The most honest of these is feare of harme and prevention of danger This is just and taught by nature which labours more strongly in removing evill then in pursuite of what is requisite unto her good Neverthelesse because Warre cannot be without mutuall violence It is manifest that allegation of danger and feare servâ—s only to excuse the suffering part the wrong doer being carried by his owne will So the Warre thus caused proceeds from nature not altogether but in part A second motive is Revenge of injury susteined This might be avoided if all men could be honest otherwise not For Princes must give protection to their Subjects and adherents when worthy occasion shall require it else will they be held unworthy and unsufficient then which there can be to them no greater perill Wherefore Caesar in all deliberations where difficulties and dangers threatned on the one side and the opinion that there should be in him Parum Praesidii little safeguard for his friends was doubted on the other side alwayes chose rather to venture uâ—on extreamities then to have it thought that he was a weake protector Yea by such maintenance of their dependants Many Noblemen in all formes of Government and in every mans memory have kept themselves in greatnesse with little help of any other vertue Neither have meere Tyrants been altogether carelesse to mainetaine free from oppression of strangers those Subjects of theirs whom themselves have most basely esteemed and used as no better then slaves For there is no master that can expect good service from his bondslaves if he suffer them to be beaten and daily ill intreated by other men To remedy this it were needfull that Justice should every where bee duly ministred aswell to strangers as to Denizons But contrariewise we find that in many Countreys as Muscovie and the like the Laws or the Administration of them are so far from giving satisfaction as they fill the generall voice with complaint and exclamation Sir Thomas Moore said whether more pleasantly or truely I know not that a trick of Law had no lesse power then the wheele of fortune to lift men up or cast them downe Certainly with more patience men are wont to endure the losses that befell them by meere casualty then the damages which they susteine by means of injustice Because these are accompanied with sense of indignity whereof the other are free when Robbers break open a mans house and spoile it they tell the owner plainly that money they want and money they must have But when a Judge corrupted by reward hatred favour or any other passion takes both house and Land from the rightfull owner And bestowes them upon some friend of his owne or of his favorite He saies that the rules of Justice will have it so that it is the voice of the Law the Ordinance of God himselfe And what else doth he herein then by a kind of Circumlocution tell his humble suppliants that he holds themselves Idiots or base wretches not able to get releife must it not astonish and vex withall any man of a free spirit when he sees none other difference betweene the Judge and the Theefe then in the manner of performing their exploits as if the whole being of Justice consisted in point of formality In such case an honest Subject will either seeke remedy by ordinary courses or awaite his time untill God shall place better men in office and call the oppressors to account But a stranger wil not so he hath nothing to do with the affairs of Barbary neither concerns it him what officer be placed or displaced in Taradante or whether Mulisidian himself can contemne the Kingdome his Ship and goods are unjustly taken from him and therefore he will seeke leave to right himselfe if he can and returne the injury ten fold upon the whole Nation from which he received it Truth it is that men are sooner weary to dance attendance at the
Popes Crociata The truth is that the Saracenes affirme no lesse of the Warres which either they make against Christians or which arise between themselves from difference of Sect. And if every man had his due I thinke the honour of devising first this Doctrine That Religion ought to be inforced upon men by the sword would be found appertaining to Mahomet the false Prophet sure it is that he and the Caliphes following him obteined thereby in a short space a mighty Empire which was in faire way to have inlarged untill they fell out among themselves Not for the Kingdome of Heaven But for Dominion upon Earth And against these did the Popes when their authority grew powerfull in the West incite the Princes of Germany England France and Italie Their chiefe enterprise was the Recovery of the Holy Land In which worthy but extreamely difficult action it is lamentable to Remember what abundance of noble Blood hath been shed with very small benefit unto the Christian State The Recovery of Spaine whereof the better part was then in Bondage of the Saracens had been a worke more availeable to the men of Europe more easily mainetained with supply more aptly serving to advance any following enterprise upon Kingdomes further removed more free from hazard and Requiring lesse expence of Blood But the honourable piety of the undertakers could not be terrified by the face of danger nor diverted from this to a more commodious businesse by any motives of profit or facility for the Pulpits did sound in every Parish Church with the praises of that voyage as if it were a matter otherwise far lesse highly pleasing unto God to beare Armes for defence of his truth against prosecutors or for the Deliverance of poore Christians oppressed with slavery then to fight for that selfe same Land wherein our Blessed Saviour was borne and Dyed By such perswasions a marvellous number were excited to the Conquest of Palestina which with singular vertue they performed though not without exceeding great losse of men and held that Kingdome some few generations But the Climate of Syria the far distance from the strength of Christendome And the neer Neighbourhood of those that were most puissant among the Mahometans caused that famous enterprise after a long continuance of terrible War to be quite abandoned The care of Ierusalem being laid aside it was many times thought needfull to represse the growing power of the Turke by the joint forces of all Christian Kings and Common-wealths And hereto the Popes have used much