Chapter II: Part 2

This little pamphlet was put out in the poorest dress possible, bespeaking a press of meagre equipment, and a printer without an idea of the form which even the leaflet can assume in skilful hands. Without imprint, author's name, or any mark of identification, it indicates a secret impression and [33]issue--one of the many occasional pamphlets which appeared at the time from "underground" shops which least of all wanted to be known as the agent of publication. Neville either avowed the authorship or it was traced to him, and the displeasure of Cromwell and banishment from London followed.

In 1681 he printed "Discourses concerning Government," which was much admired by Hobbes, and even Wood admits that it was "very much bought up by the members [of parliament], and admired: But soon after, when they understood who the author was (for his name was not set to the book), many of the honest party rejected, and had no opinion of it" A later writer describes it as an "un-Platonic dialogue developing a scheme for the exercise of the royal prerogative through councils of state responsible to Parliament, and of which a third part should retire every year."{1} Reissued at the time under its better known title--"Plato Redivivus"{2}--it was reprinted in 1742,{3} and again by Thomas Hollis in 1763.

1 Dictionary of National Biography, XL. 259.

2 Plato Redivivus, or A Dialogue concerning Government:
wherein, by Observations drawn from other Kingdoms and
States both ancient and modern, an Endeavour is used to
discover the politick Distemper of our own; with the Causes
and Remedies. The Second Edition, with Additions. In Octavo.
Price 2s. 6d. Printed for S. I. and sold by R. Dew. The Term
Catalogues (Arber), 1.443--the issue for May, 1681. The
initials S. I. do not again occur in the Catalogues, and R.
Dew is credited with only two issues, both in May, 1681,
neither giving the location of his shop. The tract called
out several replies, such as the anonymous Antidotum
Brittanicum and Goddard's Plato's Demon, or the State
Physician Unmasked ( 1684).

3 A copy is in the Library Company, Philadelphia.

His translations from Machiavelli are not so easily traced, nor is any explanation possible for his having delayed for nearly [34]thirty years publication of evidence of his admiration for the Florentine politician. He was not alone in desiring to make the Italian political moralist better known, for translations of the "Discourses" and "The Prince," with "some marginal animadversions noting and taxing his [Machiavelli's] errors," by E. D.{1} was published in a second edition in November, 1673, but I do not connect Neville with that issue. In the following year the connection of Charles Harper's name with the "Florentine History" suggests Neville, as does a more ambitious undertaking of the "Works," first fathered by another London bookseller, but with which Harper was concerned in 1681:

The Florentine History, in Eight Books. Written by Nicholas Machiavel, Citizen and Secretary of Florence: now exactly translated from the Italian. In Octavo. Price, bound, 6s. Printed for Charles Harper, and J. Amery, at the Flower de luce, and Peacock, in Fleet street.{2}

The Works of the Famous Nicholas Machiavel, Citizen and Secretary of Florence. Containing, 1. The History of Florence. 2. The Prince. 3. The Original of the Guelf and Ghibilin Factions. 4. The life of Castrucio Castraceni. 5. The murther of Vitelli, etc., by Duke Valentine. 6. The State of France. 7. The State of Germany. 8. The Discourses of Titus Livius. 9. The Art of War. 10. The Marriage of Belphegery a Novel.{3}

1 Edward Dacres.

2 The Term Catalogues (Arber i. 18--the issue for November
25,1674.) It was entered at Stationers' Hall, June 20,
1674, "under the hands of Master Roger L'Estrange and Master
Warden Mean" with the statement that the translation was
made by "J. D. Gent."

3 This novel wa added by Starker to a translation of novels
by Gomez deQueverdoy Villegas published in November, 1670.
The name of the printer suggests a connection with Neville.

[35]11. Nicholas Machiavel's Letter in Vindication of himself and his Writings. All written originally in Italian; and from thence newly and faithfully Translated in English. In Folio. Price, bound, 18s. Printed for J. Starkey at the Mitre in Flret street near Temple Bar.

[Same Title.] The Second Edition. Printed for J. Starkey, C. Harper, and J. Amery, at the Miter, the Flower de luce, and the Peacock, in Flret street. Folio. Price, bound, 16s.{1}

1 The Term Catalogues (Arber) i.199--the issue for
February, 1675. Entered at Stationers' Hall, February 4,
1674-75, "under the hands of Master Roger L'Estrange and
Master Warden Roycroft," with the statement that the
translation was made by "J.B. Salvo iure cuilibet." The
resort to L'Estrange in both instances is suggestive. 2 Ib
453--the issue for June, 1681. "The Works of that famous
Nicholas Machiavel" is announced in the Catalogues, June,
1675, for publication by R. Boulter, in Cornhill, and at the
same price of 18s., but I doubt if Neville had anything to
do with that translation.

It may be admitted that questions of government were eagerly discussed in the seventeenth century. It was only needed to live under the Stuarts and to pass through the Civil War and Protectorate to realize that a transition from the divinely anointed ruler to a self-constituted governor resting upon an army, and again to a trial of the legitimate holder of royal prerogative, offered an education in matters of political rule which naturally led to a constitutional monarchy, and which could not be equalled in degree or lasting importance until the American colonies of Great Britain questioned the policy of the mother country toward her all too energetic children. Hobbes' "Leviathan, or the Matter, Form and Power of a Commonwealth, Ecclesiastical and Civil," appeared in 1651, a powerful argument for absolutism, but cast in such a form as to make the [36]writer an unwelcome adherent to royalty in exile.

