Cocks in 1616, “esteemeth him much, and he may go and speak with him at all times, when kings and princes are kept out”; and again, in 1620: “I cannot but be sorrowful for the loss of such a man as Captain William Adams was, he having been in such favour with two Emperors of Japon as never was any Christian in these parts of the world, and might freely have entered and had speech with the Emperors, when many Japon kings stood without and could not be permitted.” Adams had a wife and daughter living in England. He also had a son and daughter in Japan.[33] To all of these he left his property in equal shares. References are several times made to the disposal of his goods and to the transmission of money to England, as well as to difficulties arising from the disposition of certain goshons or trading licences belonging to his children in Japan.[34]

The result in Japan of the union of the English and Dutch Companies was, as we have seen, that the English factory remained at Firando instead of removing to the far more commodious town of Nagasaki. A combined fleet of English and Dutch ships, sailing under the modest name of the Fleet of Defence, was equipped for the purpose of endamaging the common enemy and of diverting the trade of China from the Philippine Islands to the Dutch and English settlements; in other words, to blockade the Spanish and Portuguese ports and seize as many of the Chinese trading junks as possible. In the two expeditions to the Philippines undertaken by the fleet before the English and Dutch again separated, they captured many prizes; and the Dutch are said to have treated their Chinese prisoners with great cruelty, while their new allies interfered to protect these unfortunate people. All the time, however, that the English were thus engaged at sea, peaceful negotiations were still being carried on by Cocks for establishing trade with China, though it is not surprising that “our joining with the Hollanders to take China junks is ill thought of.”

In 1621 the English at Firando, apparently with the idea that trade was now going to flourish, built a new warehouse and wharves, and undertook other works on a large scale. But it was impossible that their relations with the Dutch could be cordial; and dissensions soon broke out. There was ill blood between the sailors of the two nations. In the Philippines they could scarcely be restrained from fighting; and when, at the end of June, the fleet returned to Firando and the crews got ashore, they at once came to blows, and a Dutchman was killed. Then followed the trial and execution of the English sailor who had killed him; and the temper in which his shipmates regarded his condemnation may be judged from the fact that “Captain Robert Adams was forced to put the rope about his neck with his own hands.” And it was not only with the English that the Dutch sailors quarrelled. They were drunken and riotous and “brabbled” in the streets, till at last the long-suffering Japanese lost patience and seizing two of them summarily cut off their heads. The English, too, demanded a victim. A Dutchman, who had stabbed an Englishman, was condemned and executed by his own countrymen in a novel fashion, “they having first made the man so drunk that he could scarce stand on his legs, and so cut off his head within their own house.” As to the crews of the English shipping, they were perhaps only a degree less turbulent; to maintain discipline and set an example, four runaways were condemned and hanged.

In 1620 the English ship, Elizabeth, cruising off the Island of Formosa, captured a Japanese vessel on her way from the Philippines to Japan. On board were found two priests, who, in the end, proved to be Pedro de Zuñiga, an Augustinian, and Luis Flores, a Dominican. They long denied their names; and we find many references in the diary to their examination at Firando. (It was an object to the English and Dutch to convict them, as, in such case, the ship became good prize.) In the end, these two unfortunate men, together with the Japanese captain of the vessel, were, in 1622, put to death by the horrible torture of slow fire, and the crew were beheaded;[35] so that we cannot much regret that the captors were baulked of their prize. With grim humour the shogun appropriated the cargo for himself, “leaving the rotten hull for us and the Hollanders.” So, much against their will, the factors had to deliver over the prize goods, after a little hesitation, which, however, they saw it was useless to persist in, when Cocks was told that “they would take it whether we would or no, and that, if we had not absolutely proved the Portingalls to be padres, the Emperor meant to have put Captain Leonard Camps and me to death and to have seized on all we had in the country; and, if any resistance had been made, to have burned all our shipping and put us all to the sword” (ii. 335).

At the end of 1621 Cocks set out on the last visit to the court at Yedo recorded in his diary, the English and their Dutch allies now going in one company. Speck was no longer at the head of the Dutch factory. He had left Japan in the previous October; his successor being Leonard Camps, who was now Cocks’s travelling companion. After delivering the customary presents, and after the usual long delay in getting leave to depart, they were dismissed without the shogun’s return gifts, which were not ready, “which truly is the greatest wrong or indignity that ever hitherto was offered to any Christians.” It is almost unnecessary to add that Cocks and Camps quarrelled. The diary ends on the 24th of March, 1622, in the middle of the journey back to Firando; and in the last entry Cocks tells us how the Hollanders slipped away from him. No phrase could better express the whole course of the dealings of the Dutch with the English in Japan.

The rest of the story of the English factory is soon told. The Council of Defence of the East India Company at Batavia had some time before determined to reduce it to small dimensions. In his letter of the 7th September, 1622, Cocks records the receipt of orders “to leave off our consortship of the Fleet of Defence with the Hollanders, and to send our five ships for Jaccatra with as much speed as conveniently we could”; all money and merchandise was to be withdrawn, except a small “cargezon” or stock worth 5,000 taels, to be left in charge of Osterwick and a couple of assistants; and Cocks, Eaton, and Sayers were to “come along in the said ships for Jaccatra, for lessening charges in the factory.” All which directions the cape-merchant piously assured the Company should be followed “as near as we can”; but nevertheless stayed where he was. The difficulty, however, of getting payment of outstanding debts was at least some excuse; and he still fondly clung to the hopes of the China trade.

While the English were thus yielding ground, their Dutch rivals were more energetic than ever. They had failed in an attempt to surprise Macao; but had forcibly established themselves in the Pescadore Islands, and they still persisted in their old offence of passing for