perswasion and often published their Crociata with pardon of sins to all that would adventure in a worke so Religious Yet have they effected little or nothing and lesse perhaps are ever like to doe For it hath been their Custome so shamefully to misuse the fervent zeale of men to Religious Armes by converting the Monies that have been Leavyed for such Wars to their owne services and by stirring up Christians one against an other yea against their owne naturall Princes under the like pretences of serving God and the Church that finally men waxed weary of their turbulent spirits And would not believe that God was carefull to mainetaine the Pope in his quarrells or that Remission of sins past was to be obteined by Committing more and more grievous at the instigation of his suspected holinesse Questionlesse there was great reason why all discreet Princes should beware of yeilding hasty beliefe to the Robes of Sanctimonie It was the Rule of our Blessed Saviour By their works you shall know them what the works of those that occupied the Papacie have been since the dayes of Pepin and Charlemaine who first enabled them with Temporall donation The Italian writers have testified at large Yet were it needlesse to Cite Machiavell who hath Recorded their doings and is therefore the more hatefull or Guicciardine whose works they have gelded as not enduring to heare all that he hath written though he spake enough in that which remains What History shall we Read excepting the Annales of Caesar Baronius And some books of Fryars or Fryarly Parasites which mentioning their Acts doe not leave witnesse of their ungodly dealing in all quarters How few Kingdomes are there if any wherein by dispensing with others transferring the right of Crowns Absolving Subjects from alleageance and cursing or threatning to curse as long as their curses were regarded they have not wrought unprobable mischiefs The shamelesse denyall hereof by some of their friends And the more shamelesse justification by their flatterers makes it needfull to exemplifie which I had rather forbeare as not loving to deale in such contentious arguments were it not follie to be modest in uttering what is knowne to all the world Pitty it is that by such demeanour they have caused the Church as Hierome Savanarola and before him Robert Grosthead Bishop of Lincolne prophecied to be reformed by the sword But God would have it so How farre the Popes blessing therefore did sanctifie the enterprise upon Ierusalem it rests in every mans discretion to Judge As for the honourable Christians which undertooke that conquest to justifie their Warre they had not only the redresse of injuries and protection of their oppressed Brethren But the repelling of danger from their owne Land threatned by those misbeleivers when they invaded If the Popes extortions which were not more forcible then those of Peters the Hermits added spirit unto the action yet altered they not the grounds of the Warre nor made it the more holy Let the Indulgences of Pope Leo the tenth beare witnesse of this who out of politick feare of the Turkes violence urged a Religious contribution towards a Warre to be made upon them The necessity of that which hee propounded was greater doubtlesse then any that had perswaded the Conquest of Palestina But too foule and manifest was the unholinesse of obtruding upon men Remission of sins for money That the Sums which Pope Leo thereby raised and converted to his owne uses have made his Successers loosers by the bargaine even to this day Pius the Second formerly well knowne by the name of Aeneas Silvius was discernedly reckoned among the few good Popes of latter ages who neverthelesse in a Warre of the same Religious nature discovered the like though not the same imperfection His purpose was to set upon Mahomet the great who had newly won the Empire of Constantinople and by carrying the Warre over into Greece to prevent the danger threatning Italie In this action highly Commendable he intended to hazard his owne person that so the more easily hee might win adventurers who else were like to be lesse forward as not unacquainted with such Romish tricks Yet was not his owne devotion so zealous in pursuit of this holy businesse but that he could stay a while and convert his forces against Malatesti Lord of Rimini letting Scanderbeg waite his Leisure who had already set the Warre on foote in Greece For said he we first subdue the little Turke
of any names except to supply such men as are wanting by death or sicknesse upon good testimonie under the hands of the Master the Boat swayne the Master Gunner the Purser and other Officers of the ship For it neerly concerns them to looke well thereunto having daily use of them Of Arms and Munition IT were a course very Comfortable defensive and honourable that there were for al his Majesties ships a proportion of Swords Targets of proof Moryons and Curatts of proofe allowed and set downe for every ship according to his burthen as a thing both Warlike and used in the King of Spains ships the want whereof as it is a great discouragement to men if they come to any neere fight or landing so would the use thereof be a great annoyance and terrifying to the enemy And herein should his Majesty need to be at no extra-ordinary expence For the abating of the superfluous great pieces in every Ship with their allowance for Powder Match and Shot would supply the cost of this provision in very ample manner Of Captains to serve in his Majesties Ships AT al such times as his Majest ships are imployed in service it were very convenient that such Gentlemen as are his Majesties owne sworne servants should be preferred to the charge of his Majesties Ships Choice being made of men of valour and Capacitie rather then to imploy other mens men And that other of his Majesties servants should be dispersed privately in those services to gaine experience and to make themselves able to take charge By the which means his Majestie should ever have Gentlemen of good accompt his owne servants Captains of his owne Ships instead of pettie Companions and other mens servants who are often imployed being indeed a great indignity to his Majesty to his shipping and to his owne Gentlemen For that in times past it hath been reputed a great grace to any man of the best sort to have the Charge of the Princes