In 1652 Filmer published his "Observations concerning the Original of Government," one of a series of tracts, completed by his "Patriarcha," printed after his death, which has made him a prophet of the extreme supporters of the divine origin of kingship. These are only examples of the political discussion of the day, and to them may be added Harrington, whose "Oceanan" appeared in 1656.{1} It satisfied no party or faction, and a second edition was not called for until 1700, when other writings of the author were added. This compilation was, in 1737, pirated by a Dublin printer, R. Reilly, who added Neville's "Plato Redivivus;"{2} but the third English edition (1747), issued by the same printer who made the second edition, omitted Neville's tract.

1 Entered at Stationers' Hall by Livewell Chapman,
September 19,1656. Eyre and Rivington, ii. 86.

2 Bibliotheca Liudeusianat ii. 4228.

THE STORY

"The Isle of Pines" was Neville's fifth publication, issued nine years after his fourth, a political tract: "Shuffling, Cutting and Dealing in a Game of Picquet" Like most titles of the day, that of "The Isle of Pines" did not fail in quantity. It was repeated word for word, except the imprint, on the first page of the text. Briefly, the relation purports to have been written by an Englishman, George Pine, who at the age of twenty shipped as book-keeper in the India Merchant, which sailed for the East Indies in 1569.

Having rounded the Cape of Good Hope and [37]being almost within sight of St. Lawrence's Island, now Madagascar,{1} they encountered a great storm of wind, which separated the ship from her consorts, blew many days, and finally wrecked the vessel on a rocky island. The entire company was drowned except Pine, the daughter of his master, two maid-servants, and one negro female slave. They gathered what they could of the wreckage, and Pine and his companions lived there in community life, a free-love settlement By the four women he had forty-seven children, and in his sixtieth year he claimed to have 565 children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. It was from one of his grandchildren that the Dutch ship received the relation. Apart from the title-page, the entire tract is occupied by the story of George Pine, from whom the island took its name. In 1667, or ninety-eight years after Pine was wrecked, the Dutch captain estimated that the population of the island amounted to ten or twelve thousand persons. Methuselah, with his years to plead for him, might boast of such breeding, but in ordinary man it is too near the verminous, the rat, the guinea-pig, and the rabbit, to be pleasant.

1 It was the Island of St. Laurence of James Lancaster's
Voyage, 1593. Hakluyt, Principall Navigations, vi. 401.

The publication must have attracted attention at once, for before the end of July Neville put forth a second part, "A New and further Discovery of The Isle of Pines," which purported to be the relation of the Dutch captain to whom the history of Pines had been confided. It is an unadorned story such as might have been gathered from a dozen tales in Hakluyt or Purchas, and is interesting only in giving the name of the [38]Dutch captain--Cornelius Van Sloetton--and the location of the supposed island--longitude 76° and latitude 20°, under the third climate--which places it to the northeast of Madagascar. Almost immediately after the publication of the second part it was combined with the first part, as already described, and published late in July or early in August Cornelius Van Sloetton, as he signed himself in the second part, became Henry Cornelius Van Sloetten in the combined issue.

INTERPRETATIONS

It was Pine's relation which received the greatest attention on the continent, and that was chiefly concerned in describing his performances in populating the island. It was therefore with only a mild surprise that I read in one of those repulsively thorough studies which only a German can make, a study made in 1668 of this very tract, "The Isle of Pines," the assertion that Pines, masquerading as the name of the discoverer and patriarch of the island, and accepted as the name of the island itself, was only an anagram on the male organ of generation--penis. On one of the German issues in the John Carter Brown [39]Library this has also been noted by a contemporary hand.{1} Such an interpretation reduces our tract to a screaming farce, but it closely suits the general tone of other of Neville's writings, which are redolent of the sensual license of the restoration. To this I would add an emendation of my own. The name adopted by Neville was Henry Cornelius van Sloetten. It suggests a somewhat forcible English word--slut--of doubtful origin, although forms having some resemblance in sound and sense occur in the Scandinavian languages.

1 Christian Weise, Prof. Polit, in augusteo in A. 1685.

Such interpretations seem to fit the work better than that of a German critic, who sees in the book a sort of Utopia, a model community, or an exhibition in the development of law and order. Free love led to license, maids were ravished, and the complete promiscuity of intercourse disgusted Pine, who sought to suppress it by force and, in killing the leader of a revolt, a man with negro blood in his veins, to impose punishments for acts which he had himself done. The ground for believing that Neville had any such purpose when he wrote the book is too slight to be accepted. In 1668 the author had no call to convey a lesson in government to his countrymen by any means so frankly vulgar and pointless as the "Isle of Pines." If Neville had intended such a political object, a phrase would have sufficed to indicate it. No such key can be found in the text, and there is nothing to show that, politician as he was, he realized that such an intimation could be drawn from his paragraphs.

