enjoying the protection of a Crowned Head and of a Monarch for whom the Dutch Company doth protest they have the utmost Veneration be elevated above a Company who can boast of a Protection only of a Republick yet their said Company cannot make such ill use of their quality as to oppress and trample on the Company of Holland in that manner as will be so far from pleasing his Majesty that it will doubtless bring upon them his Royal Indignation As to the Answer of the Lords the States General to the Memorial of Sir John Chardin since that instead of producing the same it hath pleased the English Deputies to refer themselves only thereunto The subscribed will also refer to the same being assured that your Honours will not find there what is alledged by the English Deputies but on the contrary will see what the Subscribed have said thereof in their Answer So that there needs only the pains of reading of it to be undeceived As to what the Subscribed said in their Answer That it was a very strange thing that the English Company who had only their Residence and Factory at Bantam should now pretend to the City and Fort of Bantam The English do by their third Paper say That the Factory and Fort built with their Money were worth all the rest of the Buildings on that place As if the price and value of their Factory and the Money which they may have lent the King which is not believed no more than the value of their Factory which was only an old building could give them any right of Propriety and Lordship over the City and Fort of Bantam which is contrary to all Laws Natural and Civil which the English Gentlemen being also well aware of They add that they do not ground their pretensions thereupon but do say that the Old King of Bantam was a Lawful King and his Son only Conditional and at the will of his Father This is a new method of acting and a strange way of proceeding after the Subscribed have given themselves the pains to prove in their Answer by solemn and authentick proofs that the Old Sultan of Bantam did assign over his Kingdom to his eldest Son without reserving to himself any thing even not so much as Tartiassa the place of his retreat And that his Son having by vertue of this Assignment ascended the Throne did send his Embassadors every where and that he was acknowledged as a Lawful King not only by the Deceased King of Great Brittain of Glorious Memory but also by those of the English Company Now they come and say that the Young King was only a Conditional King and at the will of His Father without refuting the proofs of the Dutch Company and without proving such condition and dependance as is now alledged The inveighing against the Young King of Bantam is a mark of animosity as to which the Subscribed having already declared their sentiment in their Answer they will forbear to make any further mention thereof at present As to the question of cui bono the Subscribed having endeavoured in vain to cause the English Deputies to apprehend the force of their Argument They do not see cui bono and to what ends they should break their heads any further about it since it is evident by their triplique or third Paper that they apprehend no more of it than if the Subscribed had proposed Riddles to them As to what follows about the pretended Cruelties of the Hollanders their sanguinary humour and of the mild temper of the English It is a sign of animosity and self-love which seldom hearkens to Reason As to what is so much insisted on that the Subscribed should propose as to the exclusive Contracts that the Dutch Company could sufficiently prove in time and place what they have so often alledged and do still alledge as to the right of the said Contracts this is without any reason or ground and certainly if it were their business to prove that Right now the Subscribed would make it appear that there is nothing better grounded the same being all duly explained and limited The Subscribed will finish this their fourth Paper adding only that Mounsieur Van Dam is in no wise satisfied with the proceedings of the English Gentlemen as to his particular and that he could have wished as he mentions in his last Letters that instead of putting his name in the triplique or third Paper in so odious a manner they would have produced the Letter therein mentioned by which it would have appeared that all that Mr. Van Dam wrote about the conduct of the Governour Spellman in the affairs of Bantam was grounded only upon a supposition of things which he had heard and time having discovered them to be false it would not be at all generous to alledge or insist on such a Letter at present Dated at Westminster 3 Decemb. 