ship cōmitted unto him and by this means there would ever be true report made unto the Pr. what proceedings are used in the service which these meaner sort of Captains dare not doe for feare of displeasing the Lords their Masters by whom they are preferred or being of an inferiour quality have no good accesse to the Presence of the Prince whereby to have fit opportunity to make relation accordingly But now forasmuch as I doubt not but that some contrary spirits may or will object this as a sufficient reason to infirme all those points that I have have formerly spoken of and say unto me why should his Majesty and the State bee troubled with this needlesse Charge of keeping and maintaining so great a Navy in such exquisite perfection and readinesse the times being now peaceable and little use of Armes or Ships of Warre either at home or abroad but all safe and secure aswell by the uniting of the two Nations as by the peace which we hold with Spaine and all other Christian Princes To this I answer that this indeed may stand at the first sight for a prettie superficiall argument to bleare our eys and lull us asleep in security and make us negligent and carelesse of those causes from whence the effects of peace grows and by the vertue whereof it must be maintained But we must not flatter and deceive our selves to thinke that this Calme and Concord proceeds either from a setled immutable tranquillity in the world which is full of alterations and various humours or from the good affections of our late enemies who have tasted too many disgraces repulses and losses by our forces and shipping to wish our State so much felicity as a happy and peaceable government if otherwise they had power to hinder it And therefore though the sword be put into the Sheath we must not suffer it there to rust or stick so fast as that we shall not be able to draw it readily when need requires For albeit our enemies have of late years sought peace with us yet yet hath it proceeded out of the former tryall of our forces in times of war and Enmity And therefore we may well say of them as Anneus Pretor of the Latines said of the Roman Ambassadours who seemed curious and carefull to have the League maintained betweene them which the Roman estate was not accustomed to seeke at their neighbours hands and thereupon saith this Anneus unde haec illis tanta modestia nisi ex cognitione virium nostrarum suarum For with the like consideration and respect have our late enemies sought to renew the ancient friendship and peace with us And well we may be assured that if those powerfull means whereby we reduced them to that modesty and curtesie as to seeke us were utterly laid aside and neglected so as we could not againe upon occasion readily assume the use and benefit of them as we have done those proud mastering spirits finding us at such advantage would be more ready and willing to shake us by the ears as enemies then to take us by the hands as friends And therefore far be it from our hearts to trust more to that friendship of strangers that is but dissembled upon policy and necessity then to the strength of our owne forces which hath been experienced with so happy successe I confesse that peace is a great blessing of God and blessed are the Peacemakers and therefore doubtlesse blessed are those means whereby peace is gained and maintained For well we know that God worketh all things here amongst us mediatly by a secondary means The which meanes of our defence and safety being shipping and Sea-Forces are to be esteemed as his guifts and then only availeable and beneficiall when he withall vouchsafeth his grace to use them aright FINIS Sir Walter Rawleigh his Apologie IF ill successe of this Enterprise of mine had bin without Example I should have needed a large discourse and many arguments for my Justification But if the atempts of the greatest Princes of Europe both among themselves and against the great Turk are in all moderne Histories left to every eye to peruse It is not so strange that my selfe being but a private man and drawing after me the chaines and Fetters whereunto I have been thirteen yeares tyed in the Tower being unpardoned and in disgrace with my Soveraigne Lord have by other mens errours failed in the attempt I undertooke For if that Charles the Fifth returned with unexampled losse I will not say dishonour from Algire in Africa If King Sebastian lost himselfe and his Army in Barbary If the invincible Fleet and forces of Spaine in Eighty Eight were beaten home by the Lord Charles Howard Admirall of England If Mr. Strozzi the Count Brizack the Count of Vinnnoso and others with the Fleet of fifty eight sayle and six thousand Souldiers encountered with far lesse numbers could not defend the Terceres Leaving to speake of a world of other attempts furnished by
Kings and Princes If Sir Francis Drake Sir Iohn Hawkins and Sir Thomas Baskervile men for their experience and valour as Eminent as England had any strengthned with divers of her Majesties ships and fild with Souldiers at will could not possesse themselves of the Treasure they sought for which in their view was imbarked in certaine Frigotts at Puerto Rico yet afterward they were repulsed with fifty Negroes upon the Mountains of Vasques Numius or Sierra de Capira in their passage towards Panania If Sir Iohn Norris though not by any fault of his failed in the attempts of Lysbone and returned with the losse by sicknesse and otherwise of eight thousand men What wonder is it but that mine which is the last being followed with a company of Voluntiers who for the most part had neither seen the Sea nor the Warres who some forty Gentlemen excepted had we the very scumme of the World Drunkards Blasphemers and such others as their Fathers Brothers and freinds thought it an exceeding good gaine to be discharged of them with the hazard of some thirty forty or fifty pounds knowing they could not have liv'd a whole yeare so cheape at home I say what wonder is it if I have failed where I could neither be present my selfe nor had any of the Commanders whom I most trusted living or in state to supply my place Now where it was bruted both before my departure out of England and by the most men beleived that I meant nothing lesse then to go to Guiana but that being once at liberty and in mine owne power having made my way with