To assume, therefore, that so carefully hidden a suggestion of a model republic could have aided the circulation [40]of the pamphlet at the time, or at any later period, is to introduce an element unnecessary to explain the vogue of the relation. It passed simply as a story of adventure, and as such it fell upon a time when a wide public was receptive to the point of being easily duped. Wood asserts that the "Isle of Pines," when first published, "was look'd upon as a mere sham or piece of drollery; "{1} and there are few contemporary references to the relation of either Pine or Van Sloetten, and those few are of little moment If the seamen, who were in a position to point out discrepancies of fad in the story, made any comment or criticism, I have failed to discover them.

1 Athenæ Oxomiensis (Bliss), iv. 410.

Neville himself freely played with the subject, and it is strange that he did not excite some suspicion of his veracity among his readers. He had told in his first part of a Dutch ship which was driven by foul weather to the island and of the giving to the Dutch the story of Pine. His second part is the story of the Dutch captain, sailing from Amsterdam, re-discovering the Isle of Pines, and returning home--that is, to Holland. Yet Neville for the combined issue, and presumably only a few days after giving out the first part, composed two letters from a merchant of Amsterdam--Abraham Keek--dated June 29 and July 6, saying that the last post from Rochelle brought intelligence of a French vessel which had just arrived and reported the discovery of this very island, but placing it some two or three hundred leagues "Northwest from Cape Finis Terre," though, he added with reasonable caution, "it may be that there may be some mistake in the number of the Leagues, as also of the exact [41]point of the compass from Cape Finis Terre."

Keek offered an additional piece of geographical information, that "some English here suppose it maybe the Island of Brasile which have been so oft sought for, Southwest from Ireland."{1} The first letter of Keek is dated five days after the licensing of the first part of the "Isle of Pines," and the second sixteen days before the date of Sloetten's narrative. It is hardly possible that Neville could have been forgetful of his having made a Dutch vessel responsible for the discovery and history of Pine, and it is more than probable that he took this means of giving greater verisimilitude to the Isle of Pines, by bringing forward an independent discovery by a French vessel. However intended, the ruse did not contribute to such a purpose, as the combined parts did not enjoy as wide a circulation as the first part.

1 See page 53, infra.

On the continent a German, who knew the tract only as translated into German through a Dutch version of the English text, and therefore imperfectly, gave it serious consideration, and had little difficulty in finding inconsistencies and contradictions. Some of his questions went to the root of the matter. It was a Dutch ship which first found the Isle of Pines and its colony; why was not the discovery first announced by the Dutch? Piece by piece the critic takes down the somewhat clumsily fashioned structure of Neville's fiction, and in the end little remains untouched by suspicion. No such examination, dull and labored in form, and offering no trace of imagination which wisely permits itself to be deceived in details in order to be free to accept a whole, could pass beyond the narrow circle of a university.

[42]As an antidote to the attractions of Neville's tract it was powerless, and to-day it remains as much of a curiosity as it was in 1668, when it was written. Indeed, a question might be raised as to which tract was less intentionally a joke--Neville's "Isle of Pines," or our German's ponderous essay upon it? At least the scientific ignorance of the Englishman, perfectly evident from the start, is more entertaining than the pseudo-science of the German critic, who boldly asserts as impossible what has come to be a commonplace.{1}

1 Das verdachtige Pineser-Eylandd, No. 29 in the
Bibliography. It it dedicated to Anthonio Goldbeck,
Burgomaster of Altona, and the letter of dedication b dated
at Hamburg, October 26, 1668.

Hippe calls attention to the geography of the relation as not the least interesting of its features, for the neighborhood of the Island of Madagascar was used in other sea stories as a place of storm and catastrophe. "The ship on which Simplicissimus wished to return to Portugal, suffered shipwreck likewise near Madagascar, and the paradisiac island on which Grimmelshausen permits his hero finally to land in company with a carpenter, is also to be sought in this region. In precisely the same way the shipwreck of Sadeur,{1} the hero of a French Robinson Crusoe story, [43]happens on the coast of Madagascar, and from this was he driven in a southerly direction to the coast of the southern land."

1 La Terre Australe commue, a romance written by Gabriel de
Foigny (pseud. J. Sadeur), describing the stay of Sadeur on
the southern continent for more than thirty-five years, The
original edition, made in Geneva in 1676, is said to contain
"many impious and licentious passages which were omitted in
the later editions." Sabin (xviii. 220) gives a list of
editions, the first English translation appearing in 1693.
It is possible that the author owed the idea of his work to
Neville's pamphlet.

In most of the older surveys of the known world America counts as the fourth part, naturally coming after Europe, Asia, and Africa. Even that arrangement was not generally accepted. Joannes Leo (Hasan Ibn Muhammad, al-Wazzan), writing in 1556, properly called Africa "la tierce Partie du Monde;" but the Seigneur de la Popellinière, in his "Les Trois Mondes," published in 1582, divided the globe into three parts--1. Europe, Asia, and Africa; 2. America, and 3. Australia. A half century later, Pierre d'Avitz, of Toumon (Ardèche), entitled one of his compositions "Description Générale de l'Amérique troisiesme partie du Monde," first published in 1637.{2} The expedition under Alvaro de Mendana de Nevra, setting sail from Callao, November 19, 1567, and steering westward, sought to clear doubt concerning a continent which report had pictured as being somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. The Solomon Islands rewarded the enterprise, and with New Guinea and the Philippines completed a connection between Peru and the continent of Asia. There had long existed, however, a settled belief in the existence of a great continent in the southern hemisphere, which should serve as a counterpoise to the known lands in the northern.