1685. Signed G. Hooft Iacob Van Hoorne S. V. Blocquery A. Paets The next day being the 4th of December the Lords Commissioners Decisors made some Propositions verbally to the English Deputies to be considered of which Sir Josia Child c. desired their Lordships they might have in writing which was accordingly given them under Mr. Francis Gwyns hand their Lordships Secretary in the following words December the 4th 1685. At the Lord Treasurers Lodgings Present Lord Treasurer Lord Privy Seal Earl Sunderland Earl Middleton It was proposed by their Lordships to Sir Josia Child and the rest of the East-India Company to be considered of First That the Dutch should withdraw their Forces from Bantam and demolish the Fort and leave all things there in the same condition they were before the War between the Father and the Son And that it shall be Lawful for the English to build a Fort without interruption from the Dutch. Secondly That there shall be an agreement that for the future there shall be no Treaty made with the Natives to exclude either Nation from Trading to the places they now Trade in Signed Francis Gwyn The said Proposals were duely considered by the Committee of the East-India Company who made the following Answer unto them the 9th of the said December To the Right Honourable the Lord High Treasure of England Lord Privy Seal the Earl of Sunderland and the Earl of Middleton Lords Commissioners appointed by the Kings most Excellent Majesty for determining the differences between the English and Dutch East-India Companies according to the Treaty of 1674-75 May it Please your Lordships THe Court of Committees for the East-India Company have this day seriously considered the two Propositions made to us by your Lordships the fourth instant at my Lord Treasurers Lodgings And as to the first it is our humble opinion that the Dutch have no sincere meaning that we should live in security at Bantam in Neighbourly Peace and Friendship with them unless they do consent to deliver the Fort undemolished First Because since they do agree to withdraw
after some expostulation with them their Lordships required them to re-consider of their former answer which they did very seriously and with a faithful regard to their bounden duty to His Majesty and the trust reposed in them by the Adventurers made the following address To the Right Honourable the Lord High Chancellor of England The Lord High Treasurer of England the Earl of Sunderland and the Earl of Middleton Lords Commissioners appointed by the Kings Most Excellent Majesty for determining the differences between the English and Dutch East-India-Companies according to the Treaty of 1674-75 May it please Your Lordships IN Obedience to your Lordships Commands on Wednesday last We have seriously re-considered our last Paper presented to your Lordships and humbly craving your Lordships pardon for any Error or Offence in the words thereof we think we should fail of our Duty to His Majesty and your Lordships if we should not adhere to the substance of that Paper it being our unfeigned and unanimous opinion that it is more for the Honour and Interest of His Majesty and of His Kingdoms in general That the Treaty of 1674-75 should remain as it is than that any new agreement should be made concerning Bantam except the Fort there be delivered undermolished in part of the Companies great dammages And although in our former Papers presented to your Lordships for the Dutch Deputies view We have given reasons to justifie our demands of the Fort undemolished which we did not at first ask by Sir John Chardin which reasons we humbly conceive the Dutch East-India-Company have not nor can sufficiently answer But now since this Paper is to be seen only by your Lordships and not by the Dutch Commissioners We hope we shall clearly demonstrate to your Lordships that what we first demanded from the Dutch by Sir John Chardin was though not the same in words yet in Reality Effect and Consequence as much or more than we now demand of them For at that time we had a strong Fleet of Three and Twenty Ships with Souldiers in board ready to Sail for Bantam the Old King of Bantam our Friend was then at or near Bantam in the head of a great Army and he had given that City and Countrey to His late Majesty Under which Circumstances at that time if the Dutch had delivered effectual Orders to withdraw their Forces from Bantam we should with that Fleet and that Alliance have been in the possession of the Fort of Bantam immediately on our first arrival there and in a better posture than we can now be with the Fort restored to us undemolished because now the Old King is a Prisoner in the hands of the Dutch and his Army all overcome and dispersed All which is Humbly submitted to your Lordships Signed by Order of the Court of Committees of the East-India Company Rob. Blackborne Secr. East-India-House 2d of Jan. 1685. The foregoing Original papers exhibited to the Lords Commissioners Decisors by the Commissioners Instructors for both Companies we think may give sufficient satisfaction to any indifferent persons not onely of the state of the Controversie but a full justification of the English East-India-Companies Right to have Bantam so restored that they may hope to live there without having their Throats cut or being Stabbed as the English Agent formerly was or without being obnoxious to the having all taken from them in a moment at the pleasure of the Batavians Now because all Sumatra abounds with Pepper they pretend a Right to the whole Territory of that Island which is computed bigger than England full of Inhabitants whereon as they confess are many distinct Kingdoms which are governed by antient Soveraign Hereditary Princes And we dare presume to say They have not Two Hundred Dutch men upon the whole Island and we believe not Ten Dutch Women having no place that we know upon that whole Island able to resist Twenty Europeans but Padang and Pollocinco and their Forts upon them are very inconsiderable neither of them having a Garrison of above Fifty or Sixty Europeans and about the like number of black Fellows which are of no value To Bencoolen they do not now nor ever did pretend but say it belongs or owes