as partners and principals, with
Watts as sea captain in charge of the vessel; the other for a Nova
Scotia Company, composed of Lord William Fiennes, Sir Charles Wolseley,
Noell, Povey, and others, with Watts and Collier as managers and Capt.
Middleton as sailing master. The latter company was organized for
settling a trade in furs and skins in Nova Scotia, and to that end
engaged the cooeperation of Wolseley's cousin, Col. Thomas Temple,
lieutenant general of Nova Scotia since 1655, and of Capt. Breedon,
a prominent merchant of New England. It sent out a ship freighted with
goods under Capt. Middleton, but despite an auspicious beginning,
does not appear to have prospered. The title to Nova Scotia was disputed
not only by the French, but also by the Kirkes, whom Cromwell had
dispossessed in 1655, when he appointed Temple as governor; hostilities
broke out in Nova Scotia, and the company was called upon for a larger
stock and incorporation at a time when its promoters seemed unwilling to
risk more money. Though Povey was encouraged by the specimens of copper
which Temple sent over, the enterprise made no progress until after the
Restoration. It is probable that both Noell and Povey lost money by the
venture.

The project for a West India Company was more ambitious and must have
been formulated some time in 1656 or 1657. Various propositions were
drawn up with care, probably by Povey or by Noell and Povey together,
for the better serving the interests of the Commonwealth by the erection
of a company which had as its object the advancing of trade and the
prosecution of the war with Spain. The two ideas seem, however, to have
been kept separate. Trade was to be promoted by despatching a vessel to
"Florida" under Capt. Watts which, in case it was unable to open trade
there, was to take on a lading of pipe staves in New England, sail to
the West Indies, and return thence with a cargo of sugar and other West
Indian commodities. For the purpose of attacking Spanish towns, of
"interrupting the Spanish fleet in their going from Spain to the Indies
and in their return thence for Spain, and of ousting the Spaniards from
their control in the West Indies and South America"--a subject regarding
which Capt. Limbrey had drawn up a paper of information,--the company
proposed that the state should furnish and equip twenty frigates which
were to be fully provisioned, manned and officered by itself. The
company desired to be incorporated b