1 A copy is in the Boston Athenaeum.

The geographical ideas of the times required such a continent, [44]and even before the circumnavigation of Africa, the world-maps indicated to the southward "terra incognita secundum Ptolemeum,"{1} or a land of extreme temperature and wholly unknown.{2} The sailing of ships round the Cape of Good Hope dissipated in some degree this belief but it merely placed some distance between that cape and the supposed Terra Australia which was now extended to the south of America, separated on the maps from that continent only by the narrow Straits of Magellan, and stretching to the westward, almost approaching New Guinea.{3}

1 As on the Ptolemy, Ulm, 1482.

2 As in Macrobius, In Sommium Scipionis Expositio, Brescia,
1483. 3 See the map of Oronce Fine, 1522, and Ortelius,
Orbis Terrarum 1592. 4 The "Quiri Regio" was long marked on
maps as a continent lying to the south of the Solomon
Islands.

3 This was first republished at Augsburg in 1611; in a
Latin translation in Henry Hudson's Descriptio ac
Delimeatis, Amsterdam, 1612, in Dutch, Verhael van seher
Memorial, Amsterdam, 1612; in Bry, 1613, and shortly after
in Hulsius; in French, Paris, 1617; and in English, London,
1617. I give this list because even so interesting an
announcement of a genuine voyage did not have so quick an
acceptance as Neville's tract with almost the same title.

Such an expanse of undiscovered land, believed to be rich in gold, awakened the resolution of Pedro Fernandez de Queiros, who had been a pilot in the Mendafia voyage of 1606. By chance he failed in his object, and deceived by the apparent continuous coast line presented to his view by the islands of the New Hebrides group, he gave it the resounding name of Austrialia del Espiritu Santo, because of the King's title of Austria. On the publication of his "Relation" at Seville in 1610, the name was altered, and he claimed to have discovered the "fourth part of the world, called Terra Australis incognita." Seven years later, [45]in 1617, it was published in London under the title, "Terra Australia incognita, or A new Southerne Discoverie, containing a fifth part of the World." It is obvious that geographers and their source of information--the adventurous sea captains--were not agreed upon the proper number to be assigned to the Terra Australis in the world scheme. Even in 1663 the Church seemed in doubt, for a father writes "Mémoires touchant l'établissement d'une Mission Chrestienne dans la troisième Monde, autrement apellé la Terre Australe, Méridionale, Antartique, & I connue."{1} That Neville even drew his title from any of these publications cannot be asserted, nor do they explain his designation of the Isle of Pines as the fourth island in this southern land; but they show the common meaning attached to Terra Australis incognita, and his use of the words was a clever, even if not an intentional appeal to the curiosity then so active on continents yet to be discovered.

1 Printed at Paris by Claude Cramoisy, 1663. A copy is in
the John Carter Brown Library. In 1756 Charles de Brosse
published his Histoire des Navigations aux Terres Australes
from Vespuccius to his own day, which was largely used by
John Callender in compiling his Terra Australis Cogmta,
1766-68.

Another volume, however, written by one who afterwards became Bishop of Norwich, may have been responsible for the conception of Neville's pamphlet. This was Joseph Hall's "Mundus Alter et Idem sive Terra Australis ante hac semper incognita longis itineribus peregrini Academici nuperrime lustrata." The title says it was printed at Frankfort, and the statement has been too readily accepted as the fact, for the tract was entered at [46]Stationers' Hall by John Porter, June 2, 1605, and again on August 1, 1608.{1} The biographer of Bishop Hall states that it was published at Frankfort by a friend, in 1605, and republished at Hanau in 1607, and in a translated form in London about 1608. It is more than probable that all three issues were made in London, and that the so-called Hanau edition was that entered in 1608. On January 18, 1608-09, Thomas Thorpe entered the translation, with the address to the reader signed John Healey, who was the translator.{2} This carried the title: "The Discovery of a New World, or a Description of the South Indies hitherto unknown."{3} It is a satirical work with no pretense of touching upon realities. Hallam wrote of it: "I can only produce two books by English authors in this first part of the seventeenth century which fall properly under the class of novels or romances; and of these one is written in Latin. This is the Mundus Alter and Idem of Bishop Hall, an imitation of the later and weaker volumes of Rabelais. A country in Terra Australis is divided into four regions, Crapulia, Virginia, Moronea, and Lavernia. Maps of the whole land and of particular regions are given; and the nature of the satire, not much of which has any especial reference to England, may easily be collected. It is not a very successful effort."{4}

1 Stationers' Registers (Arber), in. 291, 386.

2 Ib. 400. Healey made an "exceptionally bad" translation
of St. Augustine's De Civitate Dei, which remained the only
English translation of that work until 1871.

3 In the Bodleian Library is a copy of the translation with
the title, The Discovery of a New World, Tenterbelly,
Sheeland, and Fooliana, London, n.d.

4 Introduction to the Literature of Europe, 2d éd., II.
167.

While a later critic, Canon [47]Perry, says of it: "This strange composition, sometimes erroneously described as a 'political romance,' to which it bears no resemblance whatever, is a moral satire in prose, with a strong undercurrent of bitter jibes at the Romish church, and its eccentricities, which sufficiently betray the author's main purpose in writing it. It shows considerable imagination, wit, and skill in latinity, but it has not enough of verisimilitude to make it an effective satire, and does not always avoid scurrility."{1} Like Neville's production, the satire was misinterpreted.