subjection to the Young King of Bantam Which if it be true we have rightfully taken possession of it That King being our declared Enemy but we shall say more of that hereafter To Atcheen Pryaman Teco and Indrapoora they did formerly pretend and they may as the Reader will see hereafter with as much reason pretend to all India and so questionless they will in a little time if the Kings of Europe and their respective priviledged Companies will give them leave first to take the principal places and then be content to accept of a little Money for them not the Hundredth part of the true value of them But they must first dispatch this business of Pepper and make that Commodity entirely their own as they have all other Spices already and then they need neither pay nor thank any King or their priviledged Companies of Europe for letting them take all the rest because the profit of that single Commodity if it were in one hand would defray the charge of a power sufficient to defend all the Coasts of India from any new-comers and to enslave the Sea Coasts of all those great Monarchs of the East who though they have great Forces by Land have no Naval power and very little skill in taking of Fortresses being not accustomed to the use of Fire-Arms ☜ We know the World better than to expect a Confession of guilt from States-Men and we know how to distinguish between the Dutch Nation and the Dutch East-India-Company the former may be as in-offensive and Just as any other Nation but the latter doubtless have always been a most injurious people for which difference the famous John De Wit assayes to give a reason in a certain Treatise he hath set forth But our end being not to cavil or contend for mastery in words much less to promote War or dissension with which they unjustly charge the English East-India-Company We shall satisfie our selves if we can obtain a Witness or Justification in the hearts and minds of the good and peaceable men of both Nations for which purpose if any of the States or other of the Dutch Nation dis-interested in these debates doubt the truth of the English Companies Allegations we will ask no more but that to satisfie themselves throughly they would privately discourse some of the Dutch themselves that were at Bantam or Batavia Anno 1682. when Bantam was surprized or at any time since Secondly We would pray them likewise to read their own Histories and observe therein whether most of the wrongs complained of by the English in all ages were not perpetrated by the Dutch Company in time of full Peace viz. The falling upon the English and beating them out of the Trade of Japan The taking from them Lantore
pieces and spiked them had killed about sixty might have easily killed many more as the Officers gave in their Report had they not been called off upon this occasion viz. towards the Evening of that day the fight began came a Gentleman from the Dutch Factory of the quality of a Second well known to the Agent he addrest himself in Portugueez and the Agent and he carryed on the discourse in Portugueez and Dutch which this Deponent not being acquainted with desired the Agent to tell it him in English which he did to this Effect This Gentleman says the Agent comes from Dutch Commissary to congratulate the English for the good success they have had against their Enemies And says that they themselves had begun but now the English have taken that honour out of their hands Withal he told the Agent that many of the Natives and I think the Phousdar a great Officer in that place entreated the Commissary to interceed with the English Agent for Mercy for that there were divers houses then on fire that unless the English Soldiers were stayed they would burn down the Town and kill all the People And that the Agent would be entreated to forbear till they the Natives could write to the Nabob at Decca for Orders to satisfie the English Demands The Agent on this the Dutch Intercession stayed the Souldiers from further killing or plunder that night though he caused two or three of the English Vessels to ply the Town with shooting to prevent new recruits in the night and to awe the place There was great care taken by the Agent that in this broyl the Dutch should not suffer in their persons or affairs but should be used with respect and the Dutch desiring it an Order was given that no Merchant Banyan or other Native being in the Dutch service should be molested and where their Servants the Natives goods were seized upon assurance from the Dutch that they did belong to their service they were presently restored And whereas the English kept a Guard upon the River to command it yet all such Boats and Vessels which did belong to the Dutch or did wear their colours did freely pass without stop or interruption though the Rowers and such who sailed them were Natives and at that time Enemies to the English And this Deponent saith that in all that fight and conflict with the Natives the English lost but one man and no more Thomas Ley. Septimo die Martii 1687. Jurat coram me John Shorter Major The Pages of the aforesaid Treatise beginning again about the middle of the Book which is of two parts the Reader will observe that the lower number of Pages we are now at are in the second part of the Amsterdam Copy Where in Page the 14 and 15. They say and what concerns Bencoolen it is true the English some years past came with their Forces and possessed themselves thereof under