In any case Paterson admitted English capitalists, who took up half of the shares, as the Act of Patent permitted them to do.  By December William was writing that he “had been ill-served by some of my Ministers.”  He had no notice of the details of the Act of Patent till he had returned to England, and found English capitalists and the English Parliament in a fury.  The Act committed William to interposing his authority if the ships of the company were detained by foreign powers, and gave the adventurers leave to take “reparation” by force from their assailants (this they later did when they captured in the Firth of Forth an English vessel, the Worcester).

On the opening of the books of the new company in London (October 1695) there had been a panic, and a fall of twenty points in the shares of the English East India Company.  The English Parliament had addressed William in opposition to the Scots Company.  The English subscribers of half the paid up capital were terrorised, and sold out.  Later, Hamburg investments were cancelled through William’s influence.  All lowland Scotland hurried to invest—­in the dark—­for the Darien part of the scheme was practically a secret:  it was vaguely announced that there was to be a settlement somewhere, “in Africa or the Indies, or both.”  Materials of trade, such as wigs, combs, Bibles, fish-hooks, and kid-gloves, were accumulated.  Offices were built—­later used as an asylum for pauper lunatics.

When, in July 1697, the secret of Panama came out, the English Council of Trade examined Dampier, the voyager, and (September) announced that the territory had never been Spain’s, and that England ought to anticipate Scotland by seizing Golden Island and the port on the mainland.

In July 1698 the Council of the intended Scots colony was elected, bought three ships and two tenders, and despatched 1200 settlers with two preachers, but with most inadequate provisions, and flour as bad as that paid to Assynt for the person of Montrose.  On October 30, in the Gulf of Darien they found natives who spoke Spanish; they learned that the nearest gold mines were in Spanish hands, and that the chiefs were carrying Spanish insignia of office.  By February 1699 the Scots and Spaniards were exchanging shots.  Presently a Scottish ship, cruising in search of supplies, was seized by the Spanish at Carthagena; the men lay in irons at Seville till 1700.  Spain complained to William, and the Scots seized a merchant ship.  The English Governor of Jamaica forbade his people, by virtue of a letter addressed by the English Government to all the colonies, to grant supplies to the starving Scots, most of whom sailed away from the colony in June, and suffered terrible things by sea and land.  Paterson returned to Scotland.  A new expedition which left Leith on May 12, 1699, found at Darien some Scots in two ships, and remained on the scene, distracted by quarrels, till February 1700, when Campbell of Fonab, sent with provisions