The title of Neville's tract also recalls the lost play of Thomas Nash--"The Isle of Dogs"--for which he was imprisoned on its appearance in 1597, and suffered, as he asserted, for the indiscretion of others. "As Actaeon was worried by his own hounds," wrote Francis Meres in his "Palladis Tamia," "so is Tom Nash of his Isle of Dogs." And three years later, in 1600, Nash referred in his "Summers Last Will" to the excitement raised by his suppressed play. "Here's a coil about dogs without wit! If I had thought the ship of fools would have stay'd to take in fresh water at the Isle of Dogs, I would have furnish'd it with a whole kennel of collections to the purpose." The incident was long remembered. Nine years after Nash's experience John Day published his "Isle of Gulls," drawn from Sir Philip Sidney's "Arcadia."{2}

1 Dictionary of National Biography, xxiv. 76.

2 I take these facts from Sir Sidney Lee's sketch of Nash in
the Dictionary of National Biography, XL. 107.

[48]

DEFOE AND THE "ISLE OF PINES"

I would apologize for taking so much time on a nine-page hoax did it not offer something positive in the history of English literature. It has long been recognized as one of the more than possible sources of Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe." It is truly said that the elements of a masterpiece exist for years before they become embodied, that they are floating in the air, as it were, awaiting the master workman who can make that use which gives to them permanent interest Life on an island, entirely separated from the rest of mankind, had formed an incident in many tales, but Neville's is believed to have been the first employment by an English author of island life for the whole story. And while Defoe excludes the most important feature of Neville's tract--woman--from his "Robinson Crusoe," issued in April, 1719, he too, four months after, published the "Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe," in which woman has a share. It would be wearisome to undertake a comparison of incident; suffice it to say that the "Isle of Pines" has been accepted as a pre-Defoe romance, to which the far greater Englishman may have been indebted. [49]

[51]

THE ISLE OF PINES, The combined Parts as issued in 1668

The Isle of Pines

OR,

[53] A late Discovery of a fourth ISLAND near Terra Australis, Incognita

BY

Henry Cornelius Van Sloetten.

Wherein is contained.

A True Relation of certain English persons, who in Queen Elizabeths time, making a Voyage to the East Indies were cast away, and wracked near to the Coast of Terra Australis, Incognita, and all drowned, except one Man and four Women. And now lately Anno Dom. 1667. a Dutch Ship making a Voyage to the East Indies, driven by foul weather there, by chance have found their Posterity, (speaking good English) to amount (as they suppose) to ten or twelve thousand persons. The whole Relation (written and left by the Man himself a little before his death, and delivered to the Dutch by his Grandchild) Is here annexed with the Longitude and Latitude of the Island, the situation and felicity thereof, with other matter observable.

Licensed July 27. 1668.

London, Printed for Allen Banks and Charles Harper next door to the three Squerrills in Fleet-Street, over against St Dunstans Church, 1668.

Two Letters concerning the Island of Pines to a Credible person in Covent Garden.

IT is written by the last Post from Rochel, to a Merchant in this City, that there was a French ship arrived, the Mailer and Company of which reports, that about 2 or 300 Leagues Northwest from Cape Finis Terre, they fell in with an Island, where they went on shore, and found about 2000 English people without cloathes, only some small coverings about their middle, and that they related to them, that at their first coming to this Island (which was in Queen Elizabeths time) they were but five in number men and women, being cast on shore by distress or otherwise, and had there remained ever since, without having any correspondence with any other people, or any ship coming to them. This story seems very fabulous, yet the Letter is come to a known Merchant, and from a good hand in France, so that I thought fit to mention it, it may be that there may be some mistake in the number of the Leagues, as also of the exact point of the Compass, from Cape Finis Terre; I shall enquire more particularly about it. Some English here suppose it may be the Island of Brasile which have been so oft sought for, Southwest from Ireland, if true, we shall hear further about it; your friend and Brother, Abraham Keek.

Amsterdam, July the 6th 1668.

IT is said that the Ship that discovered the Island, of which I hinted to you in my last, is departed from Rochel, on her way to Zealand, several persons here have writ thither to enquire for the said Vessel, to know the truth of this business. I was promised a Copy of the Letter [54]Amsterdam, June the 29th 1668, that came from France, advising the discovery of the Island above-said, but its not yet come to my hand; when it cometh, or any further news about this Island, I shall acquaint you with it,

Your Friend and Brother,

A. Keck.

{{1 }} [55]Discovered Near to the Coast of Terra Australis Incognita, by Henry Cornelius Van Sloetten, in a Letter to a friend in London, declaring the truth of his Voyage to the East Indies.

SIR,

I Received your Letter of this second instant, wherein you desire me to give you a further account concerning the Land of Pines, on which we were driven by distress of Weather the last Summer, I also perused the Printed Book thereof you sent me, the Copy of which was surreptiously taken out of my hands, else should I have given you a more fuller account upon what occasion we came thither, how we were entertained, with some other circumstances {{2 }}of note wherein that relation is defective. To satisfie therefore your desires, I shall briefly yet sully give you a particular account thereof, with a true Copy of the Relation itself; desiring you to bear with my blunt Phrases, as being more a Seaman then a Scholler.