some Forraigne Prince I would turne Pyratt and utterly forsake my Countrey My being at Guiana my returning into England unpardoned and my not takeing the spoile of the Subj of any Christian Prince hath I doubt not detroyed that Opinion But this is not all for it hath been given out by an hypocritticall Theife who was the first Master of my shipp And by an ungratefull Youth which waited upon me in my Cabbin though of honourable worthy Parents and by others That I carryed with me out of England twenty two thousand peices of twenty two shillings the peice and thererefore needed not or cared not to discover any Mine in Guiana nor make any other attempt elsewhere Which Report being carried secretly from one to an other in my ship and so spread through all the ships in the Fleet which staid with me at Trenidado while our Land-Forces were in Guiana had like to have been my utter overthrow in a most miserable fashion For it was consulted when I had taken my Barge and gone a shoare either to discover or otherwise as I often did That my ship should have set saile and left me there where either I must have suffered Famine been eaten with wilde beasts or have fallen into the hands of the Spaniards and been flayed alive as others of the English which came thither but to trade only had formerly been To this Report of Riches I make this Protestation That if it can be prooved either now or hereafter that I had in the world either in my keeping or in my power either directly or indirectly in trust or otherwise above one hundred peices when I departed London of which I had left forty five peices with my wife and fifty five I carried with me I acknowledge my selfe for a Reprobate a Villaine a Traitor to the King and the most unworthy man that doth live or ever hath liv'd upon the earth Now where the Captaines that left me in the Indies and Captaine Baily that ran away from me at Cancerota have to excuse themselves objected for the first That I lingered at Plimouth when I might have gone thence and lost a faire Wind and time of the yeare or to that effect It is strange that men of fashion and Gentlemen should so grosly bely their owne knowledge And that had not I lived nor returnd to have made answer to this Faction yet all that know us in Plimouth and all that we had to deale withall knew the contrary For after I had stayed at the Isle of Wight divers daies the Thunder Commanded by Sir Warram St. Leger by the negligence of her Master was at Lee in the Thames and after I arrived at Plimouth Captaine Pennington was not come then to the Isle of Wight and being arrived there and not able to redeeme his Bread from the Bakers he rode back to LONDON to intreat help from my wife to pay for it who having not so much money to serve his turne she wrote to Mr. Wood of Portsmouth and gave him her word for thirty pounds which shee soone after payd him without which as Pennington himselfe protested to my wife he had not bin able to have gone the journey Sir Iohn Ferne I found there without all hope of being able to proceed having nor men nor mony and in great want of other provision insomuch as I furnished him by my Cozen Herbert with a hundred pounds having supplied himselfe in Wales with a hundred pounds before his coming to Plimouth and procured him a third hundred pound from the worthy and honest Deane of Exeter Doctor Sutcliffe Captaine Whitney whome I also stayed for had a third part of his victualls to provide insomuch as having no mony to help him withall I sold my Plate in Plimouth to supply him Baily I left at the Isle of Wight whose arrivall I also attended here some ten or twelve daies as I remember and what should move Baily only to leave me as he did at the Canaries from whence he might have departed with my love and leave and at his returne to do me all the wrong he could devise I cannot conceive he seemed to me from the begining not to want any thing he only desired of me some Ordnance and some iron-bound Caske and I gave it him I never gave him ill language nor offered him the least unkindnesse to my knowledge It is true that I refused him a French Shallop which he tooke in the Bay of Portingall outward bound and yet after I had bought her of the French and paid fifty Crownes ready mony for her if Baily had then desired her he might have had her But to take any thing from the French or from any other nation I meant it not True it is that as many things succeeded both against Reason and our best endeavours So it is most commonly true that men are the cause of their owne misery as I was of mine when I undertooke my late enterprise without a pardon for all my Company having heard it avowed in England before they went that the Commission I had was granted to a man who was Non Ens in law so hath the want thereof taken from me both Armes and Actions Which gives boldnesse to every petty Companion to spread Rumours to my Defamation and the wounding of my Reputation in all places where I cannot be present to make them Knaves and
so many of my men ere I recovered the Indies The truth is that I came no nerer to Cape de Vert then Bravo which is one hundred and sixty Leagues off But had I taken it in my way falling upon the Coast or any other part of Guiana after the Raines there is as little danger of infection as in any other part of the World as our English that trade in those parts every yeare doe well know There are few places in England or in the world neere great Rivers which run through low grounds or neare Moorish or Marsh grounds but the People inhabiting neare are at some time of the yeare subject to Feavers witnes Woollwich in Kent and all down the Rivers on both sides other Infection there is not found either in the Indies or in Affrica Except it be when the Easterly wind or Breefes are kept off by some High Mountaines from the Vallies wherby the ayre wanting motion doth become exceeding unhealthfull as at Nomber de Dios and elsewhere But as good successe admitts no Examination so the contrary allows of no excuse how reasonable or just soever Sir Francis Drake Mr. Iohn Winter and Iohn Tomas when they past the Streights of Malegan meeting with a storme which drove Winter back which thrust Iohn Thomas upon the Islands to the South where he was cast away and Sir Francis nere a small Island upon which the Spaniards landed their cheins murderers from