them a warm reception.

About the 20th October, the King of Jackatra came to Bantam with 1500
fighting men, besides stragglers, and was to be followed by 1000 more.
He challenged the rebels and _pangrans_ to fight him, having a great
quarrel against them all, as they had endeavoured to have him deposed
from his kingdom. But the rebels kept within their fortifications. The
King of Jackatra and the Admiral of Bantam sent for us on the 26th
October, to know if there were any means to fire their fortifications
from a reasonable distance, beyond reach of their _bases_, of which they
had a great number. We told them, if we had a ship in the roads it might
have been easily done, but we hardly expected to find materials for the
purpose, such as camphor, salt-petre, and sulphur, having already some
other things, for the purpose of making fire-arrows. The admiral
proposed the use of a long bow and arrows for this service, but in my
opinion a musket would have answered better. We meant likewise to have
shot red-hot bullets among them from the king's ordnance, which would
have made sad work among their thatched houses and fortifications of
canes; for as Mandelicko had sought all means to set us on fire, we now
meant to try if we could return the compliment. But, whether from fear
of the King of Jackatra, or hearing that we were employed, the rebels
and pangrans came to an agreement two days after, by which Mandelicko
engaged to depart from the dominions of Bantam within six days, with
only thirty followers, which he did. The Javans are very unwilling to
fight if that can be avoided, as their wealth consists chiefly in
slaves, so that they are beggared if these be slain; wherefore they had
always rather come to a set feast than a pitched battle.

In November and the beginning of December, we were constantly busy in
completing our buildings, and getting in and cleaning pepper. A Dutch
pinnace came into the roads on the 14th December, by which we were
informed of the death of Queen Elizabeth, and the great plague and
sickness that had prevailed over all Christendom. This occasioned more
distress to us than all our late troubles; but they told us that the
King of Scots was crowned, that our land was in peace, and that peace
was likely to be concluded between England and Spain; which news was
very comfortable to us. They could give us no intelligence of our ships,
having no letters for us: But the Dutch fleet soon followed, on which I