Hamilton’s account of the east indies.

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danger they all lay under from the Chriftians, and they, to fecure themfelves, joinedtheir forces with the Emperor’s, but lay filent till they faw where the Chriftians wouldbegin their tragedy, and it was not long before they began the maffacre, near a largecity called Offacca. The Emperor’s army inarched fpeedily thither to chaftile theirinfolence, and a very bloody battle enfued, wherein the Chriftians had the better. TheEmperor foon levied a greater army, and engaged the Chriftians a fecond time withfuccefs, and quite routed them, and never gave them time to form themfelves intoanother army after, but followed his blow, fparing neither man, woman, or child thathad been baptized, and the Pagan bouzies or priefts were very good informers, fo thatin two years, above 300,000 perfons perilhed by the violent zeal of bigotted priefts,and an edidt was- publifhed, that whatever Chriftian fhould, for the future, be foundwithin the dominions of Japon , fhould be put to death without mercy.

Many new inventions were found out to torture the Chriftians, and the priefts werethe firft that made trial of the exquifitenefs of their pain. The poor women and virginswere torn limb from limb, by being tied to flakes placed in the ground, under thebranches of large trees bended down, and their limbs being fattened to the flakes andbranches, by the elafticity of the branches they were torn to pieces. Children werethrown down precipices, and dafhed to pieces, and infants were drowned, and fo RomifhChriftianity ended in Japon , with a very difmal and tragical cataftrophe.

The Englifh and Dutch at that time had their factories on a fmall ifland called Firando,that lay clofe»to the fhore of the ifland Bungo, and drove a very advantageous trade ; butin anno 1664, when the Englifh flipping arrived, our never-failing friends taking theadvantage of our being Chriftians, and coming thither contrary to the edi£l, were in.hopes to have a fecond part of Amboina acted at Japon . They gave information thatthe Englifh. were Chriftians, and not only fo, but that our King had married the Kingof Portugal’s fitter, and had a mind to introduce the Portugueze fecretly into Japon ,and how dangerous that might be to their flate, they knew by dear bought experience,and as an undeniable truth of our being Chriftians, they might fee in the very coloursthat our fliips wore, the fign of the crofs. Their information had fome of the defiredeffefts, though not the cruel part. The Emperor being acquainted with the Dutch information, ordered the Englifh to be civilly treated, their cargoes to be taken off theirhands as before, and a new Japon cargo to be provided for them, in lieu of what theybrought, and at the ufual time to difpatch them, with ftrift orders for the Englifh neverto return again upon pain of death, by which fair dealings the Dutch got the foieJapon trade into their own hands, except what is carried on by the Chinefe. Thisaccount I had from Captain John Bear, who was in the laft Englifh fhip that traded toJapon .

The Dutch and Chinefe are both limited in the numbers of their fhipping that tradeto Japon, the Dutch from one to four yearly, and the Chinefe from ten to twenty.As foon as their fhips arrive, all their crews are fent afhore to houfes provided for them,and the Japonefe take poffeflion of the fhip, and all that fhe has aboard of her; theyunhinge the rudder, and fend all the great guns and ammunition afhore. Each cargois unladed and fent to the factory appointed for its factors, and there opened and re-packed before proper officers. The goods are fent away without any enquiry whatthey cofl, or what they are content to take for them, and the officers take a memo-randum of what commodities they defire in barter, and thofe are provided and deliveredon board their fhips by the middle of O&ober, and about the beginning of Novemberthey deliver their rudder, guns, and ammunition, and are difpatched in form, to begone without delay.

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