Baldivia and he found there Phillip an Indian who told him where he was and conducted him to Baldivia wher he took his first prize of Treasure and in that ship he found a Pylot called John Grege who guided him all that Coast in which he possest himselfe of the rest which Pylot because he should not rob him of his Reputation and knowledge in those parts desisting the intreaties and teares of all his Company he set him a shore upon the Island of Altegulors to be by them devoured After which passing by the East-Indies he returned into England and notwithstanding the peace between Us and Spaine he enjoyed the Riches he brought and was never so much as called to accompt for cutting off Douly his head at Porte St. Iulian having neither Marshall Law nor other Commission availeable Mr. Candish having past all the Coasts of Chyle and Peru and not gotten a farthing when he was without hope and ready to shape his course by the East homewards met a ship which came from the Phillippines at Calestorvia a thousand pounds to a Nutshell These two in these two Voyages were the Children of Fortune and much honored But when Sir Francis Drake in his last attempt might have landed at Cruces by the river of Chyagre within eight miles of Panama he notwithstanding set the Troups on land at Nomber de Dios and received the repulse aforesaid he dyed for sorrow The same successe had Candish in his last Passage towards the Streights I say that one and the same end they both had to wit Drake and Candish when Chance had left them to the tryall of their owne Vertues For the rest I leave to all worthy and indifferent men to judge by what neglect or errour of mine the Gold Mine in Guiana which I had formerly discovered was not found and enjoyed for after we had refreshed our selves in Galleana otherwise in the first discovery called Poet Howard where we tarried Captaine Hastins Captaine Pigott and Captaine Snedall and there recovered the most part of our sicke men I did Imbarque sixe Companies of fifty to each Company in five shipps to wit the Encounter Commanded by Captaine Whitney in the Confidence by Captaine Woollastone into two Flyboats of my owne Commanded by Captaine Samuell King and Captaine Robert Smith In a Carvill which Companies had for their Leaders Captaine Charles Parker Captaine North My Sonne Captaine Thornhurst Captaine Penjuglous Lievtenant and Captaine Chudlyes Lievtenant Prideux At the Tryangle Islands I imbarked the companies for Orrenoque between which and Calliana I lay a ground twenty four houres and if it had not been faire weather we had never come off the Coast having not above two Fathome and a halfe of water Eight Leagues off from whence I directed them for the River of Surniama the best part of all that Tract of land between the river Amazones and Orrenoque there I gave them order to trim their Boates and Barges and by the Indians of that place to understand the state of the Spaniards in Orrenoque and whither they had replanted or strengthened themselves upon the entrances or elsewhere and if they found any Indians there to send in the little flyboate or the Carvill into the river of Dissebecke where they should not faile to find Pilots for Orrenoque for with our great ships we durst not aproach the Coast we having been all of us a ground and in danger of leaving our Bands upon the shoules before wee recovered the Tryangle Islands as aforesaid The Biggest Shipp that could Enter the River was the Encounter who might be brought to eleven foote water upon the Bar we could never understand neither by Keymis who was the first of any Nation that had entered the maine mouth of Orrenoque nor by any of the Masters or Marriners of our Fleet which had traded there ten or twelve yeares for Tobaccho For the Chudley when she came nere the Entrance drawing but twelve foote found her selfe in danger and bore up for Trinidado Now whereas some of my friends have been unsatifised why I my selfe had not gone up with the Companies I sent I desire hereby to give them satisfaction that besides my want of health and strength and having not recovered my long and dangerous sicknesse but was againe fallen into a Relapse my ship Stoalde and layd a ground at seaventeene foote water 7 Leagues of the shore so as the Mr. nor any of my company durst adventure to come neare it much lesse to fall between the shoules on the south side of the Rivers side and sands on the North side called Puncto Anegado one of the most dangerous places in all the Indies It was therefore resolved by us all that the five greater ships should ride at Puncto Gallo in Trinidado and the five lesser should enter the River For if Whitney and Woollaston at eleven foote lay a ground three daies in passing up in what case had I been which drew seaventeene foote a heavier ship and charged with forty pieces of Ordnance besides this impossibility neither would my Sonn nor the rest of the Captaines and Gentlemen have adventured themselves the River having but one moneths Victualls and being thrust together a hundred of them in a smale Flyboate had not I assured them that I would stay for them at Trinidado and that no Force should drive me thence except I were suncke in the Sea or set on Fire by the Spanish Gallions for that they would have adventured themselves upon any other mans word or resolution it
come to us and now I purpose God willing without delay to visit the Myne which is not eight miles from the towne sooner I could not goe by reason of the murmurings the discords and vexations wherewith the Serjeant Major is perpetually tormented and tyred having no man to assist him but my selfe only things are now in some reasonable order and so soone as I have made tryall of the Myne I will seeke to come to your Lordship by the way of the River To goe and to search the Channels that if it be possible our Ships may shorten their course for Trinidado when time serves by those passages I have sent your Lordship a parcell of scattered papers I reserve a Carte Loade one roule of Tobacco one Tortoyse and some Oranges and Limmons praying God to give you strength and health of body and a mind armed against all extreamities I rest ever to be commanded this 8. of January 1617. Your Lordships KEYMIS Now it seemes that the death of my Son fearing also as he told me when he came to Trinidado that I was either dead of my