there were others on the sides of the room, which looked to the wharf or landing-place.  The floor of this room was all covered with fine mats, and towards where the governor sat, with fine Turkey carpets and Persian felts.  Where he sat, there lay a party-coloured sattin quilt, with several rich cushions of damask and others of velvet.  He was dressed in a violet-coloured vest of sattin, under which were garments of fine India muslin or calico, having on his head a sattin cap, wreathed round by a white sash.  He was attended by the chief scrivano, the principal officers of the customs, some Turks of importance, many Indian merchants, and about an hundred servants.  He seemed about fifty years of age, and his name was Mahomet Aga.

On our approach, and doing reverence, he bowed to us, and desired us to sit down, demanding who we were, and what was our business.  We answered that we were Englishmen and merchants from London, who, by command of the ambassador of the king of England to the Great Mogul, with whom we had a league of peace and amity, had come to this place to treat for liberty of trade.  That we were in friendship with the Grand Signior, and had free trade at Constantinople, Aleppo, and other places in the Turkish dominions, and hoped to enjoy the same here; for which purpose we were come to desire his and the pacha’s phirmauns, giving us such privileges as we already had in other parts of the dominions of the Grand Signior, both for the present time and in future, as we meant to visit his port yearly with plenty of English and Indian commodities.  We said likewise that we were commanded to say by the lord ambassador, that hearing there were sundry pirates, English, Dutch, French, Portuguese, Malabars and others, who infested the trade of this port, and principally that carried on by the Guzerats, who were our friends, we had his orders to free the seas of all such incumbrances, protecting all honest merchant ships and junks from injury.  These, we said, were the true causes of our coming here.

The governor then rose up and bid us welcome, applauding our declared purposes, but asked why we were so fearful as not to come on shore without pledges.  We answered, that about six years before, some of our countrymen being here, were enticed on shore by fair promises of good usage, who were betrayed and imprisoned by the then governor, and several of them murdered.  For these reasons, we were under the necessity of being careful of our safety.  We said moreover, that he would shortly be certified we were exactly what we professed, by means of two junks of Guzerat, one of which had not come this year, but for the pass and promise of the ambassador that they were to be protected in the voyage home by our ship, against the enterprizes of any pirates who might be in these seas, as one had been last year by some of our ships, which came opportunely to their rescue, and conducted her safely to their port, and had sent the chief commanders to England, to be tried and punished for their wrongs against the friends of our sovereign.