a floating wreck with only a remnant of her crew surviving, when suddenly a fire broke out in the Prins Willem, which nothing could check.  With difficulty the St Jago drew off and, finding that his vessel was lost, Pater, refusing to surrender, wrapped the flag round his body and threw himself into the sea.  Meanwhile success had attended Thijssen.  The lagging Dutch ships coming up gradually threatened the convoy of Spanish transports and drew off many of the galleons for their protection.  The Provintie van Utrecht indeed, like the Prins Willem, caught fire and was burnt to the water’s edge; but the vice-admiral himself sank the St Antonio de Padua and another galleon that came to Vallecilla’s help, and captured a third.  It was a bloody and apparently indecisive fight, but the Dutch enjoyed the fruits of victory.  Oquendo made no attempt to capture the Reciff and Olinda, but, after landing the troops he convoyed at a favourable spot, sailed northwards, followed by Thijssen.

But though relieved the position was still very serious.  Albuquerque, now considerably reinforced from his impregnable post at the Arreyal de Bom Jesus, cut off all intercourse inland.  The Dutch even abandoned Olinda and concentrated themselves at the Reciff, where they remained as a besieged force entirely dependent upon supplies sent from Holland.  Several expeditions were despatched with the hope of seizing other positions on the coast, but all of them proved failures; and, when Waerdenburgh returned home in 1633, having reached the end of his three years’ service as governor, all that could be said was that the Dutch had retained their foothold on the coast of Pernambuco, but at vast cost to the company in men, vessels and treasure, and without any apparent prospect for the future.  But pertinacity was to be rewarded.  For the period of success that followed special histories must be consulted.  In the year following the return of Waerdenburgh the efforts of the Dutch authorities to extend their possessions along the coast at the various river mouths were steadily successful; and with the advent of Joan Maurice of Nassau to the governorship, in 1637, the dream of a Dutch empire in Brazil seemed to be on the point of realisation.  This cousin of the Prince of Orange was endowed with brilliant qualities, and during the seven years of his governorship he extended the Dutch dominion from the Rio Grande in the south to the island of Maranhao on the north and to a considerable distance inland, indeed over the larger part of seven out of the fourteen captaincies into which Portuguese Brazil was divided.  On his arrival, by a wise policy of statesmanlike conciliation, he contrived to secure the goodwill of the Portuguese planters, who, though not loving the Dutch heretics, hated them less than their Spanish oppressors, and also of the Jews, who were numerous in the conquered territory.  Under his rule the Reciff as the seat of the Dutch government was beautified and enlarged; many fine buildings and gardens adorned it, and the harbour made commodious for commerce with rows of warehouses and ample docks.  To the new capital he gave the name of Mauritsstad.