first sicknesse or that the news of my Sonnes death would have hastened my end made him resolve not to open the Myne to the which he added for excuse and I thinke it was true that the Spaniards being gone off in a whole body lay in the Woods betweene the Myne and their passage that it was impossible except they had bin beaten out of the Country to passe up the Woody and Craggy Hills without the losse of those Commanders which should have lead them who had they been slaine the rest would easily enough have bin cut in pieces in their retreate for being in possession of the towne which they guarded with the greatest part of three Companies they had yet their handfull to defend themselves from fireing and the daily and nightly Alarums wherewith they were vexed He also gave forth the excuse that it was impossible to lodge any Companies at the Myne for want of Victuall which from the towne they were not able to carry up the mountaine their Companies being divided He therefore as he told me thought it a greater error to discover it to the Spaniards themselves neither being able to worke it nor possesse it then to excuse himselfe to the Company said that he could not find it all which his fancies when I received and before divers of the Gentlemen disavowed his ignorance for I told him That a blind man might find it by the marks which himself had set down under his hand and that I told him that his care of loosing so many men in passing through the Woods was but fained for after my Sonne was slaine I knew that he had no care at all of any man surviving and therefore had he brought to the King but one hundred weight of the oare though with the losse of one hundred men He had given his Majesty satisfaction preserved my reputation and given our Nation encouragement to have returned this next yeare with greater force and to have held the Country for his Majesty to whom it belonged and of which himselfe had given the testimony that besides the excellent ayre pleasantnesse healthfulnesse and riches it hath plenty of Corne Fruits Fish Fowle wild and tame Beeves Horses Sheepe Hogs Deeres Coneys Hares Tortoyses Armadiles Wanaes Oyles Hony Wax Potatoes Suger Canes Medicaments Balsamum Simples Gums and what not but seeing he had followed his owne advice and not mine I should be forced to leave him arguments with the which if he could satisfy his Majesty and the State I should be glad of it though for my part he must excuse me to justify it that he if it had pleased him though with some losse of men might have gone dâ—â—ectly to the place with that he seemed greatly discontent and so he continued divers dayes afterward he came to me in my Cabbin and shewed me a Letter which he had written to the Earl of Arundell to whom he excused himself for not discovering of the Myne using the same arguments and many others which he had done before and prayed me to allow of his Apology but I told him that he had undone me by his obstinacy and that I would not favour or collour in any sort his former folly He then asked me whether that were my resolution I answered that it was he then replyed in these words I know not then Sir what course to take and went out of my Cabbin into his own in which he was no sooner entred but I heard a Pistoll goe off I sent up not suspecting any such thing as the killing of himselfe to know who shot a Pistoll Keymis himself made answer lying on his Bed that he had shot it off because it had been long charged with which I was satisfied some half houre after this the Boy going into his Cabbin found him dead having a long knife thrust under his left pap through his heart and his Pistoll lying by him with which it appeared that he had shot himselfe but the Bullet lighting upon a rib had but broken the rib and went no further Now he that knew Keymis did also know that he was of that obstinate resolution and a man so far from caring to please or satisfie any man but my selfe as no mans opinion from the greatest to the least could have perswaded him to have laid violent hands on himselfe neither would he have done it when he did it could he have said unto me that he was ignorant of the Place and knew no such Myne for what cause had I then to to have rejected his excuses or to have laid his obstinacy to his charge thus much I have added because there are some Puppies which have given it out that Keymis slew himselfe because he had seduced so many Gentlemen and others with an imaginary Myne but as his Letter to me the 8. of Ianuary proves that he was then resolved to open it and to take off all these kinds of objections Let Captaine Charls Parker Captaine George Ralegh and Captaine King all living and in England be put to their oaths whether or no Keymis did not confesse to them comming down the River at a place where they cast anker that he could from that place have gone to the Myne in two hours I say then that if the opening of the Myne had bin at that time to any purpose or had they had had any victualls left then to bring them away or had they not been hastned by seeing the King of Spaines Letters before they came to my hands which I am assured Keymis had seene who delivered them to me whereof one of them was dated at Madrill the 17 of March before I left the River of Thames and with it three other dispatches with a Commission for the strengthning of Orrenoque with 150 Souldiers which should have come downe the River from the new Kingdome of Granada and one other 150 from Puerto Rico with