April the 26th 1667. We set sail from Amsterdam, intending for the East-Indies; our ship had to name the place from whence we came, the Amsterdam burthen 350. Tun, and having a fair gale of Wind, on the 27 of May following we had a sight of the high Peak Tenriffe belonging to the Canaries, we have touched at the Island Palma, but having endeavoured it twice, and finding the winds contrary, we steered on our course by the Isles of Cape Ferd, or Insula Capitis Viridis, where at St. James's we [56]took in fresh water, with some few Goats, and Hens, wherewith that Island doth plentifully abound.

June the 14. we had a sight of Madagascar, or the Island of St Laurence, an Island of 4000 miles in compass, and scituate under the Southern Tropick; thither we steered our course, and trafficked with the inhabitants for Knives, Beads, Glasses and the like, having in exchange thereof Cloves and Silver. Departing from thence we were incountred with a violent storm, and the winds holding contrary, for the space of a fortnight, brought us back almost as far as the Isle Del Principe; during which time many of our men fell sick, and some dyed, but at the end of that time it pleased God the wind favoured us again, and we steered on our course merrily, for the space of ten days: when on a sudden we were encountered with such a violent storm, as if all the four winds together had conspired for our destruction, so that the stoutest spirit of us all quailed, expecting every hour to be devoured by that merciless element of water, sixteen dayes together {{3 }} did this storm continue, though not with such violence as at the first, the Weather being so dark all the while, and the Sea so rough, that we knew not in what place we were, at length all on a sudden the Wind ceased, and the Air cleared, the Clouds were all dispersed, and a very serene Sky followed, for which we gave hearty thanks to the Almighty, it being beyond our expectation that we should have escaped the violence of that storm.

At length one of our men mounting the Main-mast espyed fire, an evident sign of some Countrey near adjoyning, which presently after we apparently discovered, and steering our course [57]more nigher, we saw several persons promiscuously running about the shore, as it were wondering and admiring at what they saw: Being now near to the Land, we manned out our long Boat with ten persons, who approaching the shore, asked them in our Dutch Tongue What Eyland is dit? to which they returned this Answer in English, "that they knew not what we said." One of our Company named Jeremiah Hanzen who understood English very well, hearing their words discourst to them in their own Language; so that in fine we were very kindly invited on shore, great numbers of them flocking about us, admiring at our Cloaths which we did wear, as we on the other side did to find in such a strange place, so many that could speak English and yet to go naked.

Four of our men returning back in the long Boat to our Ships company, could hardly make them believe the truth of what they had seen and heard, but when we had brought our ship into harbour, you would have blest your self to see how the naked Islanders flocked unto us, so wondering at our ship, as if it had been the greatest miracle of Nature in whole World. {{4 }}

We were very courteously entertained by them, presenting us with such food as that Countrey afforded, which indeed was not to be despised; we eat of the Flesh both of Beasts, and Fowls, which they had cleanly drest, though with no great curiosity, as wanting materials, wherewithal to do it; and for bread we had the inside or Kernel of a great Nut as big as an Apple, which was very wholsome, and found for the body, and tasted to the Pallat very delicious.

Having refreshed our selves, they invited us to the Pallace [58]of their Prince or chief Ruler, some two miles distant off from the place where we landed; which we found to be about the bigness of one of our ordinary village houses, it was supported with rough unhewn pieces of Timber, and covered very artificially with boughs, so that it would keep out the greatest showers of Rain, the sides thereof were adorned with several forts of Flowers, which the fragrant fields there do yield in great variety. The Prince himself (whose name was William Pine the Grandchild of George Pine that was first on shore in this Island) came to his Pallace door and saluted us very courteously, for though he had nothing of Majesty in him, yet had he a courteous noble and deboneyre spirit, wherewith your English Nation (especially those of the Gentry) are very much indued.

Scarce had he done saluting us when his Lady or Wife, came likewise forth of their House or Pallace, attended on by two Maid-servants, the was a woman of an exquisite beauty, and had on her head as it were a Chaplet of Flowers, which being intermixt with several variety of colours became her admirably. Her privities were hid with some pieces of old Garments, the Relicts of those Cloaths (I suppose) of them which first came hither, and yet being adorned with Flowers those very rags seemeth beautiful; and {{5 }} indeed modesty so far prevaileth over all the Female Sex of that Island, that with grass and flowers interwoven and made strong by the peelings of young Elms (which grow there in great plenty) they do plant together so many of them as serve to cover those parts which nature would have hidden.

We carried him as a present some few Knives, of which we [59]thought they had great need, an Ax or Hatchet to fell Wood, which was very acceptable unto him, the Old one which was cast on shore at the first, and the only one that they ever had, being now so quite blunt and dulled, that it would not cut at all, some few other things we also gave him, which he very thankfully accepted, inviting us into his House or Pallace, and causing us to sit down with him, where we refreshed our selves again, with some more Countrey viands which were no other then such we tasted of before; Prince and peasant here faring alike, nor is there any difference betwixt their drink, being only fresh sweet water, which the rivers yield them in great abundance.

After some little pause, our Companion (who could speak English) by our request desired to know of him something concerning their Original and how that people speaking the Language of such a remote Countrey, should come to inhabit there, having not, as we could see, any ships or Boats amongst them the means to bring them thither, and which was more, altogether ignorant and meer strangers to ships, or shipping, the main thing conducible to that means, to which request of ours, the courteous Prince thus replyed.

