After
This, Mr Canning Wrote That He Was In Fear Of Being Poisoned By The
Jesuits, And Requested To Have Some One Sent Up To His Assistance, Which
Was Accordingly Agreed To By Us At Surat.
But Mr Canning; died on the
29th of May, and Mr Kerridge went up on the 22d of June.
At this time I was to have been sent by the way of Mokha to England; but
the master of the ship said it was impossible, except I were
circumcised, to go so near Mecca. The 13th October, 1613, the ship
returned, and our messenger made prisoner at the bar of Surat by the
Portuguese armed frigates, [grabs] worth an hundred thousand pounds, and
seven hundred persons going to Goa.[97] This is likely to be of great
injury here, for no Portuguese is now permitted to pass either in or out
without a surety; and the Surat merchants are so impoverished, that our
goods are left on our hands, so that we had to send them to Ahmedabad.
John Alkin, who deserted from Sir Henry Middleton to the Portuguese,
came to us at this time, and told us that several of their towns were
besieged by the Decaners, and other neighbouring Moors, so that they
had to send away many hundred Banians and others, that dwelt among them,
owing to want of provisions; and indeed three barks came now with these
people to Surat, and others of them went to Cambaya. Their weak
behaviour in the sea-fight with us was the cause of all this.
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