pretext that the old King of Bantam had during the Civil Wars in which he was taken prisoner granted to them free Trading and Habitation at Syllabar but being driven out of the last place by the forces of the King that now reigneth in Bantam they retired to Bencoolen and built a Fortress there where they yet keep their abode and from thence did transport and Wrest out of our hands a very considerable part of Pepper We say Wrested Forasmuch as it was by Contract with Bantam made over to us whereby although they have intruded into what belonged unto us to our great detriment yet we will pass that by as not being ignorant that such manner of Contracts and Obligations made with Princes in Those Countreys where we have only Lodges or Factories do give us no full Right actually to hinder other Nations for to buy and transport their Commodities but must leave it to the disposal of him that is Lord and Master of those Countries This Confession comes near to the truth but is not the whole Truth as has been before and will hereafter be further demonstrated and yet by this confession they must own not only our Right at Bencoolen but themselves in the wrong intirely at Indrapoura where they had neither Factory Lodge nor Dutchman and where the English had settled and fortified themselves not only with the consent but to the great joy of seven Soveraign Kings And this confession will by consequence convict them of doing injury and unjustly seating themselves at Pryaman and more especially at Batan Capass after those Kings had surrendred their Countrey to His Majesty and came in person to avow their doing it to the Dutch-Men themselves and the Dutch Chief then present did not so much as urge for his excuse any previous Contract with those Kings or any defect of Title those Kings had so to Convey their Countrey unto His Majesty His Heirs and Successors for the use of His Majesty's East-India-Company which doubtless he would have done if he had known of any such Right or pretences which have been since invented to excuse that villanous act Besides supposing the pretences to excuse that act which are now made in the aforesaid Treatise were not inventions but realities such real grounds or pretences of Contracts can never justifie the Dutch for using force and arms against the English in a time of peace for matters which it s confessed ought by the Treaty of 1674-75 to have been amicably determined by Commissioners on both sides in Europe And it is very well known to the Kings Majesty now reigning and all the Honourable Lords then of His Majesties most Honourable Privy Council that when the English Company had been at the cost of about One Hundred Thousand pounds for fitting out a Fleet of three and twenty Sail of great Ships with about one thousand Land Souldiers and some of the said Fleet were departed and others advanced on their Voyage as far as the Downs The Dutch Embassadors prevailed with his late Majesty and the Lords then Ministers to command the English Company to forbear recovering Bantam by Arms upon this very ground That by Treaty aforesaid of 1674-75 such matters and differences in India ought not to be determined by Arms but by Commissioners as aforesaid and the distinction which the Dutch would make between the Maliayans and their own people in doing that mischief at Batan Capass every one knowes is a distinction without a difference those Mallayans being their hyred Servants as appears by the Protest and Affidavit aforesaid relating to that business For if the Dutch should be accountable onely for what they do by Native Dutchmen there would be found very few of them in India to be accompted with besides Merchants Nine Tenth parts of their force in India such as it is being by Computation of Forreigners or a mixture of all European Nations as well as Natives Macassars Buggesses Ballees Turnatteens Javans Mallayans Madagascar Slaves Topasses or black Portugueez which will serve any Nation for Money Page 26. Of
engross the whole Trade of Pepper which if attained will consequently destroy the English Navigation and carry with it the Universal Trade of India in all other Commodities as well as Pepper The said Deputies therefore have been obliged in duty to inform His Most Sacred Majesty and the Lords Commissioners Decisors as they intimated to Your Honours in their last Paper what they judged to be the only means to preserve any part of the English Trade in India and to lay the foundation of an Everlasting Peace between the two Companies Which opinion the said Deputies are ready not only to Defend and Submit to the Lords Commissioners Decisors according to the Treaty of the Year 1674-75 but to demonstrate to their Lordships that all other tedious circumstantial discourses tend only to protract time Signed Joseph Ashe Governour Josia Child Deputy Benj. Bathurst Jer. Sambrooke Dated at London 17 June 1685. The Fourth Paper Received from the Dutch Commissioners Instructors To the Honorable Gentlemen Sir Joseph Ashe Baronet Governour of English East-India-Company Sir Josia Child Baronet Deputy-Governour Sir Benjamin Bathurst and Sir Jeremy Sambrooke Knights Deputies of the said Company for the Affairs of Bantam ALthough the under-written Deputies of the East-India-Company of the United Provinces cannot assure themselves well to understand the true sense of the Memorial that they received from your Honours yet they find themselves obliged to Witness