It Is
Possible, As The Spaniards Were Excluded By The Papal Grant In Favour
Of The Portuguese From Trading To The East Indies, That They Might
Endeavour To Elude This Authority By Employing Englishmen In That
Navigation.
However this may have been, _Joam_ or John II.
King of
Portugal, sent two persons on an embassy to Edward king of England, to
renew the ancient league of friendship between the crowns, and to move
him to hinder that fleet from putting to sea. The Portuguese ambassadors
had orders to acquaint the king of England with the title which the king
of Portugal derived from the Pope, to the exclusive sovereignty and
navigation of Guinea, and to demand that Edward should prohibit his
subjects from sending any ships to that country. This was accordingly
done, and the purposes of that intended voyage were frustrated. This is
an authentic testimony of the early attempts of the English, which is
related at length by _Garcia de Resende_, in the life of Joam II. Ch.
33[177]. To this, or some similar circumstance, it may have been owing
that the English desisted so long from sailing to the southwards, and
turned their endeavours to the discovery of a passage to India by some
other way.
[Footnote 176: The French pretend to have traded with Guinea from 1364
till 1413, being 107 years before it was discovered by the
Portuguese. - Astl. I. 138, a.]
[Footnote 177: Cited by Hakluyt, Vol. II. Part 2. p. 2]
"It appears by a memorandum or letter of _Nicholas Thorn_, senior, a
considerable merchant in Bristol, of which Hakluyt gives the
contents[178], that in 1526, and from circumstances for a long time
previous, certain English merchants, among whom were _Nicholas Thorn_
and _Thomas Spacheford_, had frequently traded to the Canary islands. In
that letter or memorandum, notice was given to _Thomas Midnal_ his
factor and _William Ballard_ his servant; residing in St Lucar in
Andalusia, that the Christopher of Cadiz bound for the West Indies, had
taken on board several packs of cloth of different fineness and colours,
together with packthread, soap, and other goods, to be landed at Santa
Cruz in Teneriffe. They are directed to sell these goods, and to send
back returns in Orchil[179], sugar, and kid skins.
[Footnote 178: Id. ib. p. 3.]
[Footnote 179: A species of moss growing on high rocks, much used in
these days in dying. - Astl. I. 138. d.]
"At length, about the middle of the _sixteenth_ century, the English
spirit of trade, meeting with favourable circumstances, began to exert
itself, and to extend its adventures to the south as well as the north.
About the year 1551, Captain Thomas Windham sailed in the ship Lion for
Morocco, whither he carried two Moors of the blood-royal. This was the
first voyage to the western coast of Africa of which we have any
account, and these are all the particulars to be found respecting it;
except that one Thomas Alday, a servant to Sebastian Cabot, in a letter
inserted in Hakluyt's Collection[180], represents himself as the first
promoter of this trade to Barbary, and observes that he would have
performed this voyage himself, with the sole command of the ship and
goods, had it not been that Sir John Lutterel, John Fletcher, Henry
Ostrich, and others with whom he was connected, died of the sweating
sickness, and he himself, after escaping that disease, was seized by a
violent fever, so that Thomas Windham sailed from Portsmouth before he
recovered, by which he lost eighty pounds.
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