Friends (for so your actions declare you to be, and shall by ours find no less) know that we are inhabitants of this Island of no great standing, my Grandfather being the first that ever set foot on this shore, whose native Countrey was {{6 }} a place called England, far distant from this our Land, as he let us to understand; He came from that place upon the Waters, in a thing called a Ship, of which no question but you may have heard; several other persons were in his company, not intending to have come [60]hither (as he said) but to a place called India, when tempestuous weather brought him and his company upon this Coast, where falling among the Rocks his ship split all in pieces; the whole company perishing in the Waters, saving only him and four women, which by means of a broken piece of that Ship, by Divine assistance got on Land.

What after passed (said he) during my Grandfathers life, I shall show you in a Relation thereof written by his own hand, which he delivered to my Father being his eldest Son, charging him to have a special care thereof, and ashuring him that time would bring some people or other thither to whom he would have him to impart it, that the truth of our first planting here might not be quite lost, which his commands my Father dutifully obeyed; but no one coming, he at his death delivered the same with the like charge to me, and you being the first people, which (besides our selves) ever set footing in this Island, I shall therefore in obedience to my Grandfathers and Fathers commands, willingly impart the same unto you.

Then stepping into a kind of inner room, which as we conceived was his lodging Chamber, he brought forth two sheets of paper fairly written in Englishy (being the same Relation which you had Printed with you at London) and very distinctly read the same over unto us, which we hearkened unto with great delight and admiration, freely proffering us a Copy of the same, which we afterward took and brought away along with us; which Copy hereafter followeth.{1}

1 Here begins the first part of the tract.

[61]A Way to the East India's being lately discovered by Sea, to the {{7}} South of Affrich by certain Portugals, far more safe and profitable then had been heretofore; certain English Merchants encouraged by the great advantages arising from the Eastern Commodities, to settle a Factory there for the advantage of Trade. And having to that purpose obtained the Queens Royal Licence Anno Dom. 1569. 11. or 12. Eliz. furnisht out for those parts four ships, my Master being sent as Factor to deal and Negotiate for them, and to settle there, took with him his whole Family, (that is to say) his Wife, and one Son of about twelve years of age, and one Daughter of about fourteen years, two Maidservants, one Negro female slave, and my Self, who went under him as his Book-keeper, with this company on Monday the third of April next following, (having all necessaries for Housekeeping when we should come there), we Embarqued our selves in the good ship called the India Merchant, of about four hundred and fifty Tuns burthen, and having a good wind, we on the fourteenth day of May had sight of the Canaries, and not long after of the Isles of Cafe Vert or Verd, where taking in such things as were necessary for our Voyage, and some fresh Provisions, we stearing our course South, and a point East, about the first of August came within sight of the Island of St Hellen, where we took in some fresh water, we then set our faces for the Cape of Good Hope, where by Gods blessing after some sickness, whereof some of our company died, though none of our family; and hitherto we had met with none but calm weather, yet so it pleased God, when we were almost in fight of St. Laurence, an Island so called, one of the greatest in the world, as [62]Marriners say, we were overtaken and dispersed by a great storm of Wind, which continued with luch violence {{8 }} many days, that losing all hope of safety, being out of our own knowledge, and whether we should fall on Flats or Rocks, uncertain in the nights, not having the least benefit of the light, we feared most, alwayes wishing for day, and then for Land, but it came too soon for our good; for about the first of October, our fears having made us forget how the time passed to a certainty; we about the break of day discerned Land (but what we knew not) the Land seemed high and Rockey, and the Sea continued still very stormy and tempestuous, insomuch as there seemed no hope of safety, but looked suddenly to perish. As we grew near Land, perceiving no safety in the ship, which we looked would suddenly be beat in pieces: The Captain, my Master, and some others got into the long Boat, thinking by that means to save their lives, and presently after all the Seamen cast themselves overboard, thinking to save their lives by swimming, onely myself my Masters Daughters, the two Maids, and the Negro were left on board, for we could not swim; but those that left us, might as well have tarried with us, for we saw them, or most of them perish, our selves now ready after to follow their fortune, but God was pleased to spare our lives, as it were by miracle, though to further sorrow; for when we came against the Rocks, our ship having endured two or three blows against the Rocks, (being now broken and quite foundred in the Waters), we having with much ado gotten our selves on the Bowspright, which being broken off, was driven by the Waves into a small Creek, wherein fell a little River, which being encompassed by the Rocks [63]was sheltered from the Wind, so that we had opportunity to land our selves, (though almost drowned) in all four persons, besides the Negro: when we were got upon the Rock, we could perceive the miserable Wrack to our great terrour, I had in my {{9 }} pocket a little Tinder-box, and Steel, and Flint to strike fire at any time upon occasion, which served now to good Purpose, for its being so close, preserved the Tinder dry, with this, and the help of some old rotten Wood which we got together, we kindled a fire and dryed our selves, which done, I left my female company, and went to see, if I could find any of our Ships company, that were escaped, but could hear of none, though I hooted, and made all the noise I could; neither could I perceive the foot-steps of any living Creature (save a few Birds, and other Fowls). At length it drawing towards the Evening, I went back to my company, who were very much troubled for want of me. I being now all their stay in this lost condition, we were at first afraid that the wild people of the Countrey might find us out, although we saw no footsteps of any, not so much as a Path; the Woods round about being full of Briers and Brambles, we also stood in fear of wild Beasts, of such also we saw none, nor sign of any: But above all, and that we had greatest reason to fear, was to be starved to death for want of Food, but God had otherwise provided for us, as you shall know hereafter; this done, we spent our time in getting some broken pieces of Boards, and Planks, and some of the Sails and Rigging on shore for shelter; I set up two or three Poles, and drew two or three of the Cords and Lines from Tree to Tree, over which throwing some Sail-cloathes, and having gotten Wood by us, and three [64]or four Sea-gowns, which we had dryed, we took up our Lodging for that night altogether (the Blackmoor being left sensible then the rest we made our Centry) we slept soundly that night, as having not slept in three or four nights before (our fears of what happened preventing us) neither could our hard lodging, fear, and danger hinder us we were so over wacht. {{10 }}