the Governours to the King of Spaine of the eighth of Iuly he not only complaineth that the Guianians are in Armes against him but that ever those Indians which under their noses live doe in despight of all the Kings edicts trade with Los Flamnicos Engleses enemicos With the Flemish and English enemies never once naming the English Nations but with the Epitheton of an enemy But in truth the Spanish Ambassadour hath complained against me to no other end then to prevent my complaints against the Spaniards Who landing my men in a territory appertaining to the Crowne of England they were invaded and slaine before any violence offered to the Spaniards and I hope that the Ambassadour doth not esteeme us for so wretched and miserable a people as to offer our throats to their swords without any manner of resistance howsoever I have said it already and I will say it againe that if Guiana be not his Majesties the working of a Myne there and the taking of a towne there had been equally perillous for by doing the one I had rob'd the King of Spaine and bin a thiefe and by the other a disturber or breaker of the peace A Letter of Sir WALTER RAWLEIGH to my Lord Carevv touching Guiana BEcause I know not whether I shall live to come before the Lords I have for his Majesties satisfaction here set downe as much as I can say either for mine owne defence or against my selfe as things are now construed It is true that though I acquainted his Majesty with my intent to Land in Guiana yet I never made it knowne to his Majesty that the Spaniards had any footing there neither had I any authority by Patent to remove them from thence and therefore his Majesty had no interest in the attempt of Saint Thome by any foreknowledge in his Majesty But knowing his Majesties title to the Country to be best and most Christian because the naturall Lords did most willingly acknowledge Queene Elizabeth to be their Soveraigne who by me promised to defend them from the Spanish cruelty I made no doubt but I might enter the Land by force seeing the Spaniards had no other title but force the Popes donation excepted considering also that they had got a possession there divers yeares since my possession for the Crowne of England for were not Guiana his Majesties then might I aswell have bin questioned for a thiefe for taking the Gold out of the King of Spains Mynes as the Spaniards doe now call me a peace breaker for from any territory that belongs to the King of Spaine it is no more lawfull to take Gold then lawfull for the Spaniards to take Tinne out of Cornewall were this possession of theirs a sufficient Bar to his Majesties Right the Kings of Spain may as well call themselves Dukes of Brittaine because they held Blewet and fortified there and Kings of Ireland because they possessed Smereck and fortified there and so in other places That his Majesty was well resolved of his right there I make no kind of doubt because the English both under Master Charls Leigh and Master Harecourt had leave to plant and inhabite the Country The Orrenoque it selfe had long ere this had 5000. English in it I assure my selfe had not my employment at Cales the next yeare after my returne from Guiana and after that our journy to the Islands hindered me for those two years after with Tirones Rebellion made her Majesty unwilling that any great number of Ships or men should be taken out of England till that rebellion were ended and lastly her Majesties death my long imprisonment gave time to the Spaniards to set up a towne of sticks covered with leaves of trees upon the banke of Orronoque which they call St. Thome but they have neither reconciled nor Conquered any of the Cassiques or naturall Lords of the Country which Cassiques are still in armes against them as by the Governours Letter to the King of Spaine may appeare That by landing in Guiana there can be any breach of peace I thinke it under favour impossible for to breake peace where there is no peace it cannot be that the Spaniards give us no peace there it doth appeare by the Kings Letters to the Governour that they should put to death all those Spaniards and Indians that trade Con los Engleses Enemigos with English enemies yea those very Spaniards which we encountred at St. Thome did of late years murther six and thirty of Master Hales men of London and mine who landed without weapon upon the Spaniards faith to trade with them Master Thorne also in Tower-street in London besides many other English were in like sort murthered in Orrenoque the yeare before my deliverie out of the Tower Now if this kind of trade be peaceable there is then a peaceable trade in the Indies betweene us and the Spaniards but if this be cruell Warre and hatred and no peace then there is no peace broken by our attempt Againe how doth it stand with the greatnesse of the King of Spaine first to call us enemies when he did hope to cut us in pieces and then having failed to call us peace breakers for to be an enemy and a peace breaker in one and the same action is impossible But the King of Spaine in his Letters to the Governour of Guiana dated at Madrill the 29 of March before we left the Thames calls us Engleses enemigos English enemies If it had pleased the King of Spaine to have written to his Majest in seaven months time for we were so long in preparing and have made his Majesty know that our landing in Guiana would draw after it a breach of peace I presume to thinke that his Majesty would have staied our enterprise for the present This he might have done with lesse charge then to leavy three hundred souldiers and transport ten pieces of Ordnance from Portarico which souldiers added to the Garrison of St. Thome had they arrived before our comming had overthrowne all our raw companies and there would have followed no complaints For the maine point of landing neer St. Thome it is true that we were of opinion that we must have driven the Spaniards out of the towne before we could passe the thick woods upon the mountaines of the Myne which I confesse I did first resolve upon but better bethinking my selfe I reserved the taking of the towne to the goodnesse of the Myne which if they found to be so rich as it might perswade the leaving of the Garrison then to drive the Spaniards thence but to have burnt was never my intent neither could they give me any reason why they did it upon their returne I examined the Serjeant-Major and Keymis why they followed not my last directions for the triall of the Myne before the taking of the towne and they answered me that although they durst hardly goe to the Myne leaving a Garrison of Spaniards between them and their Boats yet
