Pinteado, thus kept on board against his will, was thrust among the cabin-boys, and worse used than any of them, insomuch that he was forced to depend on the favour of the cook for subsistence.  Having sunk one of their ships for want of hands to navigate her, the people departed from the coast with the other.  Within six or seven days, Pinteado died broken-hearted, from the cruel and undeserved usage he had met with,—­a man worthy to have served any prince, and most vilely used.  Of 140 men who had sailed originally from Portsmouth on this unfortunate and ill-conducted voyage, scarcely 40 got back to Plymouth, and many even of those died soon afterwards.

That no one may suspect that I have written in commendation of Pinteado from partiality or favour, otherwise than as warranted by truth, I have thought good to add copies of the letters which the king of Portugal and the infant his brother wrote to induce him to return to Portugal, at the time when, by the king’s displeasure, and not owing to any crime or offence, he was enforced by poverty to come to England, where he first induced our merchants to engage in voyages to Guinea.  All these writings I saw under seal in the house of my friend Nicholas Lieze, with whom Pinteado left them when he departed on his unfortunate voyage to Guinea.  But, notwithstanding these friendly letters and fair promises, Pinteado durst not venture to return to Portugal, neither indeed durst he trust himself in company with any of his own countrymen, unless in the presence of other persons, as he had secret intimation that they meant to have assassinated him, when time and place might serve their wicked purpose.

* * * * *

The papers alluded to in this concluding paragraph by Richard Eden, do not seem necessary to be inserted.  They consist of, a commission or patent dated 22d September 1551, appointing Pinteado one of the knights of the royal household, with 700 rees, or ten shillings a month, and half a bushel of barley every day so long as he should keep a horse; but with an injunction not to marry for six years, lest he might have children to succeed in this allowance.  The second document is merely a certificate of registration of the first.  The third is a letter from the infant, Don Luis, brother to the king of Portugal, dated 8th December 1552, urging Pinteado to return to Lisbon, and intimating that Peter Gonzalvo, the bearer of the letter, had a safe conduct for him in due form.  From the introduction to these papers, it appears that Pinteado had suffered long disgrace and imprisonment, proceeding upon false charges, and had been at last set free by means of the king’s confessor, a grey friar, who had manifested his innocence.—­E.

SECTION III.

Voyage to Guinea, in 1554, by Captain John Lok[198].