On the morrow, being well refresht with sleep, the winde ceased, and the weather was very warm; we went down the Rocks on the sands at low water, where we found great part of our lading, either on shore or floating near it. I by the help of my company, dragged most of it on shore; what was too heavy for us broke, and we unbound the Casks and Cherts, and, taking out the goods, secured all; so that we wanted no clothes, nor any other provision necessary for Housekeeping, to furnish a better house than any we were like to have; but no victuals (the last water having spoiled all) only one Cask of bisket, being lighter than the rest was dry; this served for bread a while, and we found on Land a sort of fowl about the bigness of a Swan, very heavie and fat, that by reason of their weight could not fly, of these we found little difficulty to kill, so that was our present food; we carried out of England certain Hens and Cocks to eat by the way, some of these when the ship was broken, by some means got to land, & bred exceedingly, so that in the future they were a great help unto us; we found also, by a little River, in the flags, store of eggs, of a sort of foul much like our Ducks, which were very good meat, so that we wanted nothing to keep us alive.

On the morrow, which was the third day, as soon as it was morning, seeing nothing to disturb us, I lookt out a convenient [65]place to dwell in, that we might build us a Hut to shelter us from the weather, and from any other danger of annoyance, from wild beasts (if any should finde us out: So close by a large spring which rose out of a high hill over-looking the Sea, on the side of a wood, having a prospect towards the Sea) by the help of an Ax and some other implements (for we had all necessaries, the working of the Sea, having cast up most of our goods) I cut down all the straightest poles I could find, and which were enough {{11 }} for my purpose, by the help of my company (necessity being our Master) I digged holes in the earth setting my poles at an equl distance, and nailing the broken boards of the Caskes, Cherts, and Cabins, and such like to them, making my door to the Seaward, and having covered the top, with sail-clothes strain'd and nail'd, I in the space of a week had made a large Cabbin big enough to hold all our goods and our selves in it, I also placed our Hamocks for lodging, purposing (if it pleased God to send any Ship that way) we might be transported home, but it never came to pass, the place, wherein we were (as I conceived) being much out of the way.

We having now lived in this manner full four months, and not so much as seeing or hearing of any wild people, or of any of our own company, more then our selves (they being found now by experience to be all drowned) and the place, as we after found, being a large Island, and disjoyned, and out of fight of any other Land, was wholly uninhabited by any people, neither was there any hurtful beast to annoy us: But on the contrary the countrey so very pleasant, being always clothed with green, and full of pleasant fruits, and variety of birds, ever warm, and never [66]colder then in England in September: So that this place (had it the culture, that skilful people might bestow on it) would prove a Paradise.

The Woods afforded us a sort of Nuts, as big as a large Apple, whose kernel being pleasant and dry, we made use of instead of bread, that fowl before mentioned, and a sort of water-fowl like Ducks, and their eggs, and a beast about the size of a Goat, and almost such a like creature, which brought two young ones at a time, and that twice a year, of which the Low Lands and Woods were very full, being a very harmless creature and tame, so that we could easily {{12 }} take and kill them: Fish, also, especially Shell-fish (which we could best come by) we had great store of, so that in effect as to Food we wanted nothing; and thus, and by such like helps, we continued six moneths without any disturbance or want.

Idleness and Fulness of every thing begot in me a desire of enjoying the women, beginning now to grow more familiar, I had perswaded the two Maids to let me lie with them, which I did at first in private, but after, custome taking away shame (there being none but us) we did it more openly, as our Lusts gave us liberty; afterwards my Masters Daughter was content also to do as we did; the truth is, they were all handsome Women, when they had Cloathes, and well shaped, feeding well. For we wanted no Food, and living idlely, and seeing us at Liberty to do our wills, without hope of ever returning home made us thus bold: One of the first of my Comforts with whom I first accompanined (the tallest and handsomest) proved presently with child, the second was my Masters Daughter, and the other also not long [67]after fell into the same condition: none now remaining but my Negro, who seeing what we did, longed also for her share; one Night, I being asleep, my Negro, (with the consent of the others) got close to me, thinking it being dark, to beguile me, but I awaking and feeling her, and perceiving who it was, yet willing to try the difference, satissied my self with her, as well as with one of the rest: that night, although the first time, she proved also with child, so that in the year of our being here, all my women were with child by me, and they all coming at different seasons, were a great help to one another.