how much they are satisfied with the protestation they have made not long to defer the discussion of the Controversies about Bantam in the form prescribed by the meeting in the Year 1674-75 To which seeing the under-written Deputies have been a long time conformable they shall be very glad that the said controversies may be debated as soon as possible according to the same Form before the Lords Commissioners that must decide it Signed G. Hooft Jacob Van Hoorne S. V. Bloquery A. Paets Dated at Westminster 19th June 1685. Whereupon the English Commissioners Instructors did present unto the Lords Commissioners Decisors the following Paper Together with their Demands for Dammages sustained by the surprize of Bantam To the Right Honourable the Lords Commissioners for determination of Differences between the English and Dutch East-India-Companies occasioned by the late surprize of Bantam 1. IN Obedience to Your Lordships commands intimated to us in the Robes Chamber at White-Hall the 17th Instant We do humbly present your Lordships with Copies of all Papers that have passed between the Dutch Commissioners Instructors and our Selves since their Arrival in England We do humbly offer it to your Lordships as our Opinion and the Opinion of all English Men that have any knowledge of the Affairs of India That nothing less than the withdrawing of all the Dutch Forces from Bantam and the Territories thereof belonging to both or either of the late Kings of Bantam on the 14th day of March 1681-82 and the surrender of the Fort of Bantam unto His Majesty undemolished can prevent the Dutch from being immediately Masters of the entire Trade of Pepper And what fatal consequences to His Majesty and His Kingdoms do depend upon such their Engrossing of that Trade we have Demonstrated in Writing to His late Majesty of Blessed Memory And the Memorial relating thereunto now remains in the hands of the Clerks of His Majesties Most Honourable Privy Council And although His late Majesty did only demand from the Dutch the withdrawing of all their Forces from Bantam c. and the satisfying the East-India-Company for the dammages sustained by reason of the unjust surprisal thereof Our later advices from India have given us sufficient Reasons to justifie our further Demand of having the Fort of Bantam delivered to His Majesty undemolished for the following Reasons 1. Because as we foresaw when we humbly presented our Memorial aforesaid to His late Majestie The Dutch have since not only obstructed but Hostilely invaded our Trade and shot at our Servants with Bullets on the Coast of Mallabar to deter and beat them off from that little remainder we had there of the Pepper Trade 2. We since understand that the Dutch have so miserably enthralled and improverished both the late Kings of Bantam that they are not now both able to pay us 5 l. of that vast Debt they owe us otherwise than by that Fort of Bantam which was built with the Money the young King owed us and the Guns mounted on the said Fort are our own Guns for which we were never paid 3. Because the Young King as we have been credibly informed and do believe assassinated formerly our Agent and Factors though for what Cause or who instigated them thereunto we know not And now the Dutch say it was He the said Young King and not They that commanded us away from Bantam And therefore we dare not without a strong Garrison to defend us trust our Servants and Estates in his Dominions neither will any go thither that are worth sending without such security be provided for their Lives 4. Because if the Old King of Bantam had a right to Bantam and to the Territories thereof They are now His Majesties by His Donation of them to the late King of ever Blessed Memory If the Right thereof lyes as the Dutch say in the Young King He hath been so inhumane ungrateful and bloody an Enemy to His Majesties Subjects confessedly without the least Cause or Provocation on their part that we humbly conceive His Majesties Honour cannot be repaired without invading his City and Countrey And the rather because though he be called a King he is in truth none but a perfect Slave to the Batavians and an Executioner of their will and pleasure 5. If the Dutch say the Young King is their Allie and they are bound in honour to protect him We say by that Rule there can never be Peace between the English and the Dutch in India And they may be as good Right easily make a Quarrel between any other Indian Princes and their Neighbours or their own Sons or Brothers and then take a side and condition with the prevailing side to turn us and all other Europeans out of their Countries and we must not revenge our Selves because they will protect such injured and injurious Princes as their Allies Whereas by the Articles of Peace the English and Dutch ought mutually to assist and help each other 6. This is an old practice of the Dutch So they made a quarrel with the Macassars and when the differing Princes were equally matched they assisted one side which turned the ballance and they conditioned with the prevailing side to turn the English Nominatim and all other Europeans out of their Countrey 7. The Dutch were doing the same thing again between two Kings or Rajas on the Coast of Mallabar when our last Letters came from that Coast 8. If the Dutch say the old King was assisted by the English against his Son the Young King and therefore he turned the English out of his Countrey We