Voyage of Captain Walter Peyton to India, in 1615.[161]

This voyage seems to have been under the command of Captain Newport, who sailed as general in the Lion; but is called, in the Pilgrims, The Second Voyage of Captain Peyton to the East Indies, because the former voyage of Newport was written by Peyton, who, though he occasionally mentions the general, never once names him.  In this voyage Peyton sailed in the Expedition; the fleet consisting of three other ships, the Dragon, Lion, and Pepper-corn.  The journal appears to have been abbreviated by Purchas, as he tells us it was gathered out of his larger journal.  This voyage is chiefly remarkable as introductory to the embassy of Sir Thomas Roe to India, contained in the subsequent section, as Sir Thomas and his suite embarked in this fleet.  Instead of giving the remarks of Sir Thomas Roe in his own journal, so far as they apply to the voyage between England and Surat, these have been added in the text of the present voyage, distinguishing those observations by T.R. the initials of his name, and placing them all in separate paragraphs.

[Footnote 161:  Purch.  Pilgr.  I. 528.]

We learn by a subsequent article in the Pilgrims, I. 603, That Captain William Keeling was general, or chief commander of this fleet, and sailed in the Dragon, Robert Bonner master.  The other two ships were the Pepper-corn, Captain Christopher Harris, and the Expedition, Captain William Peyton.—­E.

Sec.1. Occurrences during the Voyage from England to Surat.

We sailed from Gravesend on the 24th January, 1615, and on the 2d February Sir Thomas Roe, ambassador from his majesty to the Great Mogul, repaired on board the Lion, with fifteen attendants.  At the same time, Mr Humphry Boughton embarked in the Pepper-corn, being recommended by the king to the company for a passage to India.  We carried out in the fleet eleven Japanese, who were brought to England in the Clove, divided proportionally among the ships; likewise fourteen Guzerates, brought home in the Dragon, together with nineteen condemned persons from Newgate, to be left for the discovery of unknown places, the company having obtained their pardons from the king for this purpose.  On the 20th, some of the Dragon’s men, among whom were the Newgate birds, attempted to run away with the pinnace, but were prevented:  Yet next night one of these condemned men, and two of the crew of the Pepper-corn, carried away her pinnace.  Two of my men conspired to carry away my boat that same night, but were discovered.

The 23d February we set sail from the Downs, and on the 6th March we lost sight of the Lizard.  The 26th we saw land, supposed to be the western part of Fuerteventura, but it proved to be part of Barbary.  One of the points of land at the mouth of the river Marhequena, we found to be laid down wrong, a whole degree more northerly than it ought to be; as likewise cape Bajadore is misplaced a whole degree, which we found by experience, escaping great danger caused by that error in our charts.  The 26th of April we got into the trade wind; and on the 10th May, being by estimation 620 leagues west of the Cape of Good Hope, we saw many pintadoes, mangareludas, and other fowls.