in vassallage unto themselves Now this could not satisfie the ambition of that See which gloried falsly to be the only See Apostolique For as the Reputation of the Romane Prelats grew up in those blind ages under the Westerne Emperours much faster then true piety could raise it in former times when better Learning had flourished So grew up in them withall a desire of amplifying their power that they might be as great in temporall forces as mens opinion have formed them in spirituall matters Immediately therefore upon the death of Charlemaine they began to neglect the Emperours consent in their Elections And finding in them that afterwards reigned of the house of France either too much patience or too much weakenesse they were bold within seaventy years to decree That in the Creation of Popes the Emperour should have nothing at all to doe Having obteined this It followed that they should make themselves Lord over the whole Clergie in all Kingdomes But the worke was great and could not be accomplished in hast for they were much disturbed at home by the People of Rome who seeing about Fifty Popes or rather as mainetainers of the Papacie would now have them called Monsters to succeed one another and attaine by the faction of Cut-throats and Strumpets St. Peters Chaire despised that hypocrisy which the world abroad did Reverence as holinesse Likewise the Empire falling from the line of Charles to the mighty house of Saxonie was so strongly upheld by the first Princes of that race as it greatly curbed the ambition of those aspiring Prelats Yet no impediment could alwaies be of force to withstand the violence of seeming sanctity The Polonians Hungarians and some other farre removed Nations had yeilded themselves in subjection more then meerely spirituall even to those Popes whom Italie knew to be detestable men As for the Romane Citizens they were chastised by the sword and taught to acknowledge the Pope their Lord though they knew not by what right Long it was indeed ere they could with much adoe be throughly tamed Because they knowing the Lewdnesse of their Prelate and his Court their devotion unto him the trade by which now they live was very small Because also they were the Popes domesticall forces against which no Prince doth happily contend But finally the Popes Armes prevailed or when his owne were too weake the Emperours and other friends were helping Contrariwise against Emperours and other Princes the sword of the people even of their owne Subjects hath been used by teaching all Christians in our Westerne world a false Lesson That it is lawfull and meritorious to rebell against Kings excommunicated and deposed by the Pope This curse was first laid upon the Emperour Henry the fourth by Pope Hildebrand or Gregory the seaventh It is true as I said before that Leo of Constantinople had felt the same though not in the same sort For Leo being excommunicated was not withall deposed only he suffered a revolt of some Italian Subjects And one may say That the Germane Empire deserved this plague Since the founder thereof had given countenance to the Popes Rebelling against their Soveraigns the Emperours of Constantinople Howsoever it were when Hildebrand had accursed and cast downe from his throne Henry the fourth there were none so hardy as to defend their Injured Lord against the Counterfeited name of St. Peter Wherefore he was faine to humble himselfe before Hildebrand upon whom he waited three daies beare footed in the Winter ere he could be admitted into his presence Neither yet could he otherwise get absolution then by submitting his estate unto the Popes good pleasure what was his fault He had refused to yeild up to the Pope the investiture of Bishops and Collation of Ecclesiasticall dignities within his dominions a right that had alwayes belonged to Princes untill that day It were superfluous to tell how grievously he was afflicted all his life after Notwithstanding this submission In breife the unappeasable rage of Hildebrand and his Successors never left persecuting him by raising one Rebellion after an other yea his owne Children against him till dispoyled of his Crowne he was faine to beg food of the Bishop of Spyers promising to earne it in a Church of his own building by doing there a Clarks duty for he could serve the Quire And not obteining this he pined away and dyed That Bishop of Spyers dealt herein perhaps rather fearfully then cruelly For he had to terrifie him the example of Vteilo Archhishop of Mentz chiefe Prelate among the Germans Who was condemned of heresie for having denyed that the Emperour might be deprived of his Crowne by the Popes authority If Princes therefore be carefull to exclude the doctrine of Hildebrand out of their dominions who can blame them of rigour This example of Henry though it would not be forgotten might have been omitted had it not been seconded with many of the same nature But this was neither one Popes fault nor one Princes destiny He must write a story of the Empire that means to tell of all their dealings in this kind As how they wrought upon Henry the fifth whom they had set up against his Father what horrible effusion of Blood they caused by their often thundering upon Fredericke And how they rested not untill they had made the Empire stand headlesse about seaventeene years These things moved Rodolph Earl of Habspurgh who was chosen Emperour after that long vacation to refuse the Ceremony of being Crowned at Rome though he were therero urged by the Electors For said he our Caesars have gone to Rome As the foolish Beasts in Aesops Fables went to the Lyons Den leaving very goodly footsteps of their journey thitherward but not the like of their returne The same opinion have most of the succeeding Emperours held all of them or almost all neglecting that Coronation Good cause why Since the Popes besides many Extortions which they practised about that Ceremony Arrogated thence unto themselves that the Empire was held of them in Homage And dealt they not after the same fashion with other Kingdomes What right had St. Peter to the Crowne of Sicily and of Naples The Romane Princes wonne those Lands from the Saracens who had formerly taken them from the Empire of Constantinople The same Romanes had also been mighty defenders of the Papacy in many dangers yet when time served the Pope tooke upon him as Lord Paramount of those Countryes to drive out one King and set up another with a Bloody confusion of all Italie retaining the Soveraignty to himself In France he had the daring to pronounce himselfe superiour unto the King in all matters both Spirituall and Temporall The Crowne of Poland he forced to hold of his Miter by imposing a subjection in way of penance For that the Polish King had caused one St. Stanislaus to be slaine For the death of St. Thomas Beckett and more strangely for a Refusall of an Archbishop of Canterbury whom his Holinesse had appointed