There Were Certain Places Near Nangasaki Where Several Jesuit
Fathers And Other Christians Were Martyred, In The Reign Of Ogosha
Same, and where their parents and friends had planted evergreen-trees,
and erected altars near each tree, where many hundreds
Went daily to say
their prayers; but now, by command of the emperor, all these trees are
cut down, the altars destroyed, and the ground all levelled, it being
his firm resolution utterly to root out the remembrance of all matters
connected with Christianity.
[Footnote 67: The Dairo was formerly the sovereign of Japan, uniting the
supreme civil and spiritual power, committing the military affairs to a
kind of generalissimo, who usurped supreme authority, and reduced the
Dairo to be a kind of sovereign pontiff or chief-priest. - E.]
In the months of November and December, 1618, there were two comets seen
all over Japan. The first, rising in the east, was like a great fiery
beam, rent to the southwards, and vanished away in about the space of a
month. The other rose also in the east, like a great blazing star, and
went northwards, vanishing quite away within a month near the
constellation of Ursa-Major or Charles-waine. The wizards of Japan have
prognosticated great events to arise from these comets, but hitherto
nothing material has occurred, excepting the deposition of
Frushma-tay, already related.
I am almost ashamed to write you the news which the Spaniards and
Portuguese report, though some of them have shewn me letters affirming
it to be true, of a bloody cross having been seen in the air in England;
and that an English preacher, speaking irreverently of it from the
pulpit, was struck dumb: On which miracle, as they term it the king of
England sent to the pope, to have some cardinals and learned men brought
to England, as intending that all the people of England should become
Roman catholics. I pray you pardon me for writing of such nonsense,
which I do that you may laugh; yet I assure you there are many Spaniards
and Portuguese here who firmly believe it. I know not what more to write
you at this time: But I hope to come to England in the next shipping
that comes here; and I trust in God that I may find your worship in good
health.
RICHARD COCKS.
SECTION XVI.
Ninth Voyage of the East India Company, in 1612, by Captain Edmund
Marlow.[68]
We sailed from the Downs on the 10th February, 1612, in the good ship
James, and crossed the equator on the 11th April.[69] The 27th of that
month, at noon, we were in latitude, by observation, 19 deg. 40' S. and in
longitude, from the Lizard, 11 deg. 24' W. We this day saw an island
fourteen leagues from us in the S.E. which I formerly saw when I sailed
with Sir Edward Michelburne. It is round like Corvo, and rises rugged,
having a